Counterplay bkamc-18

by Robert K. Tanenbaum

  Norris A. Marshall the Fourth? Guma asked.

  Yeah, long line of workingmen, Marshall replied. Just call me Norris.

  Marshall had done the prerequisite griping about “extra” work. But in reality, he couldn’t have been happier to be part of a project right out of a movie instead of sweating over some city sidewalk. He’d arrived dressed for work with a sleeveless, dirty blue T-shirt that didn’t quite cover a protruding beer belly of prodigious proportions, counterbalanced by a butt of equal tonnage. But his tan forearms were the size of fence posts, and there didn’t appear to be an ounce of fat on them.

  Once in the backyard, Clarkson led the way over to the patio table on which he laid out the printout from the GPR, as well as a to-scale map depicting the anomaly from above and its relations to Global Positioning Satellite reference points he’d established the previous evening. He now marked those points with chalk and then drew a rectangle eight feet by four feet on the concrete.

  Emil Stavros had watched the proceedings from the doorway. When Clarkson stood up from his chalk work, the banker announced, I’ll be stepping out to run a few errands. Please clean up your mess from this wild goose chase before you leave.

  According to Detective Fairbrother, who’d kept watch from his sedan, Stavros then left the house, walking ahead of Amarie Stavros, who walked after her husband as fast as her high heels would allow shouting, Where we going, Emil? And what are those men doing? I thought you said they were here to fix the hot tub. Why do they need a police officer to fix the hot tub? Does this have something to do with your trial? I’m confused.

  Just get in the car, Amarie, please, he said walking up to the limousine that had pulled up to the curb.

  Fairbrother watched the limousine pull away and, giving it plenty of space, began to follow. As he tailed the limo, he relayed Amarie’s complaints to Guma, who laughed, I guess she’s not the brightest bulb in the chandelier.

  Yeah, but what a set of gabonzas, and still looking pretty good for a forty-something Rockette, the detective said. I’d say he didn’t marry her for her ability to balance a checkbook. Let me know when it’s time to pounce.

  You’re a good man, Clarke, Guma said. Wish I could be there when you do. Make the cuffs extra tight for me, will ya?

  You got it, Ray, Fairbrother answered and left with one of the younger plainclothes cops from the DAO’s investigations unit.

  Clarkson then called Marshall over and explained that he had to be careful not to damage any potential evidence beneath the concrete. We just want to crack the concrete and lift it out piece by piece without disturbing anything underneath. Think you can do it?

  Marshall reacted like an old platoon sergeant who’d been asked by his commanding officer if he was capable of taking a machine-gun emplacement. He walked over to where he’d leaned his jackhammer against the hot tub and shouldered it like a rifle before returning. I’ll go through this slab so gently it wouldn’t dent a baby’s bottom, he said.

  Right along the chalk lines then, Norris, if you please, Swanburg said.

  Marshall stood for a moment surveying the slab. He took a moment to flex the muscles in his arms and chest, then like a surgeon preparing for work, he pulled on his work gloves, taking the time to secure the leather over each finger. Dragging out the moment for as long as possible, aware that he had a rapt audience, he placed the business end of the jackhammer on one of the chalk lines. He glanced at Guma, who gave him a nod, and squeezed the trigger.

  Cracking the six-inch thick slab took Norris Marshall the better part of two hours, during which he’d stopped on occasion to help the others lift the pieces out and pile them in a corner of the yard. When he was finished, there was a nearly perfect rectangle cut out of the patio.

  Beneath the slab was an oblong depression in the soil. Common occurrence, Swanburg explained. When soil is removed, it never goes back in quite as compact. It’s a lot looser with air pockets and such. Over time, gravity and moisture will cause the soil to settle and compact, leaving a depression.

  Nice work, Norris, Clarkson said. Not a dent in the dirt. You’re a true artist.

  Thank you very much, Norris replied. He would have bowed but his belly prevented anything more than a slight inclination of his massive head forward. We aims ta please. Anything else?

  Nope, Clarkson said. I think we can take it from here.

