The Hanged Man

by T. J. MacGregor

  “What does that have to do with Andy?”

  She leaned forward now, he had her full attention, he controlled once again. “I spent my first three months at Lake Butler. I got into trouble, fights mostly, and was transferred to Manatee. Dr. Steele was supposed to do some shrink tests and evaluate me to see if I’d be a threat to the inmate population. Turns out he was more interested in what I was busted for. He did other kinds of tests. I did pretty well, because he started working with me.”

  “Working with you how?”

  Hal kept sketching as he talked, covering the page with Rae in various poses. “Telepathy experiments at first.”

  She laughed. “Telepathy. Right.”

  “Believe what you want.”

  “You mean he would think of something and you’d have to guess what it was?”

  “Same idea. But the actual experiments were more complicated than that.”

  “Give me an example.”

  “One of the first things we did involved the assistant superintendent.”

  “Which assistant superintendent? We had three in the four years I worked there.”

  “Colmes. The guy who laughed like Groucho Marx.”

  She made a face. “One of my least favorite human beings. He took early retirement.”

  Yes, indeed, Hal thought. He sure did. But only because his other option had been prison. “Well, this was around the time when Colmes was doing the evaluations on employees in supervisory capacities, including Dr. Steele. He asked me to see what I could pick up on his evaluation, which he hadn’t seen yet. So I did.”

  “Was this before Andy and I were married?”

  He nodded.

  “And what happened?”

  “I picked up that Colmes was giving him a conditional evacuation.”

  “Andy was hired by the Department of Corrections in Tallahassee. Colmes didn’t have anything to do with his job.”

  “But Colmes was the one who evaluated him for Manatee, then that report was sent on to the DOC.”

  “How do you know so much about how things worked?”

  “I made it my business to know.”

  He knew this made sense to her. She’d worked in prisons long enough to understand the real rules. “So go on.”

  “A couple weeks later, he asked me to find out if Colmes was involved in anything shady.”

  “Andy wouldn’t take the word of an inmate,” she blurted.

  Hal bristled at her arrogance. “I wasn’t just any inmate, Rae. That’s the whole point.”

  “Look, I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. But you know as well as I do what sort of hierarchy exists in prisons. It’s always them against us. They drum it into your head during your job orientation. “These are cons, ladies and gentlemen. They’re manipulative. They’ll pit you against your fellow workers if you give them half a chance.’ That kind of mentality. Andy was rigid that way.”

  “The difference was that he wanted something from me. I knew he would verify whatever I picked up and that if it checked out, he would be in my court from then on.” He set the sketch pad aside, got up to replenish their coffee. “What I found out was that Colmes had a taste for young boys. He was taking guys from the outside grounds detail to his trailer and fucking them.”

  She didn’t react.

  “You already know this, don’t you,” he said.

  “There were rumors when his retirement was announced. What did Andy do when you told him?”

  “I guess he looked into it, talked to some of the inmates, confronted Colmes. Not too long after that Colmes announced his retirement and Dr. Steele got a great evaluation.”

  “So you were Andy’s spy.”

  In more ways than you know. “That was one of my roles.”

  “What were your other roles?”

  Enough, he thought. He had whetted her appetite for information, raised her curiosity, and fueled her existing doubt about what sort of man Steele was. “That’s it for now. C’mon, I’ll show you around.”

  He felt a certain pride as he gave her the grand tour of the chickee. She didn’t comment on the padlock on his study door, but seemed to like that room the best. She asked how long it had taken to do this or that, where he’d gotten his supplies, did the TV actually work? He told her about the satellite dish he’d installed, the generator that supplied power to the chickee.

  “I’ve got about five hundred movies,” he said proudly. “Have you ever seen Natural Born Killers? Or Pulp Fiction?”

  “No.” Then: “How long have I been here?”

  Exasperated that she didn’t want to talk about movies, he snapped, “What difference does it make?”

  “It makes a difference to me.”

