by B J Bourg
I nodded and studied her. “What’s going through your mind, Sue?”
“I’m remembering the faces of Rebecca and Lex.” She took a deep breath and exhaled forcefully. “If Philip is the killer, I don’t know if I can keep my hands off of him. You might have to stop me.”
I grunted, knowing exactly how she felt. Self-restraint was a necessary quality in law enforcement and I came by it easily—except when children and women were brutally murdered. When that happened, I had to remind myself that I worked for God, and I knew he wouldn’t want me straying outside of my oath. But was I also responsible for reminding Susan?
CHAPTER 33
Once we were back in the interview room with Philip, I tossed the keys on the desk in front of him.
“Want to tell me about this key?” I fingered the key that fit the lock at Carl’s house.
“That’s…that’s the key to my shed.”
I pulled out my phone and scrolled through my images until I found a photo of the key in the lock at Carl’s house. “Does that look like your shed?”
He sighed long and hard. “Look, can I start all over again?”
I wanted to tell him where he could go, but I ignored the impulse and nodded. “Yeah, please start from the beginning and tell me the truth this time.”
His shoulders drooped in resignation. “Okay, I received a call from Carl Duval to tear down his shed. I now remember that Nathan was with me. I work so many jobs that I actually forgot he was with me on this one.”
I wanted to tell him he was full of shit and that he remembered very well, but, again, I resisted the urge. “Go on,” I coaxed when he paused to sit there and stare down at his hands. “Tell us what happened next.”
“Well, we worked for a couple of days before we found the box. It was hard work, because this was a well built shed and it took some time to tear through the walls. When we found the box, Mr. Duval was in the shed. Like I already told you, I found the box when I pried a board loose, but I’m not the one who opened it. Mr. Duval pried it open using one of my flat bars. That’s when he found the gold coin and a piece of animal hide rolled up tight and tied in place with some kind of leather string.”
“Did you see the map?”
Philip nodded. “It looked ancient, like it was drawn in the stone ages. I knew right away that we had found something special, and so did Mr. Duval. I could tell by the way he was acting that he thought he had stumbled onto something that would fetch a lot of money.”
“Go on.”
“Well, he didn’t know what to do at that point. He wanted to know if there was more, so he had us pull the remaining inner panels off the wall. We worked on that until noon and then he invited us inside for lunch.” He rubbed his face, hesitating for a few seconds before continuing. “While we ate, we could hear him in the next room on the phone. He was talking to someone and I heard him ask what he should do if he found an expensive gold coin and a map to a treasure. They talked for a while and he then said he would stop tearing down the shed and call some experts to come in.”
“How’d you feel about that?”
“I mean, I wasn’t happy about it, but what could I do?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “What did you do?”
“Um, it was Nathan’s idea. We had seen Mr. Duval unlock the house with a set of keys from his pocket a couple of times, but one day he didn’t have those keys. He asked us to wait by the garbage can while he went to unlock the door. Well, Nathan walked where he could see him and he saw Mr. Duval pull a key from under a brick along the flowerbed.”
“Is that the key you stole?”
“Yeah, but it’s not like you think.”
I wanted to ask him how he knew what I was thinking, but just waved for him to continue.
“When Mr. Duval told us he was terminating the job, I asked about the money he’d already paid me. He said I could keep the extra as a bonus, so Nathan and I went down to the Bayou View Pub in town and had a few drinks.”
I was very familiar with the Bayou View Pub. Every time I drove by the place it brought back bad memories of a murder I’d worked there. “Who was working that night?” I asked.
He snapped his finger, trying to remember. “I don’t go there often, but it’s the same girl every time. I think her name’s Dixie or something?”
I nodded. Dixie Boudreaux. We had a lot of Boudreauxs in town, not all of them related, but Dixie was related to an old friend of mine and the former mayor, Dexter. Dixie was always helpful when something happened at the Pub, so she would be able to either verify or discredit Philip’s story.
“So, what happened at the bar? You said something about it being Nathan’s idea—what was his idea?”
“To steal the gold and the map.” Philip glanced from Susan to me. “You’ve got to believe me—I wouldn’t usually entertain such a thing, but the economy hasn’t been kind to handymen. I was hurting for money. Hell, I still am.”
“Get to Nathan’s idea,” I pressed.
“Right. Okay, so Nathan gets a few drinks in him and he starts talking about taking the map. He said we could wait until no one was home, use the key to enter the house, take the map, make a copy of it, and then put it back before anyone even noticed it was missing. I knew it was a bad idea, but—I’m not gonna lie to you—I wanted part of the money. Hell, I’m the one who found it, and Mr. Duval didn’t even offer me a penny. I felt like he owed me, you understand? After all, it wasn’t his money. He’s not the one who put it there.”
I nodded, maintaining a poker face. I now understood how they entered the house and left without causing damage, and I was now convinced I was staring at one of the killers. I was also convinced Nathan was with him during the murders, but how had he managed to kill Nathan while he was locked in jail? It would’ve been nearly impossible for him to kill Nathan and then meet me at the police department yesterday evening. Could there be a third killer working with—?
