Eleven Days

by Donald Harstad

  It turned out that I’d been shot, just lightly grazed, by the .22. He’d fired at me, too. That must have been the spark I saw. I remembered him spinning, and the spark at the same time.

  “Hey, Art!” I hollered. Him spinning. Him spinning. “Hey, Art!”

  He came around the corner. “Yeah.”

  “Hey Art, I think I hit him. I shot inside the hallway, and I think I hit him. How’s Dan?”

  “He’s dead.”

  “I thought so. He was right in front of me. We had just gone through the cell area, and I was ahead, then we came out and he was in front and he fell and that son of a bitch was shooting and I think I hit him.”

  It came out pretty fast. Sally was staring at me, and so was Art.

  “Who is ‘that son of a bitch’ you’re talking about?”

  “Man named Travis. He did the Herkaman murders.” Revelation. “Art, I know that guy.”

  “Who?”

  “That Travis. I know him. I mean I recognized him.”

  “You’ve seen him before?”

  “Yeah. Not his face, Art. His walk. The way he carries himself. I know him, but not by this Travis name.”

  Art waited as long as he could, maybe two seconds, maybe three. “Well, then, who is it?”

  I looked at him. “I don’t know, I can’t place him.” I shook my head. “Ain’t that a son of a bitch?”

  “Yes.”

  “Something else … but I can’t put my finger on it. Oh. Did Mike get him? Mike chased him out of the back drive.”

  “Check with Mike,” said Art to Sally.

  I saw Lamar come into the dispatch center. He was pale. He’d evidently come in through the kitchen.

  “What happened?”

  I told him as best I could. I was getting a little confused myself at that point.

  He listened, then said to Sally, “Start calling everybody who isn’t on the radio. Start with Lieutenant Kainz, we’re gonna need people. Then get the medical examiner. Then, Art, you call the reserves. We’ll need to secure this place and the hospital.”

  “Okay. I can call Theo and Mike of our people.”

  “Do it. And Mike’s out, I just saw him. Get as many people on the road as you can. If Carl did hit him, he might be out on a gravel somewhere. Dead, but I hope not. Not yet.”

  “We’d better call Dubuque,” I said. “DCI is waiting for this guy down at his house. He might be going back there.”

  Mary Quentin, another dispatcher, came in. She seemed stunned. We all were.

  My attending EMT, the soft-spoken Donna Gorskey, said, “You need a head X-ray.” She turned to Lamar. “You better get him up to the hospital right away, we’re gonna be awful busy here for a while.”

  “Right,” said Lamar. Which, of course, would take him out of the picture at a critical time. He also didn’t want to lose Art right now, either.

  “Carl, we’ll get you up there as soon as we can free somebody up.”

  “No rush, I’m fine.”

  I continued to sit in the side chair at dispatch. Under the No Smoking sign. I lit up. Who was that son of a bitch? I knew I’d seen him before. Often, to be able to say that. Looked awfully familiar. I tried to remember if he’d said anything. No, no voice. I was sure of that. But my head felt kind of thick. His moves. His build. What was it?

  They came for Jane’s body, and I thought that Mary Quentin was going to lose it right there. She got hold of herself, though, with little help from anybody. I was just about all helped out myself.

  I caught a ride with the first ambulance to leave the scene, and sat in the hospital for a little while, as Kenneth Mills was hurt a lot worse than I was. But he was still alive. Doing better than Elizabeth.

  I got my head X-rayed again, and Henry looked at it carefully.

  “You’ll be all right. No new cracks. How do you feel?”

  “Oh, okay, I guess.”

  “You could be dead.”

  “Yeah.”

  I had already called Sue from the hospital and told her the gist of what had happened. She wanted to come up, and did. She fought her way through the crowd and was crying when she got to me. I put my arm around her and tried to get her out of the way when Dan’s wife arrived. Too late.

  Sue stayed with Alice Smith, and I hitched a ride back to the office with a lab tech.

