Feather From a Stranger

by Marianne Schlegelmilch

  “Ever seen this before?”

  “It's mine,” Doug answered. “Where'd you get it?”

  “Mara Edwards found it this morning on the ground near the porch to the bunkhouse. She said she went out there to check to see if there was any sign of you there when you didn't show up as planned this morning.”

  “It must have fallen out of my pocket when I took my gloves out this morning,” Doug answered. “I can't believe I left the door unlocked. I had a couple of beers last night. I must have been more wasted than I thought I was.”

  “I guess that's understandable in view of your day,” Tandry answered.

  “Anything special about it?” Sgt. Tandry inquired, squinting and watching Doug's face as he waited for him to reply.

  “Like what?” Doug said, starting to rise from his chair. “It's a phone number. Anything illegal about that?”

  “Didn't say there was, Doug. Simmer down. Why you so riled about me asking?”

  Tandry waited for Doug to sit down in the chair.

  “You know we're looking at everything and anything right now,” Tandry said.

  “Sorry, Ken,” Doug began, “it's just so damned unsettling…Dan being gone…knowing that maybe it was murder…probably was murder. I apologize.”

  By now, Doug was contrite and displaying the full spectrum of the burden he bore on his face.

  “The number belongs to Adam Carlson, my girlfriend, Sassy's, brother.”

  “Glad to hear you say that, Doug, because I already checked it out before you got here.”

  Doug wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. “What're you tryin’ to say here, Ken?”

  “I'm not saying anything, Doug, except that it's my job to look at this from every angle I can. It's not easy for me either. You're all my friends…” Sgt. Tandry stopped, not letting himself say anymore.

  “Just for the record, Ken,” Doug volunteered, “I've been trying to find Sassy's brother since I got back. I picked him up in Destruction Bay in late February on the way back from Juneau. Sassy told me he'd been working on a construction job up there. He said he wanted to get back a week before the company plane was ready to bring the crew back and I just happened to be going through right about then, so Sassy asked me if I could save him the plane fare and pick him up.”

  Ken Tandry said nothing, choosing, instead, to listen as Doug continued.

  “Once we got to Palmer, he got himself a cell phone so they could get a hold of him about other jobs. He gave me the number so we could stay in touch. I'd been talking to him about working as a deckhand on my boat, but he said he was tryin’ to hold out for another construction job in Canada because the pay was so good.”

  Doug settled back into his chair and thought for a moment before speaking again.

  “I haven't been able to get a hold of him since, even though Sassy says he's around. I figured maybe he just didn't want me buggin’ him about workin’ for me. Just tryin’ to help him out for Sassy's sake is all. You got somethin’ on him or somethin’?”

  “You know I can't discuss the investigation with anyone not connected to the department right now, Doug.”

  “I suppose you got your reasons,” Doug answered.

  “One more thing, Doug, then I think you'll be good to go as far as any more questioning is concerned. Did you notice anything unusual at Dan's the night before he took off on his flight—or even the morning he left—right after or anything like that?”

  Doug thought for a moment, trying to let the scenes from that visit replay in his mind.

  “Not really, Ken. The plane was pretty much packed up by the time I got there. Sassy and I, well… we headed almost immediately to the bunkhouse after saying hello to the family. Before we went to bed, we unhitched the horse trailer from our truck and left it out near the side of the hangar for Adam so he wouldn't disturb anybody when he came by later that night to pick it up. Sassy said he needed it to help someone pick up some livestock the next day and wanted to have it at his place to save time in the morning.”

  “I heard Thor growl from the barn around three a.m. or so, but I didn't hear anything strange and figured it was A.C. and went back to sleep. There's a lot of moose and sometimes bear that come around at night. and Thor is usually pretty good about letting us know about it. When I went out the next morning, the trailer was gone and Thor was in the house with Anna, as usual. By then, Dan had already taken off. Everything seemed pretty normal.”

  “Okay, Doug,” Ken Tandry said, writing down Doug's statement. “Anything else you can think of, give me a call.”

