by Paul Doiron
“Where did you get that?” Nick asked.
It was my turn to be the one slowly doling out information. “Do you know who this is?”
“Of course.”
“Well?”
“That’s Pierre Michaud.”
“Who’s Pierre Michaud?”
“The man Charley killed.”
“What?”
Nick reached into the chest pocket of his shirt, removed a crushed pack of cigarettes, and set it on the table. The brand was Natural American Spirit. The illustration on the package showed an Indian in eagle-feather headdress inhaling tobacco from a long pipe.
“You mind continuing this conversation outside? I could use a smoke.”
But I sensed his real motive. He didn’t want to be overheard.
19
The rain had stopped, and a mist was rising from the ashphalt. We wandered off past the chugging eighteen wheelers, past the arc lights, past the drop-off where the asphalt crumbled. We entered a field of wildflowers and weeds. It was too early in the summer for crickets, but I heard other unknown insects clicking from the shadowed ground, and a few fireflies flickered farther out in the tall grass.
“People listen better in the dark, I’ve found,” he said.
“I was listening to you inside.”
He chuckled. “You weren’t listening. You were letting your eyes rest on me while you thought about yourself.”
He had me there.
“You ever hear what happened at St. Ignace?” he said in the brief glow of the Zippo he used to light his cigarette.
“Up in the St. John Valley?” I said. “An undercover game warden disappeared. He was presumed murdered by the group of poachers he had infiltrated. The Warden Service tore apart the town looking for him. A few buildings burned to the ground in the raid. Politically, it was a shit show for the department. The colonel at the time was forced to resign.”
“That’s one version,” Nick said, exhaling smoke I could taste on the tip of my tongue. “Everyone who was there that night tells a different story. Keep in mind I only know what I heard. I was the police chief in Indian Township at that time and had enough shit to handle with my own people.”
“You’re saying that Charley was the one who shot and killed the ringleader? This Michaud guy?”
“That’s right.”
“How is it possible that I never heard about this?”
“The exchange of gunfire happened at night on Beau Lac. That’s almost as far north in Maine as you can go. The international border runs right down the center of the lake. Charley only winged the man, but the shot knocked him out of his canoe. Michaud drowned trying to swim to the Canadian shore.”
In the darkness of the rain-soaked field, I was half hypnotized by the orange glow of his cigarette as it danced through the air like yet another firefly.
“You didn’t answer my question. How have I never heard about this?”
“The Warden Service got raked over the coals pretty good, like you said. Both the U.S. attorney and the Maine attorney general found Charley was justified in his actions. Michaud was a cop killer. Everyone had an interest in putting the scandal to bed.”
“But they never found the undercover warden.”
“No matter how hard they searched.”
I closed my eyes and tried to see the granite memorial in Augusta devoted to law enforcement officers who had died in the line of duty.
“Scott Pellerin,” I said. “That was his name?”
“Smart kid. Too cocky for his own good, though. Charley said it must’ve been how he blew his cover—overconfidence.”
The occasional rumble of big rigs passing along the highway made me think the storms were returning.
“How does the badge fit into this?”
“Both Pellerin and Dupree are French names. You should check out if they were related. There might be a connection.”
“You seem to be working on a theory,” I said.
“Am I?”
“That Charley always regretted Michaud’s death because it kept him from finding Pellerin. That’s why he kept that picture in a box with his other ‘trophies.’ For some reason, the reappearance of Duke Dupree’s badge has made him rethink the events of fifteen years ago. He realized he had been misled.”
“Is that my theory?” said Nick. “I’m smarter than I thought.”
“It explains why Charley would want to check things out on his own—in case the man who murdered Pellerin has been preparing for the day when he was finally found out.”
Nick tossed the orange ember of his cigarette into the weeds. “It also explains why he took his truck instead of his plane. He might have had a bunch of stops to make, people to talk with along the way. That old Ford Ranger of his is distinctive. Folks might remember it if you ask.”
“It sounds like you’re encouraging me to go after him.”
“You’re going to do what you’re going to do. That’s your MO, I’ve heard.”
“So if Michaud didn’t kill Pellerin, who did?”
“One of his confederates.”
“In his letter, Charley said he didn’t want to put his family or me in danger. From whom, though? Some poacher who wasn’t caught in the raid? Sure, a guy who thinks he got away with killing a game warden is going to be dangerous. But you did this job, too, Nick. We’ve all dealt with scarier people than some toothless old night hunter.”
“A toothless man can put a bullet in you just as fast as one with a mouthful of choppers. Fifteen years ain’t that long ago, either. This mystery man might not be that old.”
“I was speaking metaphorically.”
“Seems like Scott Pellerin got killed for underestimating the men he was infiltrating. That’s a mistake Charley isn’t going to make. You’d best follow his example and keep your guard up.”
I listened to a toad trilling across the field. “So where do you think Charley is now?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
“He’ll want to talk with the girl who sold Smith the badge,” I said.
“That would be my assumption, but he can’t risk giving himself away. He’s the man who shot Pierre Michaud, remember. People in the Valley have long memories, even if the rest of the world has forgotten what happened up there.”