  “Today’s Sunday. I brought you here on Thursday.”

  “Then the police are probably looking for me by now.”

  “Probably.”

  “I can live without Andy,” she said softly. “But I can’t live without my son.” Then her eyes filled suddenly with tears and she walked away from him, out of the room.

  Her son, that pesky detail again. He needed news. His small satellite dish would pick up Lauderdale, but he didn’t want her to overhear anything about Steele. Not at this point. They had made a nice start, he wanted to build on that.

  He walked out onto the platform where Rae stood, arms clutched against her. She had been crying and now watched Big Guy cruise silently through shadowed waters. “If you can do what you say, then tell me how Carl is.”

  “No matter what I say, you’ll think I’m making it up to placate you.”

  “Then prove to me first that you can do what you say you can. Tell me something about myself.”

  “What kind of something?”

  “From my childhood.”

  Easy enough. He’d already done his homework. “When you were young, two or three, a relative—an older cousin or an uncle—decided it was time you learned how to swim and tossed you in a pool. You nearly drowned. That’s why you’re a nonswimmer now.”

  “You could’ve learned that from Andy.”

  “Yeah, I could’ve. But I didn’t.”

  She didn’t say anything; he knew she believed him. “If you still want me to try Carl, I’ll need a photograph of him or something that belongs to him.”

  She hesitated, fear coiled snakelike in her eyes.

  “You want to know, right?”

  “If you have my purse, there’s a photo in my wallet.”

  “I’ll get it.” He retrieved her purse from the storage closet, dug out the wallet, and returned to the platform. He handed it to her.

  She slipped a photo out of one of the compartments. As she stared at it, the compassion and pain in her eyes brought a deep, terrible ache to the center of his chest. He didn’t want her to be in pain.

  “It’s not a recent photo, does that matter?”

  “I don’t know.”

  She handed it to him and he sat down on the platform floor, the photo pressed between his palms. Then he gazed into the boy’s eyes, eyes just like his mother’s, and reached.

  He had never reached into a kid before. He felt as if he swam in a primal sea where the intensity of emotions fluctuated like light. Mommy. Need. Hurt. Scared. Teddy bear. Hospital. Don’t like. Mommy, where’s my Mommy… Hospital. He seized on the word and reached deeper, but his reasoning mind interfered now, tossing up possible reasons for why the boy was in the hospital. He couldn’t find what he needed.

  “He’s scared, he misses you, he’s confused. He has a teddy bear he can’t find. It’s a washed-out brown, with a broken ear.”

  Rae, sitting in front of him, nodded, her eyes brimming with tears. “And Andy? Is Andy taking care of him?”

  “That’s all I pick up.” Hal handed her the photo.

  For a long time after that, she remained out on the platform, in a pool of warm light, staring at her son’s picture. Hal watched her, torn between his need
to possess her, to do whatever it took to accomplish that, and his fear that regardless of what he did or how fast he did it, he still might fail utterly and miserably.

  Chapter 12

  “Wake up, Sheppard, I need to talk to you.”

  The captain’s voice boomed from the answering machine, rousing Sheppard from a sound sleep. He groped for the receiver and glanced at the clock. 7:03. “The sun has barely risen, Gerry,” he said without preface.

  “I guess you haven’t seen the paper yet this morning.”

  “Not yet.” Sheppard didn’t tell him that he’d cancelled his subscription to the Fort Lauderdale News to save money. “Steele’s homicide was the lead story yesterday, so it can’t be that.”

  “On page three there’s a short piece about how the day before the body was found, the cops got a call from a psychic who had tuned in on the case. The source isn’t named, but I’m betting it was Pete Ames.”

  “Christ.” Sheppard sat up in bed, fully awake now. “Did they print her name?”

  “No. But Ames won’t be giving any more unauthorized statements to the press, I’ll guarantee that.”

  “He got canned?”

  “Don’t sound so hopeful. Ames has been with the department for ten years. My guess is that he’s going to be transferred to another department.”

