Presumption of Guilt

by Archer Mayor

  Dan Kravitz finished putting a chair upside down on one of the tables, crossed to the door, and opened it without protest or hesitation.

  “Mr. Kunkle,” he said amicably, letting Willy inside. “Would you like me to fix you something?”

  “I’m good,” Willy told him, sliding into a booth where he wouldn’t be seen from the street.

  It was becoming a familiar setting for them, which was unusual for an urban nomad like Kravitz, who had variously called home other people’s trailers, abandoned houses, corners of empty warehouses, and now—for the past several years—a large room above this restaurant, which the owner had made available to him in exchange for Dan’s helping out now and then.

  Willy alluded to this sedentary abnormality. “You running out of gas in your old age, Dan?”

  Kravitz slid into the booth opposite him. “Because I’m still calling this place home?”

  “You gotta admit—it’s not your style.”

  Dan reflected before responding. For a long time, Willy had thought him mentally delayed. Their first conversations had consisted of Dan’s uttering little more than grunts, single words, or extremely short sentences, painfully doled out. In the end, the truth had proved to be the exact opposite. Dan was articulate, highly educated, and perhaps even a genius—if an unconventional one. He was also a watcher—at once removed from society while obsessed with analyzing and cataloging its every tic and twitch.

  Willy, of course, couldn’t have cared less about what drove him. He just liked him for what he could dig up, and at that, Dan was the best Willy had ever known.

  “I am making adjustments now that Sally has grown older,” Kravitz said at last. “Among them being some sense of domestic stability.”

  Willy didn’t comment. The floor overhead wasn’t actually legally inhabitable, due to its restricted access—a narrow, ladderlike staircase behind the bar—and its lack of amenities, which the restaurant itself supplied for after-hours use. But it was a high-ceilinged, bare, single room overlooking the street, with separate sleeping alcoves for father and daughter, and kept compulsively clean and tidy. That was another striking attribute of the man seated before him: No matter what the task or the environment, Dan Kravitz always managed to stay as scrubbed clean as an operating room technician. Kunkle was a neat-freak—Sam never had to touch a vacuum cleaner or wash a dish at home. Kravitz made Willy look like a slob.

  “I don’t usually see so much of you as I have lately, Mr. Kunkle,” Dan said in his oddly canted English.

  “Yeah,” Willy conceded. “Well, I have a job for you. Maybe seeing you earlier today reminded me of your talents.”

  Dan waited patiently.

  “You were lying your ass off about breaking into people’s houses, weren’t you?”

  “Have you received complaints?” Dan asked, his concern clearly more directed at having been detected than at committing an illegal act. Dan prided himself on leaving no evidence of his visits behind, nowadays.

  Willy understood that. “No. And I’ll take that as a yes, since you’re being cagey. Let me rephrase: If I happened to know a nutcase who loved to break into houses and snoop around, there’s an address I’d like him to check out. How’s that?”

  Kravitz smiled demurely. “That’s excellent. What might be the address and the reason for a curiosity that clearly doesn’t amount to legal probable cause?”

  “Very clever,” Willy growled. “No, it doesn’t. It ties into that body at VY.”

  “Yes. The long-missing Henry Mitchell. I read about that online.”

  “One of his ex-pals, Johnny Lucas, lives—”

  “On River Road, across the Connecticut,” Dan interrupted—an unusual breach of manners for him.

  Willy stared at him, struck by exactly that point. “Showoff,” he said. “You been there?”

  But Kravitz shook his head, looking slightly embarrassed. “I’m not inclined to cross the river—or leave town, for that matter. I’m simply aware of Mr. Lucas and his residence, because he used to work in Brattleboro, and because of his unusual path to wealth. I apologize for speaking out. You were explaining your interest in Mr. Lucas.” Dan seemed eager to move past his misstep.

  “What do you know about him?” Willy asked pointedly.

  “Nothing, which I find very interesting.” Dan left it at that.

