by Earl Emerson
“Maybe they were just going to light the place and the old woman stumbled onto the perp while he was doing it, and he was afraid she’d tell the police it wasn’t me.”
“And then they put your jacket on the back porch?”
“They were probably planning that all along.”
“Did you recognize the voice on the phone that night?”
“Nope.”
“I guess if there were eight reasons, number eight would be framing another person to get them out of your hair. You find this house prepared for arson. The house is evidence. The house burns down, the evidence is gone, and you’re discredited and removed from the picture because you’re the prime suspect. What I don’t understand is why G. A. is so determined to get you. There’s a good chance any other FIU investigator would have handed you that jacket and said, ‘Here, you forgot this when you were here the other day.’ He started building a case right away.”
“He and I have been butting heads over Leary Way.”
“So he had a grudge against you before the fire?”
“I would say so.”
Keeping close to the beach, they circled Lake Union, paddling slower when there was something Diana wanted to see, faster during the open stretches. They passed the Lake Washington Ship Canal Bridge with the freeway running atop it and then headed west, paralleling a former rail line that had been converted into the Burke-Gilman jogging trail. Two in-line skaters paced them for a few blocks.
On the west side of the water they doubled back and passed under the Aurora Bridge and Highway 99. Finney knew Diana was an active athlete, but still he was surprised at the depth of her competitive spirit. Nobody had ever outpaddled him from the backseat, and only a few of the strongest had been able to match him stroke for stroke the way she was doing. On the west side of the lake they got into a playful contest to see who would quit paddling first, their speed gradually picking up. “You’re welcome to take a rest anytime you want,” he said.
Breathing hard, she said, “Yeah, so are you.”
They were both arm-weary by the time they began closing in on the houseboats off Westlake Avenue, by the time Finney noticed a man standing on the dock in slacks and a navy-blue fire department windbreaker. Captain G. A. Montgomery. Oh, God, Finney thought, the bastards have come to arrest me in front of Diana. Robert Kub and Chief Reese loitered in the shadows farther along the dock. As expressionless as a bum requesting spare change, Montgomery waited while Finney held the kayak snug against the wooden dock and let Diana climb out. Kub met Finney’s gaze as Finney climbed out and held the bow rope. Reese folded his arms behind his back.
“What do you want?” Finney asked.
G. A. moved forward, and an angled sunbeam spotlighted a patch of beard his razor had missed. “This would be better if you and I were alone,” he said, giving Finney the full effect of his intimidating stare.
Mirroring his cocky demeanor, Finney said, “Why? You afraid of witnesses?”
“John, go easy on the insolence. I just wanted you to know we went through that jacket one more time. Don’t know how we missed it earlier, but there was a ticket stub in one of the pockets. Want me to tell your friend here what it was for?”
“There’s no other reason for you to find a stub you couldn’t find earlier except to frame me.”
“I’ll ignore that. You go to the movies?”
“Not for about a year.”
“How about a movie the night before Riverside Drive?”
“I was with you that night.”
“After we spoke you went to a flick. One of those artsy-fartsy theaters in the U District. We have the stub.”
“I haven’t been to any movies.”
After several beats, G. A. continued, “You want me to explain to your friend here the significance of this?”
“The significance is that you’re a liar. I know what you’re doing. You’re going to introduce the jacket in court. I’ll say it was stolen from my station locker and you’ll say it couldn’t have been because I was wearing it the night before.”
“We can prove to the jury you were wearing it the night before.”
“If I wanted to torch that house, why would I tell you it was set up for arson the night before I did it?”
“A man who plays with fire knows how it starts, but not how it ends. You assumed Engine Twenty-six would be first in and you could run upstairs and save the old woman and get yourself a medal. You weren’t counting on catching that aid run just before the fire was called in.”
G. A. and Finney stared at each other. They both knew he hadn’t been to a movie. It was bad enough that incriminating details were piling up against him by accident and that somebody had tried to frame him.
“I don’t understand why you feel the need to falsify evidence,” Finney said.
