The Only Clue

by Pamela Beason

  “Yes, well.” The atmosphere gathered density between them for a few seconds before her mother said, “How are you, dear? You sound anxious.”

  Grace took a breath. “I’m okay. How are you?”

  “Your father and I have taken up ballroom dancing. We had our second lesson last night, and my feet hurt. Other than that, we’re doing well. How are the gorillas?”

  Tears welled up in Grace’s eyes as she found herself on the verge of saying the words probably dead.

  “What’s happening, Grace?”

  Finally she gave in to her emotions. She told her mother everything that was happening, and ended up sobbing like a five-year-old.

  “That’s terrible, darling.” Her mother was surprisingly sympathetic. “I’m so sorry you’re going through all that. But I know you’re strong.”

  Grace took a shuddering breath and blotted her tears with her shirt sleeve. “Thanks, Mom.”

  “I know this is a hard time for you, but it could be a turning point.”

  Turning point? “The End” was more like it.

  “Maybe you should let it go.”

  Pulling the phone away from her ear, Grace stared at it in horror. Let it go? Was her mother suggesting she simply stop looking for Gumu, Neema, and Kanoni? Let whatever was happening to them simply happen? The blurry image of the sad-eyed little ape from Craigslist popped into her imagination.

  Her mother’s voice continued, more distant now. “Without the gorillas, you could do other things. Richard asks about you all the time. Did I tell you he’s head of the Psychology Department now?”

  About forty-seven times, she wanted to scream.

  “It’s not too late to have a normal life, Gracie.”

  Suddenly she was seething. She pulled the phone close to her mouth. “I’ve got another call coming in, Mom. Gotta go.”

  She punched END and stood there fuming. Let it go? And bringing up Richard? Richard Riverton had been her lover in grad school. A smart, good-looking man. A political man. He’d slept with two female professors to work his way up the academic ladder, always insisting to her that the affairs meant nothing to him. All that seemed to matter to her parents was that he had achieved tenure and now was head of a major university department. Richard had accomplished everything they’d expected from their daughter.

  Then she saw it on the phone—a text message from the Craigslist ad. It was an address less than forty minutes away. Come by at 3pm.

  She texted back that she’d be there. She debated calling Matt, but it wasn’t even eight a.m. After working the late shift, he’d still be asleep.

  Then she decided not to tell him at all. He was working at three. He had other priorities. He’d either tell her to leave this for the police, or he’d want her to wait until he could come with her. He looked like a cop; he acted like a cop. If the baby monkey seller was spooky, he might not even open the door if Matt was standing outside. And she had to see that little ape.

  * * * * *

  Before he’d even had his first cup of coffee, Lok and Kee reminded Finn that he’d run out of proper cat food by taking twin dumps on the plastic mat next to their food dishes. Just in case his human was slow to grasp the depth of his dissatisfaction, Kee also peed on Finn’s dirty clothes, which incited Cargo to roll around in them. And now Lok was hell bent on shredding one arm of the couch.

  Finn rushed to swat the clawing cat with a dishtowel. Lok easily stayed a yard out of reach, bouncing around the room from one piece of furniture to the next. Finn could have sworn the cat was grinning.

  While Cargo was content to eat whatever Finn pulled out of the refrigerator, the cats had gone on strike against leftover mashed potatoes and eggs and bacon bits. Clearly he had to attend to some home fires. Feeling slightly guilty, he sent a text to Grace, asking her if she could finish gathering the information on her staff and their cars on her own while he went to the grocery store, washed his pissed-on hairy clothes, and mowed his lawn before reporting to work that afternoon. He tried to soften the message by promising he’d connect with her later.

  * * * * *

  Grace spent hours driving from one volunteer’s house to another, snapping pictures of their license plates and tire treads to help Finn rule out the staff cars and tread marks from the intruder’s. She knew he had his own life and home to take care of; she knew he had to work. But it still felt like he’d already given up on finding the gorillas.

