Tamarack County: A Novel

by William Kent Krueger

  “You don’t have to call me,” she told him. “Really. Unless it’s about Dexter.”

  “I’ll call,” he promised.

  Outside, the air hit him like a fist. The wind was up, and the chill in it was monstrous. He quickly drew his gloves and stocking cap from the pockets of his parka and pulled them on. He was glad to get into Jenny’s Forester and out of the wind. He started the engine and let it warm up a couple of minutes so that the defroster would melt the moisture from his breathing, which had begun to form a crystalline coating on the inside of the windshield the moment he got in.

  While he sat waiting, he thought about his night with Stella and how he felt about it. Was he relieved to be leaving in this way, quickly and without any emotional mess? Not really. Was he confused? Absolutely. But he was also, he realized with a smile he wasn’t even aware of until he caught sight of himself in the rearview mirror, grateful. Although there was a good deal of danger in what he’d shared with Stella, he’d enjoyed himself immensely. This did cause him some guilt, because he honestly wasn’t sure what last night meant in terms of his relationship with Rainy Bisonette. When Rainy left, Cork had tried to think of it not as an ending but as a hiatus. He’d believed that at some point he and Rainy would be together again and what was required of him was mostly patience.

  Until last night, he’d thought of himself as a patient man. Now he wasn’t sure. He wasn’t sure of a lot of things.

  When the glass had cleared, Cork turned the Forester in a tight circle and headed away. He glanced in the rearview mirror and was just a little disappointed not to see Stella’s face at a window, watching him go.

  He drove straight to the Tamarack County Sheriff’s Department. When he swept inside, Deputy Pender was on the public contact desk. Without Cork even having to ask, Pender buzzed him through the security door.

  “She’s expecting you,” the deputy said, nodding in the direction of Dross’s office.

  By the time Cork walked in, the whole sky was illuminated by the pale light of early dawn, and beyond the windows, the town of Aurora was emerging fully from the dark. Dross was at her desk, phone in hand, in the middle of a conversation. She waved him toward an empty chair. Cork shed his coat, draped it over the back of the chair, and sat.

  “Honestly, Ed, there’s no reason for you to cut your visit short. We’ve got this thing in hand.” Dross listened, then nodded. “I promise I will. My best to Alice.” She hung up. “Ed Larson. He heard about Evelyn Carter, and he thinks he should cut his visit to San Diego short.”

  Cork glanced at his watch. “Awfully early out there. Is he worried you can’t do this without him?”

  “He’s worried he’ll miss out on an interesting case.”

  “So fill me in on this interesting case,” Cork said.

  Dross turned in her chair so that she sat in profile, silhouetted against the dawn. She seemed to be speaking more toward the brightening sky than to Cork. “Every time I question the Judge, I get the same feeling. He doesn’t really have a clue about what’s happened to his wife. In fact, it’s getting to the point where he doesn’t have a clue about much of anything anymore. I really believe he’s losing it. From everything I’ve been told, he’s been on that downslide for a while. His wife’s death seems to have snapped whatever was holding him to reality. So, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about Evelyn Carter. I keep asking myself is there maybe some connection between her disappearance and the death of Wakemup’s dog.”

  “Why would there be any connection?”

  She turned back to him. “Because of Cecil LaPointe.”

  Cork said, “I’ve been wondering if LaPointe might have something to do with the dog and with what happened to Marlee Daychild, but Evelyn Carter? I mean, if LaPointe wanted revenge, why not just go after her husband?”

  “Okay, consider this. To a man in prison, what’s the most important thing in life?”

  “Not getting a shiv stuck in him, I suppose. Or anything else stuck in him, for that matter.”

  “Ask me, and I’d say it’s his freedom. The one thing you absolutely give up in prison is your freedom.”

  “Okay, go on,” Cork said.

  “What was the most important thing in the Judge’s life?”

  “I give up,” Cork said.

  “His wife. Without her around, he’s helpless. The way things are looking for him right now, in very short order, he’ll be in a nursing home, probably a locked memory unit, with no real say left in his life. About as near to prison as you can get without being behind bars. Or at least that’s how I’d look at it.”