Just as the thought entered my mind, it was blown violently away by another, more reasonable, idea. Chuck Duval had somehow gotten his hands on Nathan Baxter and exacted his revenge on the young man!
“So,” I asked as calmly as I could, trying not to give away my thoughts, “when did y’all retrieve the map?” I was careful not to use terms like “break in” or “burglarize” or “steal.” I needed this to seem casual, like he was merely picking up his dry cleaning or a load of wood from the lumber yard.
“Um, let me see…we watched the house for a couple of days, waiting for the whole family to leave. I think it was Christmas Eve when we finally went in.” He cleared his throat and licked his dry lips. “We, um, we searched the house and couldn’t find it. It felt like we were in there way too long. I have to say, I’ve never done anything like this before, but Nathan, he was acting like a pro. It was all his doing, really. I was just going along with him, if you know what I mean.”
“I do,” I coaxed. “Where’d y’all eventually find it?”
“Well, we found this lock box in the closet. We lifted it and shook it, but there wasn’t much inside. We could tell it was something light, like a piece of paper—or a map—so we brought it out of the closet. We didn’t have any tools with us, so we headed for the garage. That’s when we heard a car drive by. We took the safe with us and hurried outside. After making sure to lock up, we ran off with the safe, heading back to the boat.”
“Wait—boat?”
“Yeah, we came up from the back in my boat. There’s a canal about a mile east of his house, and we came up that way.”
I nodded thoughtfully, then asked about the car they’d heard. “Who was in it?”
He shrugged. “We didn’t wait around to find out. We just got the hell out of there. Nathan, he said we shouldn’t keep the safe in our possession in case we got stopped by a game warden on the water, so he said we should break it up in the field and take only the map. He said that would be easier to hide. So, we threw it against a tree and used some heavy branches to break it open
. It wasn’t hard. Once we were inside, we found the map.” He paused and took a deep breath, almost trembling. “It was something, I tell you. I’ve never seen anything like it. It was so old it seemed like it might break, but it stayed together.”
“What was on it?”
“We couldn’t really see it until later, when we got to my house. We unrolled it and it was some kind of dried animal hide with some drawings on it. I wasn’t too familiar with the area, but it looked like Lake Berg was on the map and there was an X on a little island on the western side of the lake.”
I thought back to the story Bill Welch had told me about the Death Shadow Massacre. Lake Berg was large enough to fit the types of ships that ran the waters in the 1700s, and there was a path of bayous through the marsh that connected the lake to the Gulf of Mexico. I felt a rush. My heart was pounding in my chest. Was this real? Could the area around Lake Berg be what used to be called Death Shadow Marsh? Could we be on the verge of unearthing a treasure that had been buried over three centuries ago? And could this treasure have been the reason an entire innocent family had been wiped out?
“Did you go looking for the treasure?” I asked.
He hesitated, then shook his head slowly. “We went out on the lake right after we got the map, but we were too afraid to go on the island. Nathan said Carl might’ve called the FBI or something and they might be watching the island. And then after the murder happened, we were too scared to go searching anymore. We figured whoever had the map would be blamed for the murders.”
No shit, I wanted to blurt out, but didn’t. Something Bill Welch had told me now made sense. He said Carl acted like a man who’d won the lottery. If this map was for real, then he might’ve done better than winning the lottery. I needed proof that the map existed.
“So, where’s the map now?” I asked. “Do you still have it?”
Philip hesitated again, this time for a long moment. When he spoke, he was unsure of himself. “What’ll happen to the treasure when it’s found?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, will I get a cut? After all, I’m the one who found it first. It’s only right that I get some of the treasure.”
My blood boiled. I couldn’t believe he would even consider getting his hands on some of the gold after murdering the Duvals—if, indeed, he had. It was true that he might be innocent, but as of right now, he was my number one suspect.
Disguising my feelings, I said, “Well, fair is fair, I guess, but first we need to sort out this case. In order for me to believe you have rights to the treasure I’ll need to prove there is a treasure. I’ll need something to corroborate your story.”
“Like what?”
“Well, the key to the Duval home was a start. It helps to establish that you did go into their home to retrieve something, but it doesn’t prove that you have claim to a treasure.” I was making things up as I went along. “Now, if the map is in your possession, then that would go a long way toward giving you claim to the treasure. It would also help corroborate your story that you were the one who actually found it, which would definitely infer a rightful claim to it.”
“I do still have it.”
“Where can I find it?”
It was obvious to me that he didn’t want to tell me, but he knew he had to. Finally, after much inner contemplation, he sighed heavily. “I have two fifty-five gallon drums where I dump my sawdust. You might’ve seen them if you went to my house. It’s buried at the bottom of the one with the red lid, and it’s in a plastic bag—a Mechant Groceries bag.”
I cocked my head to the side. “Not a very secure location.”
“I’ve always heard the best place to hide something was in plain sight.”
“There’s some truth to that, I suppose.” I returned him to the jail cell and told him we’d be right back to finish our talk. Once the cell door was locked, Susan and I headed for the front lobby. Before we could push through the door, it opened and there stood Chuck Duval. I froze in place, studying the man.
“Mr. Duval.” My voice betrayed my surprise. “I didn’t know you were back in town.”
