The Maine Massacre

by Janwillem Van De Wetering

  Bernie came back from the jail and held his mug under the coffee machine.

  "We're sure busy these days, Jim."

  "We sure are, Bernie."

  "I've been thinking today. You want to hear, Jim?"

  "Yes."

  "About Cape Orca, Jim. Five people died, right, and one ran away, right?"

  "Sure, Bernie."

  "I know who killed one of them. The fox did. Old Paul Ranee drank himself to death and he was singing and carrying on when he croaked, and the fox was with him. I know that for sure. Liquor was poison for old Paul and the fox fed it to him, by the half gallon. Right, that's one murder and there's nothing we can do about it. Captain Schwartz ran away because the fox paid a friendly call. That isn't homicide, but it's something else that ain't right. Terrorism or something. Young Albert made me rip my cruiser to pieces. That's terrorism again. Right?"

  "Let's say you're right, Bernie. Then what?"

  "So maybe we should do something, Jim. We're the law, we got power. Let's make sure we cripple them before they do something else, like take a shot at us."

  The sheriff held up his mug. "I'll have coffee too, Bernie, and maybe the sergeant would like some. Somebody shot the tail off his hat tonight."

  Bernie dropped his mug. It broke.

  "I want to hear about that, Jim."

  "It was the sergeant's hat, Bernie."

  "Sergeant?"

  De Gier looked up from his cleaning. "As Jim says, Bernie, I stood on Madelin Astrinsky's driveway, halfway between the Dodge and the front door, and whop. The tail is in the cruiser. The hat is on the hook over there."

  "You see who did it?"

  "Something in the woods. A silhouette, black, maybe six feet high, on snowshoes. It went away."

  Bernie stared at the shards near his feet. He looked up again. "That's right, you're a cop too. You tell us what you saw, not what you think you saw. But I'll tell you what you saw, you saw the BMF gang. They knew you were on your way to Madelin's because you said so on the radio. The fox and young Albert and Tom were listening in Robert's Market. The CB radio is under the counter. Or maybe you were set up from the start. Madelin is bad too. One of the boys, or all of them, got in a car and raced over to Madelin's while you were talking to us under the elm trees. The fox has snowshoes in his jeep. We've got to cripple them, Jim. They'll have us next. I don't know about you, but I'm not going to have myself shot at."

  Bemie's voice had become shrill.

  "Coffee, Bernie."

  "Yeah, coffee." He took the sheriff's mug and got two more from the shelf.

  "Here you are, Jim. Here you are, sergeant. When did it happen, sergeant?"

  "Eight-forty."

  "Okay, can I go around and check alibis, Jim?"

  "Sure, Bernie."

  "And can I run them in?"

  "On what charges?"

  Bernie sat down. "Theft. I've had complaints about the fox and Albert stealing lumber off people's land. Vague complaints, but I can shake the complainers and get good complaints. Theft is a crime, and mat's all we have on them now. All the other stuff is nothing. You won't find that boat either, Jim. I had the Coast Guard on the phone just now. Your friend is on leave, and he'll be away for a while. I can't get the game wardens to cooperate either because they're mad at me about old Bill Thompson's dog and the ten sixty-fours."

  "I'll find the boat, Bernie, or the sergeant will. Madelin has a little Cessna, in excellent repair. How about phoning your girlfriend and asking her to fly you over the bay tomorrow, sergeant? The number is in the book. I'll look it up for you."

  The sergeant phoned. The call didn't take long. He put the phone down. "Sure, Jim. I suggested that the commissaris come too. He might like a chance to get away from his sister. She says tomorrow morning ten o'clock is fine. It'll be a clear day."

  Bernie had been moving the shards of his mug with his foot. "I'll check the alibis tomorrow morning, Jim. What are you going to do? Maybe we should get them from all sides at once."

  The sheriff got up. "I'm going to my room to think. Sometimes I come up with something if I think long enough. There's Carl Davidson's death, the guy who froze in the woods. Some time ago I ran into an Indian who was telling me about Carl. They used to go out hiking together. I could go and find that Indian tomorrow. He'll be in the reserve. Sergeant?"

