Nik Kane Alaska Mystery - 01 - Lost Angel

by Mike Doogan

  Faced with nothing but dead ends, his mind slipped off to other matters. He thought about making himself breakfast, but all he had was oatmeal and a few freeze-dried meals. He could do better than that at the cafeteria. But he knew his real reason for going there was the hope he’d see Ruth Hunt again. He thought about her for a while, searching for something not to like.

  “Well,” he said to the empty room, “there is the fact she’s married.”

  Kane knew he shouldn’t be thinking about the wife of one of his employers in quite the way he was, but decided he just didn’t have the mental discipline to stop. Laurie’s decision to leave had left a vacuum inside him that feelings for Ruth were rushing to fill. He’d tried steeling himself against such feelings, but a few moments standing alone with Ruth in the cabin and his willpower had just run out. Well, he thought, I’ll just have to have the feelings, do this job, and leave without acting on them. I did seven years, I can do this.

  He thought for a while about Laurie without, as usual, getting anywhere. Her departure still seemed as random as a lightning strike. He knew that living with him was no day at the beach, but she’d put up with him for so long, and stuck with him all through his prison term, that he’d thought they’d be together forever.

  But she was gone from his life and she wasn’t coming back.

  He wrenched his thoughts from that channel and began thinking about Rejoice. He supposed its government was something between feudalism and monarchy, with elements of theocracy and the New England town meeting thrown in. Or was that the way to think about it? Maybe it was just its own thing, a community shaped in part by its beliefs, in part by its circumstances. Primitive because its conditions were primitive; fundamentalist because its members’ beliefs were fundamentalist. Still there after forty years because of the stubbornness of those beliefs, compounded by misin-formation about the outside world and a growing economic stake in the area.

  Perhaps fragile despite all of that, Kane thought, without the deeper historical roots of other communities dominated by religious belief. One good shock to Rejoice’s belief system, and the members might scatter like ducks that glimpsed the shadow of an eagle. That prospect alone would be enough to make the more devout members want his search to fail. But was their faith strong enough to send someone out into the cold to try to murder him?

  Besides, how could anyone know how Rejoice would react to a shock? History showed that belief systems could be tough and durable. Why else were there people clinging to absurd beliefs in creation myths, to outmoded ideas about women, to exclusionary beliefs in their own righteousness? Why else would a couple of hundred people be living out in this difficult country, clinging to the contents of a book of dubious authorship. Was the Bible really God’s word? Was there really a God? Why did that question seem important to him?

  These and other thoughts occupied Kane for some time, until hunger and frustration drove him off the bed. He got a folding knife out of his duffel and dug the slugs out of the log wall, weighing each in his hand. He dropped them into his shirt pocket, put on his coat, and let himself out, carrying a flashlight in one hand. He walked through ankle-deep snow to the tree line. Once there, he lined himself up with the cabin, switched on the flashlight, and examined the ground. It took him a few minutes to find where the shooter had stood, using a birch branch as a rest. His flashlight beam lit up the plywood covering the window.

  He must not have been a very good shot, Kane thought. With the lights on inside the cabin, it would have been hard to miss from here.

  Kane followed the footprints through the trees. They soon came to a well-worn path. He turned toward the town and followed it, but other well-worn paths branched off. No way to tell where the shooter had gone.

  He walked back through the trees, keeping his flashlight pointed toward the ground. The shooter must have known the area well, to make his way back without using a light. But otherwise Kane hadn’t learned much from his expedition.

  Back at the cabin, Kane made a last pass through the bathroom, then drove to the community building. At six-thirty a.m., it was coming to life. Kane walked into the cafeteria and was served powdered eggs, sausage of indeterminate origin, and powdered orange juice. Every bit as good as prison food, he thought. The only thing that set the breakfast apart were freshly baked biscuits with honey. The biscuits were delicious.

  As Kane was eating, more people arrived, most of them nodding to him as they passed. He’d just about finished when Ruth came out of the back, waved, and walked over. When he motioned for her to sit, she shook her head.