  I wanted Travis. And I was beginning to think I knew where he was.

  36

  Tuesday, April 30

  00:07 hours

  I went into the dispatch center, looking for Lamar or Art.

  Sally looked up. “How are you?” she asked with genuine concern.

  “Oh, I’m fine. How are you?”

  “I’ll make it.”

  “Good. They find him yet?”

  “Not yet. But they found the car.”

  “They did?”

  “About half a mile out. Flat rear tire, I guess. Everybody just drove by where it went off over the edge by the vet’s office. No tracks, I guess. State trooper found it when he was on his way into town.”

  “Where is it now?”

  “I’m not sure,” she said. “But there were two holes in the back of the car. One in the tire. You must have got it.”

  “Good.” I sat down on the edge of the desk. “Where’s Lamar?”

  “Back in the cells, I think. He and Art are taking pictures before they move the last of the bodies.” She glanced at the jail monitor screen. “Yeah, there he is.”

  I looked at the familiar shape of Lamar on the black-and-white TV screen. I was very tired, I realized. I’d talk to him later, when he was done. I sure didn’t want to get dragooned into taking any pictures tonight. That should have been Theo’s job, anyway.

  “Theo should be doing this.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. Don’t bother with him, Lamar took him off the case. We don’t need him, anyway.”

  She smiled. “The one good thing …”

  I smiled back, glad for a bit of distraction. “Not enough.”

  I sat in the dispatch center, on the floor, leaning my head back against the wall. They were becoming enormously busy, with a tremendous amount of radio, telephone, and teletype traffic. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was seeing the beginning of the largest manhunt in the history of Iowa.

  The noise was constant, but always the same, so to speak. I found it helped me relax, and let me think about what had happened. I had to think it through. I didn’t know if I missed something or what, but I was getting the feeling that there was something I had to remember that I had forgotten. Who was it? of course.

  There was a discordant note in the background noise, and I opened my eyes and saw Hal and Hester looking down at me, with Sally saying, “I think he’s asleep.”

  “I’m not asleep.”

  I stood up. “You guys made good time back from Dubuque.”

  “Are you all right?” asked Hester.

  “Fine.”

  “He keeps saying that,” said Sally with considerable doubt in her voice.

  “You up to giving us a statement?” asked Hal.

  “Sure.”

  We went through the thinning crowd to the rear and into Lamar’s office. The first thing they had me do was take a breath alcohol test. Passed with flying colors, of course. But you can’t be too careful with defense attorneys. Standard procedure. They also advised me of my rights.

  Then we taped my account of what had happened. I was really surprised at myself. It seemed to me that my rendition was clear and concise. I felt nothing. Nothing at all. No regret, no sadness, no feeling of loss over Jane and Dan, Harvey and Kendall. No anger, either. Nothing. I was reminded of a song of that name, from the show A Chorus Line. Except I didn’t cry over feeling nothing. But it kept running through my mind. The song, that is.

  I gave the best description of the assailant that I could, and of the car. As I was finishing up, I realized that I still didn’t know the status of all the prisoners. I asked.

 
“Traer, Betty, and Rachel are all okay. Tommy Jenks is alive, but not expected to live.”

  Tommy was the twenty-five-year-old prisoner.

  “Kenny Mills died about half an hour ago,” said Hal. “His wife was dead on the scene.”

  “Except for Traer, it was a clean sweep.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Three troopers are taking him to the Linn County jail,” said Lamar. “Better security. And we don’t want that son of a bitch Travis coming back here.”

  “For sure,” I said. “Except I’d like another crack at him.”

  “Now,” said Hal, “Art says you recognize this guy?”

  I sighed. “Yeah. Sort of. I think I’m familiar with his walk, or his build. I don’t know who it is yet, but I know the son of a bitch.”

  “Think you’ll be able to place him?”

  I looked at Hal. “Sooner or later.” I shook my head. “I wish I’d reacted better.”

  “From what Saperstein tells us about him,” said Hester, “you did well just to stay alive, let alone hit him.”

