EQMM, March-April 2010

by Dell Magazine Authors

  North-country boys aren't easily spooked, don't fear much, living or dead. Still, Shea found himself walking soft in the dim corridors, half expecting to meet a ghost around the next corner. So when he stepped into the courtroom and saw a cop staring up at the photo display, for a crazy moment he wondered if . . .

  But the cop was definitely real.

  A big man, half a head taller than Shea, wearing a summer blue uniform, short sleeves that showed muscular biceps and a Semper Fi tattoo. Horse-faced, underslung jaw, oversized stallion's teeth. His smile was probably scarier than his glare, but he wasn't smiling now. He was glowering up at the poster shot of Red Max Novak holding the AK over his head, silently screaming his defiance.

  "Can I help you?” Dan asked.

  "I'm Sheriff Martin Doyle. Marty to my friends. You can call me Sheriff Doyle."

  "I didn't call you at all,” Shea said mildly, “and this work site is closed to the public. So is there something I can do for you? Sheriff Doyle?"

  "Yeah. You can bag this whole cockamamie project and head back where you came from. Valhalla, right? You boys are a long way from home."

  "Work's not so easy to find up north."

  "You should have tried harder. This project's a lousy idea."

  "I agree with you a hundred percent,” Puck said, joining them from the hall. “But I've got my own reasons. What's your beef, sport?"

  "You see the lawman in that photograph, the one with silver hair, standing by that damned tunnel? That's old Tom Kowalski. Sheriff Kowalski, in those days. He went out of his way to welcome me when I took his job, twenty years ago. Brought me up to speed, helped me all he could, though he owed me nothin'. A good man, a good cop. The jailbreak destroyed his career. Made him a joke in his own hometown."

  "Must have been tough,” Shea said.

  "Not as tough as having the city council vote to raise a damned shrine to the murderer who wrecked Tom's life. There's nothing heroic about Red Max Novak. He was just another radical commie psycho. Colleges campuses bred ‘em like rats in those days."

  "We're not politicians, Sheriff Doyle,” Dan said, “we're in the construction business. Just hired help doing a job."

  "Doing the wrong job,” Doyle said. “Just so we're clear, guys, there's no statute of limitations on murder or breaking jail and abetting either one is a felony. It seems to me that's damned close to what you people are doing. And I'm not the only one who thinks so. We have a lot of veterans in this town, and a lot of working men who thought the hippies were scum and still do. So you boys better keep your eyes peeled for vandals and lock up your tools every night. Because if you have any problems on this particular job, our response time might run a little slow."

  "No big surprise,” Puck snorted, “considering your department lost the most famous prisoner you ever had. We'll keep an eye on our gear. Feel free to get back to the hunt."

  "What hunt?"

  "For Red Max,” Puck said innocently. “Bein’ there's no statute of limitations and all, shouldn't you be out looking for him, Sheriff?"

  * * * *

  Sheriff Doyle wasn't the only one unhappy about the job. Four days into the project, Maph Rochon, a bull-necked, bullheaded Ojibwa ironworker, stormed into Shea's temporary office, demanding to be paid off.

  "You gotta be kiddin', Maph,” Dan said. “You haven't worked a full week yet."

  "Ain't gonna work one, neither,” Rochon said. “I don't like this place."

  "Fine, you want to quit, go ahead. But you can whistle for gas money, I'm not—” He broke off as Puck grabbed his bicep.

  "Whoa up, what are you doing? You can't cut Maph loose."

  "Watch me! He's a drunk and a hothead, more trouble than he's worth."

  "He's also a freakin’ artist with an acetylene torch and we're gonna need him bad when we start reconfiguring those cells. You're the boss, Danny, act like one. Cool your jets and solve the damn problem."

  Shea opened his mouth to argue, then closed it again. Because Puck was right. As usual.

  "What seems to be the trouble, Maph?” Shea grated, forcing a smile.

  "This freakin’ place bums me out,” Rochon said stubbornly. “If I'd known what the job was gonna be, I wouldn't have signed on."

  "You gripe about every job, Maph, but you've never quit on me before. What's your problem? You don't like Novak's politics?"

