by Bill Capron
He used his pencil to tick down the list. Thirty murders from Portland, Maine to Portland, Oregon, with six holes in the schedule. He didn’t have hard proof, but he had no doubts either. And for the first time in days he was no longer felt at risk. The killer was free because no one connected the dots. There was never a reason to look for similar MO’s, shared friendships, extraneous clues, look alike suspects. No reason until one person saw the possibilities, how ever serendipitous.
One man killed all those people; he was an idiot savant of death. More than thirty murders, more than thirty men set up, nine years of fooling the police. But for the unmatched hand print, Robin would be in jail, and the killing would go on.
The detective could have been like the Tucson cops who made the choice to ignore the evidence. Yes, Maureen McMartin was a blessing.
~ ~ ~
The aforesaid oblivious saint bit into Meg’s attempt at supper, a burnt around the edges and cool in the center chicken pot pie. She worked her tongue along the inside of her mouth. “Very tasty.”
Meg stared at her mother. “It’s horrible.”
The girl emptied both plates in the garbage. She pulled a pizza from the fridge and shoved it in the microwave. She spoke at the microwave; “Mom, you shouldn’t lie like that. It’s so obvious.”
Maureen slipped into justification mode; “I didn’t want to be super critical, Meg.”
Her daughter popped the microwave door. “Yeah, well, I’m not a baby.”
Maureen relented; “Okay, next time I won’t hold back. Anyway, it was a very attractive chicken pot pie, what with that dark border, but I think you set the heat too high.”
“I was in a rush.”
“It doesn’t work that way.”
Meg arranged the pizza on plates. “Speaking of work, how was your day?”
Maureen answered, “Among other things, we found a dead body in a garbage can. He’d been there a week and I can’t start to describe the smell. Are you sure you want to hear this?”
Meg’s voice took on a patronizing tone; “Mom, I live with you, I want to know what you do. Make believe I’m your husband. You’d tell a husband, wouldn’t you?”
Her mother’s nod was halfhearted. “Anyone special you’d like to hear about?”
Meg put on a disinterested face. “Oh, why don’t you start with Mr. Morgan?”
They both laughed.
“Well, I got a surprise this morning. Robin Morgan met me at the station, and he had one hell of a story to tell.”
Maureen told the story quickly, right up to where Robin stormed out of the room.
“And you didn’t believe him?” Meg was incredulous, but it wasn’t lost on her that her mother had called him Robin.
Maureen explained, “Listen, Meg, it wasn’t like this was the most likely alternative. I mean, it looked like he was snatching at straws. But he’d done so much work, and he was certain he’d found the answer.”
Meg felt his anger. “And you pushed his nose in it.”
I wasn’t as understanding as I might have been. “Yes, but it wasn’t intentional.” She would apologize if she could. “Still, he left of his own accord.”
“Yeah, right.”
She accepted her daughter’s rebuke. “But after he left, I read the articles, looked at the pictures. I saw what he meant.”
“Then you believe him?” Hope again.
“No.” She watched her daughter deflate. “Maybe. I don’t know. But I believe Robin Morgan thinks he’s innocent, and …”
“And what?”
She shook her head as she spoke; “I don’t think he’s crazy.”
Relief filled the girl’s face. “So you think he’s innocent too.”
Maureen was less sanguine; “I’m afraid I do, and that presents its own problems.”
Meg was puzzled. “How can being innocent be a problem?”
She pressed her lips to her intertwined fingers. “Well, it’s a problem because the whole system is now tilted to his being guilty. You can’t easily put the brakes on that.”
“But you have to,” Meg pleaded.
She shook her head. “No, Meg, I can’t stop that train. It would cost me my job, and how’s that going to help Robin Morgan.”
Meg agreed, “It won’t.”
“So I’ll investigate it, but under the table.”
Her daughter leaned in conspiratorially. “And you’ve learned what?”
Maureen described Simpson’s observation of Robin in the library, and the meeting with Bob Sunday about the yellow VW. “Tomorrow night you and I will go to the library to do our own research.”
