Court Trouble

by Mike Befeler

  If they’d been alone, rather than on a convention floor, would Mark still be alive? One more veiled threat and no substantive proof. With all these guys involved in illegal activities, anything could happen. Maybe some clue remained in Manny’s files, a clue Mark had missed before. Time to go look again. He would do a thorough search. The answer was there. It had to be.

  CHAPTER 31

  Mark pulled out his cell phone and called Barbara Grimes. The same timid voice answered.

  “Barbara, this is Mark Yeager. Would it be possible for me to come over and look at Manny’s files again?”

  Mark heard sobs. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

  “It’s . . . it’s . . . someone broke into my house.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Yes.” She paused. “When I came home I heard the back door slam. I looked around and found a file cabinet open in Manny’s office and a broken window.”

  “Did you call the police?”

  “No. I don’t know what to do. I taped a piece of cardboard over the broken window.”

  “I’ll be there in an hour.”

  When he pulled up in front of Barbara’s house she was sitting on the front steps and shivering, even though she was all bundled up in a white fur coat.

  “I couldn’t stay in the house any longer,” she said, holding the coat closed at her neck as tears ran down her cheeks. “I feel violated.”

  Mark put an arm around her shoulder. “I understand. Sophie and I felt the same way when someone broke into our first home many years ago. Would it be all right with you if I looked around Manny’s office?”

  She nodded and gulped down another sob.

  Mark escorted her inside and into Manny’s office. He scanned the room. Nothing seemed to be disrupted, other than one open file-cabinet drawer.

  “Has anyone been through these files since I last visited here?” Mark asked.

  Barbara shook her head. “Only the police. They searched the files again and asked my permission to take the note left on the desk. They returned the files you had found. That’s all.”

  Mark kept his gloves on. No sense adding distracting fingerprints. As Barbara made a hasty retreat, Mark leafed through the manila folders in the cabinet. He wanted to check four specific files. After a considerable search, he located the Idler, Roscoe and Fish records and pulled them out. He couldn’t find the Daggett file.

  He searched again. It had definitely disappeared.

  He opened the folder that had writing in pencil inside the jacket. It read: HOWARD ROSCOE AND WESTERFIELD WEAPONS. He found material primarily concerning Lee Daggett, with several letters from Westerfield Weapons.

  Mark scratched his head, picked up the three folders and strode into the living room to find Barbara.

  “There’s something funny here,” he said. “The information in the folders seems to be mixed up and one of the files has disappeared.”

  Barbara’s face paled, and she put her hand to her cheek. “Oh, dear. When the police returned the files, I accidentally dropped them on the floor and some papers came out. I threw the sheets back in, any which way, and stuffed the manila folders back in the file cabinet. But everything should be there.”

  “You’re positive the police kept no records from the file cabinet?”

  “That’s what they told me. Only from the desk.”

  Mark scanned through the folders. “Most of the Westerfield Weapons information is missing.” He looked thoughtfully at Barbara. “Whoever broke in must have taken the folder with Lee Daggett’s name inside it, but the contents must have been primarily Westerfield Weapons papers. I wonder if the intruder wanted to steal Daggett or Roscoe documents.”

  Barbara looked at him blankly.

  Mark excused himself and returned to Manny’s office. There had to be something else here that would shed light on what had happened. He pulled open the file cabinet and started looking through folders again.

  An hour later he had found nothing of significance. What else could he have missed in the office? No papers in the desk drawer. He circled the room and stopped in front of the floor-to-ceiling bookcase. He pulled out a business best-seller from two years ago and blew the dust off. More closely scrutinizing the bookshelf, he realized that every shelf had dust except for one section. He removed a book from this part of the shelf. A small manila envelope peeked out from the open slot. He extracted it from behind the other books, opened it and dumped the contents out on the desk: two folded pieces of paper, an audio tape, a computer memory stick, a key with a piece of paper taped to it and a picture.

  He picked up the picture—Ken Idler was leaning over a stack of plastic bags containing a white substance. Two other men Mark didn’t recognize stood next to Ken.

