Code 61 ch-4

by Donald Harstad

  It was a good day. Bright sunshine in a cloudless blue sky, with the yellow, orange, and red leaves of fall covering the landscape. I was in a very good mood, considering the fact that I was at work.

  I was driving up to Freiberg to meet with Byng, and exercising my prerogative of taking the scenic route along the Mississippi. Byng had telephoned the office earlier and said that he'd been back on the roof and could find nothing. That meant that I wouldn't have to go back up that damned ladder. A very good mood.

  I picked up my mike, and called Byng on our OPS channel. “Twenty-nine, Three.”

  “Go ahead, Three.”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “I'm about five out. Want to ten-twenty-five somewhere?” I thought I'd leave where we'd meet up to him.

  “Uh, yeah. Why don't you meet me over at the Conception County Sheriff's Department?”

  Conception County Sheriff's Department was in Jollietville, Wisconsin, just across the river from Freiberg. A large bridge that crossed the Mississippi in two spans joined the towns, and the two states.

  “Ten-four. Be there in a couple of minutes.” Well. A nice, if unexpected, change of plan. I hadn't seen Harry and the Conception County boys in a good month.

  “Ten-four. Got somethin' over here I think you should see. Talk to ya when ya get here.”

  For some reason, I didn't like the sound of that.

  A second later, Sally's voice crackled on the INFO channel. “Comm, Three?”

  I leaned forward, and pressed the second of eight frequency buttons. “Comm, go.”

  “Three, remember the case you had about, oh, four years ago, when you got your car stuck and had to be towed out?”

  Of course I did. It had been at a drowning, where a canoe had turned over, and we were trying to get to the victim in an area without a road.

  “Ten-four, Comm, I do.”

  “They had a similar case in Conception County last night. This might be in reference to that.”

  “Ah, ten-four, Comm.” And I hung up the mike.

  “KQQ 9787, 12:29.” She gave the call letters as a sign she was through transmitting and ready to receive; and the time was given then so that it appeared on the voice recording, just in case her console clock was different from the electronic clock on the recorder.

  I was pretty sure that, if they'd had a drowning in Conception County last night, and Byng wanted me to see it, it was either one of our locals or somebody we had an interest in. You always wonder, and hope it isn't anybody you know personally, and maybe like.

  I was pulling up in front of the Conception County Sheriff's Department about eight minutes later.

  “Comm, Three's out of the car at Conception County.”

  “Ten-four, Three. 12:37.”

  I made a quick note of the time in my log. I had a feeling that it was going to be needed in a report.

  I walked in, and got buzzed through the bulletproof area and into the main part of the office. Byng was standing in the hall, and motioned me back to Investigator Harry Ullman's office.

  “Hey, Houseman,” said Harry, getting up from his desk and extending his hand. “Long time no see!”

  “You got that right, Harry. What's up?”

  He shook his head. “Another fuckin' floater in the river last night. That's seven this year. Called me out in the middle of the damn night.”

  “You wear your life jacket this time?” I asked because Harry had fallen in once, on a recovery a few years back, and nearly drowned himself. He couldn't swim.

  “Always, Carl. You know me.” He picked up an incident report sheet from his desk and handed it to me. “Ring any bells?”

  I scanned the sheet, and the driver's license stapled to it. The deceased was a white male, twenty-four years of age, named Randy Baumhagen. His driver's license indicated he was from Freiberg, Iowa, but I didn't know him. His color photo showed a fairly good-looking young man in a frilled white shirt with black trim. The standard uniform worn by employees of the General Beauregard, the gaming boat moored in Freiberg.

  “Works on the boat,” I said.

  “Worked. You know him?”

  “Nope, just can tell from the shirt.” I grinned at Harry. A small “gotcha,” but it was all part of the game.

  “You must be a detective,” said Harry.

  “I work at it,” I said lightly. “Any reason I really should know him?”

  Harry glanced at Byng. “He thinks so.”

  I looked over at the Freiberg officer, and raised an eyebrow.

  “Remember the car that I told you got scratched? The boyfriend of Alicia from last night?”