“I hadn’t thought of that.”
“So you’re determined to pursue this?”
“In the morning.”
“I can recommend the motel across the parking lot.”
“Is that where you’re staying?”
“I have a lady friend up in Mars Hill.”
Nick Francis had lots of lady friends, from what I’d heard.
“I don’t suppose you want to come with me tomorrow—play investigator again.”
He had a chain-smoker’s laugh. “Old men shouldn’t be running around, chasing after thrills. They should be content in the arms of their family. Besides, I have to stick around Houlton until Tuesday.”
“What happens Tuesday?”
“My son is being arraigned. And he’s going to need me to pay his bail again.”
* * *
Following Nick’s recommendation, I took a room at the motel across from the truck stop. A sign on the dresser threatened anyone caught smoking with a $250 fine. Based on the odor baked into the rug, the penalty hadn’t deterred a prior occupant.
It could have been that I was smelling the residue of Nick Francis’s cigarettes. My clothing reeked of American Spirits. I hung them from the shower rod with the window open to air out.
I was curious about Nick’s son, Molly’s dad. The fact of the younger man being in jail might have explained the bandage on the father’s forehead.
One of Charley’s favorite sayings came to mind: “Some people are more than they appear. And some people are less than they appear. But nobody is the way they appear.”
But surely, he couldn’t have fooled me, not after all the adventures we’d lived through.
The decision
before me—choosing to believe in Charley’s essential goodness—seemed to have momentous importance, as if in making it, I wasn’t just defending my friend but also somehow defining myself.
Because I had been betrayed before by trusting in the character of a person I’d thought I’d understood, I had vowed never to be fooled again, no matter the circumstances. But I couldn’t live my life distrusting the people closest to me.
I made my decision. I trusted Charley.
Kathy had been true to her word. When I opened my email, there was a message with the subject line: DUKE DUPREE!
He killed himself after his draft board refused his application to join the army after Pearl Harbor. His wife found him in the outhouse with a shotgun at his feet and half his head blown off. That’s the legend in Millinocket anyhow.
Of course, you won’t see this message since you’re deep in the woods at Debouille Pond with no signal. I hope the char are biting!
PS: Call Dani.
Dupree having committed suicide explained why his badge had held no particular value to his next of kin. The shield symbolized his dishonor. Dupree might even have pawned the badge before his death. Who could say how many hands it had passed through over the decades?
As intriguing as this information was, it brought me no closer to understanding why Charley had reacted the way he had when he saw the badge on Smith’s table. What connection did he have to a failed game warden who’d died before he was born? If anything, I felt myself to be at a greater loss than I’d been before I read Kathy’s message.
Meanwhile, Ora was waiting. I could picture her in the camp, in her wheelchair with the green blanket over her knees, Vivaldi playing on the old cassette stereo. I owed her the truth, I realized. I couldn’t have it both ways. In order to trust, I needed also to be trustworthy.
“Where are you?” was her first question.
“I’m at a motel in Houlton.”
“Did you find Mr. Smith?”
As if the jackass deserved to be called mister, I thought.
But that was Ora Stevens. She would grant the devil the dignity of being addressed with an honorific.
She listened to my account of the day without interruption until I came to the part of the story where I’d met Nick Francis and he’d brought up the bungled undercover investigation fifteen years earlier.
“This has to do with that man Michaud,” she said, her voice rising as the truth became clear to her. “He is the one in the picture in Charley’s cigar box!”
“Yes.”
“I should have recognized him, but when it happened, I couldn’t bring myself to read the papers. The grief was too much for me. And I could tell how greatly Charley was suffering. Of course this is all about Scott. It’s the only explanation that makes sense.”
“What connection did Scott Pellerin have with Charley?”
“Oh, Mike,” she said. “Scott Pellerin was once you.”
20
While we talked, I opened the browser on my phone and brought up the Warden Service website. I found the page dedicated to fallen officers.
In his commemorative photo, Scott Pellerin was wearing the same dress uniform—red coat and short-brimmed green Stetson—that I had worn the day I was sworn into service.
His eyes were an unremarkable brown. His hair was an unremarkable brown. Perhaps it was the anonymity of his features that had made his superiors think him suitable for undercover work. Scott Pellerin had a face you could easily forget.
“They were like father and son,” Ora said. “Scott’s own father was a merchant mariner and alcoholic. His mother was one of those enablers. Scott never had a male role model until he met Charley.”
The resemblance to my own life story wasn’t exact—but close enough to be unsettling.
“Of course, you and Scott had different personalities,” Ora continued, “and there wasn’t anything between him and Stacey. She was just a teenager when he died, busy with her friends.”
Still, I was surprised Stacey had never mentioned this Pellerin to me. Maybe she hadn’t realized the extent of her father’s connection to the young man. She had been a rebellious teen, uninterested in her parents’ lives. A typical adolescent in other words.
“When you say we had different personalities, what do you mean?”