  Mark unfolded one of the pieces of paper and read an affidavit stating that the inspected batch of twenty AR-15 rifles had been converted to automatic weapons. It listed twenty serial numbers.

  The other piece of paper turned out to be an invoice that listed the same twenty serial numbers. A handwritten note read, “Time to pay up,” with the signature “Howard Roscoe.”

  Mark remembered seeing a handheld tape player in one of the desk drawers. He retrieved it, put the tape in and pushed PLAY.

  The tape spun for a moment. Then the machine emitted a click followed by the sound of background conversation. After ten seconds a drawling voice said, “She-it, Lee, you can’t do that. It’s illegal.”

  Lee’s deep voice said, “I don’t give a flying fuck. I’ve set up this gambling operation, and it’s going to make a mint.”

  Mark leaned closer to the tape player.

  Drawling Voice said, “But you’ve already invested in a casino. Why mess with something in Denver?”

  “Supply and demand. Not everyone wants to go up to Black Hawk or Central City to gamble. There’s a need right here on the flatlands.”

  “Yeah, but the cops will bust you in under two weeks.”

  “Not if I watch my clientele. I’m not going to get greedy. Just make my fair share.”

  A raucous laugh jarred Mark. He had heard enough, so he turned the tape player off. Manny had the goods on Lee. Now on to the memory stick.

  He turned on Manny’s computer and waited for it to boot up. Fortunately, no message appeared demanding a password.

  Not much on security.

  Mark inserted the memory stick in the computer’s USB port and waited for the icon to appear on the screen. An identifier appeared called “Fishing” on the E drive. He clicked on it and found icons for Word and PDF documents. He selected one called “Fish Facts.” On the screen flashed a summary describing Howard Fish’s operations at Creo Tech. It highlighted his software piracy operation. Mark closed that document and opened a PDF file named “Fishing Frenzy.” Up popped a scanned copy of an invoice from Lingan Ling for ten thousand copies of Microsoft Word at twenty dollars apiece.

  No one would legally import copies of Word from Taiwan and clearly not at that price!

  Mark removed the memory stick and shut down the computer. Then he carefully replaced the items in the manila envelope and left it on the desk.

  Manny had something on every one of the suspects. They all had good reasons to eliminate him. But no one suspect stood out from the others.

  Mark picked up the key and removed the strip of paper taped to it. It didn’t appear to be a lockbox key. It reminded him of the key to a padlock in his garage. What would it unlock? Obviously, Manny didn’t want anyone else to find it or else why would he have hidden it? Then Mark remembered a bill he had seen on the desk during his earlier visit. He grabbed the pile of papers on the desk and thumbed through until he located what he wanted—the bill from Your Store Self Storage. He wrote down the address. Then he looked at the strip of paper. It looked like a security code. Could the key fit a lock for a self-storage bay and the code be used to gain access into the facility? He’d have to check it out. He put the key and slip of paper in his pocket and returned to the l
iving room.

  “You need to call the police again,” Mark said to Barbara. “In addition to reporting the break-in, there’s an envelope on the desk they will want to see. It may help identify Manny’s killer. I know it’s difficult for you, but hopefully this is the last set of evidence the police will have to collect.”

  Barbara remained silent.

  Mark again admired the furniture and paintings and this time noticed the thick, white shag carpet. “I still think this room belongs in a museum,” Mark said, giving his best look of reverence.

  “Thank you,” Barbara said, fidgeting with the bracelet on her left wrist.

  “I’m going to ask you something else,” Mark said. “I’m still trying to understand Manny’s business dealings, what might have led to his murder and why someone would break in and steal from his office.”

  “I’ll try to answer any questions I can.” Barbara’s bottom lip quivered.

  “This may be difficult for you, but I’m going to bring up a disagreeable subject. I heard from Cheryl Idler that Manny blackmailed her husband. Did you suspect that of Manny?”