  “So how does Dexter fit in?”

  “Ray Jay Wakemup’s been clean and sober for two years. If what his sister told me yesterday is true, Dexter was his best friend, maybe his only friend. Dexter was also his anchor. Without that anchor, odds are that Ray Jay’ll drift again right back into using. And here’s the kicker. Think about Sullivan Becker.”

  “Becker? He’s in Florida and . . .” Cork stopped, because he saw exactly where Dross was going.

  This is what they both knew about Sullivan Becker. After he’d prosecuted Cecil LaPointe for the murder of Karyn Bowen, a trial that he’d made sure got lots of media coverage, Becker had been offered a position by the district attorney for Dade County, Florida, who was an old law classmate of Becker’s. Becker was an avid sailor. In Minnesota, he’d kept a small sailboat in the marina on Iron Lake and had a larger boat, a thirty-foot Hunter, moored in the marina at Grand Marais on Lake Superior. Summers, he sailed every weekend. He raced in regattas. He’d leaped at the opportunity to moor his practice and his sailboat in Florida’s sunny clime, and over the years, until his retirement, he’d made a good name for himself taking on the Cuban mafia.

  Two years ago, after all hell broke loose with Ray Jay Wakemup’s accusation that Becker and Judge Ralph Carter and the Tamarack County sheriff had withheld important information that might have cast doubt on Cecil LaPointe’s guilt, Becker had escaped the media by taking to the sea. He’d issued statements, but always electronically. He didn’t return to Dade County until the media fire was finally smothered by LaPointe’s continued insistence on his own guilt.

  Then, late last summer, while Becker was jogging—another passion, but meant mostly to keep himself in shape for sailing—he’d been the victim of a hit-and-run. He’d survived, but in the accident, both legs had been crushed, and both had been amputated. Sullivan Becker would probably never sail—or run—again. Although no suspect ever surfaced, the prevailing sentiment was that it was payback by the Cuban mafia for all the damage Becker had inflicted over all those years.

  Cork said, “They took Becker’s legs, took what was most important to him, that’s what you’re getting at?”

  “Bingo.”

  “Didn’t kill him. Didn’t kill Ralph Carter. Didn’t kill Ray Jay Wakemup. Left them alive, but without whatever it is that would make their lives worth living.”

  Dross said, “I’m guessing that if Roy Arneson or Harmon Wakemup were still alive, whoever’s behind this would have found a way to do the same to them.”

  “It’s a stretch,” Cork said.

  “But it would explain a lot.”

  “That it would. So LaPointe is out for revenge?”

  “Or someone is out to avenge him.”

  “Who?”

  “That’s what I’m going to try to find out. I called Stillwater Prison, and I’ve got permission to speak with Cecil LaPointe this afternoon.”

  “Good luck. I tried two years ago, and he refused to talk to me.”

  She picked up a book that had been lying facedown in front of her on the desk, and Cork saw that it was The Wisdom of White Eagle. “You’ve read this?” she asked.

  “Sure.”

  “What do you think?”

  “I’m not big on the idea of channeling spirits. That said, it seems like a pretty good take on the spiritual journey. Very Indian.”

  “Do you think the man who wrote t
his is capable of arranging the murder—if that’s what we’re dealing with—of Evelyn Carter?”

  “I’d have a better idea of the answer to that if I could talk to LaPointe in person.”

  “Which is why I want you to go with me down to Stillwater today.”

  “You think he’ll be any more willing to talk now?”

  She tapped the book. “If what he wrote in here isn’t bullshit, then he might talk to us, given what we’re dealing with up here.”

  Cork thought about it. “And if he still refuses, I guess that would tell us something, too. What time do we leave?”

  “I told the Stillwater people we’d be there at two.” Dross leaned toward him and studied his face. “Is that lipstick?”

  “Grateful client.” Cork stood quickly, grabbed his coat, and said, “Pick me up at my place in an hour.”

  CHAPTER 28

  It was Monday morning. When Cork arrived home on Gooseberry Lane, he found Jenny in the kitchen with Waaboo, both of them eating oatmeal, Jenny a lot less messy in this endeavor than her son. Stephen was nowhere to be seen.