  At precisely three p.m., she arrived at the address sent by the Craigslist seller. It was a single-story house off the highway down a long gravel driveway. Behind the house was a huge field planted in corn, and beyond that she could see the tops of a few willows and alders that probably grew next to a stream. The house she was visiting was separated from its neighbors by straight windbreak rows of tall evergreens and newly plowed fields on either side. The general lack of forest and hills gave the area a chilly feel, emphasized by the brisk wind that blew across the flats. Several old cars nosed up to an outbuilding that looked like a workshop of some kind. The painful screech of metal on metal blared from within.

  Someone interested in primates might have seen or heard a description of Dr. Grace McKenna, so she’d gathered her long hair into a ponytail and pulled it through the opening on the back of a Seattle Mariners ball cap, then added dangly plastic fish earrings that a friend had given her as a joke.

  She stuck a wad of gum in her mouth and double-checked her appearance in the rear view mirror. Satisfied that the woman there looked different than Grace McKenna usually did, she tucked her wallet under the seat, left her keys in the ignition, and went to knock on the front door.

  A graying woman with wild hair answered. She had an oven mitt over her right hand.

  “I’m here to see the baby monkey?” Please let it be Kanoni.

  The woman checked the driveway behind Grace. “Just you?”

  “Yeah,” Grace said. “My boyfriend wanted to come, but he had to work.” She popped her gum for effect. “We always wanted a monkey. They’re so sweet.”

  “Huh. They can be a handful, too. Monkeys are out there.” She pointed to the outbuilding with her uncovered hand. “My husband Tim will show you.” She shut the door.

  As Grace approached the other building, the shriek of a power tool cut through the air. When she paused in the doorway, she saw a man using a grinder to remove rust from a car fender. The chill wind blew through torn plastic strips tacked over the windows. Surely the woman hadn’t meant that the animals were inside with all the racket and cold.

  She waited for the noise to die down. When the man finally lifted the sander from the metal surface and the whining slowed, she shouted, “Tim?”

  He startled, leaping back from the car.

  “Sorry.” She stepped forward. “I’m Jane? I came about the baby monkey? Your wife said to come out here.”

  “You scared about ten years off me.” He set the sander down on the hood of the car, then yanked foam earplugs out of his ears and stuck them in his jeans pockets.

  “C’mon, they’re back here.” He motioned her to follow him to the rear of the building.

  Flicking aside a plastic shower curtain tacked to an overhead beam, he revealed two wire cages atop an old wooden table. How could anyone keep animals in these conditions? The noise alone would be terrifying and painful to any animal’s sensitive ears; the cold might lead to bronchitis or pneumonia. The leftmost cage held straw and an old coffee can. The right one held the black ape. Placing a hand on the cold metal mesh, she bent down and leaned close to get a good look.

  * * * * *

  Finn had barely started going through Melendez’s notes from the early shift when the Sergeant Carlisle walked into the squad room and handed him a slip of paper.

  Finn scanned it and then looked up. “One-car accident?”

  In his old job in Chicago, the department didn’t send detectives when drunks drove off bridges or wrapped their cars around telephone poles.

  Carlisle hooked hi
s thumbs in his belt. “Covering the bases. Forest Service says it’s at least a couple days old.”

  Finn did not look forward to viewing a decomposing corpse. And this wasn’t even within the city limits. “Forest Service?”

  The sergeant said, “It’s off a Forest Service road, in Shadow Canyon. And before you start whining, I know it should be the feebs or County, but you’re the only dick on deck right now.”

  Mason, the department’s technical wizard, snickered over his keyboard at the next desk.

  The sergeant’s face turned the shade of a ripe tomato. He waved a hand in the air. “You know what I meant. Mutual aid and all that. Daylight’s burning. Take a four-wheel drive and get out there. Coroner’s on his way.” After a glance at Mason, who stared intently at his monitor with his lips pressed into a tight line, Carlisle padded out of the room.

  Finn told Mason, “Maybe you’re too young to know that ‘dick’ is an old-fashioned term for detective.”

  The technician sat back in his chair, grinning. “If you say so.”

  Mason was the worst gossip in the department. Both Finn and the Sarge would hear that “dick on deck” comment for weeks. Finn pushed himself up from his desk and grabbed his jacket. At least Carlisle had given him the opportunity to get out of the office.

