The Spire

by Richard North Patterson

  Darrow recalled Joe’s confession the day of Steve’s arrest; Joe had told him none of this. “Didn’t that make you skeptical?”

  Bender laughed softly. “Back then everything about Joe Betts made me skeptical. Especially when he claimed to have stonewalled us just to keep from getting his friend Tillman in trouble. But his story cemented a decent circumstantial case. The question for us—and Farragher—was whether to believe it.”

  “Which you did,” Darrow said.

  “Not at first. We’d checked out his life, too—he was a bad drunk, it was pretty clear, and he’d just broken up with his girlfriend. Fighting with Tillman over Angela Hall made him the leading alternative; his story might have been intended to frame Steve for a murder Betts had committed.” Bender took another puff. “Thing is, we never found anything tying Joe to the murder. No witness, no physical evidence. Nothing to say that he didn’t walk back to his dorm room, like he told us, to try and sleep it off.”

  “Did anyone see him come in?”

  “No. But as far as we could tell, no one saw him anywhere at all. We know he wasn’t with Angela. Tillman was.”

  Darrow cocked his head. “What did Laurie Shilts tell you?”

  “Joe’s girlfriend? Nothing much. According to her, their breakup was nothing dramatic—she couldn’t see a future, I guess you’d say.”

  “That’s a way of putting it. Happen to notice a bruise on her cheek?”

  “No.” Bender turned to him, openly curious. “I remember she was wearing a lot of makeup.”

  “Maybe that day.”

  “So you’re telling me Betts hit her?” Bender asked bluntly. “Just like we figure the murderer hit Angela.”

  Darrow fell quiet, reflecting on his moments with Laurie. Deep down, she had told him, Joe hates women. “Laurie never said,” he answered. “But that was my impression.”

  For a time, Bender appraised him keenly. “You had more on your mind than we knew, didn’t you?”

  Remembering his calls to Steve, Darrow felt his unease deepen. “Maybe so. But I didn’t know what it meant, or anything about Joe’s story. Since then I’ve gotten better at stringing things together.”

  “So it seems.”

  Beneath Bender’s tone, though mild, Darrow heard a note of accusation. Quietly, he asked, “What do you know about Joe’s father?”

  “Only that he was dead.” Bender’s voice became weary. “I guess you’re also going to tell me the old man beat Joe’s mother.”

  “According to Joe. No reason to lie about that.”

  “That would have been of interest. You and I both know that men who abuse women often learned from Dad.” After stubbing his cigarette out on the windowsill, Bender put it in the pocket of his sport coat. “But if it makes you feel better, in the end none of this would have mattered. We had nothing on Betts except the fight over Angela Hall. The only DNA we could get from her body belonged to Tillman. When the crime lab scoured Betts’s room and found nothing, the one surprise was how neat it was.

  “As a suspect, Betts looked better than he turned out to be—at least based on what we could find. And what would his motive have been? He’d have to have been so pissed off about what happened at the party that, four hours later, he followed Angela when she left the dorm and strangled her near the Spire. Even if you can imagine that, there’s no evidence that it happened. That leaves Tillman.”

  Darrow found himself gazing at the Spire, burnished in the sunlight above the trees. “Maybe it does. But the scenario I still have trouble with is that Steve Tillman strangled her, dressed her, and then decided to deposit her body at the foot of the most iconic structure on Caldwell’s campus.”

  Turning, Bender had a small, grim smile. “Who’s to say he dressed her? You and I will never know what happened in that room. But, if you’re interested, I can tell you what I think went on between the two of them.”

  Darrow felt a new tautness, interest combined with dread. “Sure.”

  “It’s simple enough. Tillman and the girl were drinking and making out, both hotted up. Tillman had a little coke, and began wanting something more. Angela wasn’t so up for that. But Tillman just had to fuck her, no matter how. When she resisted, he lost it. That was when he hit her.”

  Bender, Darrow realized, had thought about this long and hard; like Darrow himself, he needed a story that made sense and that, at least, conformed to the physical evidence. “So she gave in,” Darrow said.

