Force of Blood

by Joseph Heywood

  “I haven’t looked at it. I was sort of waiting for you.”

  “How much coffee we got?”

  “Enough to start our engines.” She put another disk in the player.

  “Nothing more on that first one?”

  “Just what you saw.”

  By noon they were rewatching a disk showing a small bright flash, moving left to right across the screen. “Jingo?” he said.

  Her answer was an ambivalent grunt. “Something pink? Red? Can we get this stuff magnified at a lab somewhere?”

  On the same disk they had a pretty good picture of a twelve-point buck moving through the field of vision, tail and nose and ears all twitching, looking nervous, moving stiff-legged, all signals he was preparing to bolt. “He’s winding something,” Service observed.

  “God, he’s big,” Sedge said.

  Service agreed. “I’ll drop the disks at the Marquette lab on the way home. There’s a guy there named Saugus.”

  “That grid thing seems familiar,” Sedge said. “Or should.” She rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand.

  “Enough,” Service said.

  “What next?”

  “Go back out to Teaspoon Creek and take a real microscopic look, but take reinforcements with you.”

  “You want to go?”

  “No. I’ll see if I can get Professor Shotwiff over here Wednesday or Thursday.”

  “What should I tell Katsu?”

  “Leave it at we have someone we think he’ll be interested in meeting.”

  “He may not buy it.”

  “Persuade him,” he said.

  • • •

  Service was on his cell phone most of the way to Marquette, his last call to Chief Waco. “Where are you?”

  “Mason Building,” Waco said. “You?”

  “Yoop. There’s a department called the State Archaeologist, man named Yardley. Could you give him a visit and ask him to explain state policy vis-à-vis law enforcement?”

  “Important?”

  “Could be. Read his guts if you can.”

  “How quickly?”

  “Not urgent, but soon will do.”

  “Grady, I think you’re right about McKower.”

  “You two will make a great team.”

  “You sew on your new stripes yet?”

  “That would be a negative.”

  Eddie Waco laughed loudly in his ear. “Let us know when you’ve identified your choice for state master sergeant.”

  “Roger that, Chief. And, thanks.”

  29

  Marquette, Marquette County

  SATURDAY, JUNE 2, 2007

  Forensic technician Waldmar Saugus was waiting at the Michigan State Police Forensics Laboratory’s front door.

  “Am I screwing up your weekend?” Service asked, stepping inside.

  “Like you people, we don’t have weekends. Whachu got?”

  Service handed him the two disks, saying, “One is stills only, the other moving. Only three images: a huge buck, a square thing, and a moving pink light. They all could be important.”

  “Care to say where this is?”

  “You mean the twelve-point?”

  Saugus grinned.

  Service said, “No way.”

  “Didn’t think so, but I had ta ask. Is this urgent?” the technician asked, handing him the necessary paperwork and securing the disks in an evidence bag.

  “Soon as you can, but don’t break your back.”

  “You guys busy?” Saugus asked.

  “Always. Assholism never takes naps.”

  • • •

  Service relieved Friday’s sitter and was holding Shigun when his mom came through the door at her place in Harvey. “You do know how to keep a girl guessing,” she said, obviously pleased he was there.

  Service laughed. “If we’re still guessing at this stage, something’s seriously wrong with the both of us.”

  She exhaled. “That’s a fact. How long do we get to have you this time?”

  “Until Wednesday morning.”

  “What if we can’t stand each other that long?”

  “We’ll deal with it. I’m going to go replenish food for Cat at camp, and bring Newf back with me.”

  “That guy Kermit?” she said.

  He looked at her. “Did the BOL produce?”

  “Not quite, but I checked National Crime Information Center for Deslongshamp, and came up empty. Then I called a Troop friend of mine, Sergeant Ellen Wegerlee out of the Gaylord Post. She keeps an unofficial database—weird nicknames, odd crimes, cop facts. Calls it E-Coplection.”

  Stupid name, techie humor. “And?”

  “There’s a male subject cops in Wisconsin nailed on a cattle-rustling charge from Texas. They refer to the guy as Kermit.”

