by Jon Talton
“You did an outstanding job digging into that case.” He slid a UBS flash drive across the desk. It was black, like his uniform.
“What’s this?”
“Paperless office, remember? The new county policy. So this,” he tapped it, “is the murder book for your case.”
“Wait a minute, Sheriff…”
He smiled and switched his index finger at me.
I tried again. “Wait a minute, Chris. You have a homicide unit this should go to if you think Frazier’s death was suspicious. I’m not a homicide investigator.”
“You sell yourself short, David. How many murders did you solve for Mike Peralta? Fifty?”
“Sixty-two.”
“There you go.”
I felt as if I had rubbed against poison ivy but the itch was deeper than my skin. I wanted him out of this office. I wanted out of this office.
He pulled a clear plastic bag out of one of his commodious pants pockets and placed it beside the data stick. It said EVIDENCE in red. Inside there appeared to be a wallet.
“Check it out,” he said.
I held up my hands. “No gloves.”
He fished a pair out of his pants. Of course he had some. He probably had a complete crime-scene kit in those cargo-pants pockets. I reluctantly slid them on and opened the evidence envelope.
The wallet was blue nylon with a Velcro seam. It was dated only by its design and materials. Otherwise, it was in surprisingly good shape for being so old. I already knew what it held before I pulled it open and saw Tom Frazier’s driver’s license. He had dark hair and the card said he was six feet, two inches, two hundred pounds, brown eyes.
“He’s not so different from your build,” Melton said. “About the same age. He had lost his mother, his last family member. You only had your grandmother at that age.”
He had done his homework on me. I didn’t like that.
I made a quick inventory of the other contents: an emergency medical technician card issued by the state, an Associated Ambulance employee identification, thirty-two dollars in currency signed by Donald Regan. No credit cards, but hardly anyone that age back then would have qualified for one. No photos.
Other things seemed missing, too: dirt or sand from the desert, and faded material from being out in the sun.
I said, “Where did you get this?”
“Are you interested in the case?”
“Mildly.”
He leaned forward. “Enough to have a conversation with the person who found the wallet?”
“I’m a historian,” I said. “That’s the way I approach cases. It seems like you need a real homicide detective who works cold cases.” I mentioned a couple of names.
“So what’s the difference between a historian and a detective?”
I had been asked this so many times, thought about it when Peralta first brought me aboard, that I should have had a neat elevator speech. But I didn’t.
Good detectives and historians had much in common. They wanted to find the “how” as well as the “why.” Both gave heavy weight to primary sources—whether witness interviews documents, diaries, and other reminiscences of the people actually involved in the event—as opposed to secondary sources such as newspaper accounts. Both were mindful of bias.
There were important differences, too. A good historian wanted to understand causality and complex underlying social and economic forces and pivotal personalities, not merely assemble evidence. He or she was open to new interpretations as fresh scholarship emerged, formerly secret archives were opened and key players who had kept silent decided to talk.
Understanding history meant acknowledging when the facts didn’t go your way, when they challenged or undermined your thesis. Some detectives would cherry-pick facts to assemble a case. Only shoddy historians did that. History was an argument without end. A criminal investigation resulted in a conviction that was rarely overturned, even if the suspect was innocent.
History was especially about distance and objectivity. Unfortunately, I had lived part of this history, being the first deputy on the scene.
“Sounds good to me,” Melton said. “Sounds like what I need here. But don’t worry about footnotes.”
The man had such a wry wit.
I said, “What about the chain of command?”
“You’ll report directly to me,” he said, “like you did with Peralta.”
That was good. Melton had brought in or promoted thugs to the highest ranks of the department. Hard asses with a history of brutality complaints who relished his campaign against illegal immigrants and poor people in general. And as a former academic, I had never really been welcomed by many of Peralta’s commanders, either. The only thing they hated worse than a meddling professor was a reporter.
“You can’t help him, you know. That’s an FBI case, and you can only get in the way. Or worse. You could be charged with obstructing if you start digging around. These feds, believe me I know, they see the suspect’s friend meddling and they don’t like it. It might even cause them to think you’re an accessory.”
I nodded. “How do you know I’m not?”
“Because I’ve checked you out. I know your work. I trust my gut.”
“And you blackmailed me over Lindsey.”
He shook his head and blew out a breath. “No, David. I was trying to help you. I’m going to help you and Lindsey.”
My ass, I thought, wondering about his real motivations besides self-aggrandizement. Sliding the wallet back in the evidence bag, I asked him about forensics.
“I’m going to send it to the lab to test for latest prints and DNA,” he said. “It’s hard to know what we’ll find. But there are photos of the wallet and its contents in your murder book.”
I folded my hands and leaned back. “What’s next for me?”
He pulled out a notepad and scribbled, tore off a sheet of paper in the paperless county office, and placed it on the desk.