  “Right.” Willy dragged out the word, still amused. “So one of our guys stopped by Lucas’s place and was told to get lost over the security speaker. We find that interesting, too.”

  A lifted eyebrow betrayed Dan’s piqued curiosity. “You suspect Mr. Lucas of a specific malfeasance? Perhaps killing Mr. Mitchell?”

  “Perhaps,” Willy agreed. “But it’s vaguer than that. All we know for sure is that Lucas was a grunt until Mitchell bit the dust—or left the stage, as people thought in 1970. Then, like you said, it was life on the fast track. Johnny got into BB Barrett’s good graces—I’m sure you know him—became his number two man, made the business a big hit, and eventually retired, fat, rich, and happy.”

  “You have no indication that Mr. Lucas willfully removed his rival?”

  Willy sighed. “You’re making it sound like a soap opera. No, we do not. In fact, there was a hiccup in time between when Hank disappeared and Johnny replaced him, which makes it look like BB was hoping to run things on his own for a while—till he realized he needed help.”

  “I take it that you’ve conducted a background check on Mr. Lucas,” Dan guessed.

  “You take it right,” Willy reassured him. “As part of our normal routine. I seriously doubt we can do the kind of high-tech snooping you can, though. Our methods are legal, so nobody shows up much unless they’ve stepped in the shit. We have the fusion center in Burlington, but they feed off public records. I’d bet that what you collect and how you collect it would land us in jail.” He then added quickly, “Assuming you ever did anything crooked, which of course we know you don’t.”

  “As you also know, Mr. Kunkle,” Dan said disingenuously, “I have a personal moral code. You are assuring me that your request is founded on some real concerns about Mr. Lucas’s being a bad person. Is that correct?”

  Willy made a face. “I think he’s a dirtbag who’s hiding something—yeah.”

  Dan nodded once and sat back. “May I get back to you about this, perhaps in a couple of days?”

  Willy slid out and stood up, automatically adjusting his arm. “You know how to find me.”

  * * *

  Dan Kravitz finished closing up the restaurant and climbed the narrow stairs to the room above, where his daughter was ensconced in an armchair, reading a book.

  “You have company?” she asked, looking up as he appeared. “I heard voices.”

  “You did,” he replied. “The same police officer who spoke to us on the street.”

  “The famous Willy Kunkle,” she said with a small scowl. “He was weird.”

  “He is,” her father agreed, adding, “But lucky for me, a righteous man. More important, he’s given us an assignment, with which—after I do some preliminary advance work—I may ask for your help. Would that be of interest?”

  Her face beamed as she imitated his speaking style. “Surely, Father, you jest.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Sally Kravitz was completely focused, standing outside the house, watching, as her father put it, for “anything that moves.” Despite his easy manner and the surrounding stillness, her concentration was sharpened by a neophyte’s conviction that whatever could go wrong was about to, and that it would be her fault.

  “You in?” she asked over the throat mic he’d given her—a tactical model that needed a mere whisper to function.

  Her father’s voice was light and comforting. “Almost, sweetheart. I’ll let you know—promise.”

  She pressed her lips together angrily. She’d sworn to herself that her coolheadedness would leave him astonished, and already she was acting like a kid. Dumb, dumb, dumb.

  Dan ha
d let her select her observation post outside Johnny Lucas’s house, and she’d chosen the low limb of a tree across the street. Here, she’d congratulated herself. Not only had her father approved with a nod of the head—high praise from him—but, now that she was in place, she also found that she had a near perfect view of all approaches, including the river beyond. This was made easier by Dan’s having given her a pair of night vision goggles, which she loved. Also—and this had truly surprised her—he had planted a pair of motion detectors down the road, in both directions, programmed to signal them over their headphones should anything come near.

  “All right,” he whispered laconically over her earpiece. “Home sweet home. Now for the internal security system. You happy out there?”

  “Very,” she assured him.