  Sgt. Tandry stood and handed Doug Williams his business card on which he had jotted down his cell phone number on the back. Doug started to get up, but suddenly sat back down. Something about recounting the events of the night before Dan's crash had prompted him to think of the day that he had returned to pick up Sassy's clothes from the bunkhouse.

  “There's something I almost forgot about until now,” Doug began. “The day that we found Dan and they took him to the hospital, well, that night I went back to the bunk house to pick up our things…mine and Sassy's. Sassy is not the neatest person on earth,” he continued. “She had clothes scattered on every surface in that cabin. I was in a hurry and was pretty much just scooping them all up and stuffing them into a duffel bag. A pair of wire cutters fell out from under the clothes when I scooped a pile off the table. I remember it because they almost landed on my foot and I had left my boots outside because they were covered with dirt and snow.”

  Ken Tandry was listening intently. He sat back down and started writing on the legal pad he had been using to jot down notes from Doug's testimony.

  “I picked them up…the wire cutters…and threw them back on the table,” Doug continued. “Later, when I came back, I thought about putting them in the stable for Dan to find when he got out of the hospital but figured I'd leave them there so he could find them where he left them. I don't even know why I thought to mention them to you now. I guess my mind is just running wild…trying to remember every little tiny, insignificant detail.”

  “Doug, I don't know how you could possibly know this since you left before I told Sarah, Mara and Ellie about this, but…”

  Ken Tandry looked squarely at Doug before proceeding. “Did any of them discuss with you or mention the NTSB report to you?”

  “No,” Doug answered. “I didn't know it was back. Why? Did they find something?”

  Ken Tandry looked steadily at Doug before continuing. It was evident from Doug's body language and demeanor that he had not heard anything about the report until just now. He tried to choose his words carefully.

  “We got the report back yesterday afternoon.”

  Doug Williams was all ears. “So, did it show something?”

  “I'll try to summarize it for you, Doug, and then I'll give you a copy of the full report,” Tandry continued.

  “The report showed that the main rudder cable on Dan's plane had been partially cut, leaving it in weakened condition.”

  “What do you mean cut?” Doug interjected. “Are they sure it wasn't just worn or something?”

  “The report says it was cut, Doug. Apparently, they were able to examine it closely enough to see which fibers of the cable were frayed and which were cut. The report goes on to say that the fact that the cable had been partially cut, left it intact enough to operate initially, but initiated—and accelerated, even—a process of fraying that caused it to completely break under the stress of flight.”

  “Son of a…!” Doug said, stopping himself from finishing the sentence.

  “There's more, Doug,” Sgt. Tandry continued. “They also found water in the gas mix. Their determination was that the water in the gas tank caused the plane ‘s engine to keep cutting out. Even though Dan might have been able to get the engine re-started—and the engine log says that he did—the sudden change in altitude caused by the engine cutting out was enough to cause Dan to have to work the rudder more than usual, putting ex
tra stress on the rudder cable. The cable snapped under the added stress, causing Dan to lose control over the aircraft.”

  “It's unbelievable that someone would do this,” Doug exclaimed.

  “Unbelievable and at the same time, quite shrewd and obviously carried out by somebody who understands mechanics,” Tandry said. “It's a miracle Dan was even able to get the plane down in one piece. He must have been one heck of a pilot.”

  Doug stood abruptly; placing both hands on the desk, he snapped at Tandry, “Geez, almighty, Ken. Why didn't somebody find me and tell me about all of this sooner?”

  “I told the others the same way I told you,” Ken Tandry shot back. “The fact is, they were here and you weren't. I had to talk to them first, just like I talked to you and make sure in my own mind that no one—and I am talking no one,” Tandry paused for effect, “no one showed any hint of a motive or any malice towards Dan.”

  Ken Tandry sat down. The strain of investigating people so close to him was beginning to show.

  “I didn't want to pull you in here and talk to you about this and force you to discuss it when you were dealing with life and death decisions about your brother.”

