The Victim at Vultee Arch

by Charles Williamson

  “Why would that be important?”

  “Dad, global trading is one gigantic poker game. If I can run your proprietary computer model and understand exactly how you’ll bid on a complex engineered product, I can always outbid you by a dollar. You’d be playing with your cards revealed, while my hand would still be hidden. If I found any sort of flaw in your model, that would be great fun to exploit. To a competitor, those papers would be worth tens of millions.”

  Originally, I’d assumed that Dr. Thatcher’s boss was an unfeeling jerk to have been more interested in the papers than in Dr. Thatcher’s death. He’d wanted someone to pick them up this morning. The complication was that they might be the motive for Dr. Thatcher’s murder. I wasn’t ready to give them up. Keeping a copy would be just as potentially damaging to the Bank E & A as keeping Dr. Thatcher’s originals. I wanted a finger print exam of these papers in order to determine who else might have handled them. I decided to discuss the dilemma with Sheriff Taylor.

  “Son, do you think it would be unusual for a senior bank officer to carry all of this proprietary trading information with him on a trip to Sedona.”

  “Dad, I can’t imagine that even the most senior officer would be allowed to carry much of that stuff around. There’s something funny going on.”

  I thanked John for the information. I was still mostly in the dark about what Dr. Thatcher actually did for a living, but I now understood that the papers he brought to Sedona might be valuable enough to be a motive for murder.

  I called Margaret at home to make certain that she was up. I was sure that my restlessness had cost her many hours of sleep. She was up and enjoying breakfast on the deck before she left for work. I told her about my conversation with John.

  Margaret had a theory. “Maybe Dr. Thatcher was going to sell the information and the Bank E & A found out and had him killed.”

  I didn’t think that was a likely scenario. The only person that I’d truly trust on Wall Street was my own son. The men who ran these firms were probably ruthless, but I didn’t think murderers were commonly in charge. “Why not just call the FBI or SEC or whoever looks after those things and have Thatcher arrested, maybe arrange a sting operation? A big bank is not going to consider killing an employee when there are many less drastic options to protect their information.”

  “Maybe someone killed Dr. Thatcher because they wanted to take the information to sell themselves, or maybe Dr. Thatcher had a falling out with a possible buyer,” she said. “In either case, the computer formulas help to explain a death where there is otherwise not an obvious motive. I think the reports are involved.”

  “You know I had a restless night. When I finally got up early this morning, I had the very strong feeling that I’d learned something from my nightmares. Killing Dr. Thatcher with a snake was a very personal and deliberate method. Whoever killed him wanted him to be terrified. They wanted him to suffer. Otherwise a simple gunshot to the back of the head and burial in a remote location would have been more efficient.”

  Margaret agreed that I had a good point. “Love turned to hate could explain that viciousness. Mike, was there much insurance and did his former wife inherit the estate?”

  “I’ll ask Chad to check on insurance and estate issues today. A recent divorce and a bitter child custody fight have been factors in a lot of murders. Mrs. Thatcher seemed very disturbed by the news of Quentin Thatcher’s death, but emotions are difficult to read, especially over the telephone.”

  After talking with Margaret, I’d decided to follow three principal routes in the investigation. I would follow the trail of the insurance and estate funds. I would follow the trail of the proprietary trading formulas in Dr. Thatcher’s carry-on bag. I would also attempt to determine if the murder could have been racially motivated or the act of some killers who chose Dr. Thatcher at random. I thought in terms of multiple killers because it would have taken more than one person to subdue Dr. Thatcher and to handle the snake. That led me toward the possibility of a conspiracy that included someone who hired the murderers.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Before leaving for my breakfast meeting, I called my boss, Sheriff Taylor. He was already in his office and very interested in the Quentin Thatcher case. Most of the murders in Coconino County occurred within the jurisdiction of one of the city police departments or on the Navajo Reservation where the tribal police and the FBI handled them. I did my best to explain the possible value of the formulas and the hundreds of pages of data in Dr. Thatcher’s carry-on bag.

