On the river below, as it wound its way toward Long Island Sound, a few pleasure boats made white wakes. Over to the left was the Congregational Church and the town green. He made out workmen removing yesterday’s speaker’s platform. In back of the church was the cemetery and the rising meadow that had been the scene of the futile chase.
Over the hill beyond the meadow were several roads, any one of which could have been the route of the killer’s retreat. Which one?
Temporarily, he had to put aside the all-consuming fear for his wife’s safety and attempt to come up with something that would aid Rocco Herbert; for in the ultimate scheme of things only the capture of the killer would guarantee Bea’s safety.
A mild westerly wind had begun to move the balloon back on its original path. His quick calculation indicated that in minutes he’d be back over the house. Suddenly, he wanted to descend. He wanted to descend as quickly as he could.
Diocletian’s Cycle and Drag Shop on Route 66 was squeezed between an auto junk yard and a stone mason’s shop. Lyon turned the pickup into the narrow dirt drive and parked in front of the rusting Quonset hut.
Four members of a cycle club, wearing their colors, were revving Harley 1200s in front of the building. Emblazoned with sequins on the back of their leather jackets were the words, “Krauts M.C., Breeland, Ct.”
Lyon left the truck, ignored the somewhat hostile glances cast his way by the Krauts, and entered the building. Inside, motorcycles of all shapes and sizes cluttered the floor, while to the rear of the building two men were working on disassembled machines in a repair area. A bearded man in white coveralls with the name Diocletian labeled in blue over his pocket left a workbench and slouched toward Lyon.
“Mr. Diocletian?”
“Everyone calls me D.”
“I wonder if I might rent a trail bike for the day.”
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Not really.”
“Listen, buddy. The last guy I rented a bike to was wanted on six counts of carnal knowledge. Three months later they found the bike in Portland.”
“Portland’s only the next town over.”
“Portland, Oregon.”
“Anybody you know rent them?”
“You might try Crazy Louis down in Danbury. He’ll do most anything for a buck.”
“But you’re not sure?”
“Not unless somebody’s gone wacko recently.”
“What’s the cheapest motorcycle you could sell me?”
“For trails?”
“That’s what I had in mind.”
Diocletian’s face seemed to merge through several contortions as he fought valiantly to keep greed from becoming too obvious. “I do have one nice model over in the corner.”
Lyon followed him toward the rear of the shop where a peeling red and greasy motorcycle was propped among some cobwebs in the corner. “Does it run?” he asked.
“Like a baby. Four fifty and it’s yours.”
“Three hundred and you’ve got a deal.”
“Sold.”
“How about showing me how to start the thing?”
“You got a cycle license?”
“I’ve had a driver’s license for years.”
“No, in this state you’ve got to take a separate test and driver’s examination for a cycle license.”
“I didn’t know that. But what if I just run over back trails?”
“In that case the cops will never catch you.”
“So I’ve recently noticed,” Lyon replied.
In front of the Quonset hut, under the bemused glares of the Krauts M.C., Diocletian gave Lyon a quick lesson in the operation of the trail bike. For another five dollars he threw in a board that could be utilized to push the cycle on and off the back of the pickup. When Lyon felt he had a vague idea of its operation, he loaded the cycle on the pickup and drove from the store.
As he pulled onto the highway, he felt proud of his bargaining powers in lowering the price of the motorcycle. For a brief moment he thought he heard gales of laughter coming from the Quonset hut, but he chose to ignore it.
He off-loaded the motorcycle from the truck at the rear of the Congregational Church by the green. Before mounting the machine, he paused, had a thought, and walked around the corner of the church back to the green and entered the Murphysville Hardware and Supply Company.
Dan Lufkin shook his head and smiled as Lyon entered the store. “If you’re after fuses again, Lyon … if I told you once I’ve told you four times that you’ve got circuit breakers up at Nutmeg Hill.”
“Very funny, Dan. How about selling me some ammunition?”
“If you want ammo for your books, you need a wooden stake or silver bullets.”
“If you read my books, Dan, you’d know I don’t write monster stories.”
