Wash Her Guilt Away (Quill Gordon Mystery Book 2)

by Michael Wallace

  A motor roared in front of them.

  “He’s got the gas motor going,” Peter said.

  With a more powerful engine propelling it, the small boat came to life and began plowing through the water at a much higher speed, sending a substantial wake from both its sides. The wind blew a wisp of smoke from the motor to the following boat, and the three men in it could smell the exhausted fuel.

  Gordon looked at the electric motor on his boat and shook his head, pointing to an indicator.

  “Fast as it’ll go,” he said. “Can’t catch him now.”

  Meanwhile, Don’s boat was almost skipping over the water as it headed toward the bridge. He looked back and forth between Lilly on the bridge and his pursuers falling farther behind him. He was looking back at the pursuers’ boat when his reached the bridge.

  There was considerable debate later on as to whether Don did it deliberately or simply forgot to duck. The coroner’s report said the boat was going nearly 25 mph when it reached the bridge, with Don’s head a foot higher than the bottom of the structure. The resulting thwack was both emphatic and sickening.

  With the collision, the boat veered sharply to its right and ran into the pilings underneath the bridge. It stalled there, its motor trying in vain to propel it against the immovable wooden objects.

  As the boat jerked sharply to the right, Don’s body toppled out on the left and landed in the water.

  His head, cleanly severed by the bottom of the bridge, bounced back ten feet and hit the river with a plop. It floated on the surface temporarily, and Lilly dropped to his knees just in time to see it float directly under him. His body began to heave, and within seconds, he vomited into the river.

  Gordon threw the anchor of the second boat into the water and it came to a stop just above the bridge. They could see a dent in the wood where Don’s head had hit it at high speed.

  Gordon turned to his right, leaned over the edge of the boat, and threw up. Rogers turned to the opposite side of the boat and did likewise. Only Peter, his stomach hardened by years of operating-room gore, was able to hold himself together. When his boat mates were done and had sat upright again, he said:

  “Well, detective, I don’t think you’ll be needing a doctor to pronounce this one dead.”

  Interlude: Saturday July 15

  (From the Lava County Beacon-Journal)

  Lawmen Turn Out in Force

  To Say Farewell to Veteran

  Detective Harry Rogers

  By CYNTHIA HENLEY

  Beacon-Journal Staff Writer

  RED GULCH — If you wanted to commit a crime in Lava County, last night would have been the time to do it. Nearly every law enforcement officer from every agency was packed into the banquet room of the Holiday Inn downtown to send off Detective Harry Rogers, who retired June 30 after three decades with the Lava County Sheriff’s Department.

  Three hundred fifty people filled the room to capacity, and as tends to happen when law enforcement officers get together, plenty of stories were told, both at the tables and by the many speakers paying tribute.

  “We’ve lost one of our best ones,” said sheriff Bud Baker, at the end of the evening. “Good detectives, like good wine, get better with time, and Harry will be hard to replace.”

  Rogers joined the sheriff’s department after leaving the Army, in which he served as a military policeman, in 1965. Lava County was a different place back then.

  “The sheriff’s department was half the size it is now, and we still didn’t have enough to do,” he said in an interview before the event. “When I came in as a patrolman, the county hadn’t had a murder in five years, The whole drug thing was just getting started and hadn’t reached us yet. Nobody had ever heard of a meth lab. It was a simpler, happier time.”

  Asked about his plans for retirement (he’s not yet 54 and in good shape), Rogers said it was still up in the air. “I’m going to take it easy the rest of the year, and we’ll see after that,” he said. “I’m kind of looking at several things right now.”

  Rogers started out patrolling the eastern part of Lava County and made a name for himself before the end of his first year. When the Cascade Bank in Muirfield was robbed at gunpoint, he was 14 miles away but guessed that the holdup men would head east toward Red Gulch.

