Quick Pivot

by Brenda Buchanan

  God did provide.

  Forty-five minutes later Paulie hustled out as soon as the priest passed by with his escort of fresh-faced altar boys. He positioned himself next to the steps outside the main exit while the choir was still working its way through the final verse of “Lift High the Cross,” and was shaking MacMahon’s giant hand before the former UMaine tight end knew what hit him.

  “Hello, Lieutenant. How are you this beautiful morning?”

  “Looking forward to one goddamn day of rest. I expect the same can’t be said for you.”

  Paulie tugged his tie loose, smiling at MacMahon’s inability to clean up his language even in the churchyard. “I’d be derelict in my duties if I didn’t stay on the Desmond disappearance story.”

  “Since when am I one of your sources?”

  “You aren’t. But you should be. Especially because the FBI blew into town yesterday and claimed this case as its own, telling both you state boys and the Riverside PD that you’re irrelevant.”

  MacMahon’s furious expression confirmed Paulie’s guess that the arrival of the feds had ignited a turf war. Keeping a sympathetic look on his face, he pushed a little harder.

  “I feel sorry for you guys. You’ve been digging since the day Desmond didn’t show for work, and I’m guessing you’ve got some good leads. Now you’ve got to turn the whole thing over to the fibbies, who we know will take all the credit.”

  “Every fucking shred of credit and none of the blame.” The wariness in MacMahon’s voice was gone. “It’s the FBI way.”

  Paulie tossed out the question he’d sat through Mass to ask. “What can you tell me about the missing money?”

  MacMahon’s face was stone but Paulie saw struggle in his eyes. He put his big hand on Paulie’s back and propelled him away from the crowd.

  “Look Finnegan. I’ll talk to you this once. Don’t be thinking it’ll be a regular thing. And I can’t tell you anything on the record or they’ll have my fucking badge. But between us, you’re on the right track to be digging into this.”

  They stopped on the far side of a sizeable blooming shrub. MacMahon’s eyes cased the churchyard. Knowing MacMahon would bail out if anyone looked their way, Paulie turned his back to the crowd and kept his voice low. “Tell me what you know.”

  “Mill management and their bankers have been crunching numbers. I know we’ve been telling you a half million. It could be more.”

  “What do you mean ‘could be’? Did the guy clean out the till before he left, or no?”

  “It looks like it wasn’t an all-at-once thing. John D. Preble’s son—the one who went to Harvard Business School—has been analyzing the accounts. He found some interesting patterns. Every day money disappeared from one or the other of the mill’s accounts. It’s been going on for a couple of years at least. Different amounts each time, not huge payments, but regular as clockwork.”

  “Why is that odd?”

  “Deposits in those exact amounts were being made each day into a Riverside National Bank savings account in the name of an outfit called Better Days, Inc.”

  “Not a mill account.”

  “Right. Two weeks ago that account was closed with a request that the entire balance be wired to a private brokerage outfit in New York. From there it was moved to a numbered account in Switzerland.”

  “Closing balance a half million bucks?”

  MacMahon shook his head. “Whoever was behind it did a hell of a good job covering his tracks. Withdrawals were made right along. The closing balance was about sixty grand.”

  “A dummy account. Slick. They connect it to Desmond?”

  “Nobody remembers the goddamn account being opened. The signature on the card is an illegible scrawl, and the secretary of state has no record of the company. Address was a P.O. box in Portland. But given Desmond’s disappearing act, he’s suspect number one.”

  MacMahon’s wife was looking in their direction. It would take more than a flowering bush to hide her husband. Ten seconds later a small boy with a big cowlick raced up. “Mom says we can stop at Sullivan’s for doughnuts on the way home.” He slipped his hand into his father’s enormous mitt. “She told me to come get you.”

  “Tell her I’ll be right there.”

  He turned the boy around and sent him like a pinball back across the churchyard.

  “Gotta go,” he said. “Good luck. And don’t forget, you didn’t hear any of this from me.”

  * * *

  Until that morning Paulie had never been inside St. Mark’s, Riverside’s Episcopal church. The Sunday service began at a dignified ten o’clock. He arrived at nine forty-five, found a seat three pews from the back door and waited for the WASPs to file in.

  The church was as old and imposing as Holy Martyrs, but it had a different feel. Paulie decided the distinction came down to how the denominations approached suffering. At his Catholic parish, the Stations of the Cross were hung on the walls, big ceramic depictions complete with bleeding wounds. St. Mark’s had no such pictorial remembrance of the Passion of Christ, just a lot of dark wood and stained glass, and unlike its Catholic counterpart, cushions on the pews.

  At ten till the hour John D. Preble, the president of Riverside National Bank, escorted an elegantly dressed woman down the center aisle. A rotund man with a gleaming bald spot and wire-rimmed glasses, Preble radiated power, even in church.

  Five minutes later a young man strolled in who Paulie recognized as the banker’s son, John D. Preble, Jr. Dark hair brushing his collar and forehead, he wore a navy blazer and a maroon-and-blue striped tie. Bare ankles showed beneath the hem of his chinos. Sonny either didn’t live at home anymore or had driven his own car. Good deal. He could be separated from the Preble pack.