  “A fateful choice,” Bender answered softly. “Tillman made her undress, then used his finger to make her wet enough to enter, leaving no injuries. When he was done, she dressed herself. But Angela never left the room alive.”

  “You think she threatened to report him.”

  “Uh-huh. Everything we know says she was a strong-willed girl with real pride, nobody’s victim. And she was too drunk or angry to realize that a guy capable of rape and battery might take the final step. But Tillman knew enough to understand that he could spend a stretch in prison, and was coked up enough for rage to overtake his reason.” Bender took another puff, eyes narrow, as though reenvisioning the murder. “All your friend knew was not to let her talk. Three minutes later, she couldn’t.”

  Silent, Darrow reviewed Bender’s thesis. “If Angela let him penetrate her, why the scratches on Steve’s back?”

  “Maybe she changed her mind, or wanted to leave her mark.” Pausing, Bender fished out another cigarette. “Nothing’s perfect. Including the logic of a homicide involving two drunken kids.”

  “There’s also this,” Darrow rejoined. “Joe didn’t have a car that night; he left on foot, and then we clever fraternity boys parked his Miata in the library. But Steve did have a car. Does illogic also cover a drunk with a trick knee carrying a corpse two hundred yards to a very public space—instead of dumping her in his trunk and throwing her in the river? Or dumping her body in a place—the old lime pit, for example—where you might never find her?”

  Bender seemed unruffled. “No clue—Tillman sure didn’t tell us. Maybe he thought she’d leave traces in his car. All we know is what he did with her.”

  “How do you know what he did? How did he carry her, for one thing? Did the forensic people find any drag marks on her heels?”

  “No. But if he carried her over his shoulder, there wouldn’t be.”

  “In which case,” Darrow rejoined, “you’d think there might be traces of her saliva on his clothes. Were there any?”

  Momentarily quiet, Bender considered the implications of the question. “Corpses drool,” he said. “Maybe just not this one. At least not that the crime lab found.”

  “In other words, there’s no evidence at all that Steve carried her to the Spire. All we know is that I found her there.”

  “Not all. Pat Flynn—the waitress from the Donut King—saw the guy who carried her there. She swore he was about Tillman’s height and build.”

  “That could have been me, Fred. Or anyone.” Darrow hesitated. “Does Pat still live in Wayne?”

  “Yup. Same life, same job. Donut King’s still there.”

  For a long time, Bender said nothing more. “Since you came back,” he finally asked Darrow, “have you run into Joe Betts?”

  “Once.”

  “Last few years, I’ve met him a couple of different times. By appearance, I could have picked him out of a lineup. But he seems like a different guy, and not just because he’s sober.” He turned to Darrow. “A decent guy, wouldn’t you say?”

  Darrow hesitated. “Yeah,” he answered. “I would.”

  WALKING WITH DARROW back to his office, Bender paused at the foot of the Spire for a final smoke. For Darrow, the site evoked many things. But what he recalled now was stopping with Joe Betts to watch the rally where Dave Farragher had pledged before a swarm of TV cameras to solve the murder of Angela Hall.

  “Tell me about Farragher,” Darrow said.

  Bender weighed the question. “At the time of the murder, he was still pretty new in
the job—had only been prosecutor for three years. But he’d been an assistant prosecutor, known for being sharp. Legally and politically.”

  “Which mattered most?”

  “In this case, both. Dave was up for reelection, so he was on the hot seat. No point indicting someone if you may well lose at trial, or just turn out to be wrong. Dave needed to be right.”

  “Within three days?”

  “A fair question,” Bender conceded. “Dave was under a lot of pressure, including from the black community, as well as from the college. And the media. You didn’t need to be as smart as Dave to know this one was make-or-break, the biggest case he might ever see.” Briefly, Bender interrupted himself by coughing. “No one thought his vision of the future ended with county prosecutor. Some folks used to call him ‘Governor’ behind his back. Only two things could derail him for sure—some sort of scandal or fucking up this case. He needed a conviction.”

  “So when did he decide that he could win a case against Steve?”