  Barbara bit her lip. “I’ve probably been very naïve. Manny once bragged that in high school he had blackmailed a teacher. I don’t know if he blackmailed Ken or not.”

  “And his relationship with Lee Daggett, Jacob Fish and Howard Roscoe? Did you suspect any strange dealings between Manny and any of these three?”

  Barbara thought for a moment. “He did say something a few days before he died concerning Jacob. Manny said he planned to take over Creo Tech and kick Jacob out.”

  “That might be a motive for Jacob to have killed Manny.”

  Barbara fought back tears. “I can’t imagine anyone doing such a horrible thing. Even if problems existed with Manny.”

  “Is there anything else, any arguments that may point to one of the suspects?”

  Barbara put her finger to her chin. “There’s one troubling memory that I should mention to you. At a recent party I stood with Manny, Ken and Cheryl Idler, and Lee Daggett. Manny had too much to drink and started an argument with Ken. They began threatening each other.” She stopped to catch her breath. “I grabbed Manny’s arm and asked him to stop. He brushed me aside, pointed his finger at Ken and said, ‘One of these days I’d like to bash your skull in with a paddle.’ ”

  A tear ran down her cheek. “Instead he became a victim that very same way.”

  Something didn’t fit. “Did you report that incident to the police?” Mark asked.

  Barbara wiped her tears away with the back of her hand. “Yes. I’m sure that played a part in the arrest of Ken Idler. All those people heard Ken and Manny threatening each other.”

  Mark tried to put the pieces together. The evidence still led to a jumbled conclusion: Manny’s fingerprints on the murder weapon, Old Mel being contacted by a man named Manny, Manny and Ken having argued, Manny threatening to beat Ken’s head in with a paddle. If he didn’t know better, he’d consider Manny the murderer and not the victim. With Manny dead, the evidence certainly pointed to Ken. But he still couldn’t buy that Ken had committed the murder.

  Mark replayed the most recent events as he drove away. Was there any significance to some of the Howard Roscoe paper files disappearing from Barbara’s house? Howard couldn’t have stolen the material since he’d been at the gun show. Had Lee Daggett broken in and retrieved the folder with his name on it? If he did, he would have a rude awakening when he looked at the material referencing Howard Roscoe.

  Stopping at McGuckin’s hardware store, Mark approached the desk where he had previously had spare keys made.

  “You may be able to help me,” he said to the clerk. “I found this key and I’m trying to determine what lock it goes to.”

  The man looked carefully at the key and turned it over. “It belongs with a Master padlock.”

  “Can you tell what size lock it would fit?”

  “Yeah. Approximately an inch square.” Scooting around the edge of the counter, he motioned for Mark to follow him into another part of the store.

  “That one right there,” he said, pointing to a lock on a rack on the wall.

  Mark left the store, thinking he’d pay a visit to the storage facility the next day.

  Mark spent the evening reviewing the case, making notes and pondering next steps. Eliminating Ken Idler for the moment, Jacob Fish had fallen to the bottom of the suspect list. Howard Roscoe held second place, since he hadn’t broken into the Grimes house. That left Lee Daggett who could have ransacked the Grimes files. Furthermore, his affair with Cheryl Idler seemed extremely suspicious, particularly since she had driven Old Mel to the rec center so he could turn out the platform tennis lights.

  CHAPTER 32

  On Monday morning, Mark called Ben. “You mentioned trying to locate a shipment of antique paperweights owed to your partner’s client. I know a possible location where they could have been stored, if you’re willing to help me look.”

  “You bet. I’m available at lunch time.”

  “Swing by my house and pick me up at eleven-thirty.”

  When they arrived at the storage facility, the place appeared deserted. Mark gave Ben the access code, and Ben punched it in. When the gate opened, they drove inside.

  “We need to find a storage bay that has a keyed Master lock this size,” Mark said, forming a square with the thumb and forefinger of both hands. “You start at this end and I’ll start at the other. Note wherever you find the right kind of lock.”

  Mark started his inspection. Almost half the doors had combination locks. In the first row he found no Master locks of the right size. In the next row he found one, but the key didn’t fit. After one more futile attempt, he met up with Ben.

