by Peter Grist
“George, I’m going to go before these guys arrive, I have some unfinished business to sort out, and if I wait until they get here I am going to be held up for hours”.
“Well that’s all fine and dandy, but if you are going after Rosen I’m coming with you”.
“I know you want to come to George but you need to stay with Buster and explain to the State Troopers what’s been going on here, and to be honest I don’t want you getting involved in what I have to do”. George looked dismayed but understood the logic of Ed’s way of thinking. “You know they’re gonna ask how we found out about all this stuff don’t ya? What do we say, some Oracle came along, looked into ‘d past an’ the future an gave us clues? I don’t think they are gonna buy that.”
“Just tell them the truth George; Buster called you, found out who had taken Gracie and you wanted to lead them to where she was buried. You can say I helped by doing some investigation work I guess, but keep it simple…..and believable.” The lights were getting brighter from two directions. Ed shook George’s hand then turned and kissed Linda swiftly but passionately on the lips. “Please be careful!” she pleaded.
“I will, promise.”
As Ed Saunders slipped out of the far side of the clearing and into the dense trees, Captain Dewhurst and his team entered from the other side.
The State troopers surrounded the tightly packed group of people gathered in the middle of the clearing. It was plain to see who the captives were and who the captures were. Without shouts or drama, his team replaced Buster’s friends guarding the seated men. Buster’s friends were then corralled away from the members of the brotherhood and politely but firmly disarmed.
Being the only woman there, Dewhurst approached Linda.
“Mrs Saxon? I’m Captain Dewhurst, Martin.” Linda shook the offered outstretched hand. Martin Dewhurst wasn’t quite what Linda was expecting. Over the phone, he had sounded much taller if that were possible, but he was quite short and rotund, but solidly built, and although he had just marched through a forest, he wasn’t out of breath at all, and not a hair of his buzz cut was out of place. His smooth complexion was very fair with freckles painted randomly across the bridge of his nose and upper cheeks, and she guessed he would be in his very early thirties, more from his rank than his baby-faced features.
“Thank you for coming so quickly, I wasn’t sure you would.”
“I’ve got to be honest with you Mrs Saxon, none of what you said over the phone sounded plausible but the names you gave and the briefest of checks on our database showed that there could be something to what you said, and now we are here, well, the evidence seems pretty overwhelming. The briefest of looks shows me we have something to work on, so I can bring in a lot more assets; equipment and men, secure the crime scene, etc. When we know more, it is quite likely the FBI might want to get involved too, depending on if the victims came across any state borders. From what you said on the telephone a body has already been found?”
“Yes, two actually, but we don’t know who one of them is. They are both little girls.” She led him over to the open grave and as Linda looked away Dewhurst used a small Maglite to look down onto the corpses, then over the mound at Buster’s body.
“I recognise him,” he said, as he played a beam of light down the big man’s length, “Guy from the gas station, right? I’ve filled up there a few times”.
“Yes, that’s Buster Benjamin, he is the father of the coloured girl down there, that’s Grace Benjamin.”
“And what happened to the mayor back there, we passed his body on the way in?”
“I don’t know for sure but I think the mayor was one of the ring leaders of the murderers, he and the sheriff tried to get away. Buster went after them. Buster got the mayor but only after he had shot Buster. It is so sad; he was such a lovely kind man.”
At that point, another plainclothes detective moseyed up to Dewhurst and they turned away from Linda. This officer seemed too large for his thin gangly frame and walked as if he was wearing someone else’s body. “Captain, I’ve been questioning one of the men that were being held by these folks, a guy called Ryan, Sam Ryan. He seems very cooperative right now; he says there could be up to a dozen more bodies under here.”
“Okay, thanks Jack. We’ll have to get a much bigger team out in the morning. For now, cuff that group and start taking them down to the vans. Keep the Ryan guy separate from the rest of them. We’ll take them back tonight and start processing them. Tell the medics they can come and collect this guy here, but for now, we are going to have to leave the children and the mayor where they are until forensics gets up here.”
