“We were just discussing that very thing,” Merrill said.
“And?”
“Think we got it covered,” he said.
The doughnuts were soft and warm and sticky on my fingers and I had eaten three before I realized it. Merrill had eaten more.
Daniels shook his head. “We’ll get back to that in a minute. For now, let’s talk about taking Mike Hawkins down. He is our bad guy, right?”
“Oh, he’s a bad guy,” I said. “Comes from a long line of them, but it doesn’t mean he killed Menge.”
“But Sharon told you that’s what he was put there to do.”
“And I don’t doubt that, but it doesn’t mean he did it. She said Chris was protecting Justin, that Mike was too scared of him to do anything.”
“Well, I think he did,” he said.
“Then arrest him.”
“Can’t. Don’t have enough on him yet. It’s why I didn’t do anything to Hawkins last night.”
“I thought that so I could kill them,” Merrill said.
“No, but if you’d’ve let them kill you, then we could’ve taken them down.”
“My bad, but nobody told me the plan.”
“I’m hoping they’ll fuck up in an even bigger way this time and we can get them all—including Mike.”
“Not possible to fuck up any bigger than fuckin’ with me.”
I remembered something Paula Menge had told me earlier, and must have made a noise, because Daniels said, “What?”
“Paula Menge told me that she hired a PI to investigate Hawkins. She thinks he took off with half of her retainer, but—”
“Probably didn’t make it out of the dungeon.”
“Least not alive,” Merrill said. “He wasn’t in there when I was.”
“I’ll look into it,” Daniels said.
“You should probably talk to Sharon too.”
“I will.”
We were all quiet a moment, each of us still. We were weary and wounded, but had promises to keep and many miles to go.
“So how do we make the case?” Daniels asked.
“Against Hawkins?” I asked. “I thought you were thinking Sobel with Pitts’s help. Or maybe Martinez. You giving up on him?”
“I don’t think he did it now. I wanted it to be him, but we’ve got to go were the evidence leads.”
“Matos is convinced you’ve been trying to set Martinez up.”
“Wonder what he’ll say when I arrest Hawkins?”
“If that’s the way it turns out, what will you do about Martinez?”
He looked into the distance.
I followed his gaze. Across the river, Spanish moss on the branches of cypress trees rising out of the water along the banks waved like clean sheets on a clothesline in the morning breeze.
When he looked at me, his eyes were every bit as sad and vulnerable as I had expected of a man who had long since realized he was impotent to protect his wife from the evils of this world.
“I’m not sure. Gotta do something.”
I felt like a voyeur, sickened and guilty for seeing something so private, as if my knowing was part of an on-going violation of him and his family. “I’m sorry.”
“Thanks, but right now I’m more concerned about the Hawkins boys. Where’s Sharon?”
“Merrill’s mom’s.”
“Mom’ll put holes in ‘em if they come callin’,” Merrill said. “And I’ll stay over there at night ‘til this thing’s over.”
Daniels nodded. “We’ve got him at the right place at the right time. We’ve seen firsthand how his family operates. We know they sent him in there to do the deed. And we’ve got him with the murder weapon.”
Merrill said, “When this happen?”
“While you were away,” he said. “We found it in his cell. Now, we’ve just got to find his accomplice.”
“Who found the shank in his cell?”
“Pitts.”
“There’s your accomplice.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I searched his cell. There was no weapon in it.”
Out on the river, a silver pontoon boat sped by, a small fiberglass boat tied to the back, bouncing in its wake. On board, a quartet of middle-aged men in jeans, flannel shirts, and baseball caps gave us an obligatory wave.
“You think he planted it?” Daniels asked.
“Somebody did.”
“So we’re no closer to knowing with certainty who did the deed?”
I shrugged. “We’re getting closer all the time, just don’t know how yet. Every scrap of information helps. Better to know too much than too little. Eventually we’ll get the piece that makes all the others fall into place.”
“You’re right, I’m just ready to be done with this one.”
“Well, we’re not there yet,” I said, then told them about discovering that DeLisa Lopez was in the institution for over thirty-two hours the day of and following the murder.
Small waves caused by the pontoon boat’s wake rippled the smooth surface of the water and slapped at the base of the cypress trees and sandy banks.
“And we’ve still got to strongly consider Potter, Pitts, Sobel, Martinez, and Paula Menge.”
“You tell him about the uniform we found?” Daniels asked.
We nodded.
“Y’all ever find the tune-up video?” Merrill asked.
“I think I’ve got a good idea where it might be,” I said.
“Think?” he said. “Why haven’t you gotten it?”
“Been too busy savin’ your black ass.”
“Well, now you done that, let’s go get the motherfucker.”
43
The PCI inmate library was larger and had more books than the Potter County Public Library, the Pottersville High School library, and the Pottersville Elementary School library put together. With use-or-lose funds appropriated each year by the state, the librarian and her assistant flung purchase orders like seeds in the wind, producing an annual harvest of computers, audiovisual equipment, CDs, DVDs and, of course, books.
