A Kettle of Hawks (The Birdwatcher Series Book 3)

by European P. Douglas

  Chapter 32

  Sarah and Delgado drove to the North Precinct in Baltimore to talk to Ray Pallister. They’d been to see Eddy Hobbs already this morning and he couldn’t account for himself at the time of Tusk’s murder. He was shifty and hostile but Sarah also sensed he was afraid. Delgado had agreed on this when they discussed it after the interview.

  “Scared of what though?” Sarah asked, “Going to jail or something else?”

  “He’s hiding something, whatever it is, that’s what he’s afraid of,” Delgado replied.

  Ray Pallister was sitting alone in the interview room when they arrived. Once more he had opted not to have a lawyer with him. So far, this was the only thing that linked all the suspects. None of them had availed of any legal counsel at all, refusing it flat out each time like they had been instructed to. When the preamble of the meeting was done for the sake of the recording Sarah decided to push Pallister on this point again.

  “Why is it that you and all of the other suspects in this case have refused to have a lawyer with you during questioning?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” Ray answered. He was pale and jittery and looked like he hadn’t slept well in a very long time.

  “You are aware that having a lawyer present helps your case aren’t you?” Delgado asked.

  “I’m innocent,” Ray stammered, “So I don’t need my case to get any better.”

  “Where were you between midnight and seven am yesterday morning?” Sarah asked, pressing ahead with the interview proper.

  “I was at home, in bed,” Ray answered

  “The whole time?”

  “Yes.”

  “Just to clarify,” Delgado interjected, “You were in bed asleep for those full seven hours?” Ray looked worried then, like he’d been caught in a lie or said something to incriminate himself.

  “Well, I probably wasn’t asleep all that time but I was in bed.”

  “Alone?” Sarah asked. Ray looked at her like this was somehow an offensive question.

  “Yes,” he muttered looking away.

  “Were you using your phone while in bed?” Delgado asked. Ray thought about this and then answered,

  “Yes, I was playing a game before I went to sleep.”

  “Oh yeah,” Delgado said, seeming enthused now, “I do that myself, what game was it?”

  “Just a chess simulator.”

  “Were you playing against someone else or just against the phone?”

  “Against someone,” he said.

  “Who?” Sarah asked hotly.

  “I don’t know, it’s randomly assigned, you just see a username so there’s no way of knowing who they are or even where they are in the world,” Ray said. Sarah was about to say ‘Maybe you don’t but we can find out!’ when Delgado said,

  “Is there a chat feature on the game?” Ray nodded. “Do you talk to the other players?”

  “Sometimes,” Ray said, “But it’s just things like; nice move’ or ‘I’ve got you now’ kind of things.” Delgado nodded understandingly.

  “We will be looking into that,” he said, “So if there is anything you want to tell us about the messages, now is the time.” Ray looked in thought again and then said,

  “I don’t know.”

  “What don’t you know?” Sarah asked.

  “There’s an inbox, outside the individual games,” Ray sounded very flustered now, “I don’t know what’s in there, I never look!”

  “How do you know they are there then?”

  “There’s a notification icon on them,” Ray said, he was sweating now.

  “Why don’t you look at those messages?” Delgado asked calmly.

  “I did before, but they are always just spam so I stopped looking at them.”

  “When?” Sarah asked and Ray looked at her with raised eyebrows, “When did you stop checking them?”

  “Oh, it was a long time ago, maybe a year ago?”

  “Okay,” Delgado said, making a note of this in the file.

  “Do you have a regular delivery guy who calls to your apartment?” Sarah asked after a short pause while Ray drank some water.

  “There’s a guy called Tony who delivers to the building. People just text him an order, could be anything, and he delivers pretty fast.”

  “When you say it could be anything?” Sarah pressed.

  “Take out, groceries, booze,” Ray clarified.

  “Anything illegal?” Delgado asked.

  “Not that I know of, but haven’t used him all that much so don’t know,” Ray said, seeming more happy with this line of questions.

  “You have his number in your phone then?” Sarah said. Ray nodded, “Can you write it down for us and do you know his surname?”

  “I don’t know his surname,” Ray said, shaking his head as he flicked through his phone for Tony’s number and then wrote it down on a sheet Delgado slid over to him. “He lives in the apartment complex across the street though so I don't think you’ll have any trouble finding him if you need to talk to him.”

  “Thanks,” Delgado said, taking back the paper.

  “Now, back to you Mr Pallister,” Sarah said, “Are you a drug taker, even on an occasional basis?” Now he looked terrified again and sweat re-emerged on his forehead.

  “I...;” he said, his mouth hanging open a moment before he went on. “I smoke weed a couple of times a year.” This was a huge admission for him, both agents could see that.

  “Who supplies you with this weed?” Sarah went on.

  “I don’t want to get anyone in trouble,” he said squirming.

  “A petty rap for selling a few ounces of weed is a lot less than the possibility of being charged with murder,” Sarah said trying to frighten him. They had no cause at all to think they could charge Ray with murder at this point. It worked though.