  He rotated his forefinger like a crank. “Stop dragging this out. And?”

  “He was in jail in a place called Paladullah, and Wisconsin was waiting for Texas to send someone to fetch him, but he escaped and hasn’t been found. This was three years ago. I have a mug shot.”

  Friday opened her briefcase, removed an envelope, and held it out to him. He passed a grinning Shigun to her and slid the photo out of the envelope.

  Holy shit. He turned over the photo. The name: Joseph Paul Brannigan. Name’s sort of familiar? From where?

  “Sure as hell looks like Delongshamp,” Service said. “Does this birdbrain have a jacket?”

  “Probably, but I didn’t have a chance to pull it. I can run to the post and look at NCIC.”

  “Hell no, this is our time, and work can damn well go hang. But why does the sergeant in Gaylord have him in her pocket file?”

  “CR—cattle rustling—someplace near Dallas. You don’t hear that charge very often nowadays. That, and the fact that the man looks like a human clone of Kermie.”

  Service studied the face again. In some ways it looked more amphibian than human. “How’d you like to go through life looking like that?” he asked Friday.

  “You know, it’s just that sort of perception that tips some borderline personalities into lives of crime.” She added, “I’m not joking.”

  Naturally he started laughing and went out to his truck. He’d met the man. Not seen the resemblance. You’re not part of Sesame Street Nation, he told himself.

  • • •

  He was halfway to Slippery Creek when Waldmar Saugus from the lab called on the cell phone.

  “Service, Saugus here. I’ve looked at the stills, and I’m going to do a lot more manipulations to be positive, but I’m pretty damn sure you’ve brought me a photo of a net.”

  Volleyball net, Sedge said. “Net?”

  “Yeah. Can’t say for sure yet, but it looks like a live-trap net, what they call a cloverleaf snapper.”

  “How can you tell that?”

  “I can’t yet—I’m just giving you my first impressions. But I do volunteer every year to help your deer biologist out of Escanaba capture animals to radio-collar them, so they can monitor deer-yard migration routes. My grandpa has a camp in north Delta County. Where’d this photo come from?”

  “Does it matter?” Service answered.

  “Hey, I’m not talking about the twelve-point. What I’m saying is, it might make sense to ask the biologist from that district if he’s running tagging ops out where you got the photo.”

  “It’s the wrong time of year for that, but it’s also a helluva good suggestion. Thanks, Waldmar.”

  “Just a thought, but I figured you’d want to know.”

  “I do. Thanks again.”

  He got on his radio and turned to the District Two channel. “Two One Thirty, Twenty Five Fourteen.”

  “Two One Thirty,” Sedge answered.

  “Got coverage?”

  “Affirmative, for the moment.”

  “Twenty Five Fourteen clear.”

  He punched in her speed-dial number on his cell phone and she answered immediately. “What?”

  “Is there a deer biologi
st in the Newberry office?”

  “Position’s vacant right now. Tina Calabreeze retired in April. No replacement named yet.”

  “She retire locally?”

  “Yes, got a kid who’s a junior in high school at Engadine. Why?”

  “She run deer radio collars to track migration routes?”

  “When she had money in her budget. She retired partly because she felt the job was badly underfunded for essential field work.”

  “You ever work the collaring detail with her?”

  “Once. I couldn’t walk right for nearly a week afterwards. Too dangerous to trank the animals, so we ran them into nets and bulldogged them to the ground.” There was a pregnant pause. “Oh my God! The net on the camera.”

  “The technician just called me. He had a similar epiphany. Can you call Calabreeze, find out if she ever worked our target area?”

  “You bet. Anything else?”

  “Kermit may be Joseph Paul Brannigan out of Wisconsin.

  “I thought Delongshamps was Kermit.”

  “Delongshamp is probably an alias. Brannigan is wanted in Texas for cattle rustling. He was picked up in Wisconsin, but got away.”

  Sedge was laughing. “Cattle rustling? Are you shitting me, Chief Master Sergeant?”