  “You're kidding,” I said, without much conviction.

  “Nope. Same kid.” Byng looked almost sad.

  “Well, hell,” I said. “That's a shame.”

  “It gets worse,” said Harry, in his garrulous way. “You're gonna love it.”

  “Oh?” I don't know where Harry got the impression I was as ghoulish as he was. “I don't know, Harry. I'm a sensitive kind of guy.”

  He motioned to his computer monitor, on a side stand near the window. “Take a look at these.”

  I walked over, and watched as he pulled up a series of electronic photos that showed young Baumhagen. The first two were of him floating; facedown, in a pretty shallow area, judging from the vegetation. “Pretty close to shore?”

  “Just above Frenchman's Landing,” said Harry. “Water there's about three-feet deep. Looks like he went right off a floating dock.”

  “He drown?” I asked as Harry brought up a different set of images.

  “Christ,” said Harry, “I hope not. Look here.”

  On the screen was a close-up of the right side of Baumhagen's head. It was just about completely caved in, like he'd fallen from a height and gone into rocks headfirst. That kind of completely. Never happen from a floating dock. He couldn't have fallen more than five feet.

  “That ought to have done it,” I said. “I didn't see any rocks in the other photos. Murder?”

  “You bet,” said Harry. “See, I told you you'd love it. Wait, though, it gets better than this, even.”

  I didn't see how that was going to be possible, but I've learned to trust what Harry says over the years.

  The next series loaded. This time Baumhagen was lying on his back. His neck was a mess.

  “Whoa,” I said. “You don't see that every day. Is that what got him?”

  “Not sure,” said Harry, “but we don't think so. He's in Milwaukee right now, getting autopsied. Great bunch, some of the same people who worked the Dahmer case. Top of the fuckin' line, Carl. Lemme tell ya.”

  “Name dropper.”

  “No, really. Anyway, they tell me that they think the cause of death was the blow to the head, and that the neck was done post mortem.”

  The hole in the neck was pretty large. “Somebody try to remove the head? Or are the turtles just hungrier this year?”

  “The forensics people are just guessing, but they say that it was done with a sharp object, but not a blade. More rounded, like a sharpened pencil, you know? Only probably steel. One of the docs is a farm kid, and he said that it reminded him of the sort of wound you might get from something like a fencing pliers.” Harry looked up from the screen. “You know?”

  I knew. A fencing pliers was kind of a big gripper or snipper, really, with a long, rounded point on one side of the head, so you could slip it under one of the big staples used to hold wire onto a wooden fence post. Heave on the handle, and you pulled the staple out.

  Harry went on. “No damage at all to the cervical vertebrae. Most of the major muscle groups are intact. Just a big fuckin' hole, Carl.”

  “This is a little way from usual, isn't it?”

  “You got that right, Carl.”

  “Why do the throat bit?”

  “I told him about last night,” Byng interjected.

  “About the teeth.”

  “Whatcha think, Carl?” asked Harry. “Could a guy do this with his fu
ckin' teeth?”

  “No way,” I said emphatically. “Never happen. Human can't bite that hard, and fake teeth would be pulled right out of his mouth. Real teeth couldn't do that.” I looked at both of them, in the sudden silence. “Well, that's just an opinion,” I said.

  “I agree,” said Harry. “So do the boys in the ME's office in Milwaukee.” He reached up and patted me on the shoulder. “Not bad for an Iowa boy.”

  It was quiet for another few seconds. “You know, though,” I said, “if you wanted to make somebody think you'd done it with teeth… ”

  Harry chuckled. “And that you'd crushed his fuckin' skull because you got a little eager?”

  “Well, no. Although I sure as hell didn't see any rocks in any of the photos that could have dented his head like that. But… ”

  “I know what ya mean, Carl,” he said. “From what Byng says, it might tie in.” He snorted. “Vampire. Suspect that weird has to be from your side of the river.”

  “I'll tell you what,” I said. “I'll bet the odds are at least fifty-fifty that if we find whatever caused the scratch on that boy's car, we'll find the weapon that did his throat.”