  It was a good thing the sergeant had suggested the four-wheel drive SUV. Shadow Canyon turned out to be a twenty-minute drive from Evansburg and then fifteen more up a potholed dirt track. The beauty of the surrounding country partially made up for the ugliness of the road. Tall evergreens guarded the bluffs. Chartreuse and sienna lichens dotted black and gray rock formations, and thick ferns bordered the spring creeks shimmering down deep slashes in the mountainsides. He’d love to paint those waterfalls. Maybe after all this was over, he could put together a picnic and bring Grace here, make a real date out of it.

  When he saw the climbing ropes tied to the bumpers of the Forest Service trucks, he knew the scene was going to be bad. The county coroner stood near the cliff edge, his thumbs hooked in his belt under his substantial belly, watching the action below. Typical of Dave Severn to be observing instead of helping.

  Finn shrugged on his jacket, pushed his camera into his pocket, and joined him. “Severn,” he said with a nod.

  Severn had been elected last year, due mostly to the large crony contingent he’d acquired while running the biggest car dealership in Evansburg. Finn had been astounded to learn that a man with no medical training was in charge of determining which bodies were sent for autopsies and which were declared accidental or natural deaths. Coincidentally, Severn’s sister and brother-in-law ran the original Severn family business, East Valley Funeral Services. Which probably explained Severn’s ability to dispassionately view dead bodies.

  Severn returned the nod. “Finn.”

  Below them, down a steep rocky slope, a battered Ford Mustang had come to rest with its nose plowed into a large boulder. The car looked to be from the seventies, which would have made it vintage if it had been cared for instead of pocked with rust and dents. Now the left front wheel was splayed out and the roof was bashed in, as well as the side door, which hung open. The car had rolled at least once.

  A man and a woman in USFS uniform jackets sat on rocks near the wreck. Between them was a collapsible stretcher with a rolled body bag on top. The man spotted Finn. “We’re waiting,” he yelled.

  The female ranger looked at her watch. “We’ve only got a couple hours of daylight,” she hollered, curling her arm in a come-on-down motion.

  Finn glanced at Severn, who frowned back. “Don’t look at me. I’m too old to be climbing up and down mountains.”

  Too lazy was more like it. Sighing, Finn grabbed hold of a climbing rope and stepped off the road bank. His shoes were crepe-soled, not the best for scrambling over rocks. He skidded on the mossy surface and fell onto his outstretched arm, tweaking his shoulder but saving his teeth and nose from bashing against the rock. He slipped a couple more times, giving his hands friction burns and tweaking a knee to match his shoulder.

  The rangers were both standing when he reached the bottom.

  “Bill Adams.” The man held out his hand.

  The woman ranger introduced herself as Charlotte Nagel.

  “One vic?” he asked.

  “Over here.” Nagel walked him around the Mustang. The hood was crumpled against the boulder, and Finn noticed the typical spiderweb cracking in the windshield where the driver’s head had hit the safety glass. On the other side of the car, the driver’s door was open.

  “Brace yourself,” Nagel said. “Animals found him before we did.”

  The body lay half in and half out of the car, one foot wedged under the dashboard. The head, or what remained of it, lay on the ground. Longish brown hair, matted with dirt and blood. One ear, the right one. The neck vertebrae were exposed, but the lower jawbone was gone, as was the dead guy’s throat and the top part of his chest. A few flies buzzed half-heartedly around the putrefying flesh exposed to the breeze.

  Adams shook his head. “Poor bastard.”

  The guy’s shirt was shredded. Above his leather belt, his abdomen had been ripped open. Intestines swollen with decomposition gas extruded from the ragged hole. Finn jerked his gaze away and swallowed hard a couple of times, grateful the air was cool and they were out in the open. The smell was foul but bearable.

  Brown hair, average size and weight, as far as he could discern. Hard to discern the age in the current condition. Could the corpse be the missing mental case, Ryan Connelly? Finn looked at the rangers. “ID?”

  Adams gestured at the body. “We didn’t look. We didn’t want to muck anything up.”