  “CR—that’s what the record says.

  “Good God. You want me to get out to his little cabin and dust for prints?”

  Damn good idea. “Yes, that’s good. Can’t hurt. You talk to Katsu?”

  “He can meet your guy either day.”

  “Tell him noon at the same place on the Coast of Death. I’ll RZR the professor down the beach from Vermilion. I doubt he can walk all that distance.”

  “Cool. I’ll bring coffee and sammies.”

  “You’re a very civilized lady,” he said.

  “I’m neither,” she said, “but when I need food and can’t get it, I elevate bitch to new levels. I’ll let Katsu know and give you a bump after I talk to Tina.”

  • • •

  He put food out for Cat at the cabin, opened some windows a crack to air the place, loaded Newf and her food in the truck, and began the return trip to Harvey.

  The cell phone rang. “Waco here. I called that Yardley fellow at his home, which like to give him apoplexy. He refused to talk on the phone on a weekend, so I drove on over there in uniform. Then thet old boy went totally ballistic.”

  “Disproportionate reaction,” Service said.

  “By Ozark miles,” the chief said. “Once he calmed down he refused to invite me inside, claims law enforcement in the past has revealed historic, archaeologically rich sites, which has led to looting.”

  “You buy that?”

  “I told the man I want names, times, places, dates, evidence, reports—the whole shebang.”

  “Is he talking about DNR law enforcement?”

  “Nope, other agencies.”

  “When do we get the information?”

  “Says he’ll work on it next week, but he’s short on people and it won’t be priority.”

  “You believe him?”

  “Nossiree. Come Monday I speck to have his lawyers wantin’ ta palaver with our lawyers.”

  “Make you wonder what’s going on?”

  “Sure does, but I don’t like connecting dots too soon. You still on the case with Officer Sedge?”

  “I want to see it all the way through,” Service said.

  “That’s your call, Grady.”

  “We put trail cameras on the artifact site.”

  “Get anything?”

  “Got us a real fine photo of some kind of net,” Service said sarcastically. “The Troop forensic tech thinks it’s the kind of net used to capture deer for radio collaring.”

  The chief said nothing for a long while. “First, Sergeant Service, do you know what the most lucrative domestic wildlife crime is nowadays?”

  “Animal parts? I’m not much on tracking megatrends.”

  “You need to change your ways, Grady. It’s gonna be your job to keep the big picture in mind when our people are focused on the little picture, day to day. The biggest crime is that whitetail deer are being live-trapped from states that have animals of superior size and genetics, and these animals are then shipped to destinations where such fine specimens can fetch up to a hundred grand, cash money.”

  A hundred grand for a damn deer? What the hell’s wrong with people? “Deer from Illinois and Minnesota?” Service asked.

  “Kansas, too. U.S. Fish and Wildlife calls it CR, for cervid rustling. We made a half-dozen fine cases in Missouri just last year.”

  CR? “Michigan doesn’t have those kinds of gene pools.”

  “Don’t much matter. You live-trap a monster buck in the 175 class and you’re looking at immediate big money, and whatever you have, they all go to the same place: Texas.”

  The chief hung up. Service sat and thought; closing his eyes, he kept seeing the face of Kermit the frog. CR … cervid rustling … CR … cattle rustling. CR, CR, CR. What the hell have we stumbled onto?

  30

  Coast of Death, Luce County

  WEDNESDAY, JUNE 6, 2007

  WNMU-FM, Northern Michigan University’s NPR affiliate, was filled with stories of D-Day as he drove Professor Ozzien “Ozone” Shotwiff east from Harvey. Shark Wetelainen had dropped off the man last night and headed on to Service’s camp at Slippery Creek, which tended to get brown drakes somewhat earlier than other area streams. Shark was married to a Houghton detective and ran a motel, working solely to pay for his endless fishing and hunting.

  Shotwiff seemed engrossed in the radio broadcast. “I was there,” he announced quietly, “Omaha Beach. I was barely seventeen and literally crapped my drawers going ashore. I remember every damn detail, sight, sound, smell, you name it. You ever been to war, son?” Shotwiff had tears in his eyes.