  “Sheriff, if these papers were part of the motive for this murder, we need to keep them until we check them for unexplained fingerprints or other trace evidence. I strongly recommend that we hold onto them until we understand more of what they signify.”

  It didn’t take Sheriff Taylor any time to make up his mind. “They’re evidence in a homicide investigation. We’re certainly not going to return them to this bank just because some big shot wants them back today. If he calls me, that’s exactly what I’ll tell him. I’d like to meet with you and Chad tomorrow morning at 9:00 to discuss this case. We should have the official medical examiner’s report by then. Bring the papers with you so we can send them to the lab to be checked for prints. Maybe someone at the business school at NAU could help us understand if these are important and valuable records and if they’re documents that might be a motive in a murder. Keep them locked up until our meeting tomorrow.”

  I was pleased by the sheriff’s decisive response. I had worked a number of homicides that involved business executives in my nearly thirty years on the LA police force. It was my experience that senior business executives never accepted a simple no. They always tried to go over my head, sometimes all the way to the chief of police or the mayor. I was fairly sure that the bank would contact the sheriff directly and attempt to overrule my decision about keeping the documents.

  I had time for one more short phone call before heading to the Coffee Pot Restaurant. I called Meg Hull at the Sedona paper. I hadn’t returned her call yesterday evening, and I was anxious to keep on good terms with the local press. I was surprised that she answered until I realized that her office phone must be set to forward her calls to her cell phone.

  “Mike, I’ve been hearing troubling things about the snakebite death. It’s too late for me to change my article in the Friday edition. We’ve already gone to press. However, my boss is certain to ask what’s going on. I don’t want him to think I’ve dropped the ball. I heard from a friend at the Daily Sun that this might be ruled a homicide. It that possible?”

  I had no idea how the information had leaked to the Flagstaff newspaper, but I understood it would be frustrating to be scooped by them on a Sedona area death. I felt a little guilty about telling Meg information that wasn’t official yet, but I did it anyway.

  “The medical examiner will issue her report sometime today. In my last conversation with Dr. Sumter, she indicated that the official report would say this is a possible homicide. There was evidence that the victim, Quentin Thatcher of New York City, was restrained shortly before his death. There is also evidence that the snake was not a local wild specimen. It had lived in captivity.”

  “Thanks Mike. I’ll talk to my boss, but I think he’ll make the story front page above the fold for our edition next Wednesday. I’ll need to get as many facts as you can share by Monday evening. Our story might even get picked up by the wire services.”

  I agreed to keep in touch. It was time to meet Chad and Art at the Coffee Pot Restaurant.

  The Coffee Pot Restaurant in west Sedona is something of a landmark in a town where most of the buildings are a couple of decades old. It’s usually full of locals at 8:30. While it is certainty not a gourmet place, it’s famous for having 101 kinds of omelets, including a peanut butter and jelly one. The prices are good and the food plentiful.

  After three years in Sedona I often see people I know at the Coffee Pot. This time two neighbors, a former major league baseball player and
the city magistrate were sitting with three other local guys talking about sports. After saying hello, I joined Chad and Art at a booth in the center of the busy main room.

  “We were talking about Art’s older son, Bridger. He’s the center on the Mingus Union High School team, and Art’s hoping he’ll get a scholarship,” Chad explained.

  Since Chad had been a star college player, it was natural for him to still have contacts at his alma mater. I assumed that Art wanted Bridger to get a little help in his quest for a scholarship. I said, “I haven’t seen the Marauders play this season Art, but I know you’re undefeated and ranked high in the state. Bridger probably gets to play in front of a lot of college scouts.”

  Art shook his head saying, “Mingus Union High is too small compared to the Phoenix and Tucson schools. We’re lucky to be noticed at all. Chad said he’d mention Bridger to the NAU coach so that at least he’d know his name. Centers don’t get noticed easily. Chad put off discussing this crazy murder theory until you got here. Old Doc Parker in Prescott may be ten years past retirement, but he doesn’t make snakebites into homicides. I’ve heard that Sumter woman in Flagstaff thinks she knows everything. She’s from back east somewhere. What in hell is going on with your medical examiner and this homicide claim?”