  “It’s my cousin, he grows in his basement but only enough for him and his friends and the odd time me. He's not a dealer, he doesn’t even charge me for it!” Ray blurted out and then he broke down in tears. Sarah and Delgado exchanged glances and then sat back waiting for Ray to get it out of his system.

  “If you’re telling the truth about your cousin, he doesn’t have anything to worry about. We just need to check his whereabouts on the night of the murders too,” Delgado said, feeling this would soften the emotions running through Ray.

  “Ha, I can tell you what he was doing on the night of the murders, or any other night,” Ray scoffed. “He was sitting at home smoking weed and playing video games with his friends. They only ever leave the place to go to the store.”

  The three of them sat a moment after Ray said this. It was a blind alley as far as Sarah was concerned. She took a photograph from her inside jacket pocket and held it against her chest for a moment weighing up whether to show it to Ray or not. Delgado glanced at her and saw what was in her hand but he didn’t know what it was. He looked quizzically at her.

  Though she knew it was the wrong thing to do, Sarah made up her mind and planted the photograph down on the table facing Ray.

  “Have you ever seen this man before?” she asked. Ray looked down and at the same time Delgado saw the photo and recoiled in horror, he reached down and snapped it up but not before Ray had seen it. He looked up at the agents surprised by what had just taken place.

  “Have you seen him?” Sarah asked but Delgado was getting out of his chair now,

  “You don’t have to answer that Mr Pallister, I’m sorry that is from the wrong file, you can ignore that picture and question,” he said, pushing Sarah’s arms now too. “Can I see you outside a moment agent Brightwater?” he said. Sarah looked at Ray for another second and then got up and followed her partner to the door.

  “We will be right back,” Delgado said and they stepped outside.

  As soon as they were outside the door, Sarah snatched the picture back out of Delgado’s hands.

  “What the hell was that?” he demanded, “You know we can't try to link these cases like that.”


  “I needed to know!” Sarah shouted back, thankfully the corridor was empty but she knew someone nearby would be able to hear them.

  “It’s not worth it, Sarah,” he said. “You’ll get us put off the case acting like this and then where will we be?”

  “Right where we are now!” she retorted. “We’ve got nothing on this case!” Sarah was more annoyed that Ray Pallister’s eyes and face betrayed no hint of having ever seen Spalding before. It had been a stupid move on her part and one that hadn’t yielded anything but could still land her in hot water. Why had she done it?

  “We’re going to get there Sarah, each time is a step forward,” Delgado said in a softer voice. Perhaps he could understand her frustrations though he’d only had a small taste of what she’d been through the last two years. He didn’t feel any of the same pressures she did.

  “Let’s go back in there, you say you made a mistake and we’ll wrap this up. We can go through his phone for messages on the chess game app and check out his cousin and see where we are then?” Delgado suggested. Sarah nodded, there wasn’t much else she could do right now.

  Chapter 33

  Megan hadn’t had any luck in talking to Ellie about the FBI or State psychologists since that night they were all kept up by her insistence someone was in the house. Each time Megan would even try and broach the subject, Ellie would shut it down immediately, saying she didn’t trust those people and would find someone to talk to on her own when she was ready. Megan tried to tell her it probably wasn’t best to let these things fester inside of her but when Ellie said she wasn't ready and the tears welled up in her eyes again, Megan dropped it and took her into her arms.

  This wasn’t the only reason Megan gave Ellie an easier ride on this. She felt guilty, guilty that she was doing so much better than Ellie was, and being able to see her own recovery at the same time. In a way, trying to ease Ellie’s pains were forcing Megan to confront her own, to allow memories to resurface and to feel good about the plan they had hatched that led to their escape.

  A couple of days after the night-time waking, Ellie and Megan were sitting in the back room as the sun filtered in through the glass doors. Both were reading, Megan a novel and Ellie a magazine. There was no shortage of either in the house and every time Mrs Stanver went out she came back with a handful of magazines and some books. Her way of trying to keep Megan inside as much as possible.

  Megan felt Ellie’s eyes on her and looked over the top of the book,

  “You okay?” she asked.

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” Ellie said. “I was just thinking that you seem to get on well with Agent Brightwater.” Megan didn’t know where Ellie was going with this and she couldn’t read anything in her expression right now.

  “Yes, I think she’s nice,” Megan said, and then hoping to keep Ellie on side added, “For an FBI agent.” Ellie smiled at this.

  “Did you talk to her about being in the farmhouse?” Ellie asked.

  “I did,” Megan replied, closing her book and putting it down on the chair beside her. “I told her everything I could remember.”

  “You trust her then?”

  “I don’t know if I’d say I trust her, but she comes across to me as different from the rest of them. She has a personal reason to want Spalding and it shows, I think.”

  “She wants him bad?” Ellie asked.

  “Wouldn’t you? He killed her mother,” Megan said.

  “Does she want him dead?” The look on Ellie’s face was one Megan had not seen before and though she wouldn’t have been able to describe it, she got a very cold feeling from it indeed. She had an image of the three of them, Megan. Ellie and Sarah Brightwater, in a muddy field somewhere burying the dead body of Dwight Spalding. She shuddered at the idea.