  Driving at high speed on back country roads, he reached the state highway just in time to see the car described by witnesses and radioed ahead. Ten minutes later, a roadblock set up after his radio message stopped the desperados and recovered the loot.

  He was promoted to sergeant in 1970 and assigned to the detective bureau in 1975, serving in that capacity for the next 20 years. Numerous speakers talked about the cases he’d handled over that time.

  Red Gulch Police Captain Bill Dixon, who worked alongside Rogers at the sheriff’s department in the early days, recalled how Rogers had solved a string of burglaries that had been plaguing the town of Dobler.

  “Nobody could see the pattern, but Harry figured there had to be one,” Dixon said. “Finally he stopped by the offices of the Clarion, a weekly paper that used to cover that area. He looked through six months of back issues and compared it with a list of victims. In each case, the house that was burglarized was one where the owner had been in the gossip section of the paper just before, announcing a trip. The next time he saw an item like that, he staked out the house and caught the two men who had been doing the burglaries.”

  Another tribute came from fellow sheriff’s detective Jim Sutton, who told the tale of how Rogers had obtained a confession in less than a minute from a suspect in the rape and murder of a woman.

  The woman had apparently been followed home to the Red Gulch suburb of Walton after drinking at the Dew Drop Inn, and all indications were that two men had been involved in her fatal attack. Two men who had been seen together at the bar earlier were brought in for questioning and were in separate rooms.

  “Rogers and I were going in to talk to them, when Rogers stopped and took a file folder off a desk in an empty office. I asked him what he was doing, and he said it might come in handy.

  “We walk into the first interview room, and Rogers opens up the file folder and looks through it without saying a word. Then he looks up at the suspect.

  “ ‘Well, Clyde,’ he says, ‘we have a lot of forensic evidence from the crime scene in this file, and your friend is singing like the Vienna Boys’ Choir. Anything you want to tell us before it’s too late?’

  “And the guy loses it. ‘It was Jeff’s idea,’ he says. ‘He was the one who wanted to follow her home. She was never supposed to be killed.’

  “After we left, Rogers put the file back where he got it, and I slipped over to take a look. It was a bunch of reports about car burglaries on the other end of the county.”

  The audience roared with laughter.

  Sheriff’s Captain Jack La Dow brought up Rogers’ last big case, the murder of a woman staying at Harry’s Riverside Lodge near Eden Mills in May.

  “He definitely saved his best work for the end,” La Dow said. “I sent him up alone on what I thought was a routine domestic violence killing, and it was a mess. The victim was strangled in a cabin locked from the inside. It was surrounded by snow, with no footprints leading in or out. The crime scene was completely compromised by the people who discovered it, and the medical evidence was at odds with eyewitness testimony. A lot of people would have called it an impossible case.

  “And Harry figured it out in just three days. Tell us, Harry, how did you do it?”

  Rogers stood up, walked to the microphone, and held up his hands in a “what do I know” gesture, before replying:

  “Like Fats Waller says: It’s easy when you know how.”

  Epilogue: Wednesday May 15, 1996

  IT WAS A GLORIOUS SPRING DAY in Paradise Valley, and the six people sitting at a table on the deck at Harry’s at 5:30 in the afternoon were savoring it. The temperature had topped at 83 two hours earlier, and was now in the high 70s. Not a cloud
was in the sky, and a gentle breeze wafted an earthy perfume of fresh-cut lawn and pine needles through the air.

  “What a difference a year makes,” Peter said, looking quizzically at his club soda with a twist.

  “It’s what I was expecting last year,” Gordon said, twisting the maraschino cherry in his 7-Up by the stem. “Better late than never.”

  “Well now, the weather gods would be smiling on you, Mr. Gordon,” said Johnny. “It’s supposed to stay nice all through the weekend.” He took a small sip of his bourbon. “And with any luck we might get the morning spinner fall that Eden River’s known for.”

  “I’d have no problem with that,” Gordon said.