  “I don’t have time to visit,” she said, “but I wanted to say hello.”

  “I appreciate that,” Kane said, “and I do have a question. Is there anyone here who would try to shoot you?”

  The woman laughed, confusion in her face.

  “You’re kidding, right?” she said.

  “Not entirely,” the detective said. “The odds are very high that those bullets were meant for me, but I can’t ignore the possibility, however slight, that you were the target.”

  The woman cocked her head to the side and smiled.

  “You have the most interesting way of looking at things,” she said. “I can’t imagine that I’ve irritated anyone enough to try to murder me.” She paused. “But I’ll think about it some more and give you a definitive answer over dinner, provided you’d be willing to buy me one.”

  It was Kane’s turn to be confused.

  “Buy you one?” he said. “I thought everything in Rejoice was free to community members.”

  “It is,” the woman said, “but ever since I came here I’ve made it a point to have dinner at the Devil’s Toe Roadhouse every other Friday. I did that before I married and continued after. It’s something of a scandal in the community, I’m happy to say. I’ve come to think it’s my duty to give Rejoice something to gossip about.”

  Kane laughed. She was starting to make him feel human again. Feeling human, letting his guard down, had been dangerous for so long that it made him nervous.

  “I’ll bet,” he said, following that thought. “Don’t some of the people there make you a little nervous?”

  “You don’t know me very well,” she said, “if you think the crowd at the roadhouse would make me nervous.”

  So they set a time to meet, and the woman went back to her chores.

  Thomas Wright came into the cafeteria just as Kane was finishing his breakfast. He saw the detective and walked over.

  “You’re up early,” he said, waving a hand at Kane’s empty plate. “I just heard about the shooting at your cabin. Praise God no one was hurt.”

  “Someone must have gotten up early to deliver that news,” Kane said.

  “Gossip never sleeps,” Wright said with a smile.

  “Can you sit for a minute?” Kane asked.

  Wright sat.

  “What are you going to do about the shooting?” he asked.

  “Well, I’m headed out to see the trooper anyway, so I’ll report it,” Kane said. “Maybe when it’s light enough he’ll come over and look at the crime scene, although what a bunch of tracks in the snow would tell him I don’t know. Anyway, since the shooter missed, I’m far more interested in his reasons than the actual shooting.”

  “What do you mean?” Wright asked.

  “The fact that someone shot at me makes it more likely that the reason for Faith’s disappearance is something more sinister than her desire to live in the outside world,” Kane said.

  The two men sat quietly for a moment.

  “I see what you mean.” Thomas Wright said. “Shooting at you seems to represent a pretty serious objection to trying to find her.”

  “Yeah,” Kane said, “somebody must think he has a good reason for Faith to stay missing. And I haven’t been here long enough for it to be anything but the job I’m doing. I don’t suppose there’s any point in asking who has hunting rifles in Rejoice.” He pulled a slug from his pocket. “Specifically a .30-cal
iber or 7.62?”

  “I’m afraid not,” Wright said. “I think every home in Rejoice has guns for hunting and for self-defense and defense of the community. We don’t have a police force, you know, and there’s only one trooper for the whole area.”

  “That’s what I thought,” Kane said, pocketing the slug. “I’ll turn these over to the trooper, but it’s probably just going through the motions. I’d better get started.”

  Kane left Wright sitting at the table and went out to his truck. As he pushed through the doors of the Arctic entryway, he passed Matthew Pinchon, who was headed in.

  “I thought you went to Anchorage,” he said.

  “I felt like I was coming down with something, so I decided to stay,” the young man said. “The team didn’t really need me. We’ll win this game easily.”

  When Kane was well away from Rejoice, he put a Beatles CD in the player and tracked along until he reached “Here Comes the Sun King.”

  I may not have the sun, Kane thought, looking at the dark sky, but I have reason to celebrate this morning anyway. Being alive is a good excuse for song.

