North of Nowhere: An Alex McKnight Novel (An Alex Mcknight Mystery)

by Steve Hamilton

  No kidding, Alex. Think about the way they acted in the house. The coordination, the disguises—they did have a master plan, and they executed it perfectly.

  Now all you’ve gotta do is figure out who made it all happen.

  I took out the piece of paper Leon had given me, with the phone numbers for Douglas Swanson and Kenny Heiden. I tried Swanson’s office number first, got his secretary and found out he’d be in court most of the day. I told her I’d call back later. When she asked me for my name, I hung up.

  Then I tried Kenny. There was no answer at his home number—no surprise at this time of day. I told him I wanted to ask him a couple of questions, and to please call me when he got in.

  Finally, I called Gill, and left the same message.

  It actually occurred to me to call Chief Maven, ask him about that Canadian license plate. That’s when I knew I was going overboard. Just take it easy, I told myself. If you get impatient, you’re gonna drive yourself crazy. You’ve done what you can so far. Let the rest come to you.

  One more call, I thought. Thank God for cell phones, even if you only use them once every two months. Even though I knew I’d be seeing him soon, I called Jackie’s number. Jonathan answered.

  “How’s he doing?” I said. “Is he there?”

  “He left, Alex. He said he was gonna go walk on the beach.”

  “Walk on the beach? Since when does Jackie walk on the beach? Since when does he walk anywhere?”

  “Hey, that’s what he said. I figured he had a tough enough day, he can do whatever he wants.”

  “Did he say anything about it? What happened at the station?”

  “Not a word.”

  “Did he happen to mention what they found in the house?”

  “No, Alex. He’s not talking about it.”

  “We’ll see about that,” I said. “When he comes back, tell him I’ll be there in a little while. Don’t let him go anywhere else.”

  “If I tell him that, he’ll go back out again. Just on general principle.”

  “Sit him down and make him a drink,” I said. “I’m sure he can use one. I’m on my way.”

  I hung up the phone and threw it on the passenger’s seat. Just as I was pulling out of the parking lot, it rang. I picked it up.

  “Alex, this is Gill.”

  “I’m glad you called me back,” I said. “How did it go?”

  “Pretty routine,” he said. “These felony arrests are getting monotonous.”

  “I’m glad you can joke about it. Any chance of me asking you a couple of questions?”

  “I don’t see why not.”

  “You know, I’m still in town here. I was gonna go back to Paradise, but why don’t I swing by your place first?”

  “Do you know where it is?”

  I thought about the videotape. “Yeah,” I said. “I know the way.”

  “You’ve never been here before, have you?”

  “No, never,” I said. “But I’ve seen the movie.”

  You can see the Kewadin Casino from halfway across town. It’s easily the biggest building in the Soo, and it sits over on the east side, on land that was carved out of the city and given to the Sault tribe. As I drove past it, I couldn’t help noticing how many cars were parked in the several acres of asphalt surrounding the place. There was one special parking lot on the side, just for RVs—there had to be a couple hundred of them. All the summer people who came through here, almost all of them ended up at the casino at least once.

  There was a health clinic right across the street, then the Big Bear Arena, all fruits of the casino money. The whole scene looked a lot better in the bright sunlight, as opposed to the grainy dark video I had watched in Leon’s living room. I followed the route I remembered seeing, turning after the casino into a new neighborhood they had built in its shadow. I knew a lot of the people who worked at the casino lived in these new houses, including Gill.

  Gill was sitting outside on his front porch when I got there. He had a big glass jug filled with lemonade sitting on the table waiting for me. I sat in the empty chair, looked out at the street with him for a few minutes, and at the casino a half-mile away. We sat in the shade, drinking lemonade as a soft breeze came down the street to us. It would have been a perfect afternoon if not for the fact that Gill was sitting here only because he had made bail. I almost didn’t want to mention it. But that’s why I was there.

  “What did the police ask you?” I finally said.

  “They didn’t get the chance to ask me much of anything,” he said. Looking down at the remains of the ink on his hands, he wiped his pants with them, just as Bennett had done. “My lawyer was there practically before I was. They did most of the talking to him.”

  “What did they say to him?”

  “They wanted to know who did the actual breaking and entering,” he said. “They wanted the men with the guns. They made it clear to my lawyer that any cooperation on my part would be very much appreciated.”

  “What did your lawyer say to that?”

  “He said that I would love to cooperate in any way possible, but that I had nothing to give them.”

  “What did they find in your house?”

  He looked at me for a moment. “They found some artifacts,” he said. “Apparently, they came from Vargas’s house.”

  “That’s all they found? No money?”

  “Just the artifacts, Alex. They were on my porch when I got home that night—the night everything happened.”

  “What did you do with them?”

  He looked back out at the street. “Well, you’ve got to understand a couple of things. First of all, I wasn’t thinking clearly. I had been held hostage, lying on the floor, at gunpoint…. Well, you know what I’m talking about, of course. You went through the same thing. By the time the police got done with us, it was what, after one in the morning? When I finally got home, there was this box next to my side door. To tell you the truth, and this is what my lawyer told the police chief today, I honestly had no idea where it had come from. Remember, Alex, all of this had just happened. And here’s this box by my door when I got home. I assumed someone had left it there that day, and I just hadn’t seen it. I don’t go out that side door too often. Or else they had left it that evening, when I was out. I certainly wasn’t thinking that it was stolen from Vargas’s house. It felt like I had just been there five minutes before. How would it even get to my house so quickly?”