  “The Land Rover and the Bearcat are gone. Did Stephen take them?” Cork asked, hanging his parka beside the kitchen door.

  “Yes,” Jenny said.

  “To school?”

  “Good boy,” Jenny said to Waaboo, who’d managed to put a whole spoonful of the cereal in his mouth without spilling any of it. “Stephen didn’t go to school today.”

  “No? Where is he?”

  “Crow Point.”

  “To see Annie.”

  “Not exactly.”

  “What then?”

  “He’s going to do a sweat.”

  “Today? In this cold?”

  “That’s what he says.”

  “And you let him go?”

  “He’s my brother, Dad, not my son. I don’t try to tell him what to do.”

  “Sorry.”

  “He had what he believes was a vision last night, apparently a lot like the one Henry Meloux had. Stephen’s hoping a sweat might make things clear to him. Ooops!” Jenny wiped a big blob of oatmeal off the floor where Waaboo had dropped it.

  Cork slipped his boots off, left them on the mat beside the door, and considered the information Jenny had just given him. Apparently, Stephen had been able to dream the vision Meloux had urged him to attempt. Cork was proud of his son, but he wished Stephen had discussed it with him before going out to Crow Point on his own. Just one more example of how his children were outgrowing their need for him, which made him feel old and extraneous.

  “Did he tell you what the vision was?”

  She nodded. “This morning before he left.”

  “Mind sharing it?”

  Jenny told him what Stephen had reported to her. Then she asked, “Are you going out there?”

  He wished that were possible, wished he could be of some help to his son. But he had other obligations at the moment, pressing ones. “I’ll talk to him later. Right now, I’m heading down to the Twin Cities with Marsha Dross.”

  “What for?”

  “We’re going to visit Cecil LaPointe.”

  “The Wisdom of White Eagle Cecil LaPointe?”

  “That’s him.”

  “Why?”

  “Marsha thinks there may be some connection between LaPointe and both Evelyn Carter’s disappearance and what happened to Wakemup’s dog.”

  “Revenge?”

  “Something like that.”

  “But he’s still in prison, isn’t he?”

  “Doesn’t mean he couldn’t have help on the outside. What’s up with you and Waaboo today?”

  She used her napkin to dab oatmeal from her son’s nose. “We’re spending some time with Skye.”

  “Oh? I figured she’d be going out to Crow Point.”

  Jenny looked as if there was something she wanted to say to him, and he waited, but what she said was “Maybe later.”

  “Except for that very brief conversation we had when she first arrived, I haven’t had a chance to talk to her at all. What do you think of Skye Edwards?”

  “I like her,” Jenny said, and Cork could tell she meant it. But she also avoided looking at him, deliberately focusing her attention on her son. “And Waaboo here likes her, too.”

  “Is there something I should know?” Cork asked.

  “When you’re back from the Twin Cities, we’ll sit down and talk. As you said, right now you have to go.”

  He was torn. Whatever Jenny was holding back, he wanted let in on it. On the other hand, she was right. He was pressed for time. He needed to shower and change into clean clothes. When he returned from his visit to Stillwater Prison, there would be time for all the questions he might want to ask.

  “All right,” he agreed and turned to head upstairs.

  “Oh, by the way,” Jenny said to his back. “Rainy called.”

  It felt like a needle had gone into his stomach. He turned back. “What did she want?”

  “Just to say it was okay for Annie to use her cabin.”

  “Did she ask about me?”

  “Of course.”

  “And you told her . . . ?”

  “That you were working a case and weren’t here.” She said this in a matter-of-fact way while she cleaned more oatmeal from Waaboo’s face. “I didn’t mention the Daychilds.”

  “All right,” Cork said. “Thanks.”

  He continued upstairs, feeling guilty, feeling that he should call Rainy, talk to her, but knowing that he wouldn’t. Not yet anyway.

