The Cannibal Caper: A Sparky of Bunker Hill Mystery

By Rosalind Barden

Mad Cannibal Terrorizes Downtown!

Orphaned 11-year-old amateur girl sleuth Sparky returns in another noirish adventure, set in the sketchy milieu of 1930s Bunker Hill in downtown Los Angeles.

The clock is ticking as Sparky tries to track down stolen precious jewels . . . while, at the same time, a gou

• Language: English
• Publisher: Poodle Productions, LLC
• Release date: Nov 19, 2023
• ISBN: 9798989280834

Rosalind Barden

Rosalind Barden has long been fascinated by the history of Los Angeles's lost noir neighborhood, Bunker Hill. "The Cold Kid Case," the first in her zany 1930s "Sparky of Bunker Hill Mystery" series is a #1 Amazon Bestseller in its category and has been awarded multiple accolades, including the Firebird Book Award 1st Place for Cozy Mysteries. Over thirty of her short mystery and horror stories have been published, including her inspiration for the "Sparky of Bunker Hill Mystery" series, "The Monkey's Ghost," part of the FAPA President's Book Awards Silver Medalist anthology, "History and Mystery, Oh My!" She writes and continues to explore lost history in Los Angeles. Discover more at RosalindBarden.com.

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Also by Rosalind Barden

The Cold Kid Case

The Monkey Island Murder (Summer 2024)

Copyright © 2023 by Rosalind Barden

All rights reserved.

Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

For more information, visit RosalindBarden.com

Cover design by Tabitha Lahr

Interior text design by Backstory Design

PB ISBN: 979-8-9892808-2-7

EBOOK ISBN: 979-8-9892808-3-4

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To My Readers

The Cannibal Caper

1

Iwas hot, miserable.

End of summer in Los Angeles was always the worst. In the downtown flatlands, below Bunker Hill, a weak fan sputtered in Chum-Chum’s dusty storefront office, rattling the blinds covering his front window facing City Hall, flapping the paper GET OUT! sign hanging from a string over his glass front door. He propped his door open enough to let in the heat baking the sidewalks and street.

Chum-Chum hummed happily. How could he stand it?

How could anyone stand summer down here? Bunker Hill was baking too, but at least it was high enough to catch a breeze.

Hard morning sun sliced through gaps in the blinds. I stood facing Chum-Chum’s desk. He hummed and poked around the large envelope Bookie had me run down to his boss. Same as usual.

A lot changed for me, good ol’ Sparky, in 1932. I turned eleven. I wasn’t wanted for murder anymore. I wasn’t sleeping in cellars anymore. But by the end of the summer, I was still running for Bookie. He owned my soul nowadays. Like I said, same as usual.

Ah, my Rosie, how are you doing?

He wasn’t talking to me, but to his goldfish that lived in a bowl of water on his messy desk. The fish swished around in her bowl to face him. He pulled his hand out of the envelope and waggled it at Rosie. Each of his fingers wore one or two or three rings, all heavy with gems, all paste. Rosie waggled her orange fish tail.

I had to say, Rosie’s tail was nice, long and flowing. As she waggled her fancy tail, he giggled and then laughed in his weird half horse, half baby laugh. He did more finger waggling at the fish.

Was he keeping me waiting in his hot, sweating office on purpose? He sat with his bare feet soaking in a pan of ice. I could see those puffy toes sticking out from the cuffs and razor creases of his silk pajama legs. I could barely feel a ghost of cool drifting over from the chunk of ice his toes massaged in time with his finger waggling to Rosie. I supposed that’s how Chum-Chum could stand his office. He had that chunk of ice.

Chum-Chum’s eye noticed me again. He frowned. His waggling fingers smoothed his thin black hair plastering his forehead and adjusted the white silk tie on his white silk pajama shirt he wore under his red silk robe that had a repeating pattern of eyes. Those eyes made me feel like he was watching me even when he wasn’t.

Then Chum-Chum’s hands went back into the envelope. Why do you stand so far away, little girl? he asked in his odd little girl’s voice while eying me.

It was because Bookie told me to keep an arm’s reach away from Chum-Chum. He told me a hundred times. I didn’t tattletale that to Chum-Chum. I shrugged and looked at my bare feet.

I heard Chum-Chum’s hand rattling in the envelope, or maybe it was another envelope some other kid dropped off. I shot a quick eye at Chum-Chum and what he was up to. I didn’t like to watch too much. Maybe I didn’t want to know, but I was curious, or like Bookie said, too curious.