  “Art, that snake’s last meal was a white mouse. That’s not a species that lives in the wild. In fact, that particular species of rattlesnake has never before been found in Coconino County. Also, there was evidence that Dr. Thatcher was forcibly restrained near the time of the snakebite. It looks like someone was holding him from behind while the snake bit the poor bastard.” Art’s expression changed from doubt to almost anger as I explained the medical examiner’s findings. He seemed to feel both foolish and annoyed to have been so skeptical.

  Art’s comment had brought one point home. We’d been lucky regarding the location of Dr. Thatcher’s body. If the body hadn’t been found in Coconino County, Dr. Parker, the medical examiner for Yavapai County, would have been responsible. He’s half blind and almost eighty. In addition, Mojave rattlesnakes have occasionally been found in Yavapai County although not in the Sedona area. The snake might not have seemed as suspicious to the Yavapai County medical examiner. If he’d missed the bruises on Dr. Thatcher’s chest or if he’d neglected to send the snake to an expert to be dissected, this would have been recorded as an accidental death.

  Art was still reluctant to accept that this death was a murder. He asked, “What if someone let a pet snake loose, and it bit the black guy by accident?”

  “We haven’t ruled out that possibility, Art. The marks on Dr. Thatcher’s chest and arms might not be connected to the snakebite. We still have a lot of investigating to do,” I said.

  “Mike, I’d like to help with the investigation if I can. If this is a murder, it might cross over into our jurisdiction too. The victim might have been abducted from a room at the retreat center. It’s in Yavapai County. I’ll ask my lieutenant to assign me to the case to help you guys.”

  Art’s comment reminded me that I might have already violated departmental rules when I retrieved Quentin Thatcher’s personal effects from the retreat center. It would have been normal procedure to notify the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Department that I was operating in their jurisdiction. There was less than two miles as the crow flies between the retreat center and the crime scene, however they were in separate counties.

  I wanted Art’s help with anything he could remember regarding the crime scene. Last night’s rain would make it difficult to find any evidence that we might have missed when we thought we were dealing with a simple snakebite. While I was not anxious to have Art full-time on this case, his presence would cure all the inter-county issues. “I’d be glad to have you on our team Art. After all, you were the first on the scene. Now that we’re working a homicide, I’d like to go back to the area where you found the body.”

  “That was quite a storm last night. It won’t be easy to find anything we missed,” Chad commented.

  “I need to check in at the Cottonwood office. I can meet you at the Vultee Arch trailhead at 10:00,” Art said.

  “This time I’d like to hike in from the Sterling Pass trailhead. That’s where we found the victim’s vehicle.” I really didn’t have high expectations about finding anything specific along the trail, but it would give us a chance to time the hike and have a clearer idea of the events of the evening of the murder. The waitress delivered our orders, and I started my avocado and crab omelet.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  My cell phone buzzed as I was putting on my boots for the hike over Sterling Pass. Chad was already loaded with the crime scene backpack, and Art was pulling his vehicle onto the shoulder of highway 89A behind my Explorer. I was tempted to let the call go to voice mail, but I answered. It was Sheriff Taylor.

  He spoke more rapidly than his normal cowboy cadence. “Mike, I’m glad you warned me about the papers from the Quentin Thatcher case. I just got off the phone with a real ass named Henry Griffin. In his sissy English accent, that obnoxious bastard threatened me with a personal lawsuit if I didn’t turn those documents over to him within twenty-four hours. I told him to stuff it. The Thatcher case is a homicide investigation, and those documents are potentially part of the motive.”

  “Who was Griffin, a lawyer?” I wrote the name on a note card.

