The Pied Piper of Death

by Forrest, Richard;

  He walked the perimeter of the clearing. This small cove was only one of many scattered through the thousand acres of state forest that ran in a narrow band along the promontory above the river. It was an undeveloped park area traversed by a few old logging and maintenance roads. There were no formal recreational facilities for camping or hiking. Rocco knew that the area was used by only the most ardent naturalists, illegal hunters, and lovers. The neat pile of clothing near the spread blanket indicated the latter possibility for the dead girl.

  If there had been a sexual attack there might be signs of a struggle or perhaps other evidence. He mentally divided the small clearing into grid squares and began a methodical inspection. He found tiny blood spatters on a six-foot-high boulder that squatted near the blanket. These markings were consistent with the trail that led across the cove to the place where she had finally expired.

  He imagined her reeling back against the boulder after the wound. The blood on her hands indicated that she had probably clutched her belly while she stumbled across the clearing until she fell. Unable to stand, she began a painful crawl on hands and knees in a desperate attempt to escape.

  A deep cackle from the nearby logging road shattered the glen’s quiet. Rocco cringed. His request had been ignored. That laughter signaled that Happy Hansen was the assistant medical examiner assigned to the case.

  The doctor stepped into the clearing and thumped Rocco on the back with sufficient force to stagger the large man. ‘What say, little guy?’ Hansen chortled.

  ‘I’m saying,’ Rocco said over the medical examiner’s shoulder, ‘that Jamie Martin had best check out that old car parked on the shoulder since it may belong to the victim.’

  ‘Now that makes sense,’ Hansen said with his usual chuckle. He looked at the distant body. ‘I pronounce the victim female, young, and unclothed.’

  Rocco frowned. ‘Lars, didn’t medical school, the state health commissioner, or anyone else ever teach you to show a modicum of respect for the dead?’

  The medical examiner turned abruptly serious as he sauntered toward the body. ‘The school of tragedy taught me that if you are to survive in my business you have to laugh. Men like you, who work and live in pleasant little towns, don’t face this type of thing two or three times a day. You guys have coffee with friends at a neighborhood breakfast table, run a school crossing at noon, check out the library for loitering problems, stake out a stop sign, and handle a drunk in the late afternoon. My patients are always dead and have departed in more ways than you can possibly imagine.’ He knelt next to the body. ‘Yep. This one is dead like the others.’ He tried to restrain his laughter, but his shoulders convulsed and squirts of merriment bubbled through.

  Rocco refused to become involved in this doctor’s aberration. ‘Can you give me a hint as to how she might have died?’

  ‘Usually the heart stops. In fact, the heart always stops.’

  ‘Damn it all, Happy! You know what I mean.’

  ‘Spook did it,’ Jamie Martin announced from the edge of the clearing. ‘She’s got a First Cav patch clutched in her hand.’

  Rocco cast his subordinate a withering glance.

  Lars Hansen glanced at Rocco with a shrug. ‘Let us preserve the evidence,’ he said to himself as he reached toward them. Rocco slapped an acetate evidence bag and tweezers into the ME’s fingers. Hansen carefully removed the patch from the fingers. ‘First Cav all right,’ he said. ‘Jamie, do you really think that Spook is ever sober long enough to hold a small-caliber weapon steady enough to make a low wound like this?’

  ‘Thirty-two?’ Rocco asked.

  ‘I should think so. Small entrance wound in the lower belly. Ballistics will tell for sure.’

  ‘Entrance wound through the umbilicus,’ Rocco said. ‘With that much bleeding it must have severed the lower aorta.’

  ‘Need about a ten-degree upward trajectory to do that,’ Lars added. ‘I’ll tell you for sure when I get her on the table.’

  As a line of vehicles began to gather along the dirt logging road, groups of men and women began to filter into the clearing. Two paramedics pushed a gurney toward the body and stood to the side waiting for the ME to finish. Lab techs from the state forensic lab were accompanied by a photographer and a detective from the state police barracks. They talked of mundane things in subdued voices.

  ‘Time of death?’ Rocco asked.

  ‘A quick estimate based on lividity is three to five hours ago,’ Lars said. ‘Who found her?’

  ‘The minister of Saint James Church came across the body.’