  She’d been pleased to be invited. Dan had made it clear from the start that her apprenticeship would take a long time and many “house calls,” as he termed them, before he’d take her on his kind of visitation—the ones with the residents still inside.

  In fact, the building was empty now. Nevertheless, Sally recognized this to be a higher-level target than her father might normally have chosen for her, had Willy Kunkle not assigned it to him. Dan’s preference—as he’d explained—would have been another simple, non-alarmed, one-story building. Perhaps even a weekend or seasonal home, to further ensure that they wouldn’t be disturbed.

  This, however, was no such situation. The house was modern, multilevel, wired with both audio and video defenses, and owned by someone with a questionable enough past to have stimulated Kunkle’s interest. This was no starter project, and Sally had been flattered by Dan’s trust in her.

  He had done his homework beforehand, even if he hadn’t spent the time he preferred—including several visits over the previous couple of days—“casing the joint,” as was the phrase in the old movies they enjoyed watching together. What he learned had given him the confidence to involve Sally. Lucas lived here with his wife only. There were no children, only fish for pets, and—apparently—the type of security that Dan felt he could readily defeat.

  That being said, he hadn’t entered the house until tonight, which raised the question about whether she’d be invited inside or not. And truthfully, her excitement about that prospect was about evenly counterbalanced by old-fashioned fear. If Mr. Lucas was a bad apple, what might be his reaction upon finding two strangers snooping around his place?

  “Okay,” Dan said after what seemed a very long time. “You interested in a little exploring?”

  “Really?” she answered, again immediately regretting her childish glee.

  But he didn’t laugh at her. He never did. “Yup, if you feel up for it. You have to listen to your inner voice, as we discussed.”

  She tried hesitating, to show she was actually making a choice. “I’m ready,” she then said. “How do you want me to come in?”

  He gave her directions. She nimbly climbed down from her tree, crossed the road, and—picking her footsteps carefully, as she’d been taught—worked her way around to the riverside aspect of the house.

  There, she discovered her father leaning out of a window, proffering his gloved hand.

  The house he helped her enter was dark, emotionally cold, and reminiscent of an overly architected rat maze. She even glanced up quickly, upon getting her bearings, to check if the ceiling hadn’t been removed for easier viewing from above.

  The moon was full and the night sky cloudless, the openness of the nearby river allowing for additional illumination through the windows. The night vision equipment supplied the needed edge, however, giving them near perfect visibility.

  Nevertheless, the place remained remote and distant and every inch of decoration was clearly and aggressively expensive. Each item she saw broadcast the fact that price rather than appearance had dictated its selection. The result was like entering the green-tinged frozen hologram of a high-end cocktail party—accessorized with trendy and costly possessions—and minus all the guests.

  Sally wasn’t alone in her evaluation. “Very homey,” her father said. “If you’re a polar bear.”

  But while she was once more absorbing the novelty of standing on trespassed ground, Dan was on task, hoping to fulfill his obligation to Willy Kunkle by finding something more revealing than Johnny Lucas’s shortcomings as an interior decorator.

  He began in the office, after they’d completely surveyed the building’s interior, noting every door, window, light switch, and staircase—as was Dan’s normal pattern. Sally stood by, at once learning and taking in the feel of the place. They’d discussed how his search of Lucas’s possessions would be more of a raid than a training session, and therefore more given to speed and results than to instruction.

  That being so, she couldn’t but admire Dan’s concentration and economy. With the precision of a surgeon, she imagined, he used gloves and a miniature flashlight attached to a headband to help him forage through drawers, files, an assortment of cabinets, and a laptop computer—using his cell phone camera to photograph items he thought might be relevant.

  Twice, the motion detector was triggered on their radios, and they gathered at the window to see if the oncoming vehicle might be Lucas’s, but both times proved to be false alarms.

  From the office, Dan led them to the bedroom, where he quickly identified Johnny’s side of the bed and his half of the closet. He noted the man’s personal details, from the kind of book he had on the nightstand to his bottled prescriptions and taste in shoes, clothes, and even shampoo.