  As the service droned on, Paulie was surprised at how much similarity there was to the familiar Catholic liturgy. When he was a kid, his mother warned him against going into Protestant churches, implying he’d go to hell if he worshiped with people who weren’t his own kind. Now that he’d crossed the threshold, the Episcopal service seemed an awful lot like a Mass.

  Though he could have used a cup of joe, Paulie skipped the coffee hour when Preble Junior bid his parents goodbye at the door between the sanctuary and the foyer. Paulie tailed him into the parking lot, stepping up his pace when the young banker hopped into a late-model MGB Roadster.

  Paulie whistled softly between his teeth.

  “Beautiful car.” He offered the compliment before Preble turned the key. “Must be a blast to drive.”

  Preble unfolded himself from the bucket seat and climbed out to stand next to Paulie. “She’s strong in the corners and explosive on the straightaways.” He stuck out an uncallused hand. “I don’t believe we’ve met. I’m Jay Preble.”

  “Paul Finnegan.”

  “Visiting someone here in town?”

  “I live here.” Paulie circled the car, admiring it from every angle. “Grew up in South Portland. Did a four-year hitch in the Coast Guard. Moved to Riverside after I was discharged.”

  “Are you the Finnegan who writes for the Chronicle?”

  “One and the same.”

  “Probably no coincidence that we’re talking, am I right?”

  Paulie cocked his head sideways, smiling. “Aw hell, I knew I wouldn’t pass for an Episcopalian.”

  Preble’s laugh was loud and deep.

  “Hop in.” He gestured at his British racing machine. “I’ll show you what she can do.”

  Chapter Seven

  Saturday, July 12, 2014

  Riverside, Maine

  The bones had barely made it to the medical examiner’s office when the pressure to soft pedal the story began. Like a motorless boat on a foggy day, I didn’t see it coming.

  Saturday morning I jumped online before my eyes were ful
ly open to check the local TV stations’ websites. All three were recycling the Chronicle’s barebones story from the previous day, unaware the homeless guy theory was a head fake by the cops. On the Facebook front, wild theories were being exchanged, but Desmond’s name hadn’t surfaced yet. Only one of the local bloggers mentioned the story, and she had nothing insightful to say.

  I was feeling confident when Lou and I headed out for our morning stroll around the block. While the prospect of the Sunday paper’s gaping news hole loomed large, I had a draft story in the can and plenty of ideas about how to build my fact pile. Leah’s phone call popped my bubble.

  “You’d be smart to get in here sooner than later,” she said without preamble. “Upstairs is feeling spleeny this morning.”

  Upstairs was our code word for the Chronicle’s publisher and business managers, who were supposed to keep their noses out of editorial decisions. Nothing good comes of it when bean counters presume to discuss the news operation. I hustled to Portland, stopping only for a six-tray of large coffees.

  Leah helped herself to a cup but didn’t crack a smile. When I filled her in on Chief Wyatt’s late-night browbeating, she closed her eyes and clasped her hands together as if in prayer.

  “Let me fill you in on this morning’s development. The chief called Gene at home specifically to refute your Desmond notion. She said the medical examiner emailed her late last night to say his preliminary workup supports his initial impression that the remains are no more than two years old.”

  “Two years? That’s bullshit. Wyatt’s trying to throw us off the scent.”

  “She said other evidence found at the scene supports the theory that an adult male found his way inside the mill and died down in the basement, maybe last winter or the winter before that.” Leah was speaking in the quiet voice she used when trying to talk me down off a journalistic ledge.

  Flipping my first empty into the wastebasket, I peeled the lid off another cup. Paulie taught me to believe my gut when it conflicted with the official line, and Wyatt’s near-frantic misdirection amplified my instinct that the remains were Desmond’s. I sucked down some coffee and fought to keep my voice even.

  “What she’s saying doesn’t square with what I saw. The skeleton was bricked in. Nate had to hire a demolition crew in order to get at the crawl space between the corridor and the outside wall. There was no other way to get back there. Not from another point in the corridor, or from above, or through the outside wall.”

  “Why would the chief peddle misinformation?”

  “She thinks news coverage will screw up her investigation, but cops always think that. We can’t back off. If the bones are Desmond’s, the implications for Riverside will be huge.”

  Leah looked at me over the top of her half glasses. “This is not my first conversation about this today. As I said, Upstairs has been downstairs. They are deeply skeptical about your theory. The twice-repeated edict is that we are not to speculate in print.”

  “I heard you yesterday on the no-speculation rule. It sounds like you’re now telling me to stop covering the story. What the hell’s that about?”

  “I’m not telling you to stop working the story. I’m just saying my marching orders are to wait for the facts.”

  I drained my coffee. “I can’t believe Wyatt called and bitched about me. I was on assignment at the mill when the goddamn skull was found. I reacted like a reporter. What the hell is wrong with that?”

  “We don’t know it was the chief who griped, but other stories do need covering. Stories with present-day implications. What’s happening with that changing economy series you’re in the middle of writing? Or your profiles of the major players in the casino fight?”

  “I’m still working on those.”