  Ken Tandry's voice remained controlled and his facial expression flat. “I also assumed that you want what is best, and what is fair, and what is effective in an investigating officer who is looking into your only brother's murder.”

  “Good Lord, Ken, you thought I was capable of killing my own brother? “

  Doug was pacing the floor and every time he spoke he sounded closer and closer to breaking into a full-blown rant.

  “Doug, I hope you will listen and at least try to understand how hard it has been to try to do my job when I feel so close to all of you.” Tandry paced the floor, looking up occasionally to see the dumbfounded expression that Doug could not hide from his face. He didn't say any more and neither did Doug, as both men tried to regroup from the heated exchange. Doug was the first to speak again.

  “Then I guess that crumpled piece of paper I found was no accident.”

  “What crumpled piece of paper?” Tandry asked.

  “The other day, when I stopped at Ellie's to get my clothes, I was walking through the barn to make sure everything was locked up and I found a piece of paper on the floor. It had a diagram of Dan's plane on it and I thought he must have dropped it and might need it later, so I laid it on the table in the shop area just in case. As far as I know, it's still there.”

  “I'll get an officer out there with a search warrant ASAP,” Sgt. Tandry said, as both men got up simultaneously and headed for the door. “I'll follow you up there so we can both be there when the officer arrives.”

  Doug waited for Ken to walk out to the police barn and pick up a vehicle before driving straight through Palmer and up the road to Ellie and Dan's place. Ken Tandry followed him, right behind.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Place By

  The River

  SARAH AND MARA WERE JUST FINISHING LUNCH WHEN A POLICE CRUISER pulled in, followed by Doug Williams and then Sgt. Tandry. Ken Tandry had run into Ellie in town and showed her the signed order from Judge Kendall that established the need for a search. Sgt. Tandry stopped at the house and left a copy for Ellie with Sarah and Mara before proceeding to the barn, shop, and guest cabin, with Doug and the investigating officer.

  Inside the barn, Doug pointed them to the bench that still contained the crumbled piece of paper with the plane diagram on it. He also showed them the pair of wire cutters he had left on the table in the bunkhouse, being sure to mention that his own fingerprints would be on them as he had moved them from the bed to the table while picking up Sassy's clothes.

  The investigating officer confiscated both items as possible evidence. Before they were finished, he had also dusted the doors to the cabin, barn, and shop for fingerprints and ran a metal detector over the entire area where Dan's plane had been parked.

  In addition to finding Dan's long lost class ring in the barn, they found a woman's amethyst jeweled hair clip. There was a small concentration of very fine metal fibers in the dirt outside the hangar where Dan's plane had stood the night before in preparation for take-off. The investigating officer carefully scraped the fibers into an envelope before sealing it and entering it into the evidence log. He also placed the class ring and the amethyst hair clip into separate envelopes, which too, were sealed for evidence.

  Sarah stood silently alongside Ken Tandry during the proceedings, having gotten up and gone outside when the entourage arrived. Ellie was still in town arranging for Dan's memorial and Sarah wanted to make sure there were no stressors induced by the search that she would need to deal with when she got home.

  Mara watched the two talking quietly before first the investigating officer and then Ken Tandry climbed into their respective vehicles to return to the station. When she looked at Doug Williams, who had stayed back several feet behind the officers, she noticed that he looked tired and had the beginning of a thick growth of beard on his face. He had obviously neither slept nor shaved. For a moment their eyes locked as he strode past her. With no words spoken, he climbed into his truck and drove off behind the others.

  Two days later they stood opposite each other again, this time at Dan's memorial service. The day was beautiful, about fifty degrees with full sun and only a few remnants of snow remaining. The service was held down the road from Dan and Ellie's house, alongside the creek that the family frequented so often. The location was beautiful in its serenity, with clear-as-crystal water bubbling over the rocky creek bed.