  “Any luck?” Mark asked.

  “I found two. Here, I’ll show you.”

  They made their way back two rows as Ben pointed to a lock.

  Mark tried it. The key inserted smoothly, but wouldn’t turn.

  Then, one row over, Ben showed him another lock on shed number twenty-nine.

  Mark inserted the key, turned it, and with a click the lock snapped open.

  “Jackpot,” Mark said as he smiled at Ben. “Let’s see what Manny has in his secret stash.” He pulled a cord, a light flashed on, and he saw two wooden crates and three cardboard boxes. He stepped over and opened one of the cardboard boxes.

  “I’ve found your paperweights. Let’s see what’s in the wooden crates.”

  Mark tugged at a corner, but the crates remained firmly nailed shut.

  “I have a screwdriver in the car,” Ben said.

  He retrieved it and pried one of the boxes open. “Wow. Look at these rifles.”

  Mark peered inside the box. “I recognize these from the gun show. AR-15s. Manny bought these from Howard Roscoe.”

  “What did he expect to do with the rifles? Start a war?”

  “That’s a good question. I assume Manny expected to resell them. He apparently played middleman in a lot of deals.”

  “Quite an arsenal,” Ben said, gawking at the weapons.

  “And probably illegally modified from semi-automatic to automatic. A sideline for Howard Roscoe.”

  Ben replaced the lid and pounded the nails back in with the butt of the screwdriver.

  They left the shed and Mark relocked the door. “I’ll give the key to Detective Peters. He can follow up on the rifles.”

  “Once he’s officially found the boxes of paperweights, my partner’s client will be able to claim them.”

  “How long do you think that will take?” Mark asked.

  “With all the hassle over Manny’s estate, as much as six months. But we know they haven’t been lost or destroyed.”

  On Monday night at seven Mark entered Tom’s Tavern and positioned himself with a view out a window toward the Pearl Street Mall. Mark ordered a cheeseburger and a beer. He watched as the time approached, the time he had specified in the notes he’d placed on each of the suspect’s porc
hes. None of them approached the large, implanted rock across the street. Mark kept his eyes focused on the boulder. He expected the murderer would show. He waited for another thirty minutes. Still no one. The waitress kept stopping by, so Mark ordered another beer. He soon realized his ploy had failed. He unfolded the copy he had kept: “The murder of Manny Grimes was captured on an infrared photograph. Interested in making a deal? Be at the large rock on the west end of the Pearl Street Mall, 7:30 P.M., this coming Monday.”

  As he drove home, he realized he had been naïve to think he could flush out the murderer. His amateur attempt probably made the killer laugh.

  As Mark pulled into his street, a fireball erupted ahead. He jammed on his brakes and jumped out of his car. Flames shot through a window of his garage.

  His next-door neighbor ran out of the house with a cell phone clutched in his hand. Seeing Mark, he shouted, “I’m calling nine-one-one.”

  Mark’s attention focused on a figure running toward the greenbelt, away from the side of his flaming garage. Mark dashed after the disappearing arsonist. By the time he reached the open space, he had lost sight of the person. Rather than randomly charging out into the darkness, he returned to his burning garage.

  His mind raced. He thought about hooking up his garden hose, but he had put it away for the winter in the now-burning garage. His jumbled thoughts were interrupted when he heard sirens. A fire engine screeched to a halt in front of his house. Two firemen jumped off the truck and hooked up a hose to the fire hydrant two houses away. Within minutes water poured on the garage roof.

  Mark tried to open the garage door with the remote control inside his car, but it wouldn’t budge. He used his cell phone to place a call to Detective Peters to notify him of the latest development.

  He didn’t mind losing the contents in the garage, but he wanted the fire out before the flames reached the walls of his house.

  A fireman with an axe broke through the garage door. Water from the hose shot into the garage, dousing the flames that ran from floor to ceiling. Soon the firemen had extinguished the remaining hot spots.