  “So you open the box…”

  “Yes.”

  “You didn’t recognize the artifacts? I mean, you’d seen them before, right? That night, when he gave me the tour, you said you had already done it.”

  He let out a small laugh. “He gave me the tour, maybe three months ago, the last time we played at his house. Now that I’ve had time to think about it, yes, I suppose I should have recognized that stuff. It just didn’t stand out in my mind.”

  “I would have thought him having that stuff would have really bothered you.”

  He laughed again. “Alex, let me tell you something. All that Ojibwa stuff he had up there? It was essentially worthless. A couple of pieces were interesting, although they weren’t in very good shape. I suppose the museum at the community college would take them, but I’m sure they wouldn’t exhibit them. They were too damaged.”

  “You’re kidding me.”

  “You know the best part? You remember that oar he had in his case, right in the middle?”

  “Yeah, the one that looked really old,” I said. “With the carvings.”

  “That oar was not old, first of all. You take a wooden oar and you drop it in fresh water, it’s going to disintegrate. Salt water is a different story, but fresh water, after one year it’s going to look like that oar in his display case. And those carvings? Please, Alex. It looked like somebody had been horsing around with a knife, some kid maybe, or some old guy who was sitting around on his porch all summer. Sort of like me.” He smiled at that, and stopped talking long enough to take a l
ong sip of lemonade. “Of course, I don’t sit around ruining my oars with fake carvings.”

  “Was that oar in the package you got?”

  “I would have recognized that oar,” he said. “And gotten another good laugh at it. No, it was falling apart in that case, I remember. I don’t imagine you could move it.”

  “This is good,” I said. “I’m glad you’re telling me this.”

  “You know what’s really good,” he said. “Imagining that Vargas paid somebody a ton of money for that oar, thinking it was some sort of authentic Ojibwa relic.”

  “I see what you mean,” I said. “But what I’m thinking is, this proves you had nothing to do with this. Because why would you? The stuff’s worthless.”

  “Worthless in a material sense,” he said. “It did belong to somebody. But yes, you’re right. It would not have been worth stealing.”

  “And the fact that somebody would leave it at your house can only mean one thing…”

  He looked at me with those dark, careful eyes, waiting for me to finish my thought.

  “You were set up,” I said. “Whoever did this thought it would look incriminating to you, to have this stuff found on your premises.”

  He thought about that one, slowly shaking his head. “There was someone here again,” he said. “Last night.”

  “Do you know who it was?”

  “I was at the casino,” he said. “My neighbor saw somebody, right here on this porch. We all look out for each other, you understand.”

  “What was this person doing? Did your neighbor get a good look at him?”

  “No, he didn’t. He moved like a man, that’s all he knows. He said he was here one moment, and then gone. He just disappeared.”

  “Something strange is going on here,” I said. “Somebody’s playing games with us. With all of us.”

  “Cat and mouse,” he said. “And you want to know who the cat is, don’t you…”

  I looked him in the eye. “That’s the idea.”

  “I know why you’re doing this. Jackie is the best friend you have in this world.”

  “I’m doing it for all three of you.”

  He smiled. “It’s okay, Alex. No matter why, I want you to know how much I appreciate it.”

  “Don’t thank me until I get somewhere.”

  “I have no doubt you will,” he said. “Jackie talks about you all the time. He says you’re the most stubborn man who ever lived.”

  “The pot calling the kettle black, that’s what that is.”

  “Have you seen him since this morning?”

  “No, not yet. I’ll go there next.”

  “Tell him not to worry,” he said. “Tell him he has a good friend watching out for him.”

  “I’ll do that,” I said. I thanked him again, and then I left, going back out past the casino, and then west, out of town, into the woods, heading back home to Paradise.

  It was cat and mouse, like Gill said. And I had one more mouse to talk to.

  Chapter Twelve

  I tried Swanson again on the way to Paradise. His secretary must have recognized my voice, because she told me he was still in court and suggested maybe I’d like to leave a message this time instead of hanging up on her. I thought of saying something cute like, “Tell him it’s his worst nightmare,” but thought better of it. “Tell him Alex McKnight called,” I said. “Tell him I really need to speak to him as soon as possible.”

  “Do you wish to engage his services in some way?”

  “I don’t need his services,” I said. “Just some answers. Good day.”

  I hung up the phone, hoping she’d give him the message exactly as I said it. If he’s suddenly unavailable for the next few weeks, that’ll tell me a hell of a lot.

  I was about to dial Kenny’s number again, then remembered he probably hadn’t even heard my first message yet. I put the phone down, told myself again to take it easy. Getting too anxious wouldn’t help anybody.

  I kept telling myself that as I rolled into Paradise and stopped at Jackie’s place. I was surprised to see that it was open for business again, with the usual six or seven cars in the parking lot. The police invasion of that morning, just a few hours ago—if I hadn’t seen it myself, I wouldn’t have believed it.

