The St. Paul Conspiracy

by Roger Stelljes

  The three men went silent. Lyman had given Mac a lot to think about. If PTA had the juice to kill Jones, Daniels, and the senator, they had the resources and people to accomplish it. They’d have the resources and people to stymie them if they tried to go after the books, to look for some financial irregularity, which was the only reasonable supposition as to why to take out Jones. If the auditors, board, SEC, or anyone else didn’t find it, how would Mac? What resources would have to be expended to get at the records? What damage would their pursuit do to the department? Would the department even let them go after PTA? Mac’s theory looked good when he was mind mapping. But the devil is in the details. How could he go after PTA, without knowing what he was looking for?

  The enormity of the task hit Mac. He got up and walked to the back window and looked down at the back parking lot. You think you’re so fucking smart.

  Uncle Shamus, sensing what Mac was thinking, ended the silence, “What are you going to do?”

  Good question. But Mac had never backed down from anything in his life, and he wasn’t about to now. “Lyman, with all due respect for your view of Ted Lindsay and company, first thing tomorrow I’m going to start taking a look at PTA and a second look at Jones, Daniels, and the senator.” Mac hoped he wouldn’t be alone. He would have to convince Riles and the others if he was going to have any chance.

  “You have any idea what you’re looking for?” Lyman said.

  “No. The only thing I can think of is a financial issue of some sort. Why else take out Jones. But…”

  “But what,” Lyman asked.

  Mac met his eyes and held them.

  “I’m thinking Jones was killed because she found something they didn’t want her to find. Maybe she left it behind or maybe she shared it with Daniels, so maybe that’s where we look.”

  “Well, good luck to you. But one thing,” Lyman asked.

  “What’s that?”

  “If you do find anything that harms the company, you let me know. That’s the quid pro quo I want for speaking with you tonight,” Lyman stated. “I want to know. There are thousands of employees at PTA. If you’re right, Lindsay ordered it. That could literally kill the company. So, I need to know so I can inform those who remain on the board. I may be gone from there, but I care about the company. Its health is important to this city.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “Mac, why don’t you get back to the bar?” Uncle Shamus suggested.

  “Yeah, okay. Shamus, I need to use Patrick’s Room.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “I need to get going as well,” Lyman added and gave Mac one last look. “I’ll hear from you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good luck,” Lyman said as he shook Mac’s hand. Shamus opened the door and patted Mac on the back as he walked out. Lyman would wait a few minutes and leave on his own down the back steps.

  Kraft had loitered thirty or so feet away from the door to the office. With his back to the wall, he alternately watched the door, a couple of attractive thirtyish women sitting at the bar, and a Wolves game up on the TV.

  As he put his beer up to his lips, the door opened and McRyan came out, with his uncle closing the door behind him. But he also noted legs sitting in a chair. Kraft decided not to follow and waited to see who the other person was. Five minutes later, Lyman Hisle exited the office.

  Mac came back down to find Sally listening to Riley, Rock, and Lich talk about Sheila Bradley and her two big assets.

  “I’m telling you, they were the size of cantaloupes,” Riley was saying, cupping his hands in front of his chest. Obviously the drinks were feeling good as Riles was revving up. “Mac, am I lying?”

  Mac looked at Sally, who just smiled. “No, you aren’t. I want all you guys to join me in the basement for a minute, I want to show you something.”

  “What’s that?” Rock asked.

  “Just come down. Rounds on me,” Mac replied neutrally. He grabbed five beers off the bar and turned for the backstairs, joined by everyone. In the basement was the Pub game room with dartboards, pool tables and a few video games. A couple of big screens added a sports flavor, the Wild game playing in the background. Behind the stairs was a hallway. In the hallway was a built in cabinet in the wall. Mac slid open the middle drawer, reached under the ledge and popped a latch. The cabinet, a remnant from the bygone era of prohibition, was the hidden door to Patrick’s Room.

