Martin, Crook, & Bill

by Donna Nitz Muller

  Sandra studied him for what seemed a long time. Then she said, “You know what, Martin? It is harder to tell you secrets now that you are well, or close to well. It was easier when you were lost like me.”

  “I know,” Martin answered.

  “I can’t tell you,” Sandra whispered, putting her hands on her thighs and staring at her fingers. “Except to say that we executed Crook’s plan, and it worked perfectly.”

  “When you are ready, you can tell me,” Martin said. “What did Hauk say when you saw him?” Martin asked. He had moved to a different time and Sandra looked confused.

  “What?” Sandra’s head came up, startled.

  “What did Hauk say?” Martin repeated. He studied her. “Didn’t Hauk check on you after all that searching for nothing?”

  “Oh, then.” The relief so obvious she looked like a balloon releasing air. “I wouldn’t come out of my room. My dad had to deal with him. He told Hauk I had gone camping by myself and that had to satisfy him. That’s the story the paper printed.” Shaking her head, she added, “I never thought people would get into such a dither.”

  Martin shrugged, “You’re important. I hoped you would break down and tell your mom the whole story. None of us will ever tell it for you.”

  “Can’t do that to her. It’s better if she doesn’t know what happened to me.” Thoughtfully, Sandra added, “What would she do if she knew she had a grandson? It’s one more reason I hate Hauk. He destroyed the closeness I had with my Mom. I hate him for that almost as much as for what he did to me.”

  “Hauk is dead,” Martin said.

  “It doesn’t change the hate,” Sandra said.

  Sandra, usually energy wrapped in tight skin, sat passive and thoughtful. “Isn’t it odd,” she questioned Martin, “that I still want to play basketball. I really wonder about that. I want to play harder and faster and better than ever. I want it more than I did before this happened. Does that make me a monster of some kind?”

  “It’s the last strand of a previous life and no one can take it from you,” he answered.

  Martin waited for her to say more about the other secret. The secret she kept from him. The secret she shared with Crook. But she didn’t say anything more, and he did not ask. For now, it was enough to know that Sandra was not alone with it. He trusted Crook to handle it.

  “Will you be able to play on Tuesday with your hurt arm?” Martin said.

  Sandra nodded.

  Martin watched Bill grab a piece of pie and a fork and look at his plate with relish. Then he set it down on the table. If Bill couldn’t eat they were in serious trouble. Even Crook, who had company of his own for the first time in his adult life, sat motionless.

  “Is something wrong with the pie?” Maureen asked.

  “Why are we suddenly so glum?” Sandra asked.

  Bill answered, “It’s this Hauk thing that has me in a big worry. We can’t pretend it didn’t happen. I can’t think about anything else. We could all be in jail by next week.”

  “Should we just go to the detectives and tell our story? It’s the cover-up that always makes it worse.” Tillie appeared tentative as she talked.

  Crook said, “We hang tough and we hang together.”

  “For now we are here to celebrate the trip to the barn,” Maureen reminded everyone. “Or the removal of the sliver.”

  “The removal of Hauk,” Crook mumbled, but everyone heard.

  “The season opener,” Sandra said.

  “A boyfriend for Maureen, finally,” Martin tried to speak in the same tone as the others, but he could not quite pull it off and laughed, glancing at his crimson sister.

  Martin glanced at Crook, but he did not appear the least disturbed by the teasing. In fact, there was the slightest glimpse of pleasure in his eyes.

  “A girlfriend for Crook would be more reason than anything. Now we have to drive back to Lincoln to tell that receptionist she is out of luck,” Bill said, taking a forkful of apple pie.

  “She was always after me,” Crook said.

  “I think it was Clara who was after you, Crook,” Martin said.

  “Who was Clara? I forgot,” Tillie asked her husband.

  “You would not want to meet Clara,” Martin said.

  “Clara was just hideous,” Sandra started to tell Tillie. “She had tufts of hair like Harpo Marx, and she delivered Kirby.”

  Martin looked at his sister who appeared stunned. Her mouth gaped slightly and a white rim circled her eyes. He said to her, speaking quietly, “It is not easy to be a part of this. No one will question it if you want to go home now.”