  De Gier woke up. He had drifted away. The horse of death had floated through his dream, brushing the snow with its hoofs. It had been ridden by Madelin, in her long purple skirt. "Yes," he said. "Yes, Jim."

  "Go to bed, sergeant. You've had a long day. I'll wake you for breakfast. We'll have eggs. I'll make an omelet. How about asking your chief to come out for breakfast?" He looked at his watch. "It's close to midnight. You think I can still phone him?"

  De Gier was on his way to the door. "Yes. I am sure he would like to come out."

  "Okay. We'll have a good long breakfast and go through the case with him. I can use some advice it seems."

  Bernie's round red head turned away from the sink where he was washing the mugs. "You got terrorists in Amsterdam, sergeant?"

  "Yes."

  "What do you do with them?"

  "We bring them in, if we have arrestable charges against them."

  "I say you should shoot them, by accident like. Lots of people get shot in the woods, especially now, in the hunting season. Old Jones got shot through the head two years ago. That was the season too. If you shoot them first they can't shoot you afterward, can they?"

  "We don't have woods in Amsterdam, Bernie."

  "Europe is soft," Bernie said. "That's why we had to come out twice to help you people."

  "Calm down, Bernie," the sheriff said quietly. "Calm down. We've got to get proof and we're going to get proof. And when we have it we'll arrest them and give them to the judge."

  "Maybe you're soft too, Jim," Bernie said and turned back to the sink.

  11

  "VERY GOOD OF YOU, SHERIFF," THE COMMISSARIS SAID and feasted his eyes on the table offering a profusion of choice in a strange assortment of bowls and covered-up dishes. "Can I look?"

  "Go ahead, sir."

  The commissaris lifted lids. "Sausages, mmm! Bacon, a-ha! An omelet, splendid! The sergeant was telling me about your home-baked bread. Is that it?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Came out very well, didn't it? Looks like the bread I buy from the Jewish baker on Sundays. Still warm, just like yours. You know, sheriff, the Dutch have never learned that breakfast is the one important meal in the day. We try to get by on stale bread that never had any taste in the first place, and maybe some jam, and a cup of weak tea. And sometimes porridge, bah! Disgusting, absolutely. My sister has retained the habit, of course."

  "Go ahead, sir. It'll get cold."

  The sergeant cut bread and the sheriff served. The commissaris began to eat.

  "Amazing," the commissaris said some time later. "I didn't know I could eat that much. The stew was delicious. Lamb stew, wasn't it?"

  "Yes sir, a dog got the lamb and we got the dog. The lamb was our prize. The subject gave it to us. I had it slaughtered and we kept it in the freezer. It's about finished now, but we'll have a deer next. The pay is poor, but we still manage to live well, thanks to the prisoners mostly. They keep the greenhouse going, and we have clams from the beach and there's a vegetable garden. The old sheriff was very good at organizing, and I'm planning to continue the tradition. The deputies are married and have their own homes, but I have to live in the jailhouse."

  The meal was over and an old man came from the jail to clear the table. He poured more coffee.

  "Shall I do the dishes now, sheriff?"

  "No, later. I'll call you, Mac."

  The old man nodded and went back into the jail. The heavy door closed behind him.

  "What is he in for, sheriff?"

  "For nothing in particular, sir. We picked him up because he was drunk and wandering around. He didn't want to go home. Mac lives by himself and he's out
of firewood. I don't have too many prisoners just now. When I get some I'll make them cut a few cords for Mac. Then he'll want to go home again. He's one of the town drunks, okay for the first two weeks of the month, but when they drink their way through the welfare check they become a nuisance."

  "And Mac makes himself useful here?"

  "Oh yes, he likes being told what to do, like most of us. In a way that's why you're here, sir. To tell me what to do. The sergeant may have told you that homicide isn't really the sheriff's business, but it seems we've got ourselves into the situation now and I'll have to go on."

  "But you are doing very well, sheriff. We aren't, I am afraid. We must be a burden to you, what with our inexperience and clumsiness. The Dodge is stuck on the estate again. We had to go back and fetch the station wagon and it isn't even snowing."