  “It’s 2014, Joe. The days when you could spend all your time on the crime beat are gone. I know it’s what you love to do. But even if you’re right about the remains being Desmond’s, it happened forty-six years ago.”

  “Talk to Gene Pelletier if you think this isn’t an important story. The theft of a half a million bucks from the Saccarappa’s bank account knocked Riverside to its knees. The town stayed down for decades. If I’m right and that’s George Desmond’s skeleton, the poor bastard who’s been blamed all these years was innocent. The public has a right to know who was really behind the embezzlement, and who killed George Desmond. How can you tell me not to go all out?”

  “Jesus, Joe. Climb down off the soapbox, will ya?”

  It was a struggle to stand still.

  “I’m not the enemy,” she said. “I’ll run interference for you, but you can’t spend all your time playing detective when more important stories are going uncovered.”

  “That’s one of the most cynical things I’ve ever heard come out of your mouth. I’m not playing anything. In 1968, a lot of lives were ruined. It’s epic. Someone got away not only with murdering a man, but destroying a whole town.”

  “It’s not your job to solve this case, Gale.”

  Her clipped tone and the fact she was calling me by my last name should have been the tip-off. But I was beyond paying attention to red flags. “I’m not going to let it go. I’m right. You’ll see.”

  We stared at each other for a full thirty seconds. Leah and I had been through a lot in the past few years, holding each other up as we’ve watched the newspaper business in Maine fade away, like the images in a photograph left on a sunny windowsill. We were almost always on the same side of newsroom battles, but I wasn’t so sure this time. It felt awful to fight with my foxhole buddy.

  She spoke first. “I’ll leave you on the story today. Tomorrow and Monday are your days off. I don’t care if you spend every stinking minute of your free time digging for information about Desmond and his disappearance. But I’m not going to pay overtime for a story I didn’t assign. And let me reinforce what I said yesterday. You won’t be writing unless and until there’s official corroboration of your theory.”

  “Got it.”

  “On Tuesday you’ll be up for assignment, just like everyone else.”

  “Deal.”

  Her eyes held mine for a long ten seconds. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

  * * *

  Putting aside my irritation at the Chronicle brass, who should have known better than to listen to a cop complaining about news coverage, I mapped out my next steps while driving to Riverside. Priority number one was to talk with people who knew the mill in its heyday. I planned to start with my pal Earl St. Pierre, whose name jumped out at me when I was skimming Paulie’s old stories. The chief loom mechanic at the Saccarappa until it closed its doors, Earl was a jack-of-all-trades at Riverside’s only golf course, the Mill Stream Country Club. Despite being well beyond the usual retirement age, he still worked most every day. At twenty minutes to ten when I walked into the back room of the pro shop, I saw his rangy body bent over a workbench.

  “Got a few minutes to talk?”

  Earl looked up from the club he was regripping. “About your terrible golf game?”

  “Local history, actually.”

  He glanced at his watch. “It’s Saturday, so I’m playing with the Crew at ten sharp, but I’ve earned a break.”

  The pro shop occupied the walk-out basement of the two-floor clubhouse, tucked beneath a porch that wrapped around the upstairs snack bar and pub. We strolled past the lined-up golf carts to a caddie bench parked under a broad maple tree. I jumped right in, asking what he’d heard about human remains being found at the Saccarappa.

  “Little bit, not many particulars.”

  “Can you keep this conversation to yourself?”

  “Sure thing. You trying to stay a step ahead of the TV people?”

  “Something like that.”

  He pulled a toothpick out of his chest pocket. “All I know is the cops think a hom
eless guy crawled in there and died.”

  “Not unless he could walk through a brick wall.”

  Earl swiveled his head sideways. “What are you talking about?”

  “I was there when the skeleton was found. Nate Kimball, the developer who’s buying the place, hired some guys to take down a section of wall in the basement of the north wing. There was a section where the bricks were less soot-stained. He wanted to know why. The bones were behind that brick wall.”

  “Behind it how?”

  “The corridor wall isn’t the foundation wall. There’s a narrow space between them, a few feet wide, I guess. When the demo crew broke through, a skeleton was back there.”

  “You sure it was human?”

  “I saw the skull. And a pair of boots.” I told him I’d seen his name when I’d been researching old missing persons stories. “Paulie Finnegan interviewed you in 1968 when a guy named George Desmond disappeared.”

  Earl’s face paled under his tan. He glanced toward the clubhouse, then back at me. “You saying it was George’s remains they found?”

  “No one is saying that yet officially, but I think it’s a strong possibility.”

  He splintered the toothpick with his fingers. “Are you going to write up what I tell you, put it in the paper?”

  I met his eyes, shook my head. “I just want to know what you remember about his disappearance, confidentially.”

  “Confidential is right.” He leaned closer, his shoulder brushing mine, his voice close to a whisper. “Me and George grew up together. He was my best friend. It shocked me when he left town like that.”

  “Did you believe it? That he took the money and ran?”

  “I didn’t. Argued with a lot of people about it too. But he never came back. Eventually I stopped arguing.” Earl glanced at his watch, took a deep breath and set his jaw. “I’ve gotta go.”