  “And what about the cuts, Gerry?”

  His subsequent silence, though brief, didn’t bode well for Sheppard’s future. “We’ll talk about it at the hospital. Can you meet me in the coffee shop at nine-thirty?”

  “Yeah, I’ll be there,” he replied, and hung up.

  Sheppard ran four miles around his complex, showered, ate breakfast, and walked into the hospital coffee shop shortly before nine-thirty. Gerry Young had claimed a booth at the back and waved when he saw Sheppard.

  The head of homicide wasn’t a particularly large or imposing man. Half a foot shorter than Sheppard, he had a thin, wiry body, and thinning hair that had started to gray. Since he worked in a profession where people judged you by the way you looked, others often mistook him for a weak or plodding man. Sheppard knew he was neither.

  Young had been his ally since he’d started with the department five years ago. Perhaps he saw a younger version of himself in Sheppard, maybe he felt paternal toward him, maybe their common interests had forged a bond between them. Whatever the reason, Sheppard always had felt grateful for his support.

  “So give me the bad news first,” Sheppard said as he slid into the booth.

  Young looked like he’d had a bad night. Dark circles ringed his eyes, an air of gloom hung over him. Sheppard wondered if it had to do with the budget cuts or an ex-wife. “I spent most of Friday and Saturday arguing with the chief and the county jackals. Christ, if they want to save money, let those assholes take a fifteen percent cut in pay.”

  On Young’s shitlist, the county bureaucrats filled the top slots, right along with reporters and lawyers. “So?”

  “On November first, the department is losing a total of ten positions, two per department, including the two floater positions. All other positions and salaries will be frozen for at least a year.”

  Sheppard felt a hard, almost painful constriction in his bowels. “That’s six days from now, Gerry.”

  Young continued as if Sheppard hadn’t spoken; his words smacked of a prepared speech. “You’ll be eligible for unemployment, of course, and there’ll be eight weeks of severance pay that—”

  “Screw that. Unemployment won’t even cover my mortgage.” Not to mention his credit cards bills.

  “Anyone who’s got six years with the department isn’t getting cut, Shep.”

  “What about job performance? Doesn’t that count for shit with these people? Stupid question, forget it. Either way, I’m screwed.”

  Young looked about as miserable as Sheppard felt just then. “Well, you’re not alone, if that’s any comfort, Shep. We’d had so many unsolved homicides the last few years my job’s on the line, too. I’ve got two ex-wives and three kids who are going to be mighty unhappy if that happens.”

  “The chief told you your job is on the line?”

  “Not in so many words. But hell, I’ll be fifty-five my next birthday and I’ve got twenty-five years in with the department. He’d love to bring in a younger guy he could push around who would do the job for half the pay. At this point, I need a major coup to keep my job.”

  “Is the Steele homicide major enough?”

  “It might be. If we can solve it before the end of the month, it’ll still be in the press on November first.”

  “In other words, do it by Halloween.”

  Young nodded. “If we crack this one, Shep, I’ll be able to draw on a modest reserve budget that will allow me to save one job. Yours. That’s the good news, for what it’s worth.”

  “I appreciate it, Gerry. But I don’t know how the hell we’re going to pull this off by Halloween. I don’t have much to go on yet.”

  “Let’s hear what you do have and then go upstairs.”

  He’d intended to wait before telling Young about the possible link between this homicide and that of Mira’s husband. Now he felt he didn’t have a choice. Young listened without interruption until Sheppard had finished.

  “Did Hotchkiss ever tell Ms. Morales about the green shoelaces?” Young asked.

  “According to his notes he didn’t. I think if he had mentioned it to her, she would have said something about it. I’m hoping Steele’s son saw the green shoelaces, too. That would confirm what Ms. Morales saw and would provide a tangible link between the two murders.”

  “Yeah, it would. In the meantime, see if Ms. Morales will, uh, read Steele’s house.”

  “She’s going through the place this afternoon.” Bemused, he added, “I never thought I’d hear you encouraging me or anyone else to use a psychic.”