  Maureen said, “How did this happen, Martin?”

  “I don’t know,” Martin said. “I found Sandra hiding in the house. That’s the beginning for me.”

  Maureen did not leave. Martin knew her chance to leave would soon be gone. He did not want her to leave, but he would not stop her. He saw her study Kirby. He saw her sit back in her chair and try to focus on the words flowing around them.

  “This is not a game. There is danger here,” Bill suddenly said, his voice loud, flat and stern. “We all had motive of one kind or another. Hauk would be extorting Martin soon enough if he wasn’t already. He would make Crook miserable for the fun of it once he realized Crook was here. He would hurt Sandra again. He even told me last Sunday in the pub that people were wondering how I came to find Sandra. To top it off, I finally have the perfect, silent fishing partner, and I’m going to loose him.”

  Martin said, “Hauk threatened to take Kirby and now Carl will carry that out.”

  “Carl wants more than to take Kirby. He wants to hang you for this murder.” Bill appeared so genuinely upset that Martin handed him another beer.

  Silence surrounded them like physical weight. This was life and death and it centered on a young lady not yet eighteen.

  Kirby lay on Martin’s thigh. His little arms circled Martin’s knee half way around, and his ear rested on the denim of Martin’s jeans. Martin jigged his knee in a constant slow motion, and Kirby slept.

  Absently, Martin checked the clock above the table. It would not be long before Kirby was hungry, and it was his night to keep the baby. Kirby was not as regular in his eating habits as Bill, but close.

  A tired Martin drifted from the conversation. He patted Kirby’s strong back. Kirby was a night baby, awake and eager to play from one AM until two or three in the morning. This didn’t bother Martin who followed no schedule whatsoever. If Kirby wanted to play at one in the morning, Martin played.

  Crook on the other hand, required sleep through the night. If Kirby wanted to play, wide-awake, in the dark, fine. Crook fed him, changed him, shut off the light and went to sleep. Sometimes he dozed to the sounds of gurgles and thumping. Kirby did not cry.

  It was Kirby who adjusted. When in Crook’s room, Kirby slept through the night. When in Martin’s room, he heard stories, played finger games and book games and had a party. Now he slept soundly, preparing. Martin smiled, then Martin pulled himself back to the conversation.

  Tillie was talking, “Hauk’s murder is the only topic of conversation. So, Martin is off the gossip hook, and Sandra. Hauk is all anyone can talk about. So many stories of who did it from mobsters to husbands to angry people he ripped off for extortion money. So much nasty stuff coming out about Hauk now that he is dead.”

  Tillie told some of the stories circulating that included corruption beyond belief. Hauk engaged in many sordid little side ventures. Tillie’s permed, gray-black hair moved with her head when she talked and nodded. Not a single strand had a life of its own.

  Bill looked relieved to talk about it. He told about Carl’s story of finding the body. Bill heard that Carl told everyone and anyone who would listen, how Hauk’s body was stretched out full on the bed, wearing the same clothes he wore all day. No blood on the bed or anywhere in the house as far as Carl could see. There wasn’t even any blood on Hauk’s shirt. At first Carl didn’t realize Hauk was dead. Not until he step
ped closer and saw that Hauk wasn’t breathing. He had to turn the body to see the wound. Carl went running from the house, screaming, “Cop down, Cop down” into his radio.

  Then Bill added, shaking his head, his old gray eyes filmed with worry, “Carl is a fool, but the men in town to investigate the case look to be nobody’s fools. The Governor appointed them special to solve this case. Hauk was a County Sheriff, after all.” Bill’s expression looked older than a day ago; worry clung to him like mist in rain.

  “Sandra has to be ready, they will seek her out,” Bill added.

  All six adults, with chairs in hand, proceeded into the informal dining area off the kitchen and on the same side of the house. The north wall consisted of a brick fireplace long since unused. When the insurance codes changed regarding fireplaces, Martin’s father actually bricked it shut. Renovating the fireplace was on the list, but still far down, after lawn and possibly after razing the barn. The old, cracked plaster walls stood the same and the hardwood floor remained the same, swept clean but in desperate need of work.