  And in contrast to his calm and peaceful tone of voice, Dan maintained an impressive, sure-handed speed.

  This turned out to be a good thing, since the third alarm led to them watching the Lucas vehicle slowing down, about to enter the short driveway.

  “Oh, shit,” Sally moaned.

  “Not to worry,” Dan reassured her, politely gesturing toward the bedroom door. “Just head for the window we entered by. You remember the way.”

  It was said as a statement, and gave her the confidence to proceed without misstep. As she went, she mimicked Dan’s habit of replacing everything as he’d found it—from the angle of an open door to the way a small carpet corner had been flipped up. “Leave no trace” went beyond mantra here—in instances like this, it contributed to survival.

  As she was instructed, Sally exited the building quickly and carefully, leaving no footprints in soft soil and putting the rubber-soled slippers they both wore to their quietest use. She crouched by a bush on the periphery of the lawn and waited nervously for her partner in crime to follow her out.

  The lights went on at the front of the house, spreading across the lawn in a semicircular stain. The shadows of two people began to drift across the curtains.

  And still, there was no sign of Dan.

  Sally began to consider her options. Create a distraction? Throw a stone through a far window? Phone the house to immobilize at least one of the occupants? She’d been given the home’s number just in case, thinking the gesture absurd at the time. Maybe she should knock on the door, pretending to seek directions, or report a fire up the road. The one thing she didn’t consider was to use the throat mic to consult her dad. She was too worried about distracting him just enough to throw off his game.

  She rose tentatively, on the verge of acting on any of these choices, when his shape appeared briefly at the window. He shut it behind him as if in a graceful afterthought and soundlessly slid up beside her, just as the same window popped into harsh relief via a hallway light behind it.

  “Did you enjoy yourself?” he asked, slipping his arm around her shoulder, the canvas bag he’d stuffed with documents in his other hand.

  She nodded, confessing, “But this is definitely going to take getting used to.”

  * * *

  Sheriff’s deputies in Vermont walk a parallel line alongside most other police officers. They go to the same academy for their training and end up with the same certificates, but once on the j
ob, they discover—if they weren’t already aware of it—that their boss, and thus their agency, is a form of law enforcement doppelgänger. A Vermont sheriff is not a hired chief or a pulled-from-the-ranks state police colonel—he or she is a politician and business owner, and not even required to be a certified cop, even though they all are. Each county’s sheriff is paid by the state, and expected to perform such duties as civil process, court security, and prisoner transportation, but the actual requirements of the office are flexible. If a sheriff—elected for a four-year term—chose to simply sit back, do nothing, employ no deputies, and collect his or her salary—they could do so legally. It might turn out to be a short career, but at almost seventy-five thousand dollars per year, not an unprofitable one.

  No Vermont sheriff acted this way, but David Spinney had done his homework, and discovering this enormous degree of latitude had been helpful in understanding why some sheriffs stuck their necks out to create virtually full-service agencies, and others were far less ambitious, merely working to stay employed.

  The core of the dilemma, as David had found out, was that sheriffs, regardless of their aspirations, had to be profit-minded, first and foremost. Unlike the state police or municipal departments, sheriff’s offices ran on contracts—to stand by road construction projects, secure facilities such as Vermont Yankee in the old days, enforce traffic for a particular town, or supply the school resource officer at the local high school. In other words, despite the fact that they existed by edict of Vermont’s constitution, and not by statute, sheriff’s offices nevertheless had to fund their operations in an assortment of inventive ways.

  As in verifying VINs—or vehicle identification numbers—which is what David was on his way to do that morning when he found himself meditating on all this.

  He wasn’t unhappy being employed within this unconventional, often versatile framework. He liked his colleagues, enjoyed the autonomy of working from his cruiser for most of the day, and was becoming increasingly self-confident through every day’s string of spontaneous interactions. As he saw it, this job was an excellent training ground for discovering if he wanted to stay in law enforcement, and in what capacity.