  Maybe Jack can, but not you, said a tan, middle-aged woman being escorted through the house by a police officer. Leave an exhumation to a geologist and next thing you know, they’ll be in here with a stick of dynamite and a pickax.

  Nothing wrong with a boy who likes things that go boom. It’s only natural. Clarkson pretended to pout, then broke into a smile. Why, it’s the ever-lovely Dr. Charlotte Gates. So glad you could make it, and with your usual impeccable timing.

  Just got into LaGuardia about an hour and a half ago, Gates replied, and got over here as fast as I could. I kept seeing you trampling all over my “dig” with those gunboat boots of yours.

  Guma stepped forward to shake the hand of the woman he’d heard a lot about but hadn’t yet met. Gates worked at the Human Identification Laboratory at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque and hadn’t been at the grilling in Denver. However, he knew that she was one of the top forensic anthropologists in the world.

  Gates was a small woman but had an energy about her that made her seem larger. She walked with confidence, like a woman who’d spent twenty-some-odd years trekking about in the deserts of the Southwest, working for law enforcement agencies, as well as her “hobby” of helping Indian tribes locate and preserve ancient sites. She wasn’t especially pretty, but the clarity of her opal green eyes against the mahogany of her face was striking.

  She’d brought with her a bundle of white plastic pipes about an inch around and in various lengths. She looked at the hole in the cement, grunted it will do, and began to fit the pieces of pipe together to form a rectangle the same size as the hole, only broken into a half dozen squares. Each section was labeled and corresponded to similarly marked buckets she set on the patio.

  Gates was assisted by Mackenzie Lorien, a young graduate student from the University of New Mexico who was studying forensic anthropology. When ready, the pair laid the pipe grid over the depression and then they got to work.

  Working from either end, Gates and Lorien each chose a square and began carefully removing the soil and placing it in the appropriate bucket. As a bucket was filled, it was then carried by Clarkson over to a large, wood-framed screen set up on legs. The geologist would dump the bucket on the screen, then he and Swanburg would sift the contents looking for anything out of the ordinary-things that don’t belong in a bucket of dirt.

  If they found anything of interest, Swanburg noted it in a log-book, including which grid it had come from and at what depth it had been located. In the meantime, whoever filled the last bucket moved to a different square so that gradually the depression became a hole in the ground and then began to look like a grave.

  The anthropologists used garden trowels to dig and even then were careful not to just plunge the blade into the soil, but scraped up each layer gently. When the others saw how the process worked, they started helping out by carrying the buckets so that the two men could sift and the women dig. Even Marshall, who had begged to be allowed to stay, made himself useful by hauling away the debris that piled up under the screen.

  They’d been digging for two hours when Gates, who was working again near the top of the depression announced, I just hit something solid. It felt like bone. Lorien stopped what she was doing and crawled over to help her professor while the others gathered around, careful to stay outside the taped area around the grid so as to not contaminate the site.

  Gates put her trowel aside and began digging with a spoon while using a small whisk broom to brush the dirt away. She doesn’t want to take a chance that she might leave a mark that could be open to some false interpretation, Swanburg announced for the spectators, s
uch as a nick on the bone that would leave a question of whether it was caused by an anthropologist’s trowel or a murder weapon.

  Spoonful by spoonful, brushstroke by brushstroke, Gates worked for another half hour before she stood up to stretch and allow the others to see what she’d been working on. A dome of yellow-white was emerging from the ground that even the laymen among them knew was the top of a skull. Gentlemen, she said quietly, I believe we’ve found what we came here to find. I’d like to ask for a moment of silence to reflect on the fact that these are not just inanimate objects but the remains of someone who was once just like you and me…someone who loved and laughed and didn’t deserve to be forgotten in an unmarked grave.

  Gates and Lorien worked steadily as centimeter by centimeter the earth gave up a skeleton, which was lying on its back, the head slightly tilted down with the chin on the chest. At a break in the work, Gates told those who were watching, This is not absolute, mind you, but judging by what I can see now, these are the remains of a female, probably Caucasian and, looking at the teeth, between the ages of, oh, late twenties and forty.