  “When Muhlberg and I brought him Joe Betts’s story. ‘That makes Tillman a liar,’ I recall him saying. ‘If I can prove to the jury he lied about something that important, that could seal a conviction.’ ” Bender finished his cigarette. “I wasn’t there when he met with Betts. But whatever Joe said was enough to convince Farragher that Tillman was the one. A few hours later, Dave had him arrested.”

  This was another detail, Darrow remembered, that Joe had not revealed to him. He felt Bender watching his face. “Look,” the detective said evenly. “I know this is complicated for you. You found her body. Steve Tillman was your best friend, and you also knew Joe Betts pretty well. Looking back at it, I imagine you’re remembering a lot of things, and maybe feeling some sort of guilt you can’t quite put a name to.

  “But this is a classic cold case, with gaps no one can fill in. The passage of fifteen years has made it worse.” Dropping the cigarette in the grass, Bender ground it with his shoe. “The real problem is Angela Hall. She’s what I’d call a legitimate victim—not some gangbanger anyone might have shot, where there are a lot of potential witnesses. Or suspects.

  “People like Angela aren’t courting death. With victims like her, often there’s no witnesses except the killer. So you work with what you’ve got. And you learn to accept that that’s probably all you’ll ever have.”

  “Not easy.”

  Stooping, Bender picked up the butt, then faced Darrow. “Believe me,” he said quietly, “I wish I had all the answers. This was the last case of my career. No one wants to end with an unsolved homicide. But no cop wants to die still wondering about his biggest success.”

  Bender put the dead cigarette in his pocket. Alone, Darrow went back to his office.

  15

  D

  ARROW CAPPED A REVIEW OF CALDWELL’S FINANCES BY taking Joe Betts to dinner.

  The venue was the Carriage House. As before, the owner seated Darrow in the booth below his photograph—the much younger Mark Darrow brandished the ceremonial axe from atop the Spire. “This seems to have become my table,” Darrow remarked.

  Eyeing the picture, Joe shook his head. “That was a moment. Too bad the day didn’t end there.”

  The waitress took their drink orders. “Just give me Château Perrier,” Joe told her amiably. “I hear May 2009 was a good month.”

  When the waitress left, Darrow said, “You really did give it up, didn’t you?”

  “Cold turkey,” Joe answered. “After that night, I didn’t need a twelve-step program. I knew.”

  He looked unsettled by the memory. “That was years ago,” Darrow said. “You’ve done well, Joe. Certainly for Caldwell—given the times, our portfolio could have taken a far bigger beating than it has.”

  Joe grimaced. “Not many good places to put our money, what with the housing bubble and the rest. My great achievement was not losing more. Compared to letting Durbin embezzle close to a million bucks, I guess that’s a point of pride.”

  Joe might have changed, Darrow thought, but not entirely; beneath the smooth exterior, he sensed the touchiness and insecurity Joe had tried to conceal in college. “No one figured Clark Durbin for a crook,” Darrow responded. “The flaw was in the system, and your proposals for fixing it are sound. Once we get them in place, it’ll close the books on this whole sad episode.”

  “We’ll close the books, Mark, when we throw the book at Durbin. You ready to do that yet?”

  Darrow sipped his martini. “Not quite. I still want my guy Mike Riley to take a look at this. Call me thorough.”

  To Darrow’s surprise, Joe flushed with anger. “That’s not diligence, for Chrissakes—that’s necrophilia. Especially after we found the account where Durbin transferred money back from Switzerland. I’m with Ray Carrick: nailing Durbin to the mast is what the alumni need to see. New financial controls are good and well, but they don’t satisfy the viscera.”

  “Whose viscera?” Darrow asked mildly. “I’ve been called a lot of things, but ‘corpse fucker’ is pretty novel.”

  Joe managed a sour smile. “Okay,” he acknowledged. “The Durbin thing is personal to me. I feel like a buffoon, and now it’s like you’re second-guessing Greg Fox and me. For no reason either of us can detect except that you can.”

  “I’m way too busy for petty shows of authority,” Darrow answered firmly. “So bear with me. I owe a debt to Caldwell College, and have ever since Lionel got me in. That’s why I came back despite all the reasons I had to stay away.”

