by B. E. Scully
Martinez was less than three feet away from the Hound.
“Are you ready to help us get the Bone Man out of here, Hound?” Shirdon asked.
The Hound nodded.
“And will you hand your weapon to my partner there, so there’s no chance anyone gets hurt?”
The Hound looked at Martinez and jerked backward in surprise. He looked down at the gun in his hand as if unsure how it had gotten there, too. Then he held the weapon out to Martinez.
But the Hound was no hardened criminal who knew all the tricks.
Instead of turning the pistol around and handing it over safely, with the barrel pointed down, the Hound offered it up the same way he’d been holding it all along—clutching the handgrip, with the barrel pointing straight at Martinez.
Martinez reached out to grab the weapon. Shirdon spun around to face the officers in position on the embankment. Lieutenant Mickelson shouted, “Hold your fire!”
But it was too late.
Three blasts of ammunition shattered the silence of the forest cathedral. A flock of blackbirds burst from a tree in a great black cloud and disappeared over the tips of the pines.
The Hound sank to his knees and looked at his chest. The blood was already beginning to seep through the front of his threadbare coat. Then the Hound’s legs gave way and he fell onto his back among the moss-covered rocks and ancient blanket of pine needles.
Shirdon went over and knelt down beside him. She took one of his hands in both of hers and held it. It felt very, very cold.
“She’s here,” the Hound said, smiling up at the sky before closing his eye. “Manlike Woman is here. So I don’t think I’m ready to leave now. I think we’re both going to stay here a while…”
A soft rain began to fall, and the Hound’s voice blended into the mist until it disappeared up the mountain and was gone.
5
“Fifteen minutes, Lieutenant.”
Mickelson looked up from his cup of cold coffee and nodded at the officer in the doorway. Then he went back to the cup.
“I don’t envy you this one,” Martinez said. “Personally, I’d rather spend all day knocking on doors in the pouring down rain than fifteen minutes at a press conference. Guess that’s why I’ll never be in charge of anything.”
“Well, that’s one reason,” Shirdon said.
Martinez gave her a wry smile, but no one laughed. No one had been in much of a laughing mood for the past four days, ever since the bodies of both Sean Packard and Morris Falten had been air-lifted out of the forest and set down in the middle of a brand-new media firestorm. One man had been a mentally ill transient with a long history of arrests; the other had been a celebrated police detective with a long history of making arrests. Both funerals were expected to draw record crowds—mental health advocates and police watchdog groups were planning to turn out in droves to both honor the Hound’s life and protest the system that had ended it. One local reformer told a reporter that the Hound’s death could be “the catalyst to start talking about why the police increasingly view the people they’re meant to serve and protect as the enemy.”
In death, the Hound had achieved a notoriety and importance he’d never had while living.
Morris Falten’s afterlife was just as notable. Every politician and cop in the city was lining up to pay respects to one of the city’s fallen. Pro-police news sites and bloggers were using the incredible story behind Falten’s death as an emblem of “the increasingly dangerous elements that our police officers face on a daily basis.” The families of both men were trying their best to stay out of the whirlwind, but the twin funerals were like symbols of the city itself: inextricably locked together and against each other, like dead, twisted limbs sucking the life out of the very tree that sustains them.
Mickelson had been huddled with a P.R. rep all morning working out the details for the press conference. It was the third one the department had given since the Hound’s story had broken, but the more people learned about the case, the more questions they had. Martinez and Shirdon knew, though, that the neat and tidy public answers were far different from the messier, multiple private ones that don’t make it into speeches.
“Anything else from the coroner’s office yet?” Martinez asked.
Mickelson shook his head. “They still have more tests to run, and of course we’ll go over everything three times in a case this big. But we know Falten’s skull showed signs of multiple trauma consistent with Sean Packard’s account of him falling down that embankment.”
“Falling down” had been Mickelson’s go-to phrase even before the reporters showed up. Neither Shirdon nor Martinez had questioned Mickelson’s decision to leave what the Hound had told them about Manlike Woman out of the reports.
“There’s no way to verify that part of the story either way,” Mickelson told them. “Falten could have fallen accidentally—in fact, given the circumstances, it’s almost certain he did. And even if he was pushed, at this point there’s no way to verify by whom. Especially given that Sean Packard wasn’t exactly the most reliable witness.”
All of which was perfectly true. But by insisting on leaving such a crucial detail out of the reports, Mickelson had also made it perfectly clear that he wouldn’t have wanted to verify who might have pushed his partner over the embankment even if he could. According to the reports, the Hound just happened to have been at the bottom of an embankment on a desolate forest trial when Morris Falten slipped and fell, dying of the head injuries he’d sustained on the way down. As to why he’d then buried the body and gotten the hell out of town for eleven years, who could guess the motivations of a man with a mental illness as severe as Sean Packard’s?
So no official report made mention of an 18th century Native American woman showing up at just the right time on just the right remote mountain path to send Morris Falten to his death. Or to his almost-death, as the case might be.