  You can tell that just by looking at her? Guma asked. Teresa was thirty-five.

  Gates nodded. I can be more exact after I’ve got her back to the lab, but I can make reasonable guesses based on certain visible criteria. For instance, the muscles in the jaw are much larger and stronger on a male and thus cause more scarring on the bone where they attach. The area on the jaw of this person is not very pronounced and thus probably belongs to a female. Although we’re not as far down in that area, I can see enough of the hip structure to also identify the remains as female. Later, I’ll be able to tell you if she’s borne children. The shape of the skull tells me that she was at least part Caucasian. And maybe you’ve seen a Western TV show where the cowboy looks into the horse’s mouth to tell its age; the same thing, basically, can be done with humans.

  Guma looked at the skull and tried to picture the woman in the photograph hanging above his desk. Teresa, he said aloud.

  Probably, Swanburg agreed but warned him, Nothing’s set in stone yet. This could be someone else…we’ve seen it before…or, more importantly, we’re going to have to prove it’s her to a jury and that isn’t always easy.

  Guma nodded, but he also got out his cell phone and punched in a number. Clarke, you still got an eye on our errand boy? he asked.

  Oh yeah, Detective Fairbrother responded. Apparently, these errands required heading out of town on Interstate 87-in violation of his bond, I believe-and making good progress for…oh, I don’t know…maybe Canada? Should I take him down now?

  No, not yet…not unless you have to in order to prevent him from crossing the border, Guma said. Canada won’t extradite him if he faces the death penalty. And I might just want that to be the case. But I’d also like the judge to see that he is a flight risk, so let him run a little longer.

  Not a problem, Fairbrother said. We’ve got a “bird dog” GPS locator planted behind his bumper. We couldn’t lose him if we tried, and the state patrol guys are following a few miles back. See you later, alligator.

  See you later, alligator? Aren’t we supposed to say ten-four out or something like that? Guma retorted whimsically.

  Oh, almost forgot, TV cop shows, and you overdosed on Broderick Crawford. Ten-four. Feel better now, Ray? Fairbrother said.

  The team from 221B Baker Street continued to work meticulously and now every bucket seemed to contain items for the log-book. Buttons. Metal pieces from a bra. A spent shell casing from a.22-caliber gun.

  It got dark, but the 221B Baker Street team had already prepared for that eventuality and set up the floodlights they’d asked Guma to arrange for, courtesy of NYPD special services. About that time, Karp had showed up with Murrow, who’d been disappointed when his boss told him absolutely no press. Then Murrow’s cell phone went off, and Karp left in a rush.

  A few minutes later, Guma was standing near the grave as Gates whisked away the dirt near the base of the skull. She pulled a flashlight from her pocket and peered closer.

  “Whaddya got?” Guma asked.

  Gates sat up. “An entry wound,” she said. “Looks like she was shot behind her left ear.”

  “One wound or two?” Guma asked, recalling that Zachary heard two pops.

  “I can only see one,” she replied.

  It wasn’t entirely what he wanted to hear, but there was no need to wait any longer. Guma called Fairbrother again. “It’s me. Collar the bastard.”

  Well north of Albany and darn close to the Canadian border, Fairbrother hung up the telephone and flipped the car’s police radio to the state patrol frequency. “Okay, boys, time to bring this chicken back to the roost,” he said.

  “All right, finally,” his young driver yelled. He pulled the red bubble light off the dash and, reaching out the window, set it on the roof of the car, and stomped on the gas pedal.

  The readout on the bird dog locator, which appeared as a map on the laptop sitting between the two cops, let them know how far they were from the target. A mile, then a half mile…now they could see the red taillights of the limousine and didn’t need the equipment. “There they are,” Fairbrother said. He looked in the rearview mirror and saw the flashing red and blue lights of the state patrol cars approaching fast.

  When the occupants of the limousine realized that they were being pursued, the car started to speed up. But one of the state patrol cars dashed past Fairbrother’s car and jumped in front of the limo while the other state patrol car hemmed it in from the side with Fairbrother’s car bringing up the rear. Then in unison, they slowed down, forcing the limousine to pull over to the shoulder of the road.