  Patrick’s Room was a conference room, that during prohibition was a place one could get a drink and socialize without fear of trouble with the authorities, as the place was owned by the authorities. Despite its legendary history, Patrick’s room was now simply a well-furnished conference room with a white board, conference table, couch, and a TV/DVD, which was used for bartender and waitress training for dram shop liability. Shamus often made it available for cop poker games and Texas Hold’em tournaments. Once inside, everyone grabbed a seat at the conference table.

  “So, what’s this all about?” Lich asked.

  “I want you guys to hear me out on something.”

  “Which is?” Rock asked suspiciously, noting Mac’s tone.

  “You ever hear of Bristol, Ohio?”

  Riley furrowed his brow, “No. Should I?”

  “Hometown of Jamie Jones. She graduated from high school there, 1987.”

  “I appreciate the local color. So what?”

  “Let me ask another question. Who was killed the same night as Jones?”

  “Claire Daniels,” Riles replied. “But Mac, what does that have to do with-”

  “She graduated from Bristol, Ohio, high school in 1987.”

  The room went quiet. Mac suddenly had everyone’s attention.

  “How big a town is Bristol?” Lich asked after a minute.

  “Oh, about 1,214 people. Pretty steady for the last twenty or so years,” Mac replied. “The graduating class for Daniels and Jones was forty-two students.”

  “How’d you come up with this?” asked Rock.

  Mac related how he came to the discovery, Jones missing on the wall at Knapp’s place, looking at Jones’s file, finding the yearbook at Daniels’s, making a couple of phone calls.

  “So, you’re suggesting that the senator didn’t kill Daniels?” Lich asked. “Are you suggesting that we didn’t have that right? That we rung up an innocent man.” Lich was concerned.

  “I’m suggesting it’s possible.”

  “Counselor, you buying the stuff your boy’s selling?” Lich queried, still in disbelief.

  “Yeah,” said Kennedy. “I wish he was wrong, and you guys are the detectives, but I think he’s onto something.”

  “Come on, Mac, isn’t it possible that all we have here is a coincidence,” Riles pleaded. “I mean you’re talking about your signature case. You’re going to tear that down on nothing more than a couple of facts that might fit together sideways. It doesn’t make sense.”

  “I’ll grant you that it’s a little out there,” said Mac, “but Knapp was keeping his headlines. He was taping the news programs. He builds this monument to his work. Everything’s there, except this one thing-”

  “-Jones.” Riley finished, pinching the bridge of his nose.

  “Exactly. Nothing about Jones.” Mac pushed further. “Don’t you find that odd? Aren’t you the least bit curious about that?”

  “So, he didn’t keep clippings of one murder. Maybe it was all part of his grand plan. Guy was crazier than a shit-house mouse, Mac,” Rock snarled. “You read the file. Wouldn’t you agree that the details of all the murders, including Jones, match up perfectly?”

  “Yeah, with the exception of one thing.”

  “Which is?”

  “Jones! She doesn’t fit with the other victims,” Mac asserted. “Think about it, Rock. In all the time we were following Knapp, did he ever once, just once, go downtown?”

  “Nope.”

  “That’s right. He kept to the University Avenue area. How would he have run into Jones?”

&
nbsp; “Who knows. Maybe she bumped into him at some bar or restaurant. We weren’t on him then. He stalks her, takes her down-a new experience or something,” Rock argued, his conviction waning.

  “She doesn’t fit the profile, Rock,” Mac kept on. “If I’m right, if you wanted to cover the reason to kill Jones, what better way than to make her death look just like another serial killing. We look in the direction of the serial killer because that’s where the evidence points.” Mac crossed his arms. “If I’m right, whoever did this got exactly what they wanted.”

  “But, Mac, few, if any, of the details about what Knapp was doing to the women leaked. We managed that. The only thing the media had solid was the balloon.” Riley added, a skeptical tone remaining in his voice. “So, how do they get all the details right?”