  Finn didn’t want to touch the corpse either, but someone had to. He snapped on a pair of latex gloves. Holding his breath, he gingerly slid his fingers into the dead guy’s jean pockets in front, trying not to gag at the cold dampness he felt through his gloves. Then he patted down the back pockets, but found only a gunk-slimed quarter and a torn piece of red paper. “No ID.”

  “Maybe it was in his shirt pocket?” Adams suggested.

  “You mean the pocket that’s missing, along with part of his chest?”

  “That would be the one.” Adams looked up the valley off to the left. “We walked around a little, but didn’t see anything that looked important.”

  After wiping his fingers on his handkerchief, Finn leaned into the car, opened the glove compartment, and pulled out the registration. “Allen Whitehead, Renton. Where’s that?”

  “Suburb of Seattle,” Nagel said. “Sorta.”

  Finn folded the registration into a plastic bag from his pocket. “Good to know I can pass the joy of notification to the Renton PD.”

  He was relieved that the corpse was most likely Whitehead. He didn’t want to be the bearer of sad news to Connelly’s mournful parents.

  Nagel nodded. They all studied the corpse for a few more seconds. Finn had seen bodies that had been smashed, burned, and cut up, but never one in this condition. “What could do that?”

  The rangers took turns offering a variety of scavengers.

  “Coyotes.”

  “Cougar. Bobcat.”

  “Bear.”

  “Raccoons.”

  Raccoons? He was going to keep a closer eye on the masked bandits that visited his deck each evening.

  “Weasels. Rats.”

  Finn held up his hands. “I get it. Lots of possibilities.”

  “Lots of tracks.” Adams pointed.

  The ranger was right; there were dozens of prints in the patches of dirt between the rocks. Many looked like dog tracks to him, but then he was no animal expert. He snapped a few pictures of the wildlife footprints.

  Wings flapped overhead as something big landed on the branch of the fir towering above them. “Forgot the birds,” Adams said.

  “Yes,” the female ranger nodded. “Crows. Ravens. Eagles. Maybe even a hawk or an owl.”

  Adams sighed. “They’ll be back a
s soon as we’re gone. It’s getting dark.” He peered at the sky. “And it’s clouding up again. Can we bag him now?”

  “In a minute,” Finn responded. He quickly snapped photos of the car, the body, and the general surroundings, wishing the Sarge had sent a certified tech with him. Maybe he didn’t know the rangers weren’t prepared. Or maybe he just assumed this was a tragic accident.

  * * * * *

  Grace’s heart sank. The baby monkey was not Kanoni. It wasn’t a gorilla, or a monkey, or even a baby. The thin black-furred creature was an adolescent bonobo, the smallest of the great apes. The cage was barely big enough for the creature to sit upright, but the animal was huddled into the corner with its arms over its head. Tim used earplugs—why wasn’t he humane enough to realize that the poor little ape was in pain from the excruciating screech of the grinder?

  “Oh, sweet baby.” She poked her fingers through the wire mesh.

  “Watch out, he bites,” Tim said. “But once he gets used to you, he’ll make a fine pet. Monkeys are real smart, you know. You can teach them almost anything.” He picked up a wooden dowel lying beside the cage and poked the cowering animal. The bonobo squeaked and glanced at them over its shoulder, the whites of its eyes gleaming. Then it covered its head and pressed even further into the corner.

  “Isn’t it a little cold and noisy for him back here?”

  Tim narrowed his eyes. “He doesn’t mind.”

  She doubted that, but the man’s expression didn’t encourage further criticism. “How long have you had him?”

  “He’s not really mine,” Tim answered. “I’m selling him for a friend.”

  “How much?”

  “Seven thousand.”

  She sucked in air through her teeth. “That’s a lot. Can I hold him?”

  Tim shook his head. “No way, not right now. Like I said, he bites.” Then he realized he was ruining his sales pitch and added, “After he settles into a new home, he’ll let you hold him all you want. He’ll be real sweet then.”

  She fingered a plastic fish earring. “Was he born in the U.S.?” Otherwise, the bonobo had been smuggled in illegally.