  "I am not doing so well, sir, and I feel guilty about having given so little protection to the sergeant. My trouble is that I'm new too and the deputies aren't trained for this type of investigation. My chief deputy is showing signs of panic already, and the other two are young, converted rowdies who were hired because of their availability. They are good at fistfights and racing around with the siren going, but this thing is quite beyond their capacities."

  The commissaris cleaned his mouth with his handkerchief and lit a cigar. "A homicide investigation has simple rules, sheriff, and I am sure you know them all. Name the suspects and question them and sniff about for information. Follow up any clue and try to fit it into a theory. If a clue doesn't fit, discard the theory. As I happened to be here I've taken the opportunity to talk to some of the people who seem to be involved with Cape Orca. That location is the center of it all, don't you agree?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "So who do we have? My dear sister, Suzanne, who prattles on and on but has never really lived here and knows nothing. Even so she did manage to tell me something last night. I'll bring that up later. Then there is Mrs. Wash and her gentleman-servant, Reggie. Then we have Michael Astrinsky, and last but not least Jeremy, the friendly hermit. The BMF gang is in and out of the whole unfortunate business too, but they are posing certain problems. I can't fit them in at all. Can you, sheriff?"

  "They do consider the cape their private property, sir."

  The commissaris raised a thin finger. "True. That's the part I can fully understand. When I was a boy I grew up in a small town near some woods. The woods were private property, but the owner lived somewhere else and he never showed up. I knew every tree in those woods. I even named some of them. There was the camel, for instance, a tree with an enormous branch growing a few feet above the ground. I would sit on that branch for hours and have all sorts of adventures. And there was another tree, a log really, quite dead, that was the rhinoceros. The rhinoceros was my dearest friend for many years. It was a strangely shaped log, very fat, resting on broken-off branches and with a big sort of head. It really looked like a rhino. It took me into the jungle. I fought black warriors who attacked from all sides. It was great, sheriff, absolutely great!"

  The sheriff grinned.

  "You understand that sort of thing?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Good. But then the woods were sold and cut down, and I hated the men working there. I saw the camel and the rhino die and disappear. The rhino was just burned. The wood was too punky to serve any useful purpose. It was very sad. I was ten years old then, but I would have killed the laborers if I had been able to. The BMF gang may have similar feelings about their cape, and when the retired people came and built their homes and spoiled the landscape. .."

  "We know the gang got rid of two of the occupants, sir."

  "Yes, but there may have been other reasons. The sergeant has reported fully to me. Captain Schwartz was a Nazi, and Nazi ideas will provoke strong reactions in many minds. Paul Ranee was a dying man, miserably alive because of medical care. Some people believe that the old should be allowed to die, happily if possible. I've met the fox once and I must say I was rather impressed by him."

  The sheriff nodded. "He is very much together, sir."

  The commissaris looked surprised. 'Together?"

  The sheriff gestured. "Well organized, sir, practical, a tight person, no holes."

  "Ah, I see. Together, eh? That's a good word."

  "And immoral," de Gier said. "He suggested to his girlfriend that she work in a porno studio at two hundred dollars a day. He killed a man in a provoked gang fight. He left the corpse of his own friend in a New York slum street. He likes to experiment."

  "What?" the sheriff asked. "Did Madelin tell you all that? Is she the girlfriend who was supposed to do the porno work?"

  "Yes."

  The sheriff shook his head. "Madelin isn't the fox's girlfriend. I've seen them together but not in that way. I know she has lovers, university students who come up for the weekend. Her father has been complaining about that. But Madelin is on her own."

  "Her car registration is BMF ZERO," de Gier said.

  The commissaris waved his cigar excitedly. The sheriff smiled. The commissaris looked very neat in his old-fashioned three-piece suit, carefully knotted tie, and gold watchchain.

  "There we have it!" the commissaris said. "The inconsistency that has been bothering me. Or fascinating me. First it was the name of the gang and their insistence on adding 'bad' to the other word. And now Madelin stresses the mystery by adding 'zero.' Zero means nothing. We have been suspecting all along, and so we should perhaps, that the motive behind the killings was greed. Confucius, I believe, once said that the ordinary man acts because he thinks his act will be profitable; the superior man, however, acts because he minks his act is right. But what on earth is 'right'? I've often been tempted to think that right equals nothing. Perhaps 'nothing' is the ultimate wisdom. Now zero means absolute nothing and the idea it symbolizes is a void, an absolute void." He looked up. "I am sorry, am I talking rubbish?"