Sometimes Chum-Chum pulled out bills in neat stacks held together with ribbon or shoelaces from the envelopes. Other times, it was slips of paper or paper folded into little bundles about the right size for jewelry, coins. I’ve come into Chum-Chum’s office and seen piles of money on the floor. Next time, it was gone.

There were always leaning stacks of boxes in his office, shoelaces, half-eaten sandwiches, you name it. It was hard to walk in it sometimes. Once I saw a bucket filled with purple liquid. Wine maybe. Or rotgut. That wasn’t allowed, with Prohibition and all. His office was across from City Hall, but anything not on the up-and-up had no problem happening in Chum-Chum’s place. He even used to run a small speakeasy in the storefront and had his office in back, behind red folding screens. Not long ago, he moved the speakeasy a block over. Maybe he needed this whole space for his junk.

Well, I suppose you’re about done here, what’s your name? Sparkles? He laughed. He knew my name was Sparky. He slid another envelope toward me, a lumpier one than the envelope I carried down from Bunker Hill. Okay, that was the one I needed to run up the Hill to Bookie. I was Bookie’s runner, and I knew the routine.

I was about to put my hand on the lumpy envelope when Chum-Chum’s head suddenly jerked up like his head never jerked up. His eyes bulged and mouth popped open, also something he never did.

He wasn’t looking at me, but past me.

I turned around. Through the gaps in the venetian blinds over his window and door, I saw an army of cops swarming out from City Hall and heading straight to Chum-Chum’s office. Stomping in the lead was Mug, the oversized cop who wanted to round me up and toss me in an orphan home. I had a place to live nowadays, but it wasn’t official, and I had my reasons for keeping it under my hat.

As the cops got closer, closer, Chum-Chum’s round little self moved faster than I’d ever seen him move. His bare feet scrambled, knocking over the pan of ice. The ice chunk rolled out and drifted with the tide to my feet. Felt good. But only for a second.

Should I run? What would Mug do with me?

I ran for the door. Too late. Mug blocked it. Get outta here, Sparky! You don’t belong in this sewer with that man-eater! he hollered.

I couldn’t get outta anywhere because, well, Mug was blocking my way. I tried hiding behind a stack of boxes, but that only made them fall over onto Mug when he charged through the door. What was in them spilled over Mug. Doll heads? Boxes of hairless doll heads with winking eyes? Mug kicked them away. They went tumbling across the floor, smashing into more boxes.

Chum-Chum hadn’t been sweating before, but now drops of sweat fell from the tip of his nose. His shaking hands were all over Rosie’s bowl. Her water sloshed. Rosie jumped almost out of the bowl. Chum-Chum was crying.

Gimme that fish! Mug ordered Chum-Chum. You can’t take that thing in the slammer with you. Mug pointed his club in case Chum-Chum missed the point. Mug loomed toward Chum-Chum, who wasn’t a whole lot taller than me, though he was about three times as wide. No, make that four. Well, maybe five.

Chum-Chum howled and hugged the bowl close. Mug lunged his meaty mitt toward the fishbowl.

Before I knew what was happening, Chum-Chum tossed the bowl toward me, fish and all.

I was too far away. I’d never catch it. I dove. I slid on doll heads. I reached. Oh, no, I fell! And the bowl fell into my hands. Lucky catch. Rosie whirled around and around inside the bowl, not happy at all.

There was more howling from Chum-Chum and a scuffle as he tried to hide behind boxes that fell over and spilled corks, which made sense for a bootlegger like Chum-Chum was, among other things. His red robe tore and flapped loose. More boxes spilled more doll parts, arms and legs, which didn’t make sense. But what did I know?

Sparkles! Take care of my baby doll Rosie for me! Chum-Chum called to me as Mug and the other cops dragged him out of his office, doll parts crunching under their feet.

Then I heard him shout in his mean, not-girly voice, I got dirt on everybody! You tell all ’a ’em, I got so much dirt! They’ll be sorry! Tons of dirt!

At least they weren’t dragging me away. That was the main thing. But what was I going to do with this fish, Rosie?

I’d have to ask Bookie that question.

Another thing I’d need to ask, what did Mug mean by that man-eater?

2

It was tricky business getting up Bunker Hill holding a bowl of water with a ticked-off fish swimming around and around.

Rosie kept looking at me, her mouth pursed in an annoyed way. At least that’s how she looked to me. Then she’d flip her tail and swish around to turn her back to me. She did this a few times.

Okay, fish, I got the message! I said this on the Angels Flight tram as it clacked its way from the downtown flatlands up the steep Bunker Hill incline. Maybe I said it a little too loudly because a few of the other riders turned to look at me.