  “That makes sense,” said Harry. He straightened up.

  “So, Carl, did I lie or what? I said it was gonna be a good one.”

  “You didn't lie, Harry,” I said.

  “Great.” He seemed quite pleased with himself. “Whatcha say? Let's go get some lunch.”

  On our way out the door, I asked another question. “Who found him?”

  “Couple of old farts on their way to ffsh.” Harry clicked open the remote locks on his car. “Why?”

  “Just wondered what they'd be saying.”

  “They were worried about the deceased scaring off the ffsh.”

  “Figures,” said Byng.

  “I told 'em not to worry,” said Harry. “It's Friday. Fish can't eat meat on Friday, either.”

  The try at humor helped. We had a young man, brutally murdered and thrown into a river, without a real chance to live his life. All we could do to help was to try to get whoever killed him. Not much consolation for his friends and family, and not for us, either.

  Harry's one of the best cops around. I knew that when I told him, “You know what? You're such a good cop, I'm glad this is your case. Hell, Harry, I'm glad this is a Wisconsin case.”

  “Right,” he growled, as we got into his car. “And if you poor bastards from Iowa had any talent, you'd have a suspect from your peeping tooth fairy from last night. And if you had a suspect, you could tell me. And if you could tell me who your suspect was, I might have a fucking suspect myself!” He flashed a wolfish grin. “Pedro's sound all right? They have cheese burritos as the Friday Special.”

  “Great,” said Byng.

  “We'll work with ya, Harry,” I said. “Don't worry. Our main job is to make yours easier. Just as long as you feed us.”

  “That's what I'm afraid of,” he said.

  THREE

  Saturday, October 7, 2000

  07:40

  I was brushing my teeth in our upstairs bathroom when I thought I heard the phone ring. I turned off the water, and listened. Nothing. I turned the water back on, glad there hadn't been a call, because my wife, Sue, was asleep. She was a middle-school teacher, and Saturday was about the only day she could sleep past six-thirty.

  I was tapping the toothbrush on the side of the sink, and just reaching to turn off the water, when the bathroom door opened a few inches, and Sue's hand and arm came through, holding out the portable phone. “Okay,” she said, her voice throaty with sleep. “He's right here.” It would have been better if she'd said that into the phone, but I didn't think it prudent to bring that up. I was going to hear about this. I took the phone, and the hand disappeared.

  “Houseman.”

  “Carl?” It was the voice of Norma, one of the newer dispatchers. Well, sure. Who else? “Yep.”

  “Uh, we got a call, at, ummm… 06:36… and I sent Eight up on it. He got there, and thinks we should, uh, probably have you come up and take a look.” Her voice seemed to be about an octave higher than usual. “Eight” referred to Nation County Sheriff's Car Eight, the radio call sign of Tom Borman, a newish deputy with about two years' service. He seemed like a good sort, and pretty serious about his job.

  “What's he got?” I asked as I walked down the hall to our bedroom to dress. I was pretty sure he didn't want me to show up in just my boxer shorts.

  “The first call said there'd been an accident. That was on 911. Something about a lady in a tub. The caller wasn't really clear, female, just wanted help in a hurry.”

  “What's he want, help lifting her?” I asked. That wasn't good enough a reason to call me out early, and it was a hell of a long way from being sufficient reason to wake Sue. I guess I sounded a little exasperated.

  “No, no. No, we got a second phone call after the Freiberg ambulance got there. I sent them right away. They said”-and she seemed to be reading right off her dispatch log-“this subject is code blue, and we think there should be a cop up here right away, it looks like a suicide.”

  Well, that explained the call to me. Department policy is to treat suicides as if they were homicides, at least until murder had been ruled out. Who do you call to deal with a possible homicide? I was still the investigator, even though I was supposed to be working the noon-to-midnight shift. I couldn't blame Eight. He was new, and working the ten-at-night to ten-in-the-morning shift. The worst possible shift, as far as I was concerned. Even if he was virtually certain sure it was a suicide, he should ask for an experienced investigator. That would be me. And, since he asked for my assistance, I was now stuck with the report. “Right. I'll get dressed and-”

  “It's three and a half miles south of Freiberg, off County Road X8G, then the second gravel to-”

  I hate to be rude, but I was trying to pull on my blue jeans and still talk on the phone. Writing the directions down was out of the question.