  “What’s a spinner fall?” asked Cynthia Henley, holding the stem of a glass of white wine.

  “It’s a point after an insect hatch where the insects start dying in the air and falling to the water,” Gordon said. “It’s like laying out a smorgasbord on the surface of the river. The fish go crazy.”

  “I’ve been learning a lot more about that,” Rogers said, his hand wrapped around a pint of beer. “I was never much of a fisherman before, but now that I’m spending my time up here, I’m starting to get interested. Maybe I’ll break down and buy a fly rod. Could I hire you to show me how to use it, Johnny?”

  “Perhaps we could work out something in trade. Yes, I’m sure we could.”

  Rogers finished his beer and set it down on the table.

  “So how about the rest of the people who were here a year ago” asked Sharon. “Anybody heard from them?”

  They looked at each other, and Gordon led off.

  “I saw Charles Van Holland at a restaurant in the City last month. He was with an attractive woman of about 50, and she seemed to be very attentive and interested in what he was saying.”

  “We always are when we have a prospect,” said Cynthia.

  “Is that the voice of experience I hear speaking?” Peter said.

  Cynthia sighed. “I’ve been going out for four months with a legislative aide to one of the state senators. I met him a few months after I started working for the Sacramento Bee. He’s really sweet, but he works long hours, and I’m afraid I’ve found out more about Central Valley water districts than I ever wanted to know. We’ll see if it works out.”

  “Speaking of seeing if it works out,” Peter said, “I ran into Drew Evans in a bar in Danville back in February. That was before I stopped drinking last month. He was with a pretty sultry redhead and neither of them was wearing a ring. Been married less than a year and already looking for greener pastures.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Rogers said. “People change, but not that often and not that much. He’ll have a day of reckoning with his rich wife soon enough.”

  “And land on his feet with another woman who’ll think it will be different with her,” Gordon said.

  “More than likely,” Rogers replied, looking at his empty beer glass.

  Sharon put her hand on his shoulder. “Would you like one more, darling?”

  He looked up at her and smiled. “Thanks, honey, but could you get me a Coke instead?”

  She nodded and took his glass. “Anyone else?”

  Peter downed the last of his club soda.

  “I’ll have another,” he said. “You know, it’s not so bad having a clear head once you get used to it.”

  Sharon went inside, and Gordon turned to the group.

  “I got a postcard from Stuart and Rachel on Monday. They’re in Venice, checking out cathedrals and galleries. She’s expecting in November, and I guess she isn’t going to be running for State Assembly after all.”

  There was a moment of silence while the group digested the news.

  “Wow,” said Cynthia. “She really drank the Kool-Aid.”

  “Maybe not altogether,” he said. “There’s some talk she might run for Alameda County Board of Supervisors in four years. I don’t know how much there is to it.”

  “And how about our other expecting couple?” Johnny asked.

  Rogers shifted in his chair. “Eldon and April are getting married next month. The baby’s due in November.”

  “Eldon!” said Peter. “I didn’t think you had it in you.”

  “He’s a good man,” Rogers said. “I expect him to make detective in a few years. And be a fine one. He has a feel for law enforcement. And April’s already joined his church.”

  “Give her six years,” Peter said. “She’ll be the terror of the PTA. Oh, God. It just occurred to me. She’ll be changing her name from April Flowers to April Lilly. Can’t be helped, I guess.”

  “And what about you and Sharon?” Cynthia said.

  Rogers sighed. “My divorce should be final in July. I don’t think it would be right to do anything before then, but once I’m free, I just might ask her if she’ll have me.”

  Gordon swallowed the last of his 7-Up and rose.

  “I’m sure she’ll be surprised,” he said, and everyone laughed. “Excuse me. I think I’ll get another one after all. Be right back.”

  He walked through the sliding glass door and across the empty dining room to the lounge, where Sharon was alone behind the bar. Surveying the empty bar, he realized it was the first time he had seen it without a fire in the fireplace. Sharon looked up.