  In this room, sitting on a packing crate and connected through the window to an antenna, stood the new Sony TV. Two bean bag chairs squatted beneath it. All three local channels out of Sioux Falls led off the news with the murder of Sheriff Leroy Benjamin Hauk. Each person watched Carl spill his guts on TV. Each person thought their own thoughts, but no one laughed because each person sensed danger in Carl. Martin voiced it for them all, “Nothing more dangerous than a fool out of control.”

  And Crook added softly, “But is he a fool?”

  Part Two

  Chapter Twenty-One

  On Sunday afternoon, Detectives Larry Vilhallen and John White of the Governor’s Special Task Force assigned to the McCook County Sheriff murder case, drove a new black Ford Escort past the cemetery and the golf course on Highway 38 heading into Wheaton. After turning right onto Highway 81, the men asked directions at the gas station for Center Lane Apartments, their temporary home away from home. The car clock indicated 4:00 pm. A cool evening breeze bent the grass by the swimming pool and a smell of burning leaves hovered in the air.

  Vilhallen and White constituted a special unit assigned by the Governor, personally, to solve the murder of the McCook County Sheriff. Vilhallen had sandy hair and wire rim glasses and a widening middle. At the slightest hint of sunshine, his fair skin turned red and painful. He was the older detective and experienced in homicide; he would take the lead.

  The thirty-seven-year old White possessed thick, brown hair, cut short, and a long narrow face. It required a second look to notice the intelligence. White’s bland appearance was the perfect camouflage for his work. No one saw him or cared about him until too late.

  Without difficulty, the detectives found the government-subsidized housing unit, the beige brick showing some wear. The apartment was not furnished, so McCook County Deputy Carl Banks had been assigned in advance to collect sufficient furniture for the detectives to live with some comfort while stationed in Wheaton. The detectives found the door key held with masking tape to the front door. There was no accompanying note or greeting.

  When the two men opened the door, a haphazard heap of furniture allowed only a very narrow entrance. It looked like the deputy had robbed the dump. Obviously any piece of junk was acceptable to Carl.

  Vilhallen said, “All the personnel reports from Sheriff Hauk regarding Deputy Carl Banks indicated a dedicated, detailed enforcer of the law.”

  White sighed, closed his eyes and said, “I think that tells us something about the deceased sheriff, don’t you? It looks like a scavenger hunt from his mother-in-law’s basement or maybe the back room of the bar.”

  “He may have saved some poor slob the fee for hauling his junk to the dump.” Vilhallen was tired and angry. With a hanky from his pocket, Vilhallen wiped perspiration from his face.

  “He seems to have everything we require for comfortable living,” White said as he pulled from the stack a lamp with the top hanging by the wire and no bulb. In one swift motion, he threw the lamp against the wall. The round red plaster bottom did not break.

  “From this scene, I’m guessing he hated finding us furniture.” Vilhallen kicked the deep green couch cushion.

  White added, “I am guessing that Deputy Carl is nobody’s servant, especially not big town detectives coming to solve his case. I suspect he is a dumb ass.”

  Vilhallen laughed. “Carl had sense enough to be far away when we opened that apartment door.” The two detectives stared with restraint at the heap of junk topped with a three-legged TV stand like a Christmas ornament.

  Vilhallen could not look away from the garbage piled in the living room. His eyes bulged and the veins in his neck pumped purple, but he managed to reconcile the situation. Vilhallen considered Carl to be their one connection with the people in town. He was not ready to completely alienate the bastard, not yet. White wanted a hotel room for the night.

  It was supper time following a six hour drive from Rapid City. Vilhallen hoped for a quick shower and a sandwich before visiting the crime scene. White planned to read the crime scene reports. Instead both men silently planned revenge as they began to separate pieces of a bed frame from chair legs.

  What was too broken to use, they discarded in the hall. They listened to a drunk singing as he came home and to a woman doing laundry. The six o’clock whistle blew and the sun set invisible behind the church steeple. When the apartment manager stopped by, the detectives commandeered his help. Within the hour decent beds and bedding appeared in each of the two small bedrooms with appropriate billing to the State.

