by Jon Redfern
“Butch, what do you know about Professor Mucklowe?”
“Career wise? He’s a big name at the university in Native sites. We did a background run on him during the Schow case. Divorced, tenure position, published articles, and a book on the Blackfoot Nation.”
“On the level, then.”
“Seems that way. What do you make of him and Sheree Lynn?”
“He likes to play boss. She likes it when he does.”
“You think they’re telling the truth?”
“For the most part. Neither one of them has an obvious motive for killing a young boy. Sheree Lynn shows remorse at least. I don’t know, yet, what I think about Randy. He’d just as soon ignore the matter as he did the boys when they were alive. Still, it doesn’t lie right. Sheree and Randy seem to be hiding something. At least holding back.”
Billy opened Johnson’s kit, pulled out a pair of rubber gloves, a set of tweezers, and a clutch of Ziplocs.
“Butch, I’m going to do a quick walk-around downstairs. How do you want to proceed?”
“You call it.”
“Get Dodd to check the alibis of Sharon Riegert and her boyfriend, Woody. And have him record both Sheree’s and Randy’s formal statements separately. Then have him go through your reports and statements on the Schow case. Pull out names, numbers — teachers, friends, family — anyone associated with these two boys. Especially anyone who said anything about Darren. Did you say you’d met the counsellor at the school?”
“Yeah. Bill Barnes. I’ve got his number in another notebook, out in the cruiser.”
“Call him. See if he can come up with any new names of boys around fourteen who might have known Darren. Or had mentioned being here.” Billy hardly had time to catch his breath. “In a few days, the news of this kid’s death will be all over the junior high school. They still have this extended semester system here? The kids go to school till mid-July or thereabouts?”
“There’s summer school, too.”
“We need to find out who phoned Randy and Sheree this morning. And we need to move fast. Somebody knew Darren was going into this.”
The basement stairwell was darker than Billy expected. The stairs were steep and narrow, covered with chipped paint and dusty footprints. Billy examined the height of the overhang. Stairs leading to the second floor of the house were directly above. He regretted not having brought along his aluminum-cased flashlight. He would have to work in available light. The concrete at the foot of the steps was spotted with grime and what looked like burnt cork. Kneeling down in the dim glare of a forty-watt bulb, Billy touched the rotting rubber from carpet underlay.
The first room was empty. It felt lower because of a new drywall ceiling. Through a smaller passage, the second room was cordoned off by yellow-and-black police tape. Billy could already see the chalk line around the outer edge of the blood spill. He stood at attention, placed his hands behind his back. A legacy from police-training days: Touch nothing. Observe all. Make no assumptions. Entering the gloom of the murder scene, he felt the familiar uneasiness of being in a place where a terrible action had unfolded. There before him was the spattered pattern of Darren’s dried blood. The conduit pipe overhead was at least seven feet above the floor. Out came the notebook. Had he measured the length of the body back in the morgue? Damn! He searched again, flipping back and forth. He’d have to guess. Maybe five feet, five-two? He’d have to wait and see Johnson’s site photos before he could judge how the boy had been found, how far the noose had hung from the bottom curve of the pipe, and whether the rope had been looped once or twice.
Did he expect to find much? He wasn’t sure. Billy walked slowly around the site. He looked closely at the walls. A black cross and two lopsided pentacles spread across the whitewashed concrete surface. A paint can with a closed lid had been left below the wall. There was black around the lid, the same colour as the scrawl on the wall above. Johnson had dusted. Billy could see the traces of white powder on the metal rim and sides. The floor was crunchy with dried mouse droppings. Billy lifted his left foot. Fresh faeces stuck to his heel like small black grapeshot. He wiped his shoe on the concrete and let his eyes roam over the room in case any of the creatures might be cowering in the corners. The smell of urine and tobacco soured the air. Along another wall, underneath a small square window, were a washer, a dryer, and a utility sink. Billy looked behind them. Dust and hoses and electrical connections to a metal plug box. Billy swivelled around and knelt. He swept his eyes across the floor.
“There,” he whispered.