  Young shrugged. “Look, Shep. We’re after information and I don’t give a damn if it comes from a psychic or a talking donkey, as long as it’s confirmed by someone or something else. Maybe this mysterious caller you’re meeting at the Elbo Room will be an unexpected bonus.”

  Maybe, yeah. But he couldn’t count on it.

  “One more thing,” Young went on. “As of right now, we’re working this one together. Any information you get on the case, whether it’s through Ms. Morales or someone else, should be taped. I want a record. If you need to tap into computers we don’t have access to, say the word and I’ll pull the strings that will get you in. I’ll cover anything having to do with Mrs. Steele—her friends, fellow teachers, whatever. I’ll take up the slack. Agreed?”

  “How can I refuse a deal like that?”

  “Oh, you could say you’d rather work with Pete Ames.”

  “Right.” They both laughed. “C’mon,” Sheppard said. “Let’s go see the boy.”

  On the way upstairs, Sheppard explained that he’d already spoken briefly to Rae Steele’s mother. She’d called him after her conversation with the housekeeper. “She may be a royal pain in the ass.”

  Young nodded soberly. “Yeah, she’s a pain. She was in the kid’s room when I got here. But I know your innate charm will nudge her into our court, Shep,” he added dryly.

  The cop outside Carl Steele’s room in pediatrics glanced up as they approached.”How’s he doing?” Young asked.

  “Better. His grandmother is in there with him. Elizabeth Baylor.” His eyes met Young’s. “Her name’s on the list.”

  “Yeah, I know,” Young replied. “I made the list.” He pushed the door open, and he and Sheppard stepped into the room.

  Elizabeth Baylor looked like a corporate CEO on vacation, not like a pediatrician. A slender, attractive woman in her mid-sixties, she was an older version of the Rae Steele in the photo Sheppard had seen. Her chocolate-colored slacks fit her like a glove, her silk print blouse enhanced the flecks of amber in her dark eyes. A cat’s eyes, he thought, alive with a shrewd intelligence.


  “Morning, Dr. Baylor,” said Sheppard, extending his hand. “I’m Detective Sheppard. We spoke on the phone.”

  She smiled, but the smile didn’t touch her eyes. “Yes, of course. Nice to meet you.”

  “And you’ve met Gerry Young, head of the homicide division.”

  She nodded. When she turned to her grandson, the sun shone in her eyes. “Carl, honey, these policemen would like to talk to you for a few minutes.”

  The young boy stacked his Legos neatly and precisely on the moveable table that swung across the width of the bed. The beauty of the kid’s face struck Sheppard as an advertiser’s dream: freckled cheeks, sandy hair that fell across his forehead, big blue eyes. A modern Tom Sawyer.

  “You don’t look like police,” he remarked.

  Sheppard held out his badge.

  The boy took it, ran his thumb over the shield. “Cool.”

  Cool. Sheppard was pretty sure he hadn’t known that word, used in that way, until he was at least twelve. “What’re you building?”

  “A world.”

  “What kind of world?”

  “One that’s better.”

  I’m with you, kid.

  “How’re you feeling, Carl?” Young asked.

  “Okay.” He snapped together a pair of Legos, then perused the remaining pieces. “My sugar’s better. Mrs. Lee saved my life, you know.”

  “So I understand,” Sheppard replied. “We’d like to ask you a few questions about …” He hesitated mentioning Carl’s father and didn’t know what to say about his mother. His eyes darted to his grandmother for help.

  “About the other night,” she said quickly. “Tell them about your Mom and Dad arguing.”

  Carl’s tongue slipped slowly across his lower lip as he sought to fit a large Legos on top of a smaller one. “They argue a lot.”

  “About what?” Sheppard asked, noticing that the boy used the present tense.

  Carl shrugged. “I dunno. I don’t like it when they argue. I go in my room and shut the door.”

  Young asked, “What happened the night you got sick?”