“Be careful, or I’ll sue you for slander while you’re away getting your education. Don’t think I won’t do it either. And don’t forget, when that old woman dies, and she will die, we’re going to call you back and tag you with murder. My advice is to make it easy on yourself. Cop to a plea, and we won’t press for the death penalty.”
The death penalty? It hadn’t even occurred to Finney. Was this guy nuts? He had to know Finney hadn’t set that fire. Or had he convinced himself Finney had gone off his nut? The death penalty! This was all just too . . . bizarre. It all came into focus now. G. A. was part of the group setting the fires. Of course he’d investigated Leary Way himself. He’d probably set it himself, too.
“Hell, I can think of a million reasons you didn’t mean for anything to happen,” G. A. continued. “You told me about the house, said it was ready for arson, but you knew I didn’t believe you, so you decided to cross the line. I bet you didn’t even know that old woman was around. That wouldn’t be murder; that would be an accident. Lighting a match is a pretty small act in itself. You’ve been under duress. I think we’ll be able to convince a sympathetic judge to be lenient. Keep denying this and we’re going to end up throwing the book at you.”
“What did you and Bill talk about the day before he died?”
Nothing Finney had said until now had fazed G. A., but this seemed to stop him like a .300 Magnum slug hitting a bull elephant. Or maybe it was just the fact that it was a non sequitur. “What are you talking about?”
“We worked on the eighth of June. Bill died early the morning of the ninth. He called you from home on the seventh, didn’t he?” He was stabbing in the dark. Finney was guessing that because Bill Cordifis had written down those three phone numbers he’d called them. Maybe he had. Maybe he hadn’t. He certainly hadn’t called Finney. Maybe he’d phoned his father. He was flailing, but right now flailing was all he could do.
“We talked all the time.”
“Emily had some notes he’d written. There was a list of phone numbers. One of them was yours. On that same piece of paper was the address of Leary Way. Why did he have the address of a fire that hadn’t happened yet? And why call you about it?”
“I didn’t say he called me. And Emily never told me this.”
“She doesn’t know.”
“She doesn’t know? That’s convenient. Who knows? Just you? Of course, just you. Anybody can get a pen and write some crap on a piece of paper. You did that yourself. Man, you’re really stretching here. You’re just . . . pathetic.”
G. A. gave Finney a long look, swiveled around on his heel, and strode up the dock past Robert Kub and Chief Reese. Maybe that was what Finney should have done when G. A. accused him, turned around and walked away without a word. It was effective.
As soon as G. A. was out of earshot, Robert Kub approached, but before he could speak, Finney went on the attack. “You really see him take a ticket stub out of that jacket pocket?”
“Sorry to say that I did.”
“There’s no way he could have been the one who put it there?”
“G. A. wouldn’t do that.”
“Who would?”
“You
’re telling me Annie Sortland isn’t going to ID you?”
“I don’t know what she’s going to do.”
After Kub left, Diana touched Finney’s shoulder and said, “I’ve been up to visit her, but they won’t let anybody in. G. A. was on the ward, too, arguing with one of the doctors. I think he was trying to get in to see her.”
As she spoke, Charles Reese stepped within hailing distance, a crooked smile on his face. He stared past Finney as if he wasn’t there. “How are you doing, little lady?”
“Fine, Chief. You?”
“I’d feel better if your boyfriend would listen to reason. They tell me the case against him is rock solid.”
“It doesn’t sound like it to me.”
Watching the sun gleam on Reese’s dark hair, it occurred to Finney why he wasn’t behind bars. After boasting to one and all that he had a witness who would finger Finney, G. A. was afraid Annie Sortland would come out of her drug-induced stupor and name someone else. Even if G. A. wasn’t conspiring to frame him, he might have guessed Finney hadn’t left his jacket at the fire scene and he should have known Finney had gone to him in good faith the night before the fire. He certainly knew Finney had not purchased that movie ticket stub. What he didn’t know was whether or not Annie Sortland would ID him. If she ID’ed someone else, G. A. would end up looking like a boob, since he’d already told half the department Finney set the fire.