“Most of the head wounds were consistent with his fall,” Martinez corrected. “All except for the huge crater above his right eye. You know, the one that most likely finished him off.”
Mickelson shook his head again. “Since the remains were skeletal and incomplete, there was no way to one-hundred-percent determine which injury killed him. But every report so far states the same thing—based on the position relative the other wounds, it’s possible that the forehead wound came from the fall.”
“Possible but not likely,” Shirdon said. “Not when comparing the depth and force of the forehead wound compared to the ones from the fall.”
She didn’t have to add that unlike the other injuries, the forehead wound indicated a large rock being forcefully brought down against the front of Falten’s head—intentionally brought down, as if one desperate man had crouched above another desperate man and made an even more desperate decision.
Some of Falten’s bones had been carried away through the years by enterprising animals digging around the Hound’s makeshift grave, but the skeleton was intact enough to know that in addition to his head wounds, Morris Falten had suffered a bad break in his lower left leg, and there might have been even more injuries the skeleton wasn’t giving up. Which meant that Falten would have been almost entirely helpless to stop the Hound from finishing off what Manlike Woman had set out to do.
The rusty pistol recovered from the Hound’s body matched the kind used to kill J.J. Wroe—obviously the “Ivy” the Hound had referenced in the forest. But neither Wroe nor Morris Falten would get any official justice now. The Hound was dead, and with him not only the truth of what had happened eleven years ago, but also the possibility of a trial and conviction. The only justice left was the kind that’s always eventually, inevitably in balance—the justice of the grave that claims us all.
Despite two search teams scouring the area for three miles in each direction, the bicycle Morris Falten had been riding on the day of his death was never found.
For the record, Falten’s death was classified as accidental. The Hound’s deat
h was still under review from internal affairs, but it was almost guaranteed to be ruled justified—after all, what’s more justified than a mentally ill man pointing a loaded weapon at a police officer after abducting three people at gunpoint?
There were already questions rumbling about why Mickelson hadn’t alerted anyone about meeting the Hound, not to mention why he’d put two other officers at risk, as well. But Shirdon and Martinez already knew why—the same reason he’d been keeping tabs on the Hound since the day he showed up at the station. The same reason he’d taken so many risks in order to finally find out where the Bone Man was before anyone else had the chance. And depending on what they would have found in that forest, how else might the story have turned out?
Mickelson stood up and adjusted his tie. He looked down at the notes lying on the table next to the coffee mug and frowned as if trying to decide something. Then he said, “I spent all morning working on this speech, but there’s nothing in here I really want to say. And there’s nothing in here that people want to hear, either. Not really.”
Shirdon and Martinez gave each other a glance. In all their years working with Mickelson, both detectives could count the number of times they’d seen him doubt himself or go against an official policy or decision. Mickelson was an honest, solid cop, but like a lot of people who rise up the bureaucratic ladder, he respected rules and systems. Whatever lines he’d crossed with Morris Falten were as dead and gone as the man himself. But it seemed as if digging up his old partner’s body had unearthed more than just bones for Mickelson.
“What do you really want to say, Dan?” Martinez asked. He could also count the number of times he’d used Mickelson’s first name, especially at the station. But formality seemed pointless at the moment, considering.
Mickelson frowned, still lost in thought. “I’d say something close to what a police officer named K.L. Williams once said—that on any given day, in any police department in the nation, fifteen percent of officers will do the right thing no matter what is happening. Another fifteen percent will abuse their authority at every opportunity. That leaves the remaining seventy percent. The key thing about that seventy percent—the majority of the force, don’t forget—those officers will go either way depending on who they’re working with—their fellow officers and their leaders.
“After decades of police work, I’m beginning to think those numbers apply pretty much across the board. Seventy percent of any given group of people are highly susceptible to the culture around them. If the culture is abusive or corrupt, they eventually become a part of the problem, no matter how good their intentions were when they started out. And for the police force especially, if command ranks are doing the wrong things, the lower ranks begin doing the wrong things, too. And in our job, the wrong things can cost people their lives. As the head of the homicide division, I take full responsibility for the culture of this department, good and bad. And I also take full responsibility for rewarding the good while committing more than ever to rooting out the bad. Beginning with myself.”
Shirdon and Martinez glanced at each other again, but Mickelson was no longer talking to either of them. He was talking to the people who most needed to hear what he really wanted to say.
The cop running interference for the press conference reappeared in the doorway. “Less than five minutes, sir.”
Mickelson nodded at the officer, then at Martinez and Shirdon. He straightened his already straight tie one more time and strode out of the room without looking back.
“He left his speech notes on the table,” Martinez said.
“I don’t think he’s going to need them.”
“I’ll admit, I never expected to hear something like that coming from Iceberg,” Martinez said. “The times they are a-changin’”
Shirdon glanced at the forsaken speech notes, crumpled the piece of paper into a ball, and slam-dunked it into the trash can. “The question is, for better or worse?”