One woman asked, Are you feeling well, little girl? You don’t have any shoes.

What business was it of hers? I, ah, traded ’em for this fish.

She crinkled her eyebrows at me. Well! I don’t think that was wise.

I’d have to agree, said a man in a light beige suit and matching fedora, looking crisp and cool in the baking tram. Shoes are a necessity. But that fish? He tsked at Rosie. She turned to glare at him. That fish is frippery.

The woman looked at him. They both nodded. I overheard her complain to him, Her hair is such a curly mess, and all those freckles are unattractive in a girl her age.

Go ahead, make remarks about my freckle face and my dishwater-blonde, rat’s-nest hair. Everyone else did.

He agreed and said something about running wild.

Okay, fine, whatever.

When Angels Flight reached the top of Bunker Hill, I beat it out of there fast. I was just in time because the woman started up again with, Little girl, I have a few things to say to you. Wait! The man added, Your parents will be angry with you!

Yeah, well, I didn’t have any. Listen, I wasn’t complaining. Sure, a few months back, I was a street kid. My bread and butter was running for Bookie for a few tossed coins, enough to buy eats. I was sleeping in crawl spaces and cellars under Bunker Hill’s old Victorian mansions. Most of them were rooming houses now, full of old folks, working stiffs, and the normal world’s castaways. Some wild eleven-year-old girl sleeping in the cellar? Didn’t raise too much of an eyebrow on Bunker Hill.

Until I got accused of murder this summer. Then every character and his brother and sister and third cousin were after me for the reward on my head that grew by the minute.

I did get lucky. Like I said, I couldn’t complain. The strange star from the silent movie days, Tootsie LaFemme, and the even stranger guy who looked after her, Gilbert Grossman the goblin, let me hide out in their strange house on Bunker Hill, the one that the neighborhood kids called Creepy House.

Okay, I also called it that. But, come on, how could I help it? The house was hard to see behind fences and a haunted-looking jungle of green, looming plants as strange as the dark-tiled, box-like house. Creepy House was lots newer than the Victorians crowding the Hill and looked nothing like them. Not to mention those two kept themselves hidden inside, Tootsie and Gilbert.

Their house was creepy inside too, packed with old stuff and costumes and paintings left over from when she was a big star in the silent movies. She was kind of wacky, with her beaded and fringed outfits and swooping Egyptian eye paint. Gilbert kind of—no, he did look like a goblin: short, bald, scar over one eye, not to mention his strange foreign accent that sounded like something from a monster movie. I thought of him as the goblin. I hoped I never called him that by accident.

I found out that, lucky for me again, they didn’t drink kid blood with leopards like the neighborhood kids said. There were big spotted cats inside, but the one named Clara Bell was stuffed, and the other, Clara Bell’s boyfriend, was flattened into a rug. They had been Tootsie’s pets once, when they were still alive, and she was a star and went to places like Paris. She didn’t want to part with them, so that’s how one ended up stuffed and the other, a rug.

I still couldn’t believe Tootsie and Gilbert would take a chance on a scuffed-up street kid like me, feed me, help me, and keep me safe until all the nonsense about me being a murderer blew over. They seemed to like me. Didn’t know why. No one else liked me, except Bobby. He was twelve, a year older than me, and bossy. I did sock him once, though he was asking for it. That’s why his blue-eyed, sandy-haired angel face had a dented nose. Then there was Marigold. He was another boy, a tad younger than me. He was trouble too, but in a different way, with his wink and smile. But let’s not talk about that just yet.

Life was better for ol’ Sparky nowadays. No hangman’s noose. Place to live. Bobby and Marigold, both stinkers in their own ways, but I could live with that.

The thing was, Tootsie and the goblin weren’t my real relatives. My real relatives, my cousins, got stuck feeding me when my mother died a long time back on my birthday. When I turned ten, my bad luck birthday again, the cousins took off while I was doing my usual running around the Hill. I came back to an empty apartment and a landlady demanding I cough up their past-due rent.

The real relatives didn’t want me. Then a year later, on my eleventh birthday, even though I was a hunted fugitive, Tootsie and the goblin did want me. I couldn’t see how it mattered where I lived. A home was a home. But they weren’t my family, weren’t official, so I couldn’t let any officials know. That’s why Mug still wanted to nab me and toss me away with all the other orphans. For my own good.

Though I had to give Mug some points. After I was cleared of murder, Mug did replace some candy of mine he ate. He didn’t have to, but he did anyhow. He also saved my life. And Bobby’s. That’s an extra-big point.