In addition to fiction and nonfiction, hardcovers and paperbacks, the inmates were required by law to have access to a full law library, which had its own room in the back of the building. With all of this, plus specially trained inmate law clerks and orderlies, the library of PCI was one of the highest traffic areas on the compound.
When Merrill, Daniels, and I entered, the library was filled to capacity, and there were inmates waiting at the center gate for their turn to come up.
Passing the magazines and periodicals, we continued through rows of shelving lined with every genre of fiction, the most popular of which were the romance, western, and mystery. Inmates browsing for a book they hadn’t already read several times tried to eye Merrill and Daniels without being noticed, many of them grabbing the closest title to them and heading toward the door.
Clerks in the law library looked up from helping inmates file appeals to see what we were doing. The young bookish-looking assistant with glasses on his nose, phone to his ear, and feet on his desk didn’t even notice.
When we finally stopped at the video counter in the back, a collective sigh of relief seemed to be released from the inmates behind us, while the two orderlies working the video counter had the opposite reaction. Behind them, lining several high shelves, were nonviolent feature films and educational videos on nearly every subject imaginable. Above them, on a DVD/VCR mounted to the wall, a mystery show I had seen on PBS played silently, and scattered all around us were inmates with headphones who seemed to be only half watching it.
“How’s it goin’?” I asked.
The orderly closest to me, still eyeing Merrill and Daniels warily, gave me a nod and a grunt.
“You got a National Geographic video about gorillas?” I asked.
“We did,” he said, “but it’s missin’.”
“Any idea what happened to it?”
“None.”
“Let me see the case,”
<
br /> He glanced back at the wall behind him and, too quickly, said, “It’s missin’, too.”
“What is that?” I said, pointing to the case I had just asked for.
“That’s somethin’ else.”
“Let me see.”
When he hesitated, Merrill growled, “Bitch, give him the damn case.”
He turned, using his body to block our vision, but I could hear him slide a disc out of the case and drop it to the floor.
When he turned back around, he handed me the empty case I had asked for.
“Now let me see the disc that was in it.”
“There wasn’t one,” he said, sliding his foot back to better conceal it.
“Hand him the disc ‘fore I jump over this counter and shove your ass into that TV up there,” Merrill said.
I pointed down at the disc on the floor behind his foot.
He looked at it as if seeing it for the first time.
“Must’ve slipped out when I picked up the case.”
“Must’ve.”
When he handed me the disc, I took it and started walking away.
“What’re you doin’?” he asked.
“Borrowing it,” I said.
“It’s just a blank disc,” he said.
“Oh, I hope it is,” Merrill said. “‘Cause if it is, I’m gonna come back and kick your lyin’ ass all over this place.”
“Why’d you try to hide it?” I asked. “Justin Menge ask you to protect it for him?”
“I don’t know what you talkin’ ‘bout. Got nothin’ to do with no disc. Like I say, shit look blank to me.”
I walked out of the library, now far less crowded than when we came in, Merrill and Daniels following me. We crossed over the asphalt road that led from the front to the center gates, and entered the chapel.
When we were in my office, I inserted the disc and we all sat down to watch it.
Glancing around my office, I realized again how impersonal it was. Unlike every other office I had ever had, this one didn’t really feel like mine. The shelves were filled with theology texts—mostly reference books I used when studying. The walls were covered with art, the desk with objects, but none of them revealed much about my personality or tastes. There were no pictures of family or friends—nothing an inmate could use to manipulate or intimidate me—nothing very meaningful with one exception.
On the wall directly across from my desk was a framed color crayon picture of Jesus colored for me by Nicole Caldwell. It was a memorial of sorts to her. She had been murdered in this very office while waiting for her televangelist father to finish his service in the chapel. Perhaps the reason I didn’t feel completely comfortable in this office had less to do with how impersonal a prison office had to be than the way in which it was haunted for me.
When the first image came on the screen it was of the cement floor of the PM quad in G-dorm. The lighting was bad, and the shots, jerky and largely out of focus, were worse. In the background, Pitts could be heard outside the backdoor in the exercise area yelling at Jaqueel Jefferson.
The camera angle was suddenly raised and there was a fast zoom to the shower cell where Justin Menge was cuffed to the door, Billy Joe Potter standing behind him.
“I thought Pitts was the fool caught in this Rodney King shit.”
“What he told me.”
“Why would Pitts say it’s him?”
“Maybe he thought it was. Maybe they both went at him.”
At first just the bars were in focus, then the bars softened as the deep distress lines on Justin’s contorted face sharpened.
Suddenly, his face was slammed into the cell bars as Potter delivered a powerful blow to his kidneys. He let out a yelp and a string of blood-laced spit splattered on the bars.
I winced.
Several more blows, similar, but more severe, followed.
Rage disfigured Potter’s face into something I didn’t recognize, more of his humanity leaving each time he committed another act of violence.