He moved back towards the wall with the painted pentacles. A small arrow-shaped piece of black broken plastic lay on its side. He shoved his hands into the rubber gloves. How had Johnson missed this? Understandable: there was a dead body in front of her and a medic working around the site. He dropped the piece of plastic into a Ziploc. He clicked the tweezers together and stood up.
Billy looked at the one major pipe — the conduit — crossing the ceiling. “The Roshi offers the riddle — the koan,” he said to himself. He let his mind float free for a moment. Gazing down at the floor, he studied the faint pattern of blood spatters inside the chalk line. Odd, as Butch had pointed out. There was nothing directly under the pipe, where the noose had hung. If the body was bleeding — cut up before it was hanged — the blood would have splattered onto the floor. There were some spots on the boots, Billy remembered. What was missing? Four burnt candles made a rough circle directly under the pipe. They were only partially burned. Billy presumed from the markings that a fifth had been removed by Johnson for the lab. Yet, here too, the candles were clean. Billy knelt down close to peer at the wicks and the melted sides. The light was too faint for him to see blood specks, but the candle in the lab would reveal if there were any. Billy remained still and stared.
Then he saw the smudge. It looked like dried blood. Square in shape, it had a distinct edge, a straight line, as if someone had pressed a bloody object — or dropped one — onto the basement floor. Billy thought for a moment, then moved to the utility sink, which was brown-stained. He leaned over and sniffed. Sewer and mould.
Butch called him upstairs
On his way into the kitchen, Billy Yamamoto took a quick glance around the pantry and the yellow breakfast room. Clean floors, a few boxes of newspapers stacked in a corner by the pantry’s shelves. Cans of tomatoes, instant coffee, creamer, and instant macaroni dinners lined up on blue gingham shelf paper.
“I called the counsellor from the school. At his home,” said Butch, leaning his lower back against the kitchen counter. “He said he’d contact any friends of Darren he knew about. Said there wouldn’t be many, but that he might be able to round up at least a couple for interviews for later this afternoon. Or tomorrow.”
“The sooner the better. Dodd find anything yet?”
“So far, he’s logged on to the files of Cody and brought up a few names. Teachers mainly. All with phone numbers. Problem was these boys were loners or outsiders. They didn’t have a lot of buddies. He also said Randy insisted on giving his formal statement first.”
Billy slid open a drawer.
“What’re you looking for?”
“This.”
In his right hand, Billy held up a serrated bread knife. The wooden handle was smooth, the blade smudged with dishwasher spots. “This is pretty clean. Doesn’t look like it’s been washed too recently. Or used for cutting much bread.” Billy pulled out the cutlery tray, a paring knife and butter knives, spoons and forks. All clean. Nothing under the tray.
“She’s fond of yellow.”
“Look under the sink, Butch.”
Butch yanked open cupboards while Billy went through the towel drawers, lifting and sorting. Nothing.
“Did you or Dodd go through the yard this morning?”
“We didn’t.”
Billy felt a surge of impatience. Quickly, he reminded himself that he was in a small town. These police were not that familiar with homicide. “We’ll need a th
orough search, Butch.”
“I figured it wasn’t necessary since we did a close walk-around of all the upper rooms and the basement. Sheree Lynn let us go into the spare rooms and the closets. Mind you, we didn’t go up into her attic.”
Billy reached for his notebook and pen. “I’ll tour the flower beds if you want to scout around that garage to the side.”
The brown shaggy lawn, mostly crabgrass, folded thickly under Billy’s shoes. Two days before, there was a heavy storm in the city. Clouds scudded over treetops like smoke from a grass fire, and the rains beat down. As Billy walked towards the old wooden fence, the elms and the weeping willows began to stir in the hot breeze now rising. The garden was square. A rock pile full of boulders filled one side beyond the lawn. A patch of mud and broken flower stalks — withered irises and overgrown hollyhocks — ran along the weathered wooden fence. In a sun-filled spot of stalks and mud next to a brick barbecue, one with a chimney and a tin covering, was a large speckled rock nestled into the stump of an extinct elm. Billy walked beside the fence, head down, scanning the mud. It was pocked with dirty puddles, dog prints, and bent, broken stalks covering the earth like a woven basket. Up above, a flicker hammered on the bark of an elm. Billy came upon trampled grass.