  The state patrol officers and the two NYPD detectives were out of the car with their guns drawn and spotlights on the limousine.

  The chauffeur got out. “What? You guys got nothin’ better to do than harass Mr. Stavros,” the chauffeur said.

  “Shut your piehole and get your hands up,” Fairbrother yelled. “You thinking about trying to run?”

  “No, hell no, you just surprised me. I was just speeding up because I thought you needed me to get out of the way.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Fairbrother said. “And I’m Derek Jeter. Now, tell your passengers to put their hands out of the car where we can see them.”

  The driver leaned back toward the car and said something. He nodded and stood back up. “Mr. Stavros says he’s not getting out of the car until his lawyer gets here.”

  The young cop walked up to the limousine and flung open the door, then stepped back with his gun pointed at the interior. “Get the hell out of the car, now!”

  A woman screamed and a man bellowed with rage. Emil Stavros climbed out of the limo with his hands up in the air and his face a textbook example of apoplexy. “This is outrageous,” he sputtered. “I’ll see that you never work in law enforcement again.”

  “On the ground,” Fairbrother ordered.

  “What? That’s preposterous-”

  The younger detective walked up to Stavros and still pointing the gun at him, spun him around and shoved him up against the car. He patted the man down and then pulled him away from the car. “On the ground.”

  Stavros sprawled in the gravel on the shoulder of the road. “I’ll get you for this,” he hissed.

  “Yeah, yeah, tell it to the judge,” Fairbrother said, pulling Stavros’s arms behind and cuffing him. “Now listen close…you have the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be used against you in court, and you have the right to have an attorney present during questioning. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided. Are you with me so far?”

  “Yes, yes, you son of a bitch,” Stavros whimpered. “These handcuffs are killing me. What’s the charge? I’m out on bond.”

  “You’re under arrest for flight to avoid prosecution and for violating the terms of your bond. Now, do you want to stay quiet until we get back to the city and you can lawyer up? Or maybe you have som
ething to say about the body in your backyard and save the taxpayers of New York City a lot of dough.”

  Stavros didn’t answer.

  “I’ll take that as you wish to remain silent,” Fairbrother said.

  The woman in the car peeked out. “Officer?” she asked timidly.

  Fairbrother turned to see Amarie Stavros. “Yes, ma’am?” he replied.

  “Am I under arrest too?”

  “No, ma’am. In fact, we can probably let the limo driver take you back to the city or wherever you want to go.”

  “Good,” she said getting out of the car and scurrying toward a clump of bushes. “ ’Cause I gotta tinkle…if you know what I mean. Emil wouldn’t let me stop at the rest area, and I’m about to wet my pants.”

  18

  The first sign of trouble for the young lovers had appeared as a growing cloud of dust beyond where the gravel road leading to the cabin disappeared over a hill five miles distant. Ned stood up in his stirrups to gain a few inches, the westering sun casting a bronze glow on his angular face.

  He was such a picture of an Old West cowboy that Lucy felt like she should swoon or do something else ladylike. However, what she really wanted to do was to knock him out of his saddle and have at him on the prairie. Her conversion from vestal virgin to wanton woman shortly after meeting Ned, who’d also been a first-timer, had been sudden and complete. That was a year ago, she thought, and we’re stronger than ever. I wonder what that means?

  “Someone’s in an awful big hurry,” he said sounding miffed. “They better have a good reason to be haulin’ ass like that on a private ranch road, stirring up the dust and risking hitting a steer. Guess we better wait here and see what’s up.”

  Run! Lucy recognized the voice in her head as that of a martyred sixteenth-century saint named Teresa de Alhuma. Ever since childhood, St. Teresa had appeared to her in times of stress and danger with warnings and sage advice. The fact that she now no longer saw the saint but only sometimes heard her in her head, had convinced Lucy what she had suspected all along-and that was that the apparition was a figment of her imagination, a psychological response to traumatic events.