  He drove through the frozen landscape, singing along. The countryside looked as desolate and forbidding as ever, but the music—and the prospect of dinner with Ruth—buoyed his spirits.

  Devil’s Toe was still locked up tight, but there was a four-wheel-drive cruiser parked in front of the trooper office, where the lights were on. Kane parked next to the cruiser and walked in.

  A young man with close-cropped hair looked up from a computer screen. Kane figured him for about twenty-five, big like all the troopers, wearing the full outfit with his Smokey Bear hat lying on the desk.

  “Help you?” he asked in a tone of forced friendliness.

  Kane walked over and sat in the chair pulled up next to the desk.

  “My name’s Nik Kane,” he said, sticking out his hand. “I’ve been hired by the Rejoice Council of Elders to find Faith Wright. I’d appreciate any help you could give me.”

  The trooper had started frowning at the sound of Kane’s name.

  “You got some ID?” he asked.

  Kane took out his wallet, removed his driver’s license, and handed it to the trooper.

  “You don’t have a private investigator’s license?” the trooper asked, handing the license back.

  “You are new, aren’t you?” Kane said. “Alaska doesn’t issue them.”

  The trooper nodded.

  “We don’t have truck with private eyes out here in the sticks,” he said. “Now, why should I tell a civilian anything?”

  “It’s like this, Trooper”—he looked at the nameplate on the desk—“Slade. I’m here because some law-abiding citizens hired me. I have the blessing of your superiors. I think it would be in your best interests to help me. And of course, I’d be grateful personally.”

  The trooper gave Kane a hard look.

  “I don’t think so,” he said. “I’ve given this matter all the time and attention it deserves. I’ve got a lot of territory to cover and plenty of crime to deal with, and I’m not giving the departure of a girl who’s old enough to make her own decisions any more attention.”

  Kane was surprised by the trooper’s attitude. No cop liked having somebody breathing down his neck on a case, but Slade didn’t seem to think it was a case. Why would he begrudge Kane a chance to make some money and, maybe, find the girl? Unless he was just a kid trying to prove how hard-ass he could be.

  “Okay,” he said to the trooper, “but I have a job to do, a job that would be a lot easier with your help.”

  “Tough titty,” the trooper said.

  “You’re making a mistake,” Kane said. “Who knows, I might be able to teach you a thing or two.”

  The trooper leaned toward Kane.

  “I’m not interested in learning to get drunk and gun down unarmed civilians,” he said. “All I want from you is to not let the doorknob hit you in the ass on the way out.”

  Kane stood up.

  “Fine,” he said. “I don’t know why you’re being so stubborn, but I’ll be certain to report your lack of cooperation to your superiors.”

  Slade opened his mouth to reply, but the phone intervened. The trooper grabbed the receiver.

  “Slade,” he barked, then listened.

  “Uh huh,” he said, “uh huh, uh huh, uh huh.”

  With the first “uh huh” he sat straight up in the chair. With the second, he rose to his feet. By the fourth, he had his hat on and a key in his hand. He put the receiver down and walked to an upright safe, opened it, and pulled out a shotgun.

  “I’d love to keep talking,” he said, locking the safe, “but I’m afraid I have to go. Somebody just stole the mine payroll and killed one of the guards.”

  13

  And they robbed all that came along that way by them. . . .

  JUDGES 9:25

  THE TROOPER USHERED KANE OUT THE DOOR AND locked it behind them. He unplugged his cruiser, climbed in, locked the shotgun in its rack, started the SUV, and backed it fast onto the highway, straightened, and roared off, lights flashing and siren wailing.

  That seems a little excessive on an empty highway, Kane thought as he tried to keep the trooper’s lights in sight. But he could remember what it was like to be young and behind the wheel of a police car, adrenaline racing through his veins. Slade seemed to have that going on in spades. Kane looked at the speedometer. He was doing seventy, but the cruiser was pulling away.