“I came in last night,” he said calmly. “I didn’t want to burden you with my presence. I knew you were busy.”
I just stood there nodding, the images of Nathan’s severed fingers and mutilated body flashing like a slide show in my mind.
CHAPTER 34
Chuck Duval did not look like a man who had tortured and murdered a man mere hours earlier. But then again, what does such a person look like? A killer could look like the man, woman, or child next door. Sure, some of them looked evil, but others didn’t. And people killed for all sorts of reasons. Hell, I knew that first hand.
“How were the funerals?” I asked, not knowing what else to say.
Chuck was thoughtful. “Well, as funerals go, I guess they went alright.” He paused and glanced from me to Susan and then back to me. “You two are going somewhere. Before you saw me, there was focus in your eyes, like you were on a mission. Has there been a break in the case?”
I wanted to tell him about Philip Crenshaw, but I didn’t want him to try and kill the man while we were gone.
“We’re going to search a house,” I said, and then explained a little about what was going on. “I’d love for you to come along, but I don’t want to create a conflict—”
“Please, no need to explain,” he said, holding up a hand. “Go on and do your job. I’ll make my way down the street to that hamburger joint I saw when I was driving in. It looks promising.”
Without saying another word, he spun on his heel and headed out the door. Susan and I followed. My stomach had immediately started growling when he mentioned hamburgers. I suddenly realized we hadn’t eaten lunch, and it was almost time for dinner.
“Do you think he did it?” Susan asked when we were seated in my Tahoe and pulling out of the parking lot. “Do you think he killed Nathan?”
I only shrugged and asked her to call Mallory Tuttle for an update on the investigation. She hit her speaker button and began dialing. Soon, Mallory’s voice was emitting from the tiny speaker and she was filling us in on her findings.
“Somehow, someone gained entry to the house—either by knocking and forcing their way in or by him knowing them and letting them in—and tied him up and tortured him. Whoever did this used zip ties to secure him to the chair while they cut his fingers off one by one. It appears they were trying to get something out of him. They ransacked the house, but it’s such a mess that it’s hard to tell what was done by the intruders and what was done by Nathan. His phone is missing and I put a trace on it, but I haven’t gotten anything back yet.” She took a breath, continued. “He’s not originally from Chateau. I ran his rap sheet and—”
“We’ve got that,” Susan said, saving her the time it would take to run through his history.
“Well, then you have everything.” Mallory sighed. “We swabbed for DNA and dusted for prints, but nothing looks promising. In the few places the intruders obviously touched things, we came up with smooth finger smudges in the dust.”
“Gloves?” Susan guessed.
“That’s what it looks like.”
“They used gloves out at the Duval residence, too,” I interjected, but then remembered Chuck. He was a former detective. He would know to use gloves if he planned on murdering someone. But if he came here to exact revenge, why would he search the kid’s house? Maybe, like me, he suspected there were multiple killers, and he was trying to force Nathan into giving them up.
Susan and Mallory continued to talk while I drove, and we were soon pulling up to Philip Crenshaw’s house. Susan was just ending the call when I threw the gearshift in park and stepped out. I wanted to see that map, and I wanted to see it now.
The carport looked pretty much the same as it had the last time we were there, but I did notice a subtle difference. The table saw had been moved ever so slightly. The only reason I knew that was because of the drag marks in the sawdust on
the concrete. I walked around the saw and approached the two barrels. My heart began to pound as I drew closer. No!
There appeared to be more sawdust on the ground near the drums than I remembered, and the red lid was placed loosely on top, unsecured. I hurriedly removed the lid and checked inside. It was only half filled with sawdust. My heart sank.
Susan grabbed one side of the drum and I grabbed the other, and we tilted it over, allowing most of the sawdust to spill onto the concrete. We then dropped to our knees and ran our hands quickly through the dust, searching frantically for the map. The fine particles tickled my nostrils and I sneezed a couple of times.
“I don’t feel it,” Susan said after about five minutes of searching. “I don’t think it’s here.”
I had crawled as far into the drum as I could and had scooped out the last of the dust. Nothing. The map wasn’t there. I scrambled around in the sawdust, pushing through the pile, searching almost desperately. “Where can it be? Do you think he lied?”
Susan sat back on her haunches, dust covering her uniform pants and her forearms. She puffed out her bottom lip and blew upward to get a tuft of hair out of her eyes. “Did Crenshaw say if Nathan knew about the map’s location?”
“I didn’t ask. Why? What’re you thinking?”
“I’m thinking someone kept cutting off his fingers until he told them where to find the map, and when he did, they killed him so he could never give up their identity.”
I grunted. If that were true, it meant Chuck didn’t kill Nathan. If Chuck didn’t kill Nathan, then we were in real trouble, because there was another killer on the loose—and I had no clue who it could be. A thought suddenly occurred to me. I jumped to my feet and jerked my cell phone from my pocket. I called Mallory.
“Mallory, are you any closer to finding Nathan’s phone?”
“Yeah, we got it. Our phone guy is doing a forensic dump now. The file should be complete in an hour or so.”
Relieved, I asked where she’d found it.