He knelt by the rock and stared, taking out his notebook and quickly sketching the layout of the garden. He put an X where the rock and the elm stump lay. The trampled grass bordered a line of half-distinct boot prints. Billy was about to step around the rock when he saw a bright spot of yellow. He took his notebook and with its long edge brushed away the flattened grass. A paper towel, like the ones on the roll in the kitchen. Thick paper stamped with yellow flowers.
“Hey, Billy!”
Billy turned; then he saw Butch waving from the side of the garage.
“What you got, Butch?”
Butch held up a shiny chrome-coloured boom box.
“Hang on. I’ve found something here, too.”
Billy dug under the grass with his fingers. He found thick paper saturated with mud and water, buried under a handful of flower stalks and a fistful of packed dirt. The paper’s edge tore. There was an object wrapped up inside. Billy pulled it into the light and peeled away the paper.
A serrated kitchen knife with its bloodstained handle and its bloodstained blade.
“Bingo!”
Billy got up, holding the knife, making sure his fingers touched only the torn paper in which the blade was wrapped. He took a Ziploc from his pocket and dropped the knife inside. Why not clean the knife off? He looked around the grass again. Then he moved on, around the yard, past the garage, and alongside the basement to the window that looked out from the room where Darren’s body was found. Billy crouched. The earth was scored with a cat’s paw prints. He studied the area. The window had not been tampered with. He walked to the back door and scanned the sidewalk and steps but saw only small pieces of dried mud. Hard to tell where they came from. Could have been here for days, from the garden or the dirt front yard.
Billy walked into the kitchen, then down to the front hallway. Butch held the boom box in his gloved hand: “This was shoved under a rotten tarp between the fence and the garage.” The two men went down the basement stairs and into the second room, where Billy placed the boom box under the conduit pipe.
“You see,” Billy said, “the box has blood spatters.”
Butch knelt to look more closely, his knees cracking. “You figure Darren was standing on this when he was bleeding? Before he was hanged?”
Billy didn’t answer immediately. He pulled out the Ziploc containing the broken piece of black plastic. With his gloved fingers, he lifted the piece out of the Ziploc, knelt beside Butch, and placed the broken knob onto the front of the boom box. “Fits,” said Billy. “Can we assume the box tipped over at one point during the ritual? It seems to explain, at least, that the boy could’ve stood on this box. The blood pattern here leads me to assume this. When you lift the box up. . . .” Billy raised the boom box from the centre of the circle. “You can see the floor below has no blood pattern.”
Butch coughed. “But the candles were clean. So was the book. Doesn’t sit together. If you’re cutting up a kid, lighting candles, and chanting with a Satanic bible, seems to me the blood would’ve spilled around on everything. We didn’t find any rags in the garbage cans. I can’t figure it.”
Billy stood up. “I have to join you on that, Butch.”
Butch handed the broken piece of plastic back to Billy and lifted up the boom box.
As the two men got upstairs, young Sergeant Royce was walking in the front door. “Good timing, Royce,” Billy said. “I want you to seal the house and stay here until Butch and I can get an overnight arranged.”
Butch’s cell phone twittered. He unstrapped it from his belt and raised it to his ear. “Shoot. Yes, Dodd, I do.” Butch listened impatiently before clicking off.
“Sheree Lynn and Mucklowe finished their interviews,” he then said to Billy. “Johnson talked to Mucklowe’s landlord. The man said he saw Randy and Sheree Lynn this morning on their way out.”
Billy nodded.
“We need to keep this place off limits as much as we can. Butch, you’ve got to assign a night watch to relieve Royce. With a killer running loose, you never know if a site will be tampered with, especially if the press and the TV get a whiff of what’s happened.”
“Jesus.” Butch wiped his mouth.