“Scott wasn’t as well educated as you, but he was extremely intelligent. He was quiet, but not shy. Strangers seemed to warm to him easily. Maybe because he seemed so interested in people.”
Unlike me.
“What else?”
“You were both brave to the point of being foolhardy. Scott loved taking risks. He probably would have grown out of it, as you have. Charley had been teaching him to fly, and he was close to getting his pilot’s license when—you know what happened.”
“Not really,” I said. “All I know is that he was working undercover in St. Ignace, infiltrating a group of poachers, and that someone must have gotten suspicious because he didn’t make his scheduled rendezvous with his handler.”
“Stanley Kellam. The lieutenant was Scott’s handler.”
I had met Stan “the Man” Kellam a dozen times before his retirement. He used to run Division E, which included the entirety of Aroostook County: roughly the size of Connecticut and Rhode Island combined.
“Did they have a starting point for the search?”
“Scott mentioned that the poachers kept an illegal camp near Tornado Path on the Allagash River, so that was where they focused initially. They dredged Round Pond, which is just above the path.”
“I’ve been there,” I said. “Remember when Stacey and I paddled the Allagash?”
“Oh, yes. I had forgotten.” I heard the tinkling sound of ice in a glass: her nightcap. “The search expanded to include the entire waterway, south to Chamberlain Lake and east to Ashland and then west to the Québec border and north to Estcourt Station.”
She was describing a search area of a thousand square miles.
“Tell me about this Pierre Michaud.”
“I only know what Charley told me. That he was a horrible man. He shot people’s cats with an air gun for sport. He had two sons, just as bad. They were all poachers. There were other men involved, too. I don’t remember the names. I couldn’t bear to read or watch the news then—I was so heartbroken.”
“What did the Michauds say when they were confronted with Pellerin’s disappearance?”
“They said they had no idea where he’d gone. They pretended not to know he was a warden. That was how Charley knew there was a conspiracy to murder Scott, because they all told the same exact story. Normally, the details of their accounts would have differed.”
“So Michaud and the others were interrogated?”
“The detectives held the poachers as long as they could. Scott had recorded evidence to charge a few of them with crimes, but they had to let the father go after forty-eight hours. Pierre had been careful around Scott and never broke the law in his presence.”
“Ora, this is difficult, but I need to know what Charley told you about how Pierre Michaud died.”
“The police and wardens went back to St. Ignace a few nights later. They had new evidence against Michaud. They used flash-bang grenades when they stormed his house, but he must have rigged it with explosives or incendiaries, because it went up in flames and took two other houses with it. Charley says it was a diversion to cover Michaud’s escape.
“They searched for him for days. Charley did aerial surveillance, of course. By sheer luck, he spotted a canoe crossing Beau Lac late at night. The moon had broken through the clouds. Charley landed the plane on the water—you know how difficult that is at night—and Michaud fired at him, and he fired back. The man would have lived if he hadn’t tried to swim in that cold water. Some people, including the press, called it an act of revenge, but Michaud was the only one who knew where Scott’s body was hidden. They never did find it.”
Secretly, I understood the reluctance of people in the St. Jo
hn Valley to accept this story as the truth. Hundreds of men had been searching thousands of miles of dense forest for the fugitive. What were the odds of Charley Stevens flying over Beau Lac at the exact hour Michaud had chosen to cross the border?
“You need to go see Stanley Kellam,” Ora said. “Stanley used to go out on his own time for years afterward, looking for clues that would lead him to the truth. Charley said he was guilt-ridden for sending Scott to his death.”
“Do you have a phone number for Lieutenant Kellam?”
“I remember Charley saying that Stanley left the state after he retired. It sounds crazy, but I thought he said the man was going back to college!”
“Do you have any idea where?”
“I’ll check the Rolodex and give you a call back. Oh, Mike, I’m sure this is the explanation for why Charley is acting so strangely. Something about this badge has made him think he can find Scott.”
“Let’s hope so,” I said. “And you’re certain you’ve never heard the name Duke Dupree?”
“I’m sure I haven’t.”
I put the phone down beside me on the bedspread. Then I found the complimentary pen and notepaper from the motel desk and began scribbling down as much information as I could recall from my conversations that evening.
The idea of Stan Kellam going back to college after his retirement wasn’t as far-fetched as Ora thought. He had been one of those larger-than-life characters who often rise to positions of power. We hadn’t crossed paths in years, but I found I could see him clearly in my memory. A massive brute of a man. Gray eyes, dirty-blond hair, a perpetual pink sunburn. And one of the most brilliant minds in the history of the Maine Warden Service.
While many of the old-school wardens boasted twelfth-grade educations at best, Kellam had graduated from Rutgers, and he had not abandoned his studies over the course of his long career. While overseeing Division E—a job that must have consumed sixty hours a week—he had quietly obtained a master’s degree in criminology from the University of Maine. At his retirement roast, he’d joked about getting a Ph.D. next.
I also recalled that Kellam had come into a considerable bit of life insurance money when his most recent wife died in a car crash. There was some gossip that Stan might have played a role in her convenient demise. Not all the gossip was kidding.