  And Jackie himself, standing behind the bar mixing a drink, didn’t seem as if anything unusual had happened that day—until he looked at the fingerprint ink on his hands and tried to wipe it off with a towel.

  “Tell me something, Alex,” he said when he saw me. He was already putting a Canadian on the bar for me. “This gunk they use for the fingerprinting, why is it so hard to get off?”

  I sat on a stool at the bar. “Jackie, are you all right?”

  “What do they make it out of, Kryptonite?”

  “Jackie…”

  “If I use rubbing alcohol, will that work?”

  I felt like reaching over the bar and grabbing the front of his apron. “Jackie,” I said, slowly, “please tell me how you’re doing.”

  “I’m fine,” he said, finally looking me in the eye. “Don’t worry about me.”

  “Your son told me you went for a walk on the beach.”

  “Did me a world of good, too. I’m gonna have to start doing it every day.”

  “Tell me what happened,” I said.

  “Can we talk about this later?”

  “No, we can’t.”

  He threw the towel down on the bar. “What do you want me to tell you? You know what happened. They came with a search warrant, they took me in…”

  “What did they find here?”

  “Stolen goods,” he said. “They found stolen goods in my bedroom.”

  “Are you going to tell me what it was?”

  “Do I have to?”

  “Actually, I think I can guess,” I said. “I just saw Gill, and he told me about the Indian artifacts somebody left on his doorstep. Turns out they were pretty much worthless, which tells me one thing.”

  “Yeah, what’s that?”

  “It had to be a setup. Somebody took the money, Jackie, and they made it look like you and Bennett and Gill were behind it. In your case, I’m guessing they left some kind of thing that people would naturally associate with you. Maybe something Scottish. Am I right?”

  He looked at me for a moment. “Yes.”

  “What was it?”

  “It was a mug,” he said. “An old pewter mug.”

  “I think I remember it,” I said. “In Vargas’s display case. What, did it have something engraved on it?”

  “It was the Royal Navy flag,” he said. “And the Scapa Flow emblem on the other side. It’s an old naval base in Scotland.”

  “And would you have any reason to steal that kind of thing?”

  “It was pretty beat up,” he said. “I don’t imagine it would be worth much.”

  “Okay, then. That makes sense.”

  “If you say so.”

  “Why did you take it inside?” I said. “Didn’t you realize it came from Vargas’s house?”

  “I don’t know what I was thinking of, Alex. Obviously, I made a big mistake.”

  “What were you gonna do with it?”

  “I wasn’t sure,” he said. “I might have asked you at some point. I never got the chance.”

  “What did they ask you at the police station? I hope you didn’t say anything without your lawyer being there.”

  “Of course he was there. I’m not stupid. They told me we were looking at felonies, but that things would go a lot easier if I gave up the men who pulled off the heist. That’s the word your friend Chief Maven used, the ‘heist.’ He’s quite a character, isn’t he…. And he has such a fond regard for you.”

  “He should be looking for whoever really did this,” I said. “But I don’t think he’s going to. Did they set a trial date yet?”

  “No. My lawyer thinks they’ll hold it over our heads for a few days, try to get more information out of us.”

  “A few days…”
>
  “I won’t crack,” he said. “I’ll never rat out my accomplices.”

  “This isn’t a joke, Jackie. You could go to jail over this. I want to talk to a few people, starting with Mr. Swanson.”

  “I’m sorry I got you involved in this, Alex. Now I want you to just let it go. I don’t want you to go knocking people’s heads around.”

  “Too late,” I said. “Heads have already been knocked.”

  “Damn it, will you leave this alone, Alex? For once in your life, will you please just stay out of it?”

  I took a hit off the bottle and put it back down. “When you came to my cabin the other night,” I said, “and made me come out to play cards with you—why did you do that?”

  “Because I’m dumb as a turnip.”

  “You did it to help me, Jackie. I was in a funk and you took it upon yourself to help me get out of it, whether I wanted you to or not. Now I’m returning the favor. I’m gonna help you, like it or not. And there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”

  Later that afternoon, I called Swanson’s office again. I was sitting at the bar, using Jackie’s phone, so he got to hear me having it out with Swanson’s secretary. Swanson wasn’t in court anymore, she told me, but he was now having a late dinner meeting. Yes, she gave him my message. No, she didn’t know when he might call me back. He was a very busy man. The tone in her voice told me she knew I was obviously not too busy myself, if I had the time to be bothering her every hour. When I asked if he might possibly be available at his home number, she gave me the iciest “no” I had ever heard. And I’ve gotten more than my share of those before. That was the end of the conversation.

  When I hung up, Jackie stood there looking at the phone. “You’re really going after Swanson,” he said. “Based on what?”

  “If he had nothing to do with it, he’s got nothing to worry about,” I said. “I just want to ask him some questions.”

  “What, you think he’ll tell you if did have something to do with it?”

  “You know what the hardest part of police work is?”

  “Getting shot?”

  “Aside from that,” I said. “I mean as a general rule.”