“And quirk number two, Butch. Darren’s clothes.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“They are evidence. Royce, once we’ve gone and you’ve sealed doors and put up tape, go around the yards near here and look in garbage cans. Look under hedges. Keep your eyes peeled for pieces of clothing. Especially outer clothing. Killers sometimes steal underwear but toss away other bits they don’t want.”
Royce smiled. “I’ll go as soon as I can, Inspector.”
“Butch and I will be down at the station.”
Butch and Billy left the sergeant standing in the front hall. They walked to the cruiser carrying the knife and the blood-spattered boom box in two Ziplocs. Billy opened the passenger door and placed the two objects on the floor behind his seat. As Butch spoke to Dodd a second time, Billy jotted down the location of the knife and the boom box and the impressions he’d had about the blood spatters on the box and the basement floor.
It was hot and bright, and the sun sharpened the shadows of the trees overhanging the sidewalks. A crest of white cloud was building in the west over the distant Porcupine Hills. Butch pressed open the glove compartment, found a package of gum, and handed a stick to Billy.
“No thanks.”
“What are you thinking, buddy?”
“You and I have to keep close guard, Butch. That early morning phone call to Sheree Lynn is key. So are Darren’s clothes. Keep everybody working hard on this. I hope you can find staff for what may come up.”
“Hell, I hope so, too.”
The white porcelain edge of the toilet bowl felt cool to his touch. Getting up, Justin Moore washed his mouth out and stared at his mussed hair in the wooden-framed mirror over his bathroom sink. He could hear the words of his ex-girlfriend Karen. “You’ve always been lucky, Justin. Good grades, good looks. But you’re selfish. All you ever think about is what you want. Someday, you’re going to hurt yourself bad.” True, Justin thought. But lucky? Him? He wasn’t so sure. She was no longer there when he needed her, and he wasn’t certain which pain was sharpest — his yearning for Karen or his terror of Yianni Pappas.
With his stomach settling, Justin walked back into his bedroom. The room housed an oak dresser and a large computer table. Beside his bed was his backpack, ready for the dig Professor Mucklowe had arranged for the summer semester. Today would go down in the history of his life as Doomsday. He always thought of himself as a man in control. As a man of decision. But all that had risen in smoke as if he’d purposely torched his own life.
Justin’s stomach heaved again. He hauled i
n breath to calm the spasms. His mind ran in a maze of questions and names. Who could he call for a loan? So far, every attempt had failed. On his way home, Justin had gone to the bank. The manager had welcomed him at first, but had pointed out that collateral was needed for a loan over five thousand. Justin then had driven to his former high school. He’d wondered if any of his old teachers might help him out. But who?
Now, with his pockets still empty, Justin found himself standing in his mother’s room. He opened her closet and rummaged through the albums and boxes on the floor. Did she have any valuables he could pawn? He’d pay her back. She’d understand. The closet gave up nothing but the smell of leather and a faint hint of her perfume. To the left of her bed was his father’s chest of drawers. Justin rifled through them. He pulled back the mirror over his mother’s vanity table. Did she hide money behind there? All her jewels had been sold last Christmas. She hadn’t gotten much for them.
Then he remembered. He dashed down the stairs into the den and tore open the cabinet where his father used to store his golf balls. A small box with a red tassel sat behind a pile of yellowing golf magazines.
Justin pulled it open.
“A ten. That’s it?”
He tossed the box onto the floor and threw himself on the couch. The world conspired against him. The silver in the cabinets wouldn’t fetch much. He couldn’t sell the furniture. “Don’t panic,” he said to himself.
He went outside to the garage. It was an old wooden structure with a swinging door. At least in here, he thought, I can feel safe. Here was his father’s old workbench. His gardening apron. Justin picked the apron up and hugged it, its earthy fragrance rising to his nose. He imagined Yianni in a bathing suit. Hairy, skinny legs, like a spider’s. Justin started to laugh, but he stopped. Yianni hadn’t been joking. What am I going to do? He prayed under his breath to his father, the apron like a security blanket. What am I going to do?