Meg was eager; “Why not tonight, mom?”
“Because I’m meeting with Bob Sunday and Diane Simpson.”
Meg grew silent. “Do you like Mr. Morgan, Mom?”
Be careful. “Yes, Meg, I like Mr. Morgan, but we’ll have no more talk of that?”
The girl kept a frown on her face, but inside she was smiling.
When Maureen started to clear the table, Meg said, “I’ll do that while you get ready for your meeting.”
Maureen settled onto the stool she’d built into her shower and let the water run down her face and body. Suddenly she had a daughter again, not a sullen live-in teenager. And yes, she had feelings for Robin Morgan, feelings that were overwhelming defenses she’d carefully constructed in the last few years.
~ ~ ~
The little restaurant was busy with the lunch crowd; two waitresses worked the tables while Marta managed the till. She took Robin’s elbow and put him at the table in the corner. “I’ll get you a coffee.” She looked at her watch. “Twenty minutes and the place will be empty.” She didn’t ask him what he wanted.
In a minute he had his coffee and ten minutes later an omelet. She pointed a thumb at her chest and got back to the register. As he was finishing she took a seat opposite him.
Robin said, “I need a check, Marta.”
“It’s on me.”
He didn’t argue. “So when did you start buying lunch for murderers?”
“More chance I killed that woman than you.” She stood. “Gotta get back to the till.” Her black skinned flushed. “Never doubted you for a minute.” She kissed his cheek and went back to work.
~ ~ ~
It felt like fall to Robin. It was the rain, and pine cones and branches littered the gravel driveway. Cobin had not been there the previous week. He made a mental note to call the kid as he pushed the wheel barrow and picked up the debris. There was so much to do, de-moss the house, power wash the concrete, change the stone barbeque to gas.
Rascal dashed outside as soon as he opened the door; he cleaned the litter box and replenished her food. He opened a beer and went downstairs to the computer room. He sat down at the fly tying vise, ate his pizza, and finished the blond caddis he’d left in process a week earlier.
Robin arranged the copies and notes from the library. He tacked a large plastic coated map of the United States to the wall and stuck pins in each of the thirty cities where the murders had occurred. He connected the pins with string.
It was a nationwide murder spree with no one the wiser; a rampage of death marked by a spoor of victims and suspects. He was the one person in the world, other than the killer, who knew.
He used a magic marker to box in the six areas without a murder and logged onto the internet. The first site he visited was the Cleveland Plain Dealer. It took twenty minutes to find the shotgun murder of a high school girl six years earlier. She and her father fought over her dating a man ten years her senior. The wounded boyfriend, at first a vague witness, was much more certain when the case went to trial.
And so it went for Buffalo, Richmond, Montgomery, Shreveport and Dallas. Like clockwork, the killer never slipped up, never backed off, was never suspected. He researched his victims, knew their routines; and he was ready to pounce when there would be no alibi, when an innocent man could be made out a murderer.
A psychologist would have a fi
eld day with such a man. He should call Peter Zov, but that would wait. Instead he called George Fox.; and he called Bob Sunday, but Debbie said he’d gone to some hush-hush meeting in Portland.
He laid on the bed with Rascal nestled against his back. It had been a year of penance. It was like grief, as if Mona died when he kicked her out. But it was more the grief he felt for Rebecca, a delayed second mourning.
Chapter 14 - Tuesday, June 27 - 5:00 am
Robin pulled the all-weather tight as he made his way through the cold drizzle, down the trail to Johnson Creek Road, a half mile east of his house. The sky lightened and color emerged from the shadow of night. Then the rain stopped. He leaned against the fir to wait.
He saw the headlights and heard the wheels on the gravel. He stepped into the road as George’s twenty year-old Chevy pickup rolled to a crunchy stop.
“Thanks, George.” He slammed the rust pitted door behind him.
George backed up for a three point turn. He said, “There’s a car parked where your road butts up to the main road. It could be a cop.”