Martinez shook his head. “I don’t know. I guess no one does until it’s all decided. And then, as soon as things settle down, everything starts changing all over again. Round and round it goes.”
“Kind of makes a person want to go and start a hazelnut farm way out in the middle of nowhere.”
Martinez laughed, long and deep. It was an unfamiliar sound around the department these days, and it was good to hear it return. “Don’t tell me you’re actually taking that crazy idea seriously.”
“You were, just a few days ago. Not ready to give up the blue brotherhood just yet?”
“It’s true what Mickelson said, about the majority of cops—hell, the majority of people—just going along with the crowd. It’s like that old saying about one rotten apple spoiling the whole bunch—rottenness spreads. And so if there’s always going to be the rotten apples at the bottom of the barrel, then there needs to be enough fresh ones in there to override them. Or semi-fresh ones, as the case may be for us old-timers.”
“How about some semi-fresh bananas in there, too, just to mix it up a bit?”
“You got it—hell, throw in some oranges and kiwis, too. Forget the blue brotherhood—let’s make it one big blue fruit basket.”
“The blueberry fruithood. Monte, that’s got to be one of the worst food metaphors I’ve ever heard.”
The laugh boomed out of the room and down the hall, following Mickelson to the press conference. “That’s why I let you do most of the talking. But what about you, Cass? Had enough of the fruits and nuts yet?”
“You know me, Monte. That’s my main diet. And since we’re taking this food metaphor all the way, I’ll add that I may start expanding my palette—gets dull after a while, eating the same old meal. And I’m definitely keeping the farm option open. In fact, I’m keeping all options open. I don’t even know what that means yet, but it feels pretty good just the same.”
The gazed at each other across the table as years of friendship filled the silence for them. Neither of them mentioned the story Shirdon had told the Hound in the forest, about Julia Kempson’s death, because neither of them needed to.
“You know, in all of this craziness with Morris Falten and the Hound, the press has forgotten all about Sherry Stratton,” Martinez finally said.
“Sometimes less press is the best press,” Shirdon told him. “I haven’t forgotten, though. The pre-trial hearing is what, two days away?”
Martinez nodded.
“You know what you’re going to say yet? About Stratton’s old lover saying it wasn’t her in the photo?”
“I’m going to say the truth.”
Shirdon nodded.
“If they ask me whether or not it’s Sherry Stratton in the photo,” Martinez continued, “I’m going to say the truth—I didn’t know then, and I don’t know now. That’s it. If Stratton’s defense lawyers know I visited her ex in prison, then they know why, which means they also know he said it wasn’t her. So if they ask me about that, I’ll tell them the truth then, too, including the fact that I sent all of the info from the interview to the D.A. But if they don’t ask, I won’t bring it up. That’s as simple as I can break it down in my own head.”
“And is that enough, Monte—for your own head? There’s always the worst case scenario of Stratton either making bail or having the charges dropped against her. She could get her daughter back…”
Shirdon didn’t need to continue with the worst case scenario. Those grim statistics greeted them every day they came to work.
“No, it’s not enough,” Martinez answered. “Nothing’s ever enough when it comes to a dead kid, or a dead mentally ill guy who just wanted to do the right thing. Nothing’s ever enough when somebody ends up dead because of situations that shouldn’t even exist. But it’s enough to keep my conscience as clean as it can be in this life we’ve chosen or made or whatever you’d call it. And that’s enough to at least keep me getting up and going forward every day. At least I hope it is.”
“I think it is,” Shirdon said. “‘Cause you’re o
ne hell of a semi-fresh apple, Monte.”
“And you’re one hell of a banana, Shirdon, brown spots and all. And now I think we’ve both earned the right to get the hell out of the produce department for the day. Seems like I haven’t been home for more than six hours in a row for weeks, and most of those are spent trying to catch up on lost sleep.”
“You’re right, partner. Let’s get out of here before Jen starts thinking we ran off to start a hazelnut farm or some crazy idea like that.”
* * *
The tiny scrap of fur winding around Shirdon’s feet howled up at her with a volume three times its size. It was still a shock to come home at the end of the day and find not her usual quiet, empty apartment but four rooms filled with some mysterious live wire energy masquerading as a small cat.
The police had eventually found the Hound’s makeshift camp in the lumber yard, where Scruff the Cat had been huddled beneath a piece of ply-board, patiently awaiting his person’s return. The cat was taken to a local animal shelter, and any of the Hound’s possessions that didn’t get taken into evidence were earmarked for his sister. When she came to the station to pick them up, there was only one small cardboard box waiting for her.
“I know it seems horrible,” she’d told Martinez and Shirdon as she picked through the old newspaper articles and scraps of paper—the Hound’s lifetime of treasures, now worthless junk. “But all of these things that were so important to my brother just remind me of how sad his life had become. I just don’t want to remember him this way.”
She didn’t want the cat, either.
“Guess all this will end up in the trash,” Martinez said. “The cat will probably get adopted right away, though, since he’s still a kitten.”