  “Well, I don’t know about that. Maybe deep down she does, but I think she wants to see him in jail first of all or even just not able to do what he has been doing.” Ellie nodded at this answer like she was in agreement. She said nothing then and looked out the window for a moment before turning back to Megan.

  “Do you think Spalding contacts her?” she asked.

  “Agent Brightwater?”

  “Yes, I don’t mean they might be in cahoots or anything like that, but do you think he sends her messages and taunts her about her mother as he knows she is trying to track him down.” Now it was Megan’s turn to be silent for a moment. Should she tell Ellie about the message from Spalding and the message for Sarah and Tyler? Ellie was still looking at her and those forlorn tired eyes made Megan’s decision.

  “He has been in contact with her,” Megan said.

  “She told you?” Ellie said, looking very surprised.

  “You have to promise me, Ellie, if I tell you something you can never, ever repeat it.” She looked Ellie in the eyes and at that moment, with the hint of salacious gossip in the air Ellie looked more herself than Megan had ever seen. It felt good to witness there was some life still within her and it only encouraged Megan on further.

  “A few weeks ago I got a phone call from Spalding...;” Megan lifted her hands to stop Ellie’s jumping in. “Wait, wait, wait a minute and listen to the whole thing first,” she said. Ellie nodded, but looked upset at what she’d heard already. Megan felt she better get to the point again quickly to try revive her.

  “He gave me a list of coordinates and told me I had to meet Sarah and a journalist and tell them Spalding wanted them to go there,” Megan said.

  “Why? What was there?” Ellie asked, her interest outweighing her hurt again thankfully

  “I don't know what was there,” Megan said and she felt silly now starting a story she didn’t know the end of.

  “Spalding didn’t tell you?” Ellie asked, and Megan shook her head, “And Agent Brightwater didn’t tell you, or this journalist?”

  “No, I just had to pass on the message and then I was done. They took it from there,” Megan said as she thought back on how willing she’d been to be left in the dark back then. It was different now and she felt what Ellie was feeling, a thirst to know more.

  “Where did the coordinates lead to?” Ellie asked.

  “Some woods upstate I think,” Megan replied wondering if she still had the paper she had written them down on. She had re-written the message in a neater hand for Sarah and Tyler, but she couldn’t remember what she’d done with the scrawled note she took at the time she was on the phone.

  “I wonder what it could have been,” Ellie said, “I didn’t see anything about a find in the news or online.”

  “Wait here,” Megan said, “I’ll be right back.”

  Megan rushed up to her room and looked around her bedside locker and under the bed for the paper. She knew it wouldn’t be on the floor as it had been vacuumed on an almost daily basis since she was home but still she looked. She checked the frame of the bed and even lifted the mattress in case somehow it could have gotten wedged in there but still no sign. She stood in the middle of the room looking about. What the hell had she done with it? She tried to run back through the scene in her head but it wouldn't come like a normal memory but only in patches like a patchy satellite image.

  She had written it out again at her desk, she recalled and went there. Picking up the notebook she opened it on the last page to see if the page was still in there but had no joy here either. Megan searched the whole desk and everything on it and came up empty again. Then, out of her deep childhood memory came a trick she had learned years ago from her father. She opened the notebook on the top page of the pad, then took a pencil at an angle of forty-five degrees and rubbed lightly over the paper.

  To her joy the last message written on the removed page began to become clear in the indentation of that writing from before. The coordinates came clear and neat just as she'd given them to Sarah and Tyler. She ripped the new page from the pad and then, grabbing her laptop, she then ran back down to the back room where Ellie was waiting.

  “What are you doing?” Ellie asked when Megan cam
e rushing in and put the laptop down on the coffee table.

  “I have the coordinates,” Megan said brandishing the paper, “We’re going to look them up and see exactly where it is.” Ellie edged closer to be able to see the screen as Megan called up a map of the US.

  It wasn’t as easy a task as they thought it would be. Neither of them had ever entered coordinates into a map before and it wasn't immediately obvious how to do this. Any map experience either had was simply telling google where they wanted to go and watching the directions on the screen as they drove there. In the end they had to search the web to find out how to do it and then Megan finally entered the numbers as Ellie read them out.

  The map moved to the point and they both stared at the screen blankly. It was just a green patch with no markings at all.

  “Zoom out a bit,” Ellie suggested and Megan did this. “Ok, that’s better,” she said, “Looks like a forest.”

  Megan recalled Tyler saying it was a forest in the bar when they met.

  “Yeah, Tyler said that.”

  “Who’s Tyler?” Ellie asked, looking sharply at Megan suddenly.

  “Tyler Ford, the journalist I mentioned. I’m surprised he hasn’t been in contact with you about our story.”

  “I think he has,” Ellie said, “But I’ve been ignoring things like that.”

  “You should meet him, Megan winked, “He’s a fine thang!” They laughed at this and then Ellie looked back to the map.