“Drive by him real natural. I’ll stay out of sight.” But the car was gone.
George asked, “So where are we going?”
“Seattle, but I’m not sure exactly where yet.”
Robin used the cell phone. “Mr. Goodwin, you’re up early.” He listened, then, “That’s great.” He made notes on a business card.
“So where to?”
Robin put the card on the dashboard. “Get off at Sea-Tac. We’re visiting Jake Tarn.”
George turned his attention from the road. “That guy who killed his partner? Three months ago, right?”
Robin scratched his thickening stubble. “Yes, same guy, but he didn’t kill his partner.”
George looked confused. “No, then who did?”
“The same man who killed Mona.”
George veered back onto the road at the sound of the rumble strips. “You’re kidding.”
Robin shook his head.
The ex-priest asked, “Why don’t you tell me about it.”
Robin told him what he’d learned, finishing with, “I need something solid to nail this to.”
George was amazed. “You found this on your own?”
“Yes, once Carla pointed me in the right direction.”
“What do you mean?”
“She suggested a motiveless crime, remember?”
George kept his attention on the thickening traffic. “I thought it was me.”
“Whatever. Once I stopped looking for a reason, I ...” He shook his head at the wonder of it. “I’m not sure when it came to me. It had to be the Tucson murder.”
George asked the obvious question, “Why not turn it over to the cops now? There’s no way they can ignore it.”
Robin adjusted the seatbelt and turned to George. “I’m not ready, George. I want to get this guy myself.”
The ex-priest frowned. “That sounds like revenge.”
He shook his head. “No, not revenge, but I need to know if I’m right.” He tapped his forehead. “It could all be in my mind. A serial murderer who’s killed thirty-six times without anyone being the wiser. I mean, doesn’t the FBI have some kind of program to sift through crimes looking for these guys. I have to be sure.”
“So, what are you expecting from Tarn?”
Robin unfolded his list of names. “I’m going to find out if we share any friends.”
George mulled it over. “Maybe it wasn’t a friend, maybe it was an observer, someone you didn’t even know.”
“No, George, he knew too much. It’s someone I know well, and I’m going to find him.”
~ ~ ~
Robin swung the door open. “So George, you want to come in and meet another killer?”
He shook his head. “No, one murderer is enough for me.” He laughed. “I’ll stop at the Starbucks and be back in an hour.”
Robin entered the low brick building. It was two hours before normal visiting hours; he rang a bell at the front desk. The guard said Bob Goodwin was stuck in traffic and would be a few minutes late. He said Tarn was in the lawyers’ meeting room.
The lawyer arrived five minutes later. His gray suit was wrinkled, his yellow tie loose and angled, his hair wet, a piece of tissue paper, red in the center, marked his chin. He strode up to Robin. “Nice to see you, Mr. Jackson.”
The guard asked, “Don’t you lawyers ever use first names?”
Goodwin signed the log and joked, “No, Barry, we’re all such assholes we don’t want to get too familiar.”
“Amen to that.” The guard led them down a hall.
Jake Tarn was on the other side of the thick Plexiglas, dressed in the ubiquitous orange. He no longer resembled Robin. He was clean shaven, his hair had grayed to white, and he had gained a hundred pounds. His skin was a muddy gray.
Goodwin waved at the prisoner. “Hi, Jake. This is the man I told you about, Robin Morgan. He has a story to tell you.”
Robin raised his hand and said hello. The fat man on the other side gave a nod that would have done justice to Nero Wolfe, no more than an eighth of an inch.
Tarn raised a finger. “On with your story, Mr. Morgan. Barry said I get forty-five minutes, and Bob’s already wasted ten.” A smile disarmed the words.
It took twenty minutes to run through the drill; Mona’s murder, the evidence, the hand print that freed him, the meeting in Tucson, and the research.
Tarn looked interested, but in a detached sort of way. “I used to look like you, probably even more so when you had the beard. It’s hard to believe that was only four months ago.”