Jack nodded and turned away.
“Oh, and Jack, get this area completely cordoned off, about thirty feet back into the tree line. It won’t be long ‘til the press get hold of this and we’ll have reporters all over the damn hillside.”
“Okay boss, will do.”
Dewhurst turned back to Linda, “now Mrs Saxon……” but she had vanished into the night.
thirty-seven
It had taken quite some time to circumnavigate the hills and get behind the State troopers, but finally, Ed had got back to the vehicles on the track. It took just a few moments though to uncover Linda’s Jeep Cherokee from where it had been hidden from the Thule brotherhood. It was already facing downwards so he turned the ignition on but left the engine off, slipped the 4x4 into neutral and gravity crept the car downhill, picking up speed all the time. There was only one trooper guarding all of the official vehicles and he was standing on the other side of the track, leaning against the trunk of a black Dodge Charger patrol car. In his dark grey pants and jacket he was almost invisible in the night. The trooper heard a sound from further up the track and stepped out to investigate and was almost hit by the Jeep Cherokee bowling towards him with its engine and lights off. His quick reactions saved him as he jumped back, shocked, and the trooper hardly had time to unclip his sidearm before Ed had zipped past him into the darkness. The trooper cursed then ran around to the side of his patrol car and grabbed the radio. Ed blew a lengthy sigh as no shots followed him down the track. He started the engine, selected drive and started to pick up some serious speed. With the lights now on, he piled on the gas, heading back towards Ludlow.
Rosen flew through the quiet streets of his town and headed not for his home, but towards Willets place at the southernmost end of the town limits. Natural greed had changed his mind on the drive from the hills. He knew he wasn’t being tailed and there was plenty of time to get some cash from the old man’s place and then head home. The only possible fly in the ointment might be if they had sent a trooper directly to his place, but that was so unlikely, and if they had, well, he would deal with them when he got there. The mayor had lived alone since his wife had passed on over a dozen years ago, in one of the few tall townhouses in the area, rejecting lots of land he couldn’t manage for a tidy little plot with a handsome three-story wood-framed anti-bellum building. Rosen barely slowed as he turned onto the up-market Cleveland Road and came to an abrupt halt a few houses down from Willet’s driveway, the last hundred yards with his headlights turned off. ‘No point in advertising the fact.’ he thought to himself. With long, easy strides he reached Willets’ plot and ran up the driveway and under the portico to the white painted front door. Using the butt of his service revolver, Rosen smashed one of the six small panes of glass in the door and put his hand through and turned the latch. The sheriff knew that the place had an alarm but the mayor never bothered to set it unless he was away for more than a day, but still, Rosen tentatively opened the door. No alarms, just a deathly silence, almost as if the house knew it would not be seeing it’s owner any more. Using his service flashlight Rosen headed for the stairs, taking them two at a time up to the next floor. He headed straight for the old man’s study where he knew the safe was hidden under the floor. The study was covered on three of the four walls with boo
kshelves holding hundreds of old books, legal journals and the odd framed family photo. The highly polished oak floor was bare until Rosen came towards the imposing wooden desk complete with a deep, rich red leather-upholstered winged Chesterfield club chair behind it. Here, in front of the large sash windows and desk was a large circular Nain Persian rug made of forest green and yellow wool with silk highlights that Willets had picked up on one of his many trips abroad. Rosen knew the mayor had made many such trips to Persia and Asia to find and have sex with young children; he had even joined him on one of them. Rosen threw the lightweight visitors chair aside that sat on this side of the desk, then knelt down and rolled the heavy carpet up to reveal a small two-foot square piece of oak with a recessed brass ring. The wood panel came up with ease to give access to a combination safe. On the many occasions that Willets had opened the safe in Rosen’s presence, the mayor had always huddled over the safe to shield the numbers from Rosen’s view so Willets assumed, wrongly, that Rosen didn’t know the combination. The sheriff quickly entered the six-figure combination and the safe door lifted slightly as it came unlocked. Just as he was lifting the door up, he heard a noise from downstairs, the front door banged back against its frame; someone had come into the house. He turned his flashlight into the safe and illuminated a small canvas barrel bag sitting on top of files and other paperwork. He unzipped the bag to find two passports with a picture of Willets in both. One was in the name of Frederick Willets but the other was in the name of Frederick Humber. The rest of the space in the bag was taken up with rolls of one hundred dollar bills, each held tightly with an elasticated rubber band. Rosen guessed there had to be close to one hundred thousand dollars stashed neatly in this bag. “Well now I know why you were so tight only dogs could hear you fart, you old miser.” he said out loud.