  “Come on,” Mac growled. “It didn’t leak to the media, fine. But it could easily leak to someone else, intentionally or by accident. We aren’t the damned CIA around here. Shit leaks all the fuckin’ time. Point being, it’s entirely possible somebody could have copied the murders.” Mac sipped his beer, and tacked in another direction. “Of course, we could have tried to ask Knapp about this. We could have asked him about Jones and watched him go blank, deny it, but we can’t do that now, can we? That’s kind of convenient, don’t you think?”

  Riley, catching Mac’s drift, said, “You think Knapp’s assassination yesterday had something to do with this?”

  “Possibly,” Mac replied. “I checked in with the guys looking at that. The theory is the shooter was on the third level of the Vincent Ramp, right?”

  “That’s right,” Rock replied.

  “Surveillance cameras show nobody up there. In fact, nobody on any of the ramp levels.”

  “Bad surveillance system?” Lich asked.

  “I asked. It’s okay, nothing special,” Mac replied. “But there’s another thing.”

  “Which is?”

  “Ballistics. The bullet was for a Russian sniper rifle,” Mac let it hang in the air.

  “They’re sure?” Lich asked quietly.

  “They are,” Mac answered, then to Rock and Riley, “Anybody with any of the families from Russia, have Russian or Soviet military background, have access to a Russian sniper rifle, have a background indicating they would be good with a sniper rifle? Oh, and then have that rifle available when there’s two hours notice of when we’re walking Knapp into court and then be able to get away without a trace, not be picked by surveillance cameras?”

  Both just shook their heads.

  But Lich wasn’t buying it-at least not yet. “So, fine, Mac,” Lich asked, “You think something is amiss with Jones. But what about Daniels? I was with you when we interviewed the senator. He admitted everything we needed. Frankly, he came off as guilty to me, and to Peters too. So, now you’re saying the senator didn’t kill Daniels?”

  “I’m saying it’s possible. Dick, I know this sounds like revisionist history, but I never completely believed the senator did Daniels. It didn’t make sense.” Mac shrugged, “On the evidence we had, we did what we had to do. But the case always bothered me.”

  “Why?” Rock asked.

  “Politicians, especially ones like Senator Johnson, leave themselves a way out of every situation. Escapability, deniability-it’s in their DNA. They don’t put themselves in a position like the senator did-if he did. Murder? There’s just no escape from that. Even the suggestion of it is a career killer, just ask Gary Condit. Even if Daniels threatened to expose their little affair to his wife or someone else, that’s a manageable situation, happens to politicians all the time. It’s not a situation to kill over, certainly not with all the evidence left behind pointing at him.”

  “But if the senator didn’t do it, who did?” Riles asked. “On that case, you had no forced entry and a witness having Johnson leaving around the time of estimated death. I mean that’s pretty solid. What evidence do you have that someone else did this?”

  “One thing that never came out was a witness I found about the time of the senator’s hearing. I got a call from a guy named Paul Blomberg.” Mac related the story of the alley pick up behind Daniels’ place the night of her murder.

  “This is news to me. Why didn’t it ever came out?” Rock asked.

  “We never had to disclose it because the prosecution never went any further. It would have been an issue at trial.”

  “So, the senator doesn’t kill Daniels. We prosecuted the wrong man, and he commits suicide over it! Shit, shit, shit!” Lich said, shaking his head, disturbed over the thought. He kicked a chair. “Damn it.”

  “If he did commit suicide, Dick,” Sally said. “Maybe he didn’t.”

  Lich, skepticism in his voice, “What? Now you’re saying the senator didn’t commit suicide? I mean I was out there. I saw what you saw.”

  “Dick, do you know what the senator’s blood alcohol was at the time of his death?” Mac asked.

  “No, I don’t, but I suppose your going to tell me.”

  “This afternoon, when I was working all of this out, I spoke with Rick Hansen, the Wright County Sheriff. Remember him?”

  Lich nodded.

  Mac continued. “Hansen told me the senator’s blood alcohol was.32 percent at the time of death.”

  “Whoa,” Riley blurted.