  “Just tell me after I get in the car and I'm headed up to Freiberg. I'll take X8G up, okay?”

  “Sure,” she said. Her voice got some crispness back into it, and I knew I'd hurt her feelings by implying criticism.

  “I'm trying to put on my pants,” I said, and grinned as I said it, to lighten my voice. “Only so many hands.”

  “Oh… sure… Just one more thing, maybe, while I have you on the phone. I don't think this should be on the radio.”

  Having at least managed to get both legs in the jeans, I sat on the end of the bed, and said, “Sure.”

  “Eight called me on the phone, and said that this is a really bad one, but that it's a confirmed suicide.”

  “Oh?” I hate pulling on socks with one hand. I also hate junior officers making bald-faced statements like that. I mean, they're probably right most of the time, but all you need in a possible murder case is for some defense attorney to get his hands on a logged statement like that one. “But doesn't it say, right here, that the first officer on the scene determined this to be a suicide?” But the log couldn't be changed. Only amended, sort of. “Log it that I say that it's not a suicide until the ME's office says so,” I said. “Anything else?”

  “Really bad. And to handle it code sixty-one. That's all he said.”

  We used the signal code sixty-one to indicate that all radio communication regarding a particular incident be circumspect, and terse. It meant we had either a sensitive matter, or a very serious one, or both. At any rate, it was designed to prevent those with police scanners from becoming well informed.

  “Okay, kid. You call Lamar yet?” Lamar was our sheriff, and he liked to be kept apprised of tragic and disastrous happenings in the county. Mainly because he hated to go to breakfast at Phil's Cafe and have somebody ask him about a case before he knew we had a case. Looked bad. I pushed my stocking feet into my tennis shoes.

  “Yes, and he said to send you right up.”

  “Well, let's see if we can't arrange that,” I said wi
th a hissing sound as I bent over to tie my shoelaces, the phone pressed tightly between my shoulder and my ear.

  “And he said to call him if you needed him to come, too.”

  “Fine. I'll call you on the radio.” I pressed the “off” button on the phone and turned to put it back in the charger.

  “You need any help?” came Sue's voice from the other side of the bed. “It sure looks like it from here.”

  “No.”

  “I'm going to try to go back to sleep… ”

  I stood, pulled a dark gray polo shirt over my head, and slid my clip-on holster into my belt, on my right hip. I walked over to Sue, bent down, and gave her a kiss.

  “Good luck.”

  “You, too,” she said, nearly asleep again already.

  I grabbed my gun, my walkie-talkie, and my ID case; billfold and car keys from their drawer downstairs in the dining room, and was in my unmarked patrol car and reporting in to the dispatch center at 07:49.

  “What time did you call me, Comm?” I asked. Curious.

  “07:40.”

  “Ten-four.” Nine minutes. Getting old, I thought.

  I left Maitland, the county seat, where I lived and where the sheriff's office was located, and headed up the state highway to the intersection with X8G. It was a really pretty morning again. It was about fifty degrees, and warming. I love October.

  The police radio in my car was ominously quiet. That was standard with the imposition of code sixty-one. Only officers can really know the spooky feeling that comes with that particular brand of silence. You know there's something really bad, you're going to the scene, and it's absolutely quiet because most of the communications traffic is either on the phones, or just not happening at all because you're the designated catalyst for the next phase, and you aren't there yet. Sort of undercurrents, I guess. But you learn to hate silence, sometimes.

  I was moving about seventy or so, no lights or siren. They weren't really necessary, because there was absolutely no traffic anywhere. I became aware of intermittent sounds, like the faint patter of raindrops on the car. The sun was still shining brightly. Still no clouds. Then it dawned on me. Ladybugs. There were unusually large flights of ladybugs this year, and I was traveling through mini swarms of the little creatures. Well, that was at least one mystery solved today.