  “You want another drink?” she asked.

  “That and maybe something else.” She set down the glass she was filling and looked at him. “An explanation,” he added.

  “I’ll do what I can.”

  “There was one thing that was still bothering me when I left a year ago.” He looked over his shoulder to make sure they were still alone. “The witches’ coven. I couldn’t help thinking it was related to Harry’s somehow, but I couldn’t figure it out. Then a couple of days after I got home, I was sitting at my desk when it hit me.”

  “A flash of inspiration,” she said. “I’ve heard of those, but I rarely get one.”

  “Actually, I was looking at my calendar.”

  She stopped working and her face became more serious.

  “My first night here, you and I were standing out on the deck talking, and you mentioned that Opening Day weekend had been so busy you were barely able to get out for a night with the girls on Sunday. I think that was how you put it. When I was looking at the calendar in my home office, I realized what day Sunday of Opening Day weekend was. It was April 30th.”

  Sharon swallowed but said nothing.

  “As I’m sure you’re aware, there are two nights of the year that are supposed to be particularly conducive to calling out the spirits. Halloween, or All Hallows’ Eve, is the one everybody knows about. But the other one is exactly six months later, on the eve of May Day. That’s Walpurgis Night, April 30th. That had to be when the Sabbath was held in that glen Peter and I found.

  “Nothing illegal about it, of course, and depending on your theology, or lack thereof, maybe nothing really wrong with it. But I have to know, and I won’t take it any further. Am I right, and were you there?”

  “You’re right,” she said after a pause.

  “Thank you. I don’t like loose ends.”

  She filled a glass with 7-Up, added a cherry and handed it to him.

  “On the house,” she said. “For being smart and discreet.”

  He thanked her, took the glass, and turned to go, but stopped and faced her again.

  “I don’t want to push this too far, but given the history of Harry’s, with the curse and all that, might I ask if you cast a spell that night? Just between us, of course.”

  She sighed. “I don’t know if you’re perceptive or a good guesser, and I don’t particularly like your terminology. You call it casting a spell, but it’s really not much different from what the Christians call prayer. It’s expressing a hope for something and asking The One Who Has All Power to give a sign or some guidance. If that’s what you mean, yes, I did.

  “When I married Don, I hadn’t worked with him, so there was a side of him I hadn’t really
seen. Watching that come out, I started to have some concerns. Don was a weak man and given to cutting corners. The ‘spell’ you refer to was nothing more than asking for some guidance or a sign as to what Don’s real character was, and whether I should spend the rest of my life with him.”

  She laughed bitterly. “I guess that was a case of be careful what you ask for.”

  “Does Rogers know about your … activities?”

  “Don’t be silly. Every marriage has its secrets, and we will be married. I know that as much as I know anything. But he’s not like Don. He’s a strong and upright man, the man I deserve, and I’m going to do everything I can to make him happy and keep troubles from him. That’s all he needs to know.”

  Gordon took a sip of his drink as he considered her answer. “I’m not sure I agree with that,” he said. “If it was me, just saying, I think I’d want to know something like that by the fourth date.”

  She frowned.

  “All right,” he said. “I promised I wouldn’t press it any farther. But just one more thing. Mrs. Maurillo, the high school principal?”

  “A charter member,” Sharon said. “But her husband’s death was really an accident. At least I think so. I suppose I don’t really know what sort of guidance she asked for.”

  Gordon’s face must have registered something, because Sharon immediately became peremptory.

  “You’re a nice guy, Gordon, but you’ve been asking too many questions. Better stop now before you get turned into a toad.”

  “I’m going straight outside.”

  When he sat down at the table on the deck, Cynthia turned to him.

  “We’ve all been talking about love,” she said, “and the doctor here has been telling us about a nurse he’s been seeing. She must be a remarkable woman because she’s got him to quit drinking. But you haven’t shared. Are you in love now? Are you seeing anybody?”