I kept Creepy House so far up my sleeve, Bookie didn’t even know I lived there. I’d be stupid if I told a crook like him that I was living with swells in a mansion full of fancy fittings, not to mention Tootsie’s jewels.

One of these days, he’d get suspicious why I was cleaner than I used to be, why I was wearing new sailor-suit outfits instead of stolen overalls. That did worry me. I’d have to dream up a story for when he started asking questions.

Bobby knew where I lived nowadays. Same with Marigold. Both knew I used to be a street kid but counted me as a friend anyway. That counted for something, right? Especially because both were normal kids, not like me. They didn’t work for Bookie, didn’t get into trouble with cops like Mug. They had real families.

Bobby tried to reform me, telling me to keep away from Bookie. He’d blow his wig if he knew I was still running for Bookie. Marigold just smiled and winked, and made sure his prim and proper mom and her crazy uncle, his great uncle, Old Bob, the movie horse trainer with the cowboy shooter, never caught sight of me.

You see, it’s two worlds I lived in. I had one foot in the normal world with Bobby, Marigold, Tootsie, and Gilbert the goblin. Then I had one foot in the not-so-normal world with Bookie, Chum-Chum, and Mug on my tail.

Okay, maybe Tootsie and the goblin weren’t normal-normal, but understand, they didn’t have to worry about Mug dragging them off or some character with a shooter surprising them in a dark alley.

Creepy House was nice, more than nice. I had a bed in a pretty pale green-and-blue room that used to be a guest room. Now it was my room. Just for me. That was a first for Sparky. Like a dream, right? Don’t forget the three squares. Most of all, Tootsie and the goblin wanted me around.

But I was still running for my Bookie, like I was still a street kid begging for crumbs.

See, Bookie gave me the clue that cleared my name of the murder rap this summer. Sure, he ratted me out at the same time, hoping for the reward on my head. Still, there was that clue. The price for that clue was working for Bookie until he decided all my debts and expenses were paid in full. That meant I’d be working for him for free, forever.

And that explained why I was standing in Chum-Chum’s baking office, City Hall looming outside his storefront window, when the cops busted in.

The crazy thing was, Chum-Chum was untouchable. Everyone knew that. There he was, City Hall outside his storefront window, and him doing whatever, whenever. Chum-Chum wasn’t kidding about dirt. Dirt was City Hall’s middle name. It was no surprise Chum-Chum made a point of knowing it all.

I’d catch Mug giving the evil eye to Chum-Chum’s storefront office. But Mug didn’t have the power to do squat to the likes of Chum-Chum in this town.

So why did that change all of a sudden?

3

Iwasn’t making tracks to Creepy House with the fish.

Gilbert and Tootsie didn’t need to see the fish or hear anything about how I may or may not have gotten her. They knew I used to be a street kid, but I was careful not to spill the beans on too many details—like I was still running for Bookie.

What would they do if they found out? Gilbert’s face would turn red, and he’d want to blow his top at Bookie, not knowing Bookie and his pals had more shooters than Gilbert had spoons in his kitchen. Not a good idea.

That’s for starters. What would Tootsie do to Bookie?

Tootsie was no slouch. I found that out this summer when she was helping me investigate and made the bad man who hung around Court Hill Park talk with her sap, homemade from her black silk stocking she stuffed with a fistful of her jewels. Real jewels. She was something else.

Tootsie told me not to tell Gilbert about busting bad man’s face with her sap. Bad man turned out to be the older brother of Whisper-Whisper, the City Hall puppet master pulling more strings than I knew there were strings to pull. I never told Tootsie about Whisper-Whisper, and Gilbert didn’t know about either. Bookie and Chum-Chum didn’t know squat about Creepy House, and likewise.

You get my drift: it’s gotten like a tangled-up ball of Chum-Chum’s shoelace piles with me in the middle.

Like my Bookie said, if in doubt, stash it under the hat. Or up the sleeve.

That’s why I had to stash Rosie with Bookie.

I had a hot and nervous trip from the Angels Flight tram stop at the top of Bunker Hill to Bookie’s office. The more I walked, the more my arms dripped with sweat, and the more I felt like Rosie and her bowl would slip through and crash to the sidewalk.

A pack of older boys spotted me from across the street. Just what I needed.

Hey! Sparky! What’s that?

Let’s just say they weren’t yelling in their Sunday-school voices. They moved onto the street, heading toward me. The fish watched them.

Yeah, yeah, I see, I told Rosie.