“Hello, is there anybody there?” Rosen froze at the sound of the voice coming from downstairs.
“I’m going to call the police right now if you don’t come out!” The frail female voice drifted up to the study.
“Oh shoot!” was all Rosen said. He threw the passports back in the bag, rezipped it and headed for the stairs, drawing his Smith & Wesson 686 .38 Special revolver as he went. As he came around the top of the landing to the stairwell he could see one of Willets neighbours framed in the doorway by the street lighting beyond. An old lady in her late eighties stood feet apart, her housecoat flapping open as she waved a handgun vaguely in the direction of the stairs.
“Mrs Boorman, that you? This is Sheriff Rosen.” He said as he made his way purposefully down each step. With much relief, Celia Boorman lowered the old Great War Webley revolver that was shaking in her hands. “Oh my sheriff, you scared me nearly half to death…”
“Well, you might as well go the rest of the way then.” He raised his revolver and shot her in the chest, the force of the 38 calibre slug throwing her clean out of the door, the look of surprise frozen to her old craggy features. He stepped casually over the lifeless body and walked back to his car, casually putting his gun back in its holster. Lights in the street were going on all over as he started the engine and headed for the main thoroughfare through town.
Ed Saunders saw no one else as he made his way back through the municipality. Even at top speed, the Jeep didn’t move that fast and it took him more than forty-five minutes to get near to Rosen’s homestead. With a massive sense of de javu from his last flashback, he slowed the 4x4 down, but this time cruised passed the opening for Rosen’s land and finally parked in the same place that he, Buster and the others had hidden in earlier that evening. Now, as he made his way on foot towards the dwellings, there was just the faintest hint of light coming over the land as dawn approached. He reached under his jacket, pulling out the 9mm Browning from its old leather shoulder holster. He didn’t know if he could actually fire this or any other weapon for that matter. He had vowed to himself on that day in the Vietnamese village when he had watched that little girl die in his arms, to never fire another gun, and so far he had been completely successful. But Rosen was an incredibly dangerous and ruthless killer, so Ed released the safety catch, pulled the slide smoothly back to chamber a round then put the safety back on. The last thing he wanted to do was stumble in the dark and shot his own foot off. Including his flashback, which hadn’t seemed to let him down yet, this was the third time he had walked this route so he knew where he was going, so he made swift progress through the acre or so of Buckeye, firs and occasional oaks until he reached the barbed-wire fence that delineated Rosen’s yard from the woods. He leaned down next to one of the wooden fence posts and noticed that it had a very old hole punched into it that looked a lot like a nick made by a gunshot, and he thought he knew when and how it had got there. He turned his attention back to the job at hand and surveyed the area. In the half-light, he couldn’t see any cars parked outside of the main house or near the barn, but he wasn’t feeling reckless, so he stepped back into the wood line slightly and worked his way around the estate until he could see around back of the building. Nothing but a few rusted out wrecks, including what was left of the old Dodge pick- up he had seen on his first day here in Ludlow. He stopped to look at it for a moment. The picture of Gracie banging at the window as it raced through the intersection still seemed very fresh and very real, and now knowing her fate, very painful. Ed could feel his anger rising but he forced himself to calm down and focus on staying safe. He came across a small gate in the wire fencing held in place by a loop of rope. He unhitched it from the wooden post and silently entered the back yard.