  Dross picked him up half an hour later in her pickup. The roads were clear, but along the shoulders the plowed snow was piled high and packed solid. The sunlight set the winter hills ablaze with white fire. The sky was hard blue, a pureness of color possible only in the dry, frigid air of winter. Everything had such a pristine feel to it that Cork couldn’t help believing this was a day on which important answers would be found.

  “Coffee in the thermos,” Dross said. “That extra cup beside it is for you.”

  “Thanks.” Cork poured some brew, then said, “This’ll pretty much ensure that we have to stop a couple times on the way down.”

  “No problem.” Dross carefully passed a slow-moving pickup hauling a long trailer piled with Christmas trees. “So,” she said. “You and Stella now?”

  “What’s with everyone’s interest in my private affairs?”

  “Small town. No one’s affairs are private.”

  “I’m not going there, Marsha.”

  She smiled and then shrugged. “Okay. Let’s talk about LaPointe. I don’t know the guy. What do I need to know?”

  “A complicated man. Twenty years ago, he was just a mechanic, nice enough guy. Did some work on the Bronco I had back then. Knew his stuff. Good looking. A ladies’ man, but he didn’t seem to me to be a predator. The whole thing with Karyn Bowen was really surprising. Except for the fact that angel dust had been involved, I wouldn’t have believed him capable of that kind of violence. When Ray Jay Wakemup spilled his own story of what happened that night, I have to admit it seemed a more reasonable explanation. I knew Harmon Wakemup well. He was a good cop, but he had a temper, and I always thought that someday it might get him into real trouble.”

  “So you think he could have been the one who killed the Bowen girl?”

  “Again, except for the involvement of drugs, I’d say LaPointe wasn’t a good suspect at all. If I’d known Harmon Wakemup was there that night, I would have looked at him pretty hard.”

  “You didn’t have a clue about his possible involvement?”

  “None. As far as I knew, only LaPointe had been with the woman. If what Ray Jay says is true, I’m betting that Harmon, because he was studying to be a cop, went back to LaPointe’s place and made sure that there was no evidence that might implicate him or Ray Jay.”

  “Why would LaPointe keep quiet about that?”

  “I don’t know. If he talks to us, that’s something I’m definitely going to ask. Wh
o’s minding the store while you’re gone?”

  “Pender’s in charge of the department, but Azevedo’s got the lead in the Evelyn Carter investigation. He’s checking out everyone on the list the Judge gave us of people who’ve had access to the Carters’ home recently, from the Schwan’s route man to the propane delivery guy.”

  “Long list?”

  “No, but with the Judge the way he is now, we can’t be sure it’s complete.” She breathed deeply and shook her head. “If we’re really dealing with a homicide here and the Judge isn’t the perp, then somebody had access to that house. And if this is about Cecil LaPointe, then it’s somebody with a connection to him. One plus one, right? Should be easy.”

  “If LaPointe talks,” Cork said. “Big if.”

  Dross reached up and pulled the visor down to block the low, glaring sun. “I didn’t know Roy Arneson. By the time you brought me into the department, he’d already retired and was spending most of his time in Arizona. What was he like?”

  “Roy was all about Roy.”

  “Good cop?”

  “Mostly all politician. Knew what it took to look good in voters’ eyes and was more concerned with that than running the department. His big strength was that he knew enough to get out of the way and let his officers do their jobs. Then, of course, he’d take full credit for whatever we did. When Karyn Bowen was murdered, he was facing a tough reelection in the fall because Tom Spinoza, who was chief of police in Yellow Lake back in those days, had already announced that he’d be running against Roy. Spinoza was personable, a Vietnam vet, lots of experience in law enforcement. Roy was just a few years shy of retirement age. So he was worried. Sewing up the Bowen murder case was a big boost to his campaign. And it would probably have been a game breaker if it turned out that we’d arrested and prosecuted an innocent man. So a lot was at stake in LaPointe’s conviction.”

  “Important enough to him to play dumb about Wakemup’s story?”

  “Apparently so, if everything Ray Jay says is true.”

  “And the Judge?”

  “You got me there. He’s always been a son of a bitch, but that’s hardly an explanation for such a huge miscarriage of justice. So . . .” Cork shrugged.