I grew nauseated, the donuts and coffee in my stomach threatening to come up, as I saw some part of myself in Potter’s angry face and glazed eyes.
“Goddam,” Merrill exclaimed. “It was just a matter of time before he killed Menge. I didn’t think Potter had it in him.”
“Something Menge said or did or wouldn’t do set him off.”
I thought about Justin’s art, about the sensitive soul inside the body being savagely beaten and my eyes stung.
What’s wrong with us? How can we do such things to each other? How could I have ever done that to another human being?
When the disc was finished, Daniels stood up. “Why would Jefferson tell you he recorded Pitts instead of Potter?”
“Maybe Potter paid him. It’s probably not a coincidence that he left for outside court the day after the murder.”
“Well, I’m glad I didn’t stop the investigation and arrest Hawkins. This fucker just moved to the top of my list.”
Merrill and I didn’t say anything.
“Am I wrong? Doesn’t he move to the top of our list?”
“Beatin’ and cuttin’ two different things,” Merrill said.
“Yeah. Cuttin’s easier.”
They looked at me. “Whatta you think?” Daniels asked.
“Long list no matter who’s at the top.”
“You’re right. It really could be any of them. They all had a reason to do it.”
I nodded. “We’ve got to figure out which one of them crossed the line between wanting him dead and killing him.”
As Daniels and I talked, Merrill seemed distant and preoccupied, and I wondered if he was reliving his time in the dungeon or planning his retaliation.
“Let’s go through them again,” Daniels said. “starting with the sister.”
“She inherited most of what Menge couldn’t take with him.”
“All of it—as long as Sobel’s out of the picture,” Daniels added.
“And it just so happens that he’s murdered on her first visit in four years, but if it were her, she had to have a partner.”
“Before he escaped, I’d’ve said it was probably Sobel,” Daniels said.
“Could still be.”
“Him escaping could’ve been part of the plan all along.”
“She drugs him, Sobel kills him, and they both inherit.”
“Don’t count a nigga out just ‘cause his ass didn’t make Candid Camera,” Merrill said.
“Ike Turner?” I asked.
Merrill smiled.
“Who?” Daniels asked.
“Pitts.”
“He expected to be on the disc. He’s already told us about all the tune-ups he gives.”
“And he don’t just hit inmates,” Merrill said.
“He came down and walked around to all the cells after the service started when he was supposed to be in the officers’ station. We were down there. There was no reason for him to do it.”
Daniels nodded. “But what about Martinez or Matos? We can’t leave them out.”
“Martinez certainly has the motive. If Chris was going to testify.”
“He was,” Daniels said.
“Matos could’ve helped Martinez or killed him for his own reasons. Did Chris mention anything about a staff member having an affair with an inmate?”
Daniels shook his head. “Not that I remember, but with all that was going on, I probably wouldn’t’ve given it the proper attention.”
I nodded.
“We leaving out anybody?”
“The holy man,” Merrill said.
“Father James,” I said.
Daniels shook his head and let out a heavy sigh. “You know what this is? This is one of those cases that never gets cleared. The kind that haunts you the rest of your life.”
“Can you imagine the reasonable doubt a defense attorney could create with this list of suspects?”
44
Late afternoon.
Alone in my office.
Phone.
“I’m sending over the book you asked for,” Dr. Diaz said.
Still bothered by several nagging questions about murder and how it was committed, I had asked Dr. Diaz, the prison physician, if I could borrow a book on blood a couple of days ago. He told me he had just what I was looking for at home and he’d bring it in the next day.
“Sorry I’m late getting it to you,” he said. “It took me longer than I thought to find it.”
While he was talking, an inmate orderly in a white uniform appeared at my door, and I motioned him in. He handed me the book, I nodded my thanks, and he left.
“Let me know if you have any questions after you read it,” he was saying.
“I will. Thanks.”
The book was oversized and heavy with pages marked by sticky notes and passages highlighted in bright pink and yellow. The margins were filled with notes difficult to decipher. It took a while, but I finally found the section I needed and began to read, imagining Justin’s cell floor as I did.
After reading the relevant page several times, I wrote the following on my notepad:
Blood usually clots in about five to fifteen minutes after exiting the body and will initially be dark maroon, gelatin-like, and sticky to the touch. Over a couple of hours it will separate into a dark maroon-blackish clot surrounded by a pale yellow serum. This is due to some contraction of the clotted blood and a “squeezing out” of the serum, which is not involved in the clotting process.
Blood on a floor will usually dry to a crusty brownish state over a few hours to 3 or 4 days, depending upon the actual temperature, humidity level, and the degree of ventilation. Warmer, drier, and breezy conditions will dry it faster. Blood on clothing is likely to dry much faster—the clothing serving as a wick and spreading the blood out over a larger area. This leads to faster drying. If the clothing is placed inside a container or is wadded, it will take much longer to dry than if it is spread out on the floor or draped over a chair or other object.
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