I hustled as fast as I could without dropping or spilling her. Luckily, Bookie’s place was close.

I made it past the secondhand tire shop that was next to Bookie’s place. Bookie’s door was propped open because of the summer heat. Before I slipped inside, I looked back. The older boys were close behind, but they’d stopped in their tracks. Those two-bit punks knew better than to follow me into Bookie’s place.

Bookie’s office was a set of rooms in the back of a five-and-dime store. Come to think of it, I don’t remember anyone ever actually buying a ribbon or laundry powder or any of the sorts of nickel-and-dime merchandise those kinds of stores sold.

There were a lot of guys hanging around the store, and a lot of stools and chairs for them to sit on. There were tables that were handy for passing time with card games. There were shelves with dusty things for sale: buttons, hankies, bottle brushes, and a row of china shoes and other painted pots that I think you’re supposed to put houseplants or flowers in. Not sure. No one bought them, no one dusted them. But the store was always busy.

The back rooms were more than Bookie’s office. He lived there. His desk, chairs, and big file cabinet were the business part of his home in the main room. Then there was the other, smaller room where he slept, his bathroom with a tub, and a narrow broom closet.

He complained he needed another closet for his threads. One thing you need to understand about Bookie: he loved his clothes. One night, he had some guys who hung out in the five-and-dime carry in a huge wardrobe. It looked expensive, except it was badly scuffed on one side. Probably fell off a truck, knowing Bookie.

Today, the store had the usual characters sitting around, playing cards, snacking. They stared at me when I came in, but didn’t say anything. Like usual.

Though this time, I got a few extra-long stares and mouths hanging open. Probably was me carrying Chum-Chum’s precious goldfish in a bowl that did it.

Just as quick, they turned their eyes away. Except for the fans whirring in the hot store, it was silent as I disappeared down the short hallway to Bookie.

Bookie had a rug at the doorway to his office. Under the rug, he had a little squeaky toy. When people stepped on it, it squeaked. That way, he wasn’t taken by surprise and had an extra second to pull out his shooter before the rug-stepper blasted him full of holes.

Sometimes, I walked around the squeaker. Today, I made sure to put all my weight on it so it gave a nice, full-steam-ahead squeak. I needed my Bookie’s attention right off the bat.

I didn’t get it.

He held the afternoon paper up and spread open in front of him so I couldn’t see his face. His feet were propped on his desk. He was wearing his pants with the small green-and-gray checks. From what I could see of his arms, I could tell he was wearing his powder-blue shirt, which meant he was probably wearing his mint-green tie and matching mint-green suspenders. Bookie fancied himself a sharp dresser.

Bookie’s office always smelled stale and stuffy. On the floor, an electric fan blew air out of his office toward the five-and-dime. That helped. It blew on my face too, which was nice and cooling. The fan was the only sound in the room. Not a peep from Bookie.

After letting me stand there holding the fishbowl by the fan for a good long while, Bookie finally said, Yeah, I know it’s you. He didn’t sound really interested. What he was interested in was the afternoon paper.

I wasn’t much of a reader. I’d admit that to you. But I could handle enough of the alphabet to get the main gist of a situation.

I stepped closer and put the fish on one corner of his desk. I scooted one of his wooden office chairs up against his desk, climbed on top of the chair, and then on top of his desk to get a better look at the newspaper photos. They were some photos, plus what the rags called artist’s renderings. Those were even better.

Let me tell you the headlines to give you the gist of this alphabet: Mad Cannibal Terrorizes Downtown! Under that, Man-on-Toast! and Priceless Jewels Vanished! Well, now.

The photos were of triangles of toast with what looked like chopped liver spread on them, in the style of what uniformed butlers serve at society soirées, according to the rag. There was another photo of a dinner napkin with a dark stain on it: drippings from Man-on-Toast, if I wasn’t mistaken. There was a distance shot of the man, but you couldn’t see squat. The artist’s renderings made up for that with lots of details drawn in, bite marks, a big knife, and, you got the picture.

I scanned the words. Blah, blah, shocking, blah, blah, terror, blah, blah, and then something interesting about a lady’s little white poodle that discovered the body by jumping into the spilled guts and having its own personal party. A pet expert stated: This poor little darling will never recover. Ah, I’m sure that poodle will do fine dreaming of Man-on-Toast for years to come and hoping he’ll show up again.

Bookie flipped the paper around. Lookie here, another photo. It was a mug shot from 1922, the paper said. Something was familiar about the face. The headline screamed, Infamous Carnival Cannibal! Something about a "tasteless sideshow