“What happened?” Robin asked.
The black piercing eyes answered first, the words followed; “Mr. Morgan, Robin, I eat to forget.”
Goodwin got back on topic; “What do you think of Mr. Morgan’s idea, Jake?”
Tarn interlaced his fingers as in prayer. “By golly, Bob, I think he’s got it.” He steepled his fat fingers. “Please ignore my lack of enthusiasm, Mr. Morgan, but last week I learned I have leukemia, a rather aggressive variety. If I see freedom again, it won’t be for long.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
Tarn waved it off. “It’s nobody’s fault, one of life’s little tricks. Still, if what you say is true, I’ll be free soon. I want to be free.” His eyes searched the close walls. “Before you came here, the trick was on them, that I’d die before they found me guilty. Now that final irony is gone.” He shook his large head. “A pity.”
To Robin, “So how can I help?”
Robin unfolded his list of names and gave a copy to Goodwin. The lawyer opened the door and gave it to the guard who handed it to Tarn.
Robin said, “This is everyone I know. Those X’s mark the ones who meet the criteria to be the killer. Do you know any of those names, Mr. Tarn?”
He ran his finger down the page. Without lifting his eyes he said, “You can call me Jake. To you, I’m Jake.”
His finger moved slowly downward. “You got a lot of friends.”
Robin nodded apologetically.
Tarn continued, “I don’t have so many, especially now.”
He finished the list. “I don’t know any of these, but then he’s probably changed his name. I’ll do my own list. I’ll write a description of each. We’ll get it to you.” For the first time, a light shone in his eyes. “We’ll find the bastard.”
Robin smiled. “That would be good.”
At the front desk the lawyer shook Robin’s hand. “Jake Tarn is a good friend of mine, Mr. Morgan. You’re a godsend.” He paused; “And you can call me Bob.”
~ ~ ~
The two women turned the corner into the graveled driveway. They’d tried to reach Robin Morgan at the townhouse, then his house in La Center. After they met with Bob Sunday in Vancouver, they drove another ten miles north.
It was a secluded property among other secluded properties. The house was thirty years old, its natural wood siding blending into
the treed setting. Morgan’s car and truck, the blue Portland Toyota, were parked outside the garage. The ground underneath both was drier than the surrounding area.
Maureen stepped out into a light mist. She climbed the concrete steps to the front door. Diane moved silently behind her. Maureen rang the bell, but there was no answer. She cupped her hands and called out his name. No answer.
The detective stopped by the fountain at the edge of a small pond filled with goldfish. One, blue and black with a long flowing tail, fed at the surface. Up another set of steps was a small building between four white firs, the exterior and roof matched the main house. She mounted the steps and looked in the window. It was a large woodworking room. The door was open. There was a smell of oak shavings. The wood was stacked at the far end separated for drying.
She closed the door and walked through an orchard of apple, pear, peach and plum trees; the tiny fruit were already in place. Below her, a small back yard was dominated by a twenty foot statue of a leaping trout, cut in place from a Douglas fir. Between the sculpture and the house bloomed a garden of perennials, and roses budded against the back wall of the house.
Simpson broke the silence; “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
The spell was broken. “I don’t know, officer. Tell me what you’re thinking.”
“This house, this land, they’re like the man.”
Maureen turned her gaze down the hill to a less cared for lower lawn split from the house by five dogwood trees and a row of flowering plum trees that continued all the way out to the end of the driveway. The forest began at the edge of the lower lawn.
“Yes, that’s what I was thinking.”
They continued around the house to their car. Maureen voiced a new fear, “What if he really killed her?”
Simpson spoke with certainty; “He didn’t.”
“This doesn’t prove anything,” but there was no sting in her voice, “it says he’s the kind of person everyone else thinks he is.”
The officer said, “He’s innocent, you know it.”
“I don’t know it, but I hope it.” There, you’ve declared yourself to Simpson.
Diane changed the subject; “Do you think Bob Sunday can find the VW?”