Because Finney had chatted with Annie that morning, he, too, had assumed she would name him. But there was at least one other person she might finger: the arsonist, whoever that was.
“I can see why G. A. would want to harass me,” Finney said. “But you’ve already done your damage.”
Reese was smiling with just the left side of his face, the right side dead and wooden. “What we got here is a public relations nightmare. Much as I hate to admit this, losing Bill Cordifis last summer was about the best public relations coup the department has had in a while. You are going to single-handedly put us back to square one, the son of a former chief indicted for arson.”
After Reese left, Diana said, “Why did they come?”
“They’re trying to turn the screws. G. A. thinks he can get me to crack. Kub told me he does that with people he’s building a case on.”
“You catch the game G. A. was playing? First he exaggerates how bad it’s going to be for you. The death penalty—he’s maximizing there. Then he pretends he’s on your side. That’s where he minimizes. You didn’t really mean for anybody to get hurt. You were just lighting a match. Maximization and minimization. Cops have been using it ever since the rubber hose was banned.”
“I don’t know,” Finney said, putting a stupid look on his face. “I think it was working. I almost confessed.” She stared at him a moment before he burst into laughter.
Laughing together, they hauled the kayak out of the water.
46. HAPPIER THAN A DEAD PIG IN THE SUN
Sadler was so pissed off he could barely see straight. He’d run into the Kmart off Delridge to buy a pair of mats for the new truck, and came out less than five minutes later to find a big dent in his driver’s door. Hell, he hadn’t even turned off the motor. It was a beautiful truck, spruce-green with chrome running boards, an extended crew cab, and tires bigger than some third-world countries. Hell, it was brand-new. He’d picked it up two weeks earlier from Midway Motors in Fife for just under twenty-nine and a trade-in on his three-year-old Firebird.
Three errands to run while he was in Seattle, and already one of them had gone tits up. Some asshole had put a perfect pie-sized dimple in the driver’s-side door, probably with a boot, some self-righteous parking lot Nazi who’d taken issue over his being in the LOAD ONLY lane.
When Sadler pulled up to the house on lower Delridge Way, the old man was out in the driveway monkeying around with the Pathfinder Sadler knew belonged to his son. Somebody or something had knocked the hell out of it.
“How you doin’, Chief?” Sadler said, startling the old man, who’d been kneeling beside the Pathfinder with a pair of pliers. Sadler was shocked at how much weight the chief had lost, at how drawn and shaky he was.
“Oh . . . hello, young fella.”
“Sadler. Gary Sadler. I worked at Thirty-six’s when you were in the Seventh.”
“You’re the one had that girlfriend broke a pie plate over your head.”
“It was a turkey platter. And I deserved it. I was a terrible drinker in those days.”
“What brings you to this neck of the woods?”
“I was talking to your son the other day, and I thought I’d drop by and see how you were doing.”
“Right now, I’m happier than a dead pig in the sun. My grandfather used to say that. It won’t be long, I will be a dead pig in the sun.” The old man laughed, which set him on a coughing jag.
“I doubt they’ll leave you out in the sun,” Sadler said.
The old man laughed harder at this. Gary could only conjure up a smile. “I guess there’s some of us don’t figure out how to live until we’re about done doin’ it. Don’t mind telling you, I’m one of them. Family and friends. That’s what it’s all about, Gary. Don’t let anybody tell you any different.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Goddamn lung cancer. Spread to my bones.”
“Sorry to hear that.”
“Too many fires without a mask. You stay out of the smoke.”
Sadler produced a pack of cigarettes and lit one. “Too late for that.”
“It’s never too late.” As if by mutual agreement, they both stood back and surveyed the Pathfinder, sharing cigarettes from Sadler’s pack. “It’s Johnny’s car,” Chief Finney said, running his fingers over the dents.
Sadler inhaled and blew smoke out his nostrils. “What happened?”
“A fire engine hit him. He didn’t tell you about it?”
“No.”
“You work with him. You two ain’t getting along?”
“He’s not exactly first in line to be best man at my wedding.”