  "I don't give a rat's ass about politics, but I've been stuck in a few jails. Never had no fun in one and I don't like workin’ in this one, neither. I got three days’ wages and a hundred and fifty bucks gas money comin', Danny. You either get it up or I'll kick your ass for you."

  Rochon was dead serious. His shaggy hair was hanging in his bloodshot eyes. He was hung over, hurtin', and ready to take it out on somebody. The last time Shea'd tangled with him, the police had to break it up and Shea was sore for a month. Which is why he couldn't believe it when Puck took a nine-pound sledgehammer from the tool rack and tossed it to Rochon.

  "You're dead right, Maph. I got no use for jails, either. So why don't we bust this one up?"

  "Bust it up?” Rochon echoed, hefting the sledge suspiciously, still glowering at Shea.

  "See that photograph next to Red Max? The one with those cops standing around that hole, looking stupid? They had a famous jailbreak here. Red Max's buddies tunneled in and broke him out. Afterward, the cops poured a new concrete floor in the basement to cover it up. How about you bust that sucker open all over again? Let some air into this dump. Sound like fun, big fella?"

  "Yeah, maybe it does at that.” Rochon nodded slowly. “Last time they locked me up, I coulda used a hammer like this. Okay, Puck. I'll bust open that tunnel for you. I'll bust Danny up some other day.” Saluting Shea with the sledge, he turned and stalked out.

  "What the hell was that?” Shea demanded, turning on Puck. “He was primed to stomp me into dog meat and you toss him a nine-pound hammer?"

  "C'mon, Danny, Maph's a surly sumbitch, but he's not crazy enough to use a sledge on you. Besides, he can whip you any day of the week. He doesn't need a hammer to do it."

  "Then why give him one?"

  "Because your best chance against a hardhead like Maph is to clock him before he knows he's in a fight. While he's deciding whether to use that sledge or not, you sucker punch him two, three times. Put his lights out."

  "Assuming I was smart enough to figure that out,” Shea sighed.

  "Also assuming you could hit Maph hard enough to put him down."

  "You're an evil old man, Puck."

  "Thank you, sir. But I didn't get this old bein’ stupid, Danny. You'd best keep a weather eye on Rochon. Maph's a mean drunk and meaner sober. Draws trouble like flies to a roadkill."

  And Puck was right again. As usual.

  * * * *

  That afternoon, Shea walked into his office to find Maph Rochon sitting in his chair, his work boots up on the drafting table. “What are you doing in here?"

  "Waitin’ for you, boss man. What do you want me to do next?"

  "You can't be finished with that tunnel already."

  "Not exactly, no."

  "Then why aren't you on it?"

  "Ain't no tunnel to be on, Danny,” Maph said blandly. “Never was, neither."

  "What the hell are you talking about?"

  "I busted through the concrete floor like Puck told me, found the original hole into the storm drain. It's a thirty-incher, plenty big enough to shinny through for the first ten feet or so, then it opens out into a crawl space in the subbasement. And that's the problem."

  "What problem?"

  "This old building's sitting on forty-foot walnut timbers, Danny, twenty inches thick at mid-bole. They rest on the bedrock. Solid granite. The drain's cut wide to pass under them beams, but it's only six inches deep and there's a grille across it to keep the rats out. It's original, Danny. Made of the same bars they used to build the cells, set in stone, rusted nearly solid. You'd need an acetylene torch to cut it and even then the hole's to
o small to pass a man through. Nothing much bigger than a mouse ever went in or out of that tunnel. I double-checked the pictures to make sure there was no mistake. There ain't. The hole they dug in that cell floor was a shuck, a tunnel to nowhere. That up-yours finger spray-painted on the wall wasn't a joke on those cops. It was their joke on the rest of us."

  "Show me,” Shea said.

  * * * *

  Sara Jacoby emerged from the tunnel shaken and pale as a ghost, her Karan suit covered with grime. “There has to be some mistake. Could Novak have gotten out some other way?"

  "I've gone over the blueprints, Miss Jacoby,” Shea said. “They show exactly what Maph found. This old barn was built in eighteen eighty-seven, overbuilt actually, to support two water tanks on the roof, a thousand gallons each. There was no running water in those days, so every municipal building had their own supply. You see these lines on the drawing? They're walnut logs, two and a half tons apiece, braced on bedrock. No way under them, no way around. The tunnel in this photograph never went anywhere. It couldn't. It was a photo op, nothing more."