  “Did I hit him?”

  “We think so. There’s a large bloodstain on the wall, right where he was when you shot.”

  “Good.”

  “Which reminds me,” said Hal, “we’re going to have to have your gun for ballistics tests.” He held out his hand.

  “You’re gonna have to wait a few minutes,” I said. “Where’s Phil Daniels?”

  Phil was a Maitland PD officer, and an avid gun collector.

  “Don’t know,” said Lamar, “out there somewhere.” He made a general gesture toward the exterior of the building.

  I picked up the intercom and told Sally to have Phil come into the office.

  I looked at Hal. “You can keep it in sight, but I’m not gonna hand it over to you until I have the replacement in my hand.”

  “Sure, sure …”

  The only other handgun I owned was a two-inch .38, and I just didn’t feel it was adequate for this situation. Not that I could reasonably expect to ever see Travis again. But I was a little less than logical right then.

  “So what are we doing?” I asked.

  “We’ve got almost a hundred troopers searching the roads in this and the adjacent counties,” said Hal.

  “And almost that many deputies and police officers coming in from all over,” said Lamar.

  “Any luck?”

  “Not yet.”

  “How bad you think he was hurt?” I asked.

  “Probably pretty bad,” said Hester. “That cannon you carry probably nearly took his arm off.”

  “Good.”

  “We found the dent in the hall, where the bullet exited. It went through and through. What kind of ammunition do you use in that?”

  “210-grain Silvertip.”

  “You heard a pop when he shot at you and Dan?” asked Hal.

  “Very clearly. Loud pop, like a little firecracker.”

  “You think he had a silencer?”

  “No.”

  “He must be a pretty good shot,” mused Hal.

  “Good enough,” I said.

  “I’m just thinking out loud.”

  Saperstein came in. “How are you?”

  “Fine.”

  Phil Daniels stuck his head in the office. “Somebody want me for something?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “You have a .44 four-inch at home, don’t you?”

  “Sure.”

  “Can I borrow it for a while? They need this one to take to the lab.”

  “You bet, I’ll get it right away. You okay?”

  I nodded.

  I was beginning to get a little tired of people asking me how I was. I excused myself and went to the john, remembering to hand Hal my revolver as I left the room.

  I looked in the mirror and discovered the reason for all the questions. I looked like shit. There was disinfectant, that heavy orange kind, all over the right side of my head. Same side that Rothberg got. And on the right shoulder of my uniform shirt. Almost no blood, but a lot of disinfectant.

  I went back to Lamar’s office and called home. Sue answered right away.

  “Hi, how you doin’?”

  “Fine, how are you?”

  “I’m just fine,” I said, and forced a chuckle. “So many people have asked, I decided to look and see why. I got disinfectant all over my shirt. Could you get another one out of the closet, and I’ll have somebody pick it up?”

  “Sure. You’re not coming home?”

  “Not just yet, darling.”

  “All right.”

  “Why don’t you go up to your folks’ house for a while?”

  “I think I’ll do that.”

  “Good, I think that’d be a good idea.”

  “It’s all over the news, and the phone was ringing when I came in the door. It was Jane. I told her you were all right. I was right, wasn’t I?”

  “You bet.”

  “I also stopped and saw your mother while I was at the hospital. I told her you were okay, too.”

  “Thank you.”

  “When are you coming home?”

  “Later. That’s all I know.”

  I dialed dispatch. “Hey, Sally, could you tell Phil to stop by my residence and pick up a uniform shirt?”

  “Sure.”

  “Carl,” said Hal, “let’s go over what he was wearing again.”

  “To the best of my recollection, it was a dark sweat suit with a hood. Dark blue, I think, maybe black. That’s all I know.”

  “And he didn’t return fire when you and Mike were shooting at the car?”

  “No. Why?”

  “Don’t know yet.”