  ‘Canon MacIntire?’

  ‘The good reverend was out here watching for eagles.’

  ‘See any?’

  ‘Jesus, Lars, I’m not into eagles today. I have enough other problems. I know this girl and she’s all of maybe eighteen.’

  Happy inserted a thermometer into the corpse. ‘What’s her name?’ He read the thermometer. ‘Based on temp, I change the estimate to three to four hours.’

  A mental image of the girl’s supermarket name badge flashed before Rocco. ‘Boots,’ he said as he searched for her last name. ‘Boots Anderson, I think.’

  ‘That must be Lister Anderson’s kid,’ Lars said. ‘He’s a mechanic down at the Chevy agency.’

  ‘That old Impala in the road is registered to a Bonnarah Anderson,’ Jamie Martin said.

  Rocco nodded. ‘I’ll have the lab boys impound it and do their thing. It’s time to interview the neighbors,’ he commanded.

  ‘Hell, Chief,’ Martin said. ‘No one lives around here. The river is down there.’ He made a sweeping gesture along the promontory. ‘The state forest runs along this ridge for nearly a mile. We’re in like the boonies.’

  ‘See if Lyon Wentworth saw or heard anything. He lives up the road in the other direction at Nutmeg Hill.’

  Lars Hansen laughed as he looked up from his examination of the body. ‘Wentworth hear anything? He probably heard a lot. Like maybe voices crying in the wilderness.’

  ‘How about space aliens?’ Jamie Martin added.

  ‘There’s a real space cadet for you,’ Happy Hansen said as the two men laughed in unison.

  Rocco frowned until the patrolman’s laugh gurgled to a stop. ‘See Wentworth now,’ he commanded. ‘Do I have to say more?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  Lyon Wentworth couldn’t work. He glared at the computer monitor with dislike. Its blank blue face stared back like an indifferent Cyclops. The words necessary to give life to his Wobbly monsters and place them in a coherent story were unavailable. The elusive words had fled to some unknown region where they hid and defied location. He couldn’t resurrect the missing sentences, much less type them into the machine on the desk.

  His newest children’s book, The Wood Wobblies, pitted his red-eyed, long-tailed, but benign monsters against ecologically evil paper companies who were clear-cutting a New England forest. The Wobblies’ intention was to haunt the woods until the paper company reformed. Today there was little haunting and absolutely no reform.

  He clicked to the software icons and placed the cursor on an entertainment program. When the game menu appeared he immediately entered ‘Rodent’s Revenge’. He knew it was avoiding work, and he felt vaguely ashamed, but was soon immersed in the shifting computer images of mice chasing cats through a complicated maze.

  The door chimed.

  Lyon catapulted from his chair with gratitude for the interruption. Nutmeg Hill’s isolation discouraged casual visitors. The usual caller was either a Federal Express delivery man or a stranded motorist who wanted to call a motor club.

  Several years ago, only short months after the death of their young daughter, Lyon and Bea had literally stumbled across Nutmeg Hill. To deal with their grief they had forced themselves into the habit of taking long walks. They pushed these lengthy hikes until they were physically tired to the point of exhaustion. Only sleep allowed partial relief from their bitter memories.

  One Sunday morning th
ey had followed the ridge line from the state forest. They found an abandoned house with boarded windows that was nearly covered with undergrowth. It had been vacant for a generation. Its solid New England construction, built by shipwrights for a whaling sea captain, had allowed the building to survive its abandonment.

  They bought the house from the estate of the sea captain’s last surviving relative. The aged shell of a house, with fifty-nine acres, abutted the state forest. Nutmeg Hill’s reconstruction took several years of hard manual labor. The daunting refurbishment occupied them to such an extent that they were able to survive their grief.

  Their home was located on a high saucer-shaped promontory above the Connecticut River. Anyone who approached the reconstructed building on the long driveway leading up from the secondary highway first saw the widow’s walk, which stretched the length of the gambrel roof, and then the solid square lines of the house.

  Lyon opened the front door to find Jamie Martin slouched against the wall. The youthful-looking patrolman straightened when he saw Lyon. ‘I didn’t hear you drive up,’ Lyon said.

  ‘I came through the woods from the state land,’ Martin said as he smiled at the tall man in the doorway.