  Kane was just able to make out the trooper’s brake lights, but lost them as the cruiser made a high-speed turn onto the mine road. He backed off the accelerator and followed at a more sedate pace. By the time he reached the crime scene, in a curve about halfway to the mine, the cruiser was slewed across the road, lights still flashing. The trooper was standing next to it, arguing with a couple of men.

  Kane pulled to a stop well short of the cruiser.

  “I said go back to the mine,” the trooper was shouting as Kane opened his door. “You’ve already compromised the crime scene, so don’t make matters any worse.”

  Kane walked in the cruiser’s tire tracks to where the trooper stood. A couple of yards beyond it, one of the mine’s Explorers was nosed into the alders at the side of the road. Both front doors were open. Lester Logan was sprawled facedown in a blood-soaked patch of snow near the rear of the Explorer, a shotgun next to his outflung hand.

  “You’re standing on mine property,” one of the men said, in a tone that said he was trying to be reasonable. They were both older than the trooper and didn’t seem at all impressed by him. “Besides, that’s one of ours laying there.”

  “I don’t care if it’s your brother,” Slade said. “I want you to walk, carefully and in your own footprints, back to your rig and go back to the mine. If you don’t, I’m going to put cuffs on you and send you into Anchorage.”

  The two men looked at each other.

  “Do what he says, Tony,” Kane said. “He’s law and you’re not, now.”

  “Hello, Nik,” said the man who had spoken. “I guess you’re right, but it’s hard to remember sometime, isn’t it? Especially when you know a kid with a badge is only going to fuck things up.”

  “Now, listen . . .” the trooper began, but the two men turned and walked single file toward another Explorer parked some distance up the road. The man Kane had called Tony moved with a noticeable limp.

  “Was there anybody else with this car?” Kane called.

  “Charlie Simms,” Tony threw back over his shoulder. “He took a hell of a whack, and they’ve got him in the infirmary.”

  The two men reached the other Explorer, got in, and backed up the road and out of sight.

  “What are you doing here?” the trooper snapped.

  “I’m here to help you,” Kane said, “and if you’ve got any sense at all, you’ll let me.”

  “Just stay out of my way,” the trooper said, opening the door to his car. A blast of warm air from the cruiser’s heater was
hed over Kane.

  “How do you know those guys?” the trooper asked, taking a small camera from the passenger seat. “They more washed-up ex-cops like you?” He closed the door and started taking pictures.

  “I don’t know the one guy,” Kane said, “but the other one, Tony Figone, used to be on the Anchorage force with me. He was a good cop, until he tore up a knee and medicaled. If you keep at it long enough and you’re smart enough, you might hope to be as good a cop.”

  The trooper grunted and kept shooting.

  “Not much of a camera for crime-scene photos,” Kane said.

  “Digital, gramps,” the trooper said, then moved off to shoot from another angle. Kane followed along, as much to keep moving in the cold as anything else. The trooper made a complete circuit, snapping away.

  “I can just load these onto my computer and send them to crime-scene interpretation in Anchorage. For all the good that’ll do. Those clowns tracked all over, and the road’s packed too hard and been traveled too much for tire tracks to tell us anything. If there’d been some fresh snow, we might be able to see something.”

  The trooper moved closer to the body, watching where he put his feet. The exit wounds in Lester’s back were the size of softballs. Slade moved gingerly around the body, taking close-ups. When he was finished, Kane knelt next to the body and put his palm on the back of Lester’s neck. It was already cold to the touch.

  “Going to be tough getting a time of death,” he said.

  “More like impossible,” the trooper said. “I called for a doctor on the way here, but the closest one’s in Rejoice and doesn’t have any medical examiner experience. So it’s a good thing we’ve got an eyeball witness.”

  “Can I roll him over?” Kane said.

  “Don’t see why not,” the trooper said.

  Kane did. Rolling Lester over wasn’t easy; the body was stiff with cold. But when Kane finally had Lester lying on his back, he and the trooper could see the dead man’s chest clearly.

  “You ever handled a murder before?” Kane asked.

  “No,” the trooper said, “but I know the procedures.”