  "But there are pictures of a policeman crawling out of the far end . . . My God,” she said softly, as the full weight of understanding settled in. “They were all in on it, weren't they? They had to be. But how could they cover a thing like this up?"

  "With shovels,” Puck said. “Same way they faked the tunnel. Dug it out, took a few pictures, then filled it in again. Topped it off with concrete."

  "But why?” Sara demanded. “Max Novak was the most famous prisoner they'd ever had. Why would they stage a phony escape?"

  "I can think of one reason, but you won't like it,” Puck said. “Back in the Days of Rage, protesters weren't the only ones who ran off the rails. Guardsmen killed four kids at Kent State and forty civilians during the Detroit riots. Five years earlier, Mississippi cops handed three civil-rights workers over to the KKK. They ended up dead in a swamp. Could be there's a real ugly reason nobody's seen Red Max Novak lately."

  "But what are we going to do? If we tell Sheriff Doyle about this, he'll declare it a crime scene, tape it off, and shut down the project. Which is what he wants to do anyway."

  Shea shrugged. “It's your project, your call. Do you want us to cover it up again?"

  "Damn it,” Sara said softly, shaking her head. “Damn it, damn it, damn it."

  * * * *

  "I knew no good would come of this,” Sheriff Martin Doyle said sourly. “Frickin’ yuppie city council and their New Age ideas.” They were in Doyle's office in the new Port Martin Civic Center, a flashy modern construct of glass and concrete that held the sheriff's department, fire department, and city offices, and had no soul at all.

  "The city council didn't lose that prisoner,” Puck pointed out. “Your old pal Sheriff Kowalski did. Or did he?"

  "What are you saying? You think old Tom Kowalski whacked Max Novak, then staged the escape to cover it up?"

  "We have no idea what happened,” Sara said quickly. “That's why we're here. We do know that Novak definitely didn't crawl out through that tunnel, though. So the question is, why would the police fake his escape? If it wasn't to cover up Novak's murder, then what did happen?"

  "I . . . don't know anything I could swear to, you understand,” Doyle said, “but I did hear a story once. Last year, after the council voted to build the memorial, I ran into old Sheriff Kowalski at the Town Pub. It was only a few weeks before he died and he was half in the bag that night. And bitter. He told me he'd kicked Novak loose for the sake of the town, and later, the same punks he'd saved turned on him like a pack of rats. And now they were going to put up a damn shrine to the murderer who wrecked his life."

  "What did he mean, for the sake of the town?” Shea asked.

  "After Novak killed that guard during the Days of Rage, he didn't run to Port Martin by accident. Some of the kids in his little commie cell at Michigan State were from here. He figured they'd be home for the holidays, and would help him get out of the country. But when he got picked up, the first thing Max did was offer to rat out his friends to the FBI to buy himself a better deal."

  "A real sweetheart,” Puck observed.

  "Novak was a piece of shit,” Sheriff Doyle spat. “But the others . . . Hell, they were just college kids dabbling in radical politics. And they were from some of the finest families in this town. They had nothing to do with that bombing and didn't deserve to have their lives destroyed by that psycho. So the sheriff talked to their parents and arranged for a . . . ransom."

  "Took a bribe, you mean,” Puck snorted.

  "Old Tom needed the money to keep his deputies quiet. He knew they'd probably lose their jobs over it and he was right. So they faked the tunnel long enough to take pictures, then filled it in again. Everybody assumed Max's pals in the SDS or the Weathermen broke him out. A decade or so later, those same kids had businesses and families of their own, and became the new pillars of the community. And it wasn't long before they fired Tom Kowalski, the guy who'd saved their collective young asses."

  "Or so Sheriff Kowalski told you,” Sara said carefully. “How do you know that it's true?"

  "I don't,” Doyle admitted. “But I do know that Tom Kowalski wouldn't murder a kid. He was too good a man for that. Too good a cop."

  "He wasn't so hot at guarding prisoners,” Shea said, “ and he had good reason to lie. You said it yourself, there's no statute of limitations on murder, including Novak's, if he was killed back then."