  Lyon Wentworth was a slender six feet. He had a shock of brown-greying hair that protruded over his forehead. He often brushed the forelock back with an unconscious gesture. He had an infectious smile, which often transmitted a fey quality. His usual dress was boat shoes without socks, khaki work pants and a loose sport shirt. His ensemble was not necessarily color-coordinated.

  ‘We got a shooting in the woods. The chief wants to know if you heard or saw anything about three hours ago,’ Jamie continued.

  ‘I thought I heard a pistol shot about then,’ Lyon answered. ‘That’s not unusual around here. People are always going to the state forest to plink or try out a weapon.’ Jamie made meticulous notes with large letters in a small pad. ‘Who was injured?’

  ‘Injured, hell! She’s deader’n a baited squirrel. Young kid who works down at the supermarket, name of Boots Anderson.’

  Lyon felt that small jolt people experience when they meet the unexpected. ‘I know her. She graduated from Murphysville High School last year. I gave a talk on children’s literature to her English class last May.’

  ‘She learned more than English this year. Word at Sarge’s bar is that Boots was getting her bones jumped by Eddy Rashish.’

  ‘Eddy of Rashish Motors? He’s old enough to be her father.’

  ‘Well, Eddy’s old lady sure ain’t Boots’ mother.’

  ‘Is Rocco interviewing Eddy?’

  ‘I don’t know if he knows that Eddy and Boots were playing house. Don’t matter none, Mr. Wentworth. Spook is the one who killed her.’

  ‘Spook hasn’t been sober since the Viet Nam war.’

  ‘I found a First Cav patch clutched in Boots’ hand. And you know how Spook is about the First Cav. You want to come over to the woods and talk to Chief Herbert?’

  ‘No way, Jamie. The last thing I need is to get involved in another murder investigation. Besides, from what you say, it would seem that Spook has finally crossed the line.’

  ‘I don’t know what line you mean. It sure ain’t no lunch line. He’s been out to lunch for years, but this time he’s grazing in never-never land. I’ll tell the chief about the shot. Did you see anything?’

  ‘No. Tell Rocco that I heard one round of small arms fire about three hours ago. That’s all I know.’

  ‘Gotcha. Is Senator Wentworth home? I got to interview her, too.’

  ‘The State Senate’s in session today. Bea’s in Hartford. My wife wasn’t home when I heard the shot.’

  Jamie gave him a casual salute and turned to jog toward the faint path that led through the woods.

  As Lyon looked after the retreating police officer, last spring’s high school English class materialized in Nutmeg Hill’s side yard.

  Boots Anderson sat in the first row directly in front of Lyon’s podium. Her short skirt was barely within the allowable limits of the school dress code. Her exploratory seductive gaze was disconcerting. At the end of his presentation she had raised her hand with a slight squirming motion to the rest of her body.

  ‘Mr. Wentworth, about those Wobblies you write about, are they a boy and a girl or are they the same sex?’

  ‘Boy and a girl.’

  ‘Then do they … Well, what I mean is, do they …’

  ‘Make out?’ a male voice blurted from the seat behind Boots.

  ‘Make what?’ Lyon had automatically asked. He immediately regretted his naive response as laughter swept the room. He remembered Boots valiantly attempting to maintain her composure. Laughter built within her like strong pressure from an underground spring. When the giggles broke through she leaned her head back and was convulsed by a paroxysm of guffaws. That was his remembrance of the dead young woman.

  The phone rang inside the house. Lyon took his time going to the kitchen phone. He hoped that the caller would get discouraged. He counted twelve rings and became certain that the caller would persist. The insistent caller won. He snicked the phone from its wall bracket. ‘I will not come over there to view the body of a dead girl,’ he said without preamble.

  ‘How did you know it was me?’ Rocco asked. ‘Don’t you have any other friends?’

  ‘I know how you operate,’ Lyon answered. ‘My other friends do not call when they know I am trying to work. I refuse to scour the woods for clues or get more upset over the death of a young woman who I knew.’

  ‘I’ve got to bring Spook in, Lyon. I don’t want to use a state police SWAT team to do it. I need your help.’