  “He claimed to be the manager for the whole damn North American Continent for this Bank E & A. The jerk wanted me to call him Sir Henry. I called him Mr. Griffin instead. I was polite. I told him you were bringing Dr. Thatcher’s personal effects to Flagstaff tomorrow for fingerprint tests. I didn’t lose my temper until after he hung up. What a goddamn ass.”

  “Thanks for the support, boss. Maybe we can fingerprint the documents, copy them, and then return the originals quickly to get the bank off our backs. We’re about to revisit the crime scene by the same route that we think Dr. Thatcher hiked. It stormed last night down here. I doubt that we’ll find anything new, but we’ll give it a try. I hope it’s OK to bring Deputy Johnson from Yavapai County to the meeting tomorrow morning. He’s working the case for their side of the county line.”

  “Mike, I trust your instincts completely. You’ve conducted more murder investigations than everyone else in the department combined. You have my full support.”

  I felt good about the sheriff’s expression of confidence. We hiked up the steep trail, sections of which were slippery from last night’s rain. We timed our hike, trying to maintain the speed that a physically fit young man like Quentin Thatcher might have hiked.

  The Sterling Pass Trail begins in a dense forest of ponderosa pines and climbs rapidly towards the pass about a thousand feet above the trailhead. The area was damaged by a wildfire a few years ago, but it was still beautiful. As we got higher, brightly colored maples and autumn-yellow oaks mixed with the ponderosa pine and Douglas fir. Bear scat, colored with red apple peels from the fallen fruit of the abandoned orchards along Oak Creek, was scattered along the path. The prints of mule deer crossed the trail in several places. The air was brisk and heavy with the autumn forest smells accented by last night’s heavy rain. It was a glorious day for a walk in the woods.

  I thought of the young man who had grown up in a poor neighborhood in Brooklyn and made himself into a Ph.D. and a senior bank executive. I wondered what had gone through his mind as he hiked, probably with someone local as a guide, over this steep and scenic pass. Was his last walk filled with the magic of this breathtaking trail?

  Art and I were breathing in heavy moist gulps as we rested at the pass. Chad was carrying the backpack, but he hardly seemed to have noticed the steep climb. As we rested, I explained to Art that Sheriff Taylor had asked us to meet in his office to discuss the case tomorrow morning. I mentioned that we were taking the personal effects that I’d retrieved from Dr. Thatcher’s room at the Bank E & A’s retreat center, and I suggested that Art join us if he could. We’d leave from our office in Sedona at 8:30. I wanted Ar
t to be aware that I’d taken the personal effects from the room in Yavapai County without making a big deal of the information. It was a little CYA tactic. Art agreed to join us.

  We began to descend the steep forest-shaded switchbacks that took us down to Vultee Arch. We were soon at the crime scene, returning about twenty-four hours after our previous visit. The rain had turned the area’s bright red soil to sticky mud, but most of the crime scene was located on solid unrevealing red sandstone. We spent two hours looking for any useful evidence of a struggle. I asked Art two-dozen questions about his first view of the location when he found the body, but neither the search nor the conversation added anything useful to our evidence. There was one small exception.

  Chad found a partial boot print in the soft dry earth just inside the opening in the Sinaguan rock structure. Neither Chad nor I had noticed it on our first inspection of the area. We were not certain if the footprint was new or if it had been left at the time of the crime. The print might indicate that someone crouched and entered through the low opening and then stood up within the structure. Most of the floor was rock, but in that one location enough soil had collected through the open doorway to provide a good footprint. Chad took a plaster cast. It appeared to be the same style of boot as Dr. Thatcher had been wearing. That single footprint might be proof that Dr. Thatcher was not bitten as he stuck his head through the low opening. He might have entered the structure and made an inspection of the inside and then been attacked as he came out.

  It was early evening as we hiked back to the vehicles and headed for town. Chad and I went to the office to check for messages. We agreed to meet for breakfast at the Golden Goose before Art joined us at 8:30. I wanted to discuss the case with Chad without the Yavapai County deputy being present. The sun was setting in a blaze of orange and red as purple clouds formed over the high country north of town threatening further thunderstorms.