“She found the wallet. Go talk to her. That’s all I’ll say. You can approach it with fresh eyes.” He pulled a box out of his cargo pants and handed it over. Business cards. “Do you have a check?”
“A check?”
“So I can get you in the system for direct deposit.”
I pulled one out of my wallet and gave it to him. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer—and get paid for the trouble.
He stood and started to leave. “I’ll hook you up with an IT person so we can get you access to the MCSO computers. A few things have changed since you left. Got a Homeland Security grant to upgrade the system.” He smiled. “Good hunting, David.”
As the door closed, I slipped some business cards in my pocket and remembered the person who had first taught me the Sheriff’s Office computer system, a young deputy named Lindsey Faith Adams.
This was the first time in a couple of hours that I had really thought of her. It made me wonder if this was a natural recharge mechanism or if something was missing inside me. Or, worse that a cold, detached spectator was living in my soul.
“Lie down with the devil,” Lindsey had said.
And wake up in hell.
Chapter Twenty-seven
A century earlier, the Great War was raging. It swept away four empires, sixteen million lives, the first great era of globalization, and it changed everything. The belief of constant progress in the West was forever destroyed. A foolish, harsh peace set up an even deadlier world war twenty years later.
We live in the shadow of the Great War still, even if most people don’t realize it. Right down to the vernacular: no man’s land. Trench coats. Blotto. Brass Hats. Shell shock. Push up the daisies.
It was the last war fought by poets.
In Flanders fields the poppies grow…
Dulcet est. Decorum Est.
Kipling, who lost a son in the wa
r, echoed the book of Ecclesiastes, providing the words engraved in the ubiquitous British monuments: Their name liveth forevermore.
He also captured the cynicism of the later war-poets and the Lost Generation:
If any question why we died
Tell them, because our fathers lied.
My grandfather was too old to be drafted and already married. Grandmother told me much about the war when I was a child, especially how she blamed it on “Kaiser Bill.” Newer scholarship would dispute it but I doubt that would change her mind. She was ahead of her time in blaming Woodrow Wilson for the flawed peace. Some revisionists argue that the United States should not have entered the Great War at all.
Arizona was only two years past statehood when war broke out in Europe. Phoenix’s population was about fifteen thousand. The cotton farmers made big money from the war. Frank Luke, born in Phoenix, became the state’s first ace and the first airman from anywhere in America to win the Medal of Honor. He died in action in 1918. He was twenty-one years old.
Their name liveth forevermore, but Kipling has been out of fashion for decades and is mainly remembered as an apologist for British imperialism.
I meditated on these events as I crouched behind a neighbor’s bougainvillea with a clear view of our house. In my hands was the close-quarters battle receiver M-4 carbine with a night scope. To that I had added a titanium suppressor so I could work with as little noise as possible. I locked and loaded a thirty-round magazine and clicked the fire selector to semi-auto.
It was two a.m. Tuesday.
Earlier, walking back to the car beneath CityScape, the parking garage had been empty of people. Too empty. No one was following me, right? I couldn’t be sure. I was glad to drive out of that vast concrete crypt.
It was too late to visit the address Melton had given me. So I went to Durant’s and sat at the dark, comfy bar, let them fix me a martini and steak. It was the first real meal I had eaten since Saturday night.
Sharon called to tell me nothing had changed in Lindsey’s condition except that they had ruled out the worst viruses. The fever persisted.
As the Beefeater burned my throat, there was no risk of being that cold, detached spectator. The world is full of imponderables but that never stopped me from stewing, especially as some of the doctors’ warnings and comments came back. How the surgery had removed torn flesh and bone. How another round on the operating table might be required to drain the wound, to “revise” it for clean edges to promote healing…
“You okay, David?”
It was the bartender. I nodded and realized my shoulders and head had dangerously slumped.
“Yes.”
Better to channel Lindsey’s uncommon blend of wit, intelligence, and street sense. What would she tell me now?
Stay safe.
Come home to me. (Back at you, baby).
Don’t wait for Strawberry Death to find you.
Find her first.
The only way to do that, lacking Kate Vare’s cooperation, was to lay a trap. So after relieving Sharon at Mister Joe’s, I stayed only thirty minutes and left for home. I parked the Prelude prominently in front of the house, went inside, and took another nap.
Strawberry Death liked to work under cover of darkness. The night before, she had visited our office on Grand Avenue. Maybe tonight she would come here. As Vare said, I had something she wanted.
At a quarter to two, I dressed all in black and set up my sniper’s position. It was down in the forties, cold for Phoenix. A wind was coming from the north, fresh and enchanting. I had always loved these winds from the High Country, but there was no time to dream.
The bougainvillea was more than three feet tall and lush. I smelled the dirt beneath me. This had been farmland a century ago, with the closest houses being the bungalows that still stood, beautifully restored, two blocks away. My spot was only a few feet from our carport. If all went according to plan, I could claim I was in the carport. No Maricopa County jury would convict me. Kate Vare could suck it.