No lights shone from the back of the house, and he had seen none at the front, but Ed wasn’t taking any chances. His army training had told him to zigzag when moving forward but he made a beeline for the back door, crossing the thirty yards in just a few seconds. Half expecting it to be locked, Ed turned the doorknob and the door swung easily inwards. His night vision was enough to let him know that he had entered a utility room attached to the kitchen. He made his way deftly through, seeing glasses, cutlery and plates left where they had been abandoned earlier that evening. A creaky floorboard stopped him in his tracks as he entered the main hallway; he froze and listened. Nothing moved, nothing stirred. With a two-handed grip on the butt of his pistol, the barrel pointed the way he looked, Ed continued on and checked the whole of the downstairs and found it empty. He made his way back to the foot of the stairs and as he stepped onto the first carpeted step the hallway was awash with light as a car’s headlamps flooded through windows, then as quickly as it had become light, darkness returned as the car swung away from the house and headed toward the old Dutch barn. Ed had instinctively ducked down when the lights had faced the building, but now, back in the darkness he moved quickly to the front door and opened it a fraction to peak out. He could just make out one side of the barn. He opened the door wider and noticed the red paint, now dry, that he had applied a lifetime ago it now seemed. He ventured out further onto the wooden veranda and could now see one of the big barn doors but the rest of the building was still out of sight. With his back to the wall, he made his way to the end of the porch and looked around. With the left barn door closed but the other open, Ed could see the nose of the Ford police cruiser was just inside the barn, the driver’s door wide open, engine still running and lights still on. He unclicked the safety catch then vaulted one handed over the wooded rail of the porch onto the compact, dusty earth of the yard. Crouching down he ran for the barn. The lights inside the barn had been turned on and threw long shadows into the old stalls. He slid around the closed door and made for the first stall on the left. Empty. He checked the stalls on the opposite side, they looked empty but the backs were shrouded in darkness. He worked his way down the barn, getting closer and closer to the sacrificial altar at the end. He reached the last stall before the open expanse at the end, as yet undiscovered. He took a deep breath then stepped boldly into the well-lit area, arcing his pistol left to right, searching for a target. It was empty and looked exactl
y how he had left it on his last visit, except the sacks of grain in the left corner had been moved and the hatch was open that lead down to Rosen’s hideaway. He stepped forwards very slowly to the edge, first pressure on the trigger, pointing the Browning down into the hole. He peered over and could see almost the whole room, and except for a pile of ropes in one corner, and a few wooden boxes in another, it was empty.
“D’ya think I was picked before I was ripe boy?”
Ed swung around to see Sheriff Rosen’s skeletal grin over the top of his revolver. The sheriff had been standing in the shadows of the last stall on the right.
“Drop the weapon and kick it over here.” ordered Rosen. Ed had a millisecond to think about what to do. There was no way that Rosen was going to let him live, whatever he did, so there was little to lose. Ed started to lower his Browning as if to capitulate then quickly snapped it back up and pulled the trigger then darted to the left towards the altar. The crack of the 9mm Browning was matched by the roar of the sheriff’s revolver as he fired back at Ed, the cacophony sounded deafening within the confines of the wooden barn and Ed felt the round whiz past his head. He dived up onto the raised dais and behind the altar. Another shot took a chunk of marble out of the corner of the obscene structure. On hands and knees, Ed crawled across the midnight blue carpet to the other end of the piece of torture equipment, then crouching down he got to his feet. He stood and fired at where Rosen had been standing just a few seconds before but the shot went harmlessly into one of the stall sides. The sheriff had moved more to the left, nearer the entrance of the hideaway and was waiting for Ed to pop up. Too late Ed saw Rosen fire and dived to the right but the bullet had already punched through Ed’s left shoulder, spinning him around while the bullet carried on and hit the wall at the back. The wound felt like nothing more than a bee sting but it had bowled him completely over and caused him to drop his gun. His left arm went limp but he managed to find his weapon and grip it with his right hand, but it was precious seconds too late for Ed. He turned and saw that the sheriff had joined him on the wooden podium, his evil smile not wavering as he raised his revolver and pointed it towards Ed’s head.