  ‘Spook didn’t kill her. I don’t care if you did find one of his souvenirs in her hand. He may be in orbit, but he’s not a killer anymore.’

  ‘Jamie Martin doesn’t keep police investigation secrets well, does he?’

  ‘A lot of men served in that army division.’

  ‘That may be, but Spook has to be brought in and I need your help. If I have to do it formally he could get hurt.’

  ‘Damn it, Rocco! I’ll go with you, but I don’t like it.’ He slammed the phone into its mounting to break the connection.

  TWO

  On Route 40, beyond the trailer park, Lyon turned into the narrow lane that led to Spook’s acre. He parked his red Saturn behind car one of the Murphysville Police Department. He waited while Rocco finished a cellular phone call. A heavy growth of brush marked the boundaries of the property. Through a narrow opening hacked through the overgrowth he could see the large tree that held Spook’s house.

  Rocco finished his call and slouched over to the Saturn. He placed both hands on the roof by the driver’s window. ‘He’s home,’ he stated laconically.

  ‘Maybe you had better call your brother-in-law on the state police and ask him to send over that SWAT team he’s so proud of.’

  ‘Very funny. You know Spook would go ballistic if he spotted a bunch of guys wearing camouflage suits carrying automatic weapons.’

  ‘I suspect he would consider their intentions dishonorable.’

  ‘Exactly. So, it’s going to come down my way. Same as last time. I’m the company commander and you are the battalion surgeon.’

  ‘OK. We’re going to do another “he’s in trouble for not taking his malaria tablet again” scenario.’

  ‘You’ve got it,’ Rocco said.

  ‘He might remember that we used that only a couple of months ago to get him down to the VA hospital for his medication change.’

  ‘Hell, it worked then, it will work again.’

  They pushed single file into the narrow path that cut through the overgrowth into the hedged perimeter containing the huge oak tree. The tree divided into two distinct sections twelve feet up the trunk. It was at this junction that Spook had constructed his tree house. Short lengths of two-by-fours nailed to the trunk provided a ladder access. A twelve-by-fourteen-foot room had been built using the tree’s wide crotch as
a base, with support pillars provided by the divided trunk. Tar paper covered a slanted roof and the wooden sides.

  Looking directly up toward the floor of the tree house revealed that it was primarily built from scavenged lumber of assorted sizes and types.

  ‘I would think living up there would be OK in the spring and summer,’ Lyon said. ‘But in winter the wind would swirl around the trunk and seep up through the wood flooring and freeze him out.’

  ‘He’s got carpet remnants covering the floor and a potbellied wood stove that makes him snug as a bug. You’ve never been inside, have you?’ Rocco said.

  ‘No. How does he perform his private functions?’ Lyon asked.

  ‘A bucket. He brings it down every morning and dumps it in a lime pit over in that corner.’ He pointed toward the newly turned earth of a slit trench. ‘I make sure he sets it up properly. Periodically I make him fill in the trench and dig a new one. Put in a sprinkling of lime and it’s decent field sanitation.’

  ‘Let’s get it over with. I hate lying to the man,’ Lyon said.

  ‘In the long run it’s the most painless way to bring him in for questioning.’ Rocco stepped to the base of the tree and cupped his hands around his mouth. ‘Spook!’ he called. ‘Corporal Williams! This is Captain Herbert. You up there, soldier?’

  ‘I hear you, Captain,’ was the muffled reply. A trapdoor above the makeshift ladder opened. A face peered down at them. ‘What’s up, Cap?’ a quavery voice asked.

  ‘You got an Article Fifteen, Spook,’ Rocco said.

  ‘Hey, man. I done nothing.’

  ‘You got punishment, Corporal. Doc here says you didn’t take your malaria tablet today. You know that’s an Article Fifteen under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. I won’t lean on you hard, maybe a little extra guard duty.’

  ‘I hate their damn taste, Cap.’

  ‘Corporal, get your ass down here. And I mean now!’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ The trapdoor slowly opened to reveal a tall cadaverous man of indeterminate age whose long locks of hair fell over his shoulders. He wore holed sneakers and faded army fatigues. He cautiously climbed down the makeshift ladder leading from the tree house. When he reached the base of the tree he straightened into a caricature of attention and attempted to give Rocco a smart salute.