  Taking off his horn-rimmed glasses, Betts wiped both lenses with a napkin, removing spots only he could see. “I know that, Mark. Believe me.” He paused a moment. “Have you gone to see Steve again?”

  “Yeah. It’s becoming a regular stop.”

  “Anything new?”

  “Not much happening at the pen—or many distractions, either. Prison seems to breed a certain monomania. It’s fair to say he still blames you for his misery.”

  Joe put his glasses back on, fiddling with one of the stems. “That’s pretty misdirected, wouldn’t you say?”

  Darrow shrugged. “I guess that depends on whether he killed her. Steve still swears she walked out alive and that he never left the dorm.” He hesitated, then asked mildly, “Any chance at all the guy you saw was someone else?”

  Joe’s jaw set, defensiveness flashing in his eyes. “No matter what had happened between Steve and me, I wouldn’t put a friend in jail unless I knew. Even if I hadn’t glimpsed his face, the guy limped. I’d have known Steve Tillman if he’d been walking with fifteen other guys.”

  After a moment, Darrow nodded. In a tone of idle curiosity, he asked, “Do you remember what he was wearing?”

  “Not really, no.”

  “Did you happen to notice the time?”

  Joe was quiet for a moment, brow slightly furrowed. “I thought it was around three o’clock, but can’t remember why. Leaning out that window, I still felt pretty fucked up.”

  Darrow thought quickly of his own memory, still undisclosed, that he had tried to reach Steve Tillman after three o’clock. Joe’s sense of time, were his story true, would put Steve back in his dorm room an hour before. But the significance of this—if any—was unclear. “Between the party and whenever you spotted him,” Darrow inquired, “did you see Steve or Angela at all?”

  “You mean after he drove off with her? No.” Joe bit his lip. “The mood I was in, if I’d known they were screwing one floor below, I might have busted in on them. Would have been better if I had—Angela Hall might still be alive.” Joe’s voice softened. “As it was, all I did was go home and puke in the upstairs john. I remember being on my hands and knees, grabbing both sides of the commode, then staggering up to look in the mirror. I hated what I saw there—not just how I looked, but who I was.”

  “A bad night, Joe.”

  Summoning a look of candor, Joe met Darrow’s eyes. “No,” he answered. “A bad guy. I’d lost my girlfriend. I’d fought with Steve. I’d made a fool of m
yself in public. All I wanted was to get off the earth somehow—not just leave the night behind; leave myself behind. Other than my own face, the last thing I wanted to see was those two cops, wanting to go through what I’d done, over and over. I didn’t tell them about Steve until I had to.”

  The latent ambiguity in this last statement left Darrow quiet. Joe’s expression became pleading. “I’m different now, Mark. My whole life is different. My career’s good. Katie and I are good, and we’ve got two great kids. Now I’m on Caldwell’s board, and I like to think, despite this screwup, that I’m repaying my own debt to the school.” He paused, then added in a lower voice, “I didn’t become my old man, after all. The guy you saw that night isn’t me anymore. He’s as dead as Angela Hall.”

  Darrow had a deep sense of sadness. He remembered Steve Tillman saying much the same thing after his arrest—“That’s not me.” Except that Joe Betts was disowning the person he had been, not the act for which Tillman was imprisoned. Beneath Joe’s plea, Darrow felt the man’s fierce desire never to reprise memories that, whatever his reason, frightened him too deeply to conceal.

  “I understand,” Darrow said gently. “Do you happen to have a picture of Katie and the kids?”

  With evident relief, Joe pulled a picture from his wallet, sliding it across the table. In her tennis dress, Katie Betts looked athletic and well-groomed, a classic blonde from some wealthy precinct of Connecticut. Standing beside her, a bright-eyed boy and his gap-toothed sister were laughing at something off-camera.

  “Nice,” Darrow affirmed. “I envy you, Joe.”

  * * *

  DARROW LEFT THE Carriage House a little after nine o’clock. He stood on the sidewalk, breathing in the lightly humid air and recalling the summer evenings he had savored before his senior year at Caldwell transformed his memory. Reaching back in time, he located Donut King in his mental map of the past.