  "No, sir," the sheriff said. "I am not qualified to say so, but I don't think you are. I remember that zero did strange things to equations. I saw that when I was trying to get some credits in mathematics. Please go on, sir."

  "Exactly. So perhaps, but this is far out of course, far out, I picked up that expression here, an Americanism no doubt. As I was saying, it could be that the BMF gang has hit on the idea that 'nothing' is an interesting concept. They might be motivated in conducting experiments for no acceptable reason at all, certainly not for profit. The sergeant told me this morning what Madelin gave him in the way of information. The business about the deed and so forth. But I also saw something else. Something in the way the sergeant was set up—that's a correct expression, isn't it?—set up for the love rendezvous and perhaps for the warning shot in her driveway. Then there is the painting of death in the room where she seduced him. All these details. Very clever, and immoral perhaps, as the sergeant suggested. Amoral perhaps, no morals at all. Yes?"

  "Yes, sir. Perhaps."

  "Of course, just a theory, no certainty here at all. But perhaps we can imagine that the gang murdered all these people as another experiment, as a macabre joke, to prove to themselves, or to us, to authority, that immoral behavior is just as valid, or acceptable, as moral behavior."

  "Yes," the sheriff said. "It's possible, and it would be my luck to run across that sort of thing in Woodcock County, Maine. An intellectual gang. Both the fox and Albert have degrees and Madelin has a super-degree and is still studying. And Tom is an original, and an ingenious, as they say there. I saw him in the public library the other day. He was taking out the complete works of Edgar Allan Poe and a manual on jungle warfare."

  "Ingenious intellectuals, sheriff. Well, you won't be bored. Neither will the gang be bored. Which may be a good thing. Organized life in what we call civilized countries can be very boring. All adventure has gone, even the holidays are without surprises, programmed into every possible detail. So the adventurous, the unusual, the creative, the originals will try to make things happen and, expectably, may break the law in
the process."

  The sheriff grinned. The commissaris suddenly looked sad. "So, as I was saying, this gang will stop at nothing, or try to go beyond nothing. That would be an almost mystic endeavor. But I am probably carried away by my own rambling mind. The gang is also friendly, helpful even. The fox got our cars unstuck. There was chanting and flute playing in Robert's Market. And lovemaking in the Astrinsky parlor. Facts hard to rhyme with a bullet snipping off the tail on the sergeant's hat."

  "So they may go free after all, sir?"

  "Possibly."

  The sheriff cleared his throat. "When you mentioned the suspects just now you included your sister's name, sir. Suzanne Opdijk."

  "Yes indeed. I mentioned her first. I would consider her a good suspect in the case of her husband's death. I've listened to her for hours on end, and it is quite obvious that she couldn't stand Opdijk. He was stronger than she. He dominated Suzanne, frustrated her. He controlled the money, drove the car, got about, was sociable and happy in his way, while she had to stay home and try to live in a dream. She didn't want the dream, she wanted the reality that was shadowed in her dream. All she wanted was to go back to Holland. Opdijk wouldn't even discuss that possibility. So one day he is standing on die ice, close to the cliff, and she goes out and pushes him. Not at all unlikely. I am sure she can be vicious when cornered and she must have felt very cornered. But if she did push him she will never admit to having done so and we would have to produce witnesses. No witnesses have come forward."

  "But she's your sister, sir."

  "If we create justice we must make it universal. There can't be exceptions. She is my sister but she is still a prime suspect, but only in the case of Opdijk's death. I can't see her sneaking around the other houses and taking plastic foam out of a boat, or firing a rifle, or enticing a man to go out into the woods with her. But she did have a motive to kill her husband, a very strong motive I would say."

  "Yes, sir, and Janet Wash?"

  The commissaris looked at the tip of his cigar. "Well, why not? She owns the rest of Cape Orca and she may have wanted to own all of it, although she didn't seem to be that type of woman to me. She was complaining that the upkeep of the house and the land gave her too much work. She is an old woman in spite of her beauty. I could suspect her more easily if she were young, in the strength of her life."