  Anna stayed close to her mother. The two were dressed in skirts made of identical fabric and both wore matching blouses. The long hair of both mother and daughter flowed gently in the light breeze.

  Doug stood with them, the three of them the only family members besides Sarah who were present. Doug was freshly shaven and wore a new pair of jeans and a white, long sleeved shirt over which he wore a dark brown leather blazer. Reverend Carlisle, the minister from Ellie and Dan's church, officiated at the ceremony.

  Steve Bitten sent his condolences and word that he thought it would be less stressful for Ellie if he stayed away, in view of the situation he had been involved with in Dan's business, even though Ellie had personally thanked him for everything he had done to find Dan.

  “Nothing will ever make me forget what you have done to help Dan,” she had told him.

  Sarah, Mara, Sassy, Ken Tandry, and most of the residents of Knik River Rd., as well as a good representation from parts as far away as Cantwell and Trapper Creek, lined the banks of the creek as Doug, Ellie, and Anna sprinkled Dan's ashes into the flowing water. All bowed their heads to pray, and several said some final words or told stories about moments they had shared with Dan. At the conclusion of the service, before slowly walking away, each cast one single flower into the river, leaving a ribbon of colored blossoms flowing downstream under the setting sun.

  With that simple ceremony, Dan Williams was laid to rest. Mara watched Ellie take her child by the hand and walk, without looking back, to the cabin that she and Dan had built with their own hands fifteen years before. Surrounded by their friends, she walked through its doors, now a widow.

  Mara kept watching, unable to speak and unwilling to move. She knew the emptiness of this moment first hand. She felt an arm across her shoulders and looked up to see that it belonged to Doug Williams, who led her silently to join the others.

  Doug's overture to Mara did not go unnoticed by the blond woman named Amanda Carlson watching through the dining room window of the cabin.

  “I'll kick his ass, Sassy, if he's cheating on you,” Adam Carlson said as he stood beside her in the window.

  “Shut up, A.C,” Sassy told her brother, glaring at him before turning and walking quickly to the table filled with food.

  The truth was that she was growing tired of Doug Williams’ unwillingness to marry her. Everything in her life seemed to be falling apart. She was increasingly aware that
her romance with Steve Bitten would never be re-kindled now that he was about to marry Karen Steele, and now Doug seemed to be unusually interested in this newcomer from Outside, leaving Sassy feeling that her options were running out.

  Her real love had always been Steve Bitten and even now she wasn't sure what had gone wrong between her and Steve. She had done everything to please him, even taking on a more submissive role than she usually did in a relationship just because she wanted so much to please him.

  She had never questioned him when he told her how to make the deposits into his and Dan's joint business account using deposit slips he provided. She was just happy to have a job close to the man she loved, and grateful that Steve had hired her brother, Adam, to run supplies to Canada for the coffee import component of his and Dan's business, of which he was in charge.

  When Steve and Dan's accountant discovered the receipts for the coffee import business in Steve's personal account rather than in his and Dan's business account, Dan had confronted Steve. “What's going on here, Bitten?”

  Steve had seemed as surprised by the transactional error as had Dan. “What do you mean, Dan? You sound kind of ticked about something.”

  Additional investigation had shown that once the deposit error was corrected and placed into the joint account, the revenues were about thirty percent less than expected for the inventory weight. When deeper inspection revealed that all distribution accounts had been paid in full and when customers began complaining that their pre-paid orders were coming up short, the mystery deepened .

  “Maybe you can explain why all the customers are upset,” Dan had said angrily to Steve, “and maybe you can tell me what's been happening to the inventory.” By all appearances, somebody was stealing from the company, and it certainly looked like Steve was the person responsible.

  When Sassy had been confronted about the mix-up and by the fact that she had used the wrong deposit slips, she had become defensive and claimed she had only made an innocent error in doing what Steve had asked her to do. With Sassy's brother being highly involved in receipt and distribution of the coffee beans at Canadian locations, he, too, came under suspicion. With so much uncertainty, Dan had threatened to report the findings to authorities.