The neighbors were long asleep and had no dogs. The street was empty except for the Prelude and the comforting yellow glow of two streetlights. No FBI watchers. Maybe Horace Mann had a tracking device on the car and didn’t think he had to worry about me. That was fine.
It was 2:42 by my watch when headlights swung off Third Avenue and a car crept down the street. It was another dark Chevy four-door, the kind of car you got at a rental outfit. Passing our house, it sped up, crossed Fifth Avenue with a rolling stop, and continued another block to Seventh where it signaled a right turn.
The night-vision binoculars allowed me to get a tag number.
I was about to relax for a long night when headlights came from the west, from Seventh Avenue. The driver approached very slowly, stopping for a full minute at Fifth Avenue even though there was no cross traffic. Then the car crossed Fifth and coasted through our block. A person could walk faster.
Arizona was a cheapskate state with no front tag. But the car looked the same. My heart was thudding against my breastbone even though I was sure my position was hidden. The car came to the stop sign at Third Avenue, signaled, and turned north.
Five minutes, no more, and headlights again painted Cypress Street from the east. Same Chevy, same tag. It pulled to the curb two houses beyond our place and the lights switched off.
I watched through the binoculars, which were little help against the darkened glass of the vehicle. Nobody got out. This was not a neighbor getting home from a party in Scottsdale or late-arriving guests.
The muted sound of a car door opening. A head emerged and looked directly at me. Beneath the watch cap, was the wholesome pretty face of the assassin. There was no uncertainty. It was her.
The sensible response was to call the police. Surely I wasn’t going to start a firefight on Cypress Street. Instead, I set down the binoculars, picked up the carbine, and steadied it for a good aim and to prevent it from kicking up once I opened fire. My back was against the neighbor’s wall and my knees were raised to support my hands gripping the weapon.
Strawberry Death was forty feet away, all in black, moving in my direction. She walked down the sidewalk toward our house as if she were taking a very early morning stroll. I could have taken her down right then but waited. I was in the bushes of the house to the east; she was coming from the west. Then I realized my mistake.
Our Spanish-Colonial Revival style house faced Cypress Street in a backward L shape, with the short leg of the L being the master bedroom sticking out beyond the living room. It was closest to me and would block my view of her at the front door.
I could have set up at the house to the west, but the shrubbery was not as full. I could have set up across the street, but they had a dog. I was stuck.
Sure enough, when she made a ninety-degree turn and walked up our front walk, I lost contact.
I made myself stay. The front door was solid wood from 1928. Even if she were successful in prying it open, the alarm would go off. So what would she do? What would I do? Knock to see if anyone was home. If they were there and answered, shoot them, and call it a night. But that wasn’t her style. Too much potential noise. Not enough fun.
She had promises to keep.
So she would look through the picture window, see the darkened house, and make her way to the backyard to disable the alarm and come through the back door. To intercept her, I would have to leave my shooting position and go through the carport on my side of the house. But that was only if she went on the far side of the house, which would require climbing a higher wall that was close to the neighboring windows.
Suddenly, she reappeared, coming across our lawn toward me. She crouched and moved under our bedroom window, careful not to step in the flowerbed and leave tread marks from her shoes. She briefly rose up and peered inside. I had left the lights off and the blinds drawn, so she would see noth
ing but darkness.
Another ten feet and she would reach the dark sanctuary of the empty carport and beyond it a rickety fence with a gate to the backyard.
I could have painted her with the laser, ordered her to freeze.
No.
My mouth silently formed the word, “police.” And then, noiselessly, “halt.” I aimed for her chest, took in a breath, let it out slowly, and smoothly squeezed the trigger.
Three rounds came out fast as a lightning strike.
Sure, I wanted to empty the magazine into her, but that would have risked stray rounds going through the houses of neighbors. This rifle was good to five hundred meters. So I did one pull, fired a short burst.
With the suppressor, the carbine made a sound like pebbles falling.
The impact threw her backward like a discarded doll. She landed on her back in the grass and didn’t move.
I picked up the spent cartridge cases and slipped them in my pocket. I would place them in the carport to support my story for the police: I fired protecting my home from an armed burglar.
Then I heard a sound that was half gasp and half muffled scream. I wondered if the neighbors were enjoying middle-of-the-night sex.
In that instant of absent-mindedness, flashes came from the woman on the ground. Was she using a flashlight?
No.
The arms and leaves of the bougainvillea shattered. Something heavy and fast sped past my cheek. Something pulled quickly on my sleeve.
It all happened in silence, except for a slight spitting sound, the snap of shrubbery, and the smashing of bullets on the wall behind me.
The heap on the lawn had rolled over and was firing at me, using a silencer.
I fell to the ground, tried to make myself part of it, remembered everything I had read about the infantryman and the dirt below him.
She was wearing ballistic armor. The sound I had heard was her recovering from my bullets hitting her vest but only knocking the air out of her.