“Sorry to hear that. He’s a good kid. How’s he taking not getting promoted?”
“You knew that?”
“Word gets around. He doesn’t want to talk about it with me, so we don’t talk about it.”
“He’s got worse problems than not getting promoted.”
“You mean that house fire?”
“That’s one reason I’m here. I’ve got my own suspicions on that. There’s another guy on my crew showed some unnatural interest in that house before it burned.”
“Who would that be?”
“Jerry Monahan.”
“That old corn dog ain’t retired? You woulda thought what happened to Cordifis would have been a wake-up call to all those old dinosaurs. Fighting fire is a young man’s game. Soon as I made chief and couldn’t go inside anymore I realized I’d been going in way too long.” He coughed, the phlegm rattling in his lungs. “That’s what happens when you fight fire all those years. Hell, in Denmark they only leave you on the pipe for five years. After that, you get a job that keeps you out of the building. So you think Monahan might have set that fire?”
“He’s just crazy enough.”
“I remember once when we were both firefighters Jerry asked to borrow three thousand bucks. Hell, I didn’t have a dime to spare, was working down at the steel mill off shift, but a guy named Shimkus did, and when he still hadn’t gotten a nickel back after eight months, he took Jerry out behind old Station Nineteen and knocked three of his teeth out. Jerry gave him the pink slip to his car and took the bus to the dentist the next morning. That was how Jerry got interested in karate.”
They chatted for another half hour, recounting good times and bad. As he listened, Sadler wondered how such a spindly man had ever carried his reputation as a fire-breathing, door-busting, get-out-of-my-way smoke eater. He’d worked on Engine 14 and then Engine 7, and they always said nobody could take more smoke or stay in a fire longer. When Gary entered the department twe
nty years ago, all the older chiefs talked about Finney, a captain at the time. Those chiefs were all dead now. Rutgers, Mortimer, Stallworth. Heart attacks and cancer, mostly cancer—the number one item in the firefighter’s retirement portfolio.
“I could be wrong about this,” Sadler said. “So I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention it to anyone.”
“Sure. What’s that you got around your neck? That a cross? You ain’t gone Jesus on me?”
“Yes, sir. Not that I’m perfect, mind you. I guess Jesus is why I came by today. He told me to ask if there was anything I could do to make you more comfortable.”
“I figured when I got sick, religion would grab me by the nads, but it didn’t. I still think it’s for suckers. But you can do one thing for me. Would you try to make things work with John? Even if he don’t know it, Leary Way’s eating a hole right through him. He needs every scrap of understanding he can get. That’s what you can do for me, Gary. Be a friend to John. Look out for him.”
“I’ll do that.”
“Thank you.” The old man shook hands with Sadler, his grip weak, his palms sweaty.
Driving across the West Seattle viaduct toward I-5, Gary couldn’t help thinking about the night of the Leary Way fire. Gary had been on Engine 26, the only unit in the south end not at an alarm at four in the morning. The three of them had been in the watch office—Sadler, Monahan, and Jenkins.
A worried dispatcher had called on the main phone and told Sadler they’d been out of contact with Chief Finney for nearly an hour, that he’d disappeared from a fire in the Fifth Battalion. They’d used the radio, they’d paged him, they’d called on his cell phone. Even though he wasn’t supposed to be at Station 29 where he was stationed, they’d hit the bell there repeatedly. The vanishing act had begun a few minutes after the dispatchers told him they’d tracked the distress signal at Leary Way to his son’s radio. Nobody realized until later that Finney had left his radio with Cordifis.
Monitoring channel fourteen, the channel reserved for ordinary department business, Sadler and the crew on Engine 26 climbed onto the rig and began driving the south half of the Seventh Battalion. Just before dawn they found him parked on the grass in a small park, Riverview play field, where he had a somewhat obstructed view from the promontory that looked out over Harbor Island, downtown Seattle, and beyond that, Queen Anne Hill. The red Suburban’s motor was running. In the distance he’d been watching the glow in the sky from Leary Way.