  “There wasn’t much of a blood trail,” said Hester. “Blood on the wall, and possible tissue, where you shot him. A couple of drops on the kitchen floor, and a few drops on the asphalt on the back lot. I don’t think any of it was yours—you don’t appear to have bled much—but it might be.”

  “So,” I said.

  “Well, that happens sometimes, especially if the clothing is absorbing the blood. But, well, in a few minutes, why don’t you and I walk it through?”

  “Sure.”

  “Something I think you should know, though,” said Hester.

  “What’s that?”

  “We found a hand.”

  “I hit him in the hand?”

  “No, Carl.” She smiled. “It was somebody else’s hand, from a few days ago.”

  “I’m not with you,” I said. I wasn’t.

  “We think it’s McGuire’s missing hand.”

  “Wow.” The only thing I could think to say.

  “It was back in the cellblock, under the library table. Whoever he is, he must have dropped it.”

  I looked at her. “Why’d he bring it?”

  She shrugged. “We don’t know.”

  Phil came back, with my shirt and a duplicate of my revolver. I loaded the gun, went into the john, and replaced my shirt. I soaped most of the disinfectant off my face and neck and combed what was left of my hair down over the scratch on the side of my head. I looked almost presentable when I came out, and felt one hell of a lot better.

  I looked at my watch and nearly fell over. It was 03:43. I must have slept for almost two hours out at the dispatch center.

  I went back into Lamar’s office and signed a receipt for Hal, for my gun. Put a copy in my pocket.

  “Well, Hester, you ready for a walk?”

  She was, so we went back into the cells, and she had me stand in the same spot I had been in when I fired the shot. She stood where Travis had been.

  We reenacted the whole thing. Hester is five feet eight inches tall, and Travis was about five ten. Close enough, for our purposes. She spun to her right and almost fell through the door. Just like he must have. We did it three times.

  While she was figuring out the patterns, she told me that they felt that Travis must have fired about sixteen to eighteen rounds. When he’d killed Elizabeth Mills, he’d shot her fou
r times.

  She wasn’t sure how he’d gotten in. There were no marks of forced entry anywhere on the exterior of the building. She did know that he’d surprised the two reserves and had probably taken them out first. Then Jane, at dispatch. Then he’d simply worked his way through the cell areas, apparently recognizing and sparing Rachel and Betty. He’d then gone through the men’s area, killing everybody he met, most likely because he didn’t know which one was Traer. Or Kenny Mills.

  They’d interviewed Traer, and he felt that Travis was aware that he’d missed his main target, and thought he’d come for him again. Traer remembered hearing a siren, which was probably mine, in the distance, and he said that the shooting had stopped abruptly. Good old Oswald Traer was apparently having a real fit, because he’d also told Hal that he’d gotten Todd Glutzman, aka Nathane, to burn the McGuire house. To cleanse it, he said. Said that he figured that the killer was going to go for Glutzman for doing that. Dumb, but Traer was scared nearly to death. Good.

  Hester figured that Travis had hidden in the dispatcher’s broom closet and had come in behind Dan and me when we were in the men’s cell area. His timing was just a little off, she thought, because he’d probably intended shooting us from the rear.

  She was probably right. I hadn’t even thought about the little broom closet. I wondered if Dan had, and had deferred his own judgment because I was senior to him. God, I hoped not. It would be so much easier if we had both made the mistake.

  Hester and I walked slowly out into the kitchen and then onto the back porch.

  “Now, think, Carl. Did you see him here?”

  “No.”

  “Okay, now look, here’s a small smear, like he brushed the side of the door frame with his sleeve as he went out. See?”

  I saw. Not much blood. Damn.

  We went outside. There were five or six squad cars parked back there now, and a couple of officers I didn’t know standing around. Security.

  “Just where was his car?”

  I indicated an area occupied by two police vehicles.

  “Whose cars are these?” asked Hester.

  One of the cops I didn’t know said, “One’s mine.”

  “Would you move it, please?”

  He looked at her, decided she might have some authority, and agreed. He took it out onto the lawn. Rude. Lamar was proud of that lawn.