  By ten o’clock, the two men sat on the green, sagging sofa, pizza in front of them on the blond veneer coffee table, and waited for the local TV news. The one thing that worked was the TV. They had to look down because the TV sat on a kitchen wire rack that sat on the floor.

  Just as Vilhallen and White were feeling better, the TV showed pictures of news crews moving at random through Hauk’s house.

  White began to punch the channel selector. Each of the three local news channels showed footage regarding Hauk’s murder. White’s face turned an ugly gray. As pictures of the bedroom where Hauk was found changed to pictures of the dishes in Hauk’s sink, both detective’s felt sick. On that channel, the reporter picked up a folder from the counter and asked everyone in TV-land if something as simple as this folder might help the police solve this crime.

  “Tell me this is not happening.” Vilhallen threw his uneaten pizza onto the cardboard box. The third channel presented a piece on all the possible ways into and out of the house. An agile cameraman followed his reporter through every doorway and several windows.

  The 24-inch TV screen introduced the detectives to Carl Banks. His eager, hyper-excited face appeared on every channel. He spilled his guts, pointing his finger and nearly yelling that Hauk’s killer would pay. “Somebody, and I know who you are,” Carl said, his face contorted in emotion, “murdered the best sheriff this state’s ever had, and the beep beep will pay.” On another channel Carl wiped his eyes before saying in all seriousness that this was more tragic than the shooting of JFK.

  Vilhallen and White stared at one another, disbelief repeated and magnified in each other’s expression. They had a big problem in Carl. When Carl told the concerned-looking reporter that “Whoever stabbed Hauk stabbed us all,” White had to leave the room. He had to walk. From the doorway, he said to Vilhallen, “This is no longer a two week case with a nice tidy confession. This is a nightmare.”

  White left, missing one final shot of Carl with tears in his eyes and his arm around his wife as the camera blacked out. Vilhallen managed to mumble, “God, I want to arrest that man.”

  John White returned an hour later. He was trying for composure, but his hands still shook. “Somebody should have been here from Sioux Falls guarding that scene,” White tried, but he had little voice.

  “We were here within forty-eight hours of the crime,” Vilhallen said, his ton
e defensive. “How could we know Deputy Carl Banks was a moron beyond definition? We do know that Hauk was not a well-liked man.” Vilhallen tried desperately to put the TV disaster behind him and work with what he had.

  “How do we know that?” Anger still laced White’s tone.

  Vilhallen sat on the couch and put his feet on the bowed coffee table, pushing the pizza box to one side with his shoe. “If Sheriff Hauk was loved by somebody or even respected we would have arrived to a place ready to be occupied. People would want to help in any way they could. Look at who he chose as a deputy. Does any of this indicate genuine grief to you? Not a bit. Another thing - no one is going to want to help us out. Every man, woman, and child with any information is going to be on vacation. Trust me on that. I can feel it. Everybody in town knows we are here, and not one person has offered to help. We are in trouble on this one.”

  As disheartened as Vilhallen felt and sounded, to talk restored an outer calm to the frantic John White.

  “You’re right,” White said. “We saw only one face talking to those TV cameras. No one wants anything to do with this. Hauk was no friend of theirs.”

  The report by the attending deputy, in this case Carl, would be absolutely worthless. The crime scene would be contaminated beyond use. They had to hope for something in the autopsy, some credible witnesses, something in Hauk’s files. They knew Carl sent the body to the police morgue in Sioux Falls. That was verified. To the two detectives in their dumpy apartment, that single normal procedure seemed now to be a small miracle. Likely they would know the murder weapon.

  Early the next morning, Monday, the two detectives supervised the unloading and placement of equipment shipped from Sioux Falls. Their headquarters was the empty and dusty back room of City Hall. The delivery truck, parked by the back door, waited on them at 7:30 am. Parked behind the delivery truck was the local telephone van. One worker leaned against the back fender. He did not speak and seemed a little edgy. Vilhallen made a point to address the local man directly but received only a nod or a grunt in response.