  “Exactly,” Mac replied, “At the senator’s weight.32 and you’re smoked, passed out, not getting up on any stool to hang yourself.”

  “Not impossible either, Mac,” Rock added with a laugh, a little levity. “I mean, there were a couple of guys in here last night that might have pushed to that level, and they were still standing.”

  “Could they have climbed a barstool?” Mac asked, not laughing.

  “I doubt it.” Rock answered quietly.

  “Exactly. I bet ninety-nine times out of a hundred, a person that loaded passes out long before doing anything, let alone hanging yourself. Besides, if you proclaim your innocence as strongly as the senator and Lyman Hisle did, do you commit suicide that same night? Before going to trial?”

  “So, somebody killed the senator? Made it look like a suicide?” Lich asked.

  “Possibly,” Mac replied. “Follow it all the way out, Dick. If you have the ability to take out Daniels and Jones in the same night, what’s taking out the senator a few nights later? It’s November, and there are few if any people at the lake. Not to mention the fact that his cabin was isolated and hidden, thick pine trees everywhere. Remember?”

  Lich nodded, starting to buy it.

  “It was the perfect place to stage a suicide.” Mac finished and slammed his beer. He’d shot his wad. But it was comforting to him that an uncomfortable silence overtook the room. The boys were thinking about it. What he’d just told them made some sense.

  Riley spoke first, lightly shaking his head, pinching the top of his nose, “Christ, Mac.”

  “What can I say?”

  “You sold me,” Riley replied.

  “Yeah?” Mac was a little surprised. “What about everyone else?”

  Rock and Lich nodded as well.

  “I don’t suppose you have a suspect in mind,” Rock inquired.

  “I do, but it’s total speculation at this point.”

  “As if this whole thing isn’t?” Rock replied with a rueful chuckle. “Hell, you’ve gone this far, boy. Don’t stop now.”

  What the hell, Mac thought. “This is not one person acting alone here. Not possible. Whoever did this, if you assume I’m right, had to have money, resources, and people to do this.”

  “Agreed,” Riles said. “If you’re right, this is some sort of coordinated effort, and there are some very skilled people-professionals-at work here.”

  “So, cut to the chase, Mac. Who do you think it is?” Lich asked.

  “I don’t have a person.”

  “Mac?” Lich was getting impatient.

  “PTA.”

  Jaws went agape.

  “Holy shit, Mac,” Riley finally replied, shaking his
head. Rock let out a slow whistle.

  “What makes you think that?” Lich asked.

  “This is where it gets a little thin.”

  “Ohhhhhh, this is where it gets thin,” Riley said, a huge smile on his face, causing them all to laugh.

  Mac smiled and kept going. “Jones was the CFO at PTA. She took over for a guy who died last year. Stephens was his name. He’d been there a long time, died in a car accident on Shepard Road. Nothing hinky about that. I talked to one of the patrol guys on the scene. It was a one-car accident that happened in a snow storm around the time of the state hockey tournament.”

  Everyone nodded at that, remembering the storm-over a foot of snow.

  Mac moved on. “I don’t know. Maybe Jones stumbles across some financial issue that Stephens had managed to bury. PTA naturally wants her to keep it quiet, continue to cover it up. She balks.”

  “Yeah,” Sally added. “She has nasty visions of Enron. She’s the next incarnation of Sharon Watkins.”

  “And she knows Claire Daniels,” Riles said, finishing and picking up on the train of thought.

  “That’s right,” Mac added nodding. “I’m guessing Jones talks to Daniels. PTA gets wind of it, realizing they won’t be able to control her.” Mac tossed his beer bottle into the garbage. “PTA has the money. Maybe they have the resources and the people as well.”

  Everyone took it all in for a moment, the gravity of what Mac had just laid out for them.

  “Anyone else know about this?” Riles asked quietly, leaning back.

  “Nope, just everyone in this room and one other person, wholly unaffiliated with the department that we can trust,” Mac answered.

  “So, where does that leave us?” Lich asked.