  “Vietnam,” Service said. “Marines.”

  “Combat?”

  “Yessir.”

  “Then you know.”

  He did, but so far had managed to keep most of the worst memories at bay.

  “Who’s this fella we’re gonna meet?”

  “Duncan Katsu. He’s trying to get federal recognition for an offshoot of the Grand Island Ojibwa.”

  “Five-Pack Creek Band?”

  “You know them?”

  “No, but I’ve wondered for years why they don’t yet have federal status. I just figured there weren’t enough descendants.”

  “They’re real?”

  “That’s not the term I’d employ. But they existed. Crane clan, if memory serves me, which it doesn’t always.”

  “Oral traditions?”

  “From a Wisconsin Shinob I know. This where you think the Saulteur Iroquois Point fight took place?”

  “Katsu thinks so. I don’t know what I think yet.”

  “You’d have made a fine professor,” the retired academic said with a grunt. “I put a bayonet through a man’s Adam’s apple on D-Day,” Shotwiff announced out of the blue. “It sounded like one of those bursts of flatulence people call an SBD. The Kraut killed my buddy at close range and I lost my head. I was never scared again, and all I wanted to do for the next two years was kill every goddamn German I met, in uniform or out. Righteous hate is a fearful force in this world,” Shotwiff said. “This country treated you boys like dog dirt on the sole of a new dress shoe when you came back from Southeast Asia. Makes me sick. We old guys knew that, but kept our mouths shut. Some ‘Greatest Generation’ we are. Bunch of old geezers just wanting attaboys and pats on our backs to never stop. I’m still ashamed. You and your fellas deserved a whole lot better.”

  Service couldn’t think of a reply and remained quiet.

  • • •

  The professor and Katsu walked over to the edge of a birch copse and sat down, talking quietly while Service and Sedge waited. “You talk to what’sher-name?” he asked.

  “Tina Calabreeze. Yeah, I left you a message.”

  He an
d Friday had been distracted by diversions other than work.

  “She ever do roundups out here?”

  “No, but she says these small hills and ridges hold some small winter yards that attract some gigantic bucks from the southern county farm country. Most deer migrate west and south to Schoolcraft County, but a few make the trek up here. She thinks there’s a state record in Luce County, maybe more than one, something even most local headhunters don’t know.”

  “Was she good at her job?”

  “Far as I know. We’ve got two distinct things here, don’t we?”

  “It’s looking that way to me, but we need more evidence to know for sure.”

  Katsu and the professor eventually rejoined them. “We’ve had a fruitful chat,” Shotwiff said. “We’re going to play in the dirt for a while now.”

  “There’s sandwiches,” Sedge said, pointing at a bag.

  “Any preliminary thoughts?” Service asked the professor.

  Katsu was staring toward Lake Superior, his mind apparently elsewhere.

  “Well, I’m not ready to say your theory holds water, but neither am I willing to just write it off. You know who Ladania Wingel is?”

  “I met her in Wisconsin.”

  “You’re a brave man. She attack you in full harpy mode?”

  “She tried.”

  “Wingel started her PhD at Oregon,” Shotwiff said. “Her name then was Ence.”

  Why’s he telling me this? “And?”

  “Just thought you should know,” the old man said mysteriously.

  “You know her?”

  “Nobody knows her. Or wants to.”

  “She has a doctorate. She must have something going for her.”

  “Well, that’s one way to look at the data. Now you’ll excuse Mr. Katsu and me?”

  “Sure.” What the hell is going on?

  Shotwiff took one step and looked back. “You know Santinaw?”

  Service nodded.

  “The man’s a giant,” the professor said, and walked away.

  “What was all that about?” Sedge asked.

  “I don’t have a clue,” Service admitted.

  Service and Sedge carefully canvassed the area for deer sign and found nothing significant, or unusual.

  Later in the afternoon when Katsu and Shotwiff rejoined them, the professor held up a baggie. “This is undeniably Iroquois.”