  "But he wasn't! Novak spoke at a press conference in Toronto later that spring. That was months after the escape."

  "And he was wearing a ski mask,” Sara pointed out. “It could have been anyone."

  "The FBI identified his voice."

  "Or claimed they did,” Puck said. “It was still J. Edgar Hoover's FBI back then. Given what we've already uncovered, are you willing to take their word for it?"

  "Maybe not,” Doyle conceded. “The problem is, you haven't turned up any actual evidence of anything, except that the famous Christmas Break didn't happen the way people said it did."

  "What do you intend to do about this?” Sara demanded.

  "I don't know, Sara. This thing's been lying there all these years, like a hot power line downed by a storm. It destroyed Tom Kowalski and maybe Novak, too. I'm not going to blow my career over a forty-year-old jailbreak."

  "You can't just ignore this,” Sara said.

  "No, but I can pass the buck.” Taking a pad from his desk drawer, Doyle jotted a few quick notes, then slid the pad across his desk to Sara.

  "I've been against this memorial from the start, Sara. If I open a new investigation, the council will think it's political no matter what I say. Old Tom told me the names of the kids who were involved at the time. Take a look at it.” Sara picked up the notepad, glanced at it, and paled.

  "My God, Marty, this is a who's who of Port Martin. Half the country-club set."

  "Now you see my problem. If I start questioning these people about a wild story I heard from a drunk, they'll get my ass fired in a New York minute. They might talk to you, though, off the record. Tell ‘em you're doing research for the restoration."

  "But most of them are my friends, Marty. You can't expect me to question them, then report back to you."

  "What you decide to tell me is completely up to you. To be honest, if I never hear another word about Red Max and the Days of Rage, it'll be too soon. But if you uncover evidence of a crime, or any indication of where Novak might be now, it's your civic duty to tell me about it. Are we clear?"

  "Crystal,” Puck said. “You're asking us to do your job for you."

  "Maybe I am,” Doyle admitted. “But if I were you, I'd walk extra soft, Pops. Because if Red Max really was murdered back then, you may be talking to the people who took him out."

  * * * *

  "He's right,” Shea said, as they rode down in the elevator. “Maybe you should just step away from this."

  "And do what?” Sara demanded. “Shut down
the project? Or worse, build a monument to a damned lie? Not a chance, guys. Nineteen Sixty-Nine Main Street is my concept and I've put two years of my life into it. One way or another, I want the truth now."

  "Then you ain't looking for it alone,” Puck said positively. “They didn't call ‘em the Days of Rage for nothin'. We dug this mess up for you, we'll help you put it to rest. Who's first on the list the sheriff gave you?"

  Glancing at the slip of paper, Sara smiled in spite of herself. “Dawn Stanton, the town librarian. Trust me, guys, she's not dangerous."

  Perhaps not, but Red Max Novak was still a touchy subject. When Sara told Mrs. Stanton why they'd come, she ushered them into her private office, a glassed-in, second-story cubicle with an overview of the book stacks below and the big lake glistening in the distance.

  "How much do you already know?” the librarian asked absently, staring out over the lake, whitecaps breaking in the afternoon sun. She was a handsome woman, crowding sixty but well preserved, a matronly blond earth-mother in a flowered granny dress and Birkenstocks.

  "We only know that you were . . . involved somehow,” Sara said carefully. “Anything you tell us will be off the record, Dawn. The memorial is going to attract a lot of attention, I just want to avoid surprises."

  "Then you picked the wrong subject,” Dawn said drily. “Max Novak was full of surprises. Not all of them pleasant. He cut quite a romantic figure on campus back then, the romantic revolutionary, and we . . . hooked up, as kids say today."

  "You were lovers?” Shea asked.

  "Love's too strong a term to describe what we had. Hot pants would be more accurate. Max was a beautiful boy with a terrific body, but he was also a complete egomaniac. A charming, irrepressible ham. When he was arrested, he told the police he knew he had the right to remain silent, but he didn't have the ability.” She shook her head, smiling, remembering. “Those were wild times and he was one wild boy."

  "Have you ever heard from him?” Puck asked.

  "Never. But that's not surprising, I wasn't all that important to him."