“What I heard.”
“How about some ammo?”
“Sure, what kind you want?”
“Thirty-thirty.”
“Don’t have it.”
“You didn’t even look.”
“Don’t need to.”
“How come?”
“Well, in the first place, people who have that kind of gun use it to go to Maine or Canada for deer or bear. No call for me to sell it. You want shotgun shells, all kinds, or .22 all kinds, you’re in the right place.”
“Do you require identification from anyone buying ammunition?”
“Driver’s license, and they just sign the ammo register.”
“That’s all?”
“Couldn’t be simpler, but like I say, don’t get no call for thirty-thirty shells. Now, if you want a wooden stake …” Dan Lufkin began to laugh as Lyon left the store.
He kicked the motorcycle, which he had aptly termed the Red Devil, into life. Dirty exhaust came from the tail pipe; the machine coughed, sputtered, and finally labored into erratic life. Lyon revved the engine as he’d seen the Krauts do, released the brakes and threw it into gear.
With the front wheels off the ground, the machine sprang ahead. As he skidded across the church parking lot in a direct trajectory toward the cemetery fence, he eased off on the accelerator handle and slowed the machine until the wheels came down. He barely managed to skid through the fence opening into the cemetery.
The motorcycle wobbled as he fought for control. At one point, as the cycle barely made a sharp swerve, his leg brushed against the marker of Jeremiah Benton, 1714–1786. With relief he saw the gate at the end of the cemetery directly in front of him. He went through in a flurry of dust and started up the meadow toward a cow.
As the incline of the meadow increased, he found it necessary to speed up in order to keep his forward momentum. He sped over hillocks and small rocks, all the while attempting to avoid large boulders that were strewn haphazardly in the knee-high grass.
Without difficulty the cycle went through the dual rock formation that had stopped the police car the day before. Beyond that obstacle the ground seemed to disappear as the bike took off from a small hummock. He hit with a bone-jarring bounce; the motorcycle skidded sideways as he struggled to regain his balance. It stalled out, and he gratefully put both feet on firm ground. His hands were trembling from clenching the handlebars. He wished he had walked the trail rather than attempting to negotiate it on the bike.
On the leading edge of the hill the cowpath forked to the right and left. Which way would he have gone? The left fork was closer, but after the jump at the top of the hill it seemed unlikely that he could have negotiated the sharp turn to the left so quickly—it had to be to the right. He kicked the motorcycle alive and started slowly toward the right fork.
After a quarter of a mile the path widened and turned steeply toward a road several hundred yards farther on. He slowed and stopped at the edge of the pavement. It was a narrow, winding country road. Yesterday’s rider could have turned either way. From the map examination he and Rocco had made, and also from the balloon observation, he knew that to the right the road wound throu
gh the country past a few working farms and ended at the Shady Heights subdivision. To the left, it continued through the hills for three miles until it connected with Route 90, which ran along the river. Route 90 interconnected with the Interstate and would be an obvious escape route.
He kicked the motorcycle starter and moved slowly to the left. After the murder and the abortive chase, Rocco had radioed instructions to his small force and to the state police. They would have established road blocks, or at least check points, near the Interstate connection. Any cyclist would have been stopped. Unless the killer had done exactly what he had done—used a truck to transport the trail bike.
He slowed the motorcycle to a near stall and began to examine the dirt shoulder at the edge of the road. Within fifty yards he found what he was looking for. A vehicle had been pulled off onto the shoulder. He stopped the bike and got off to kneel by the side of the road next to a small oil spot. The single track of the bike was clearly visible as it approached the dual tracks of the other vehicle. He recalled that the day before yesterday it had rained: the tracks must have been made in the last forty-eight hours. The cycle tracks ended a few feet before the other vehicle tracks. The killer had obviously loaded the trail bike onto a small truck or van parked on the shoulder.
The supposition would be verified when Rocco’s men made molds of the tire marks and compared them to the ones found in back of the church. It also gave them one more fact to work with—an additional fact that might allow them to make another conjecture toward another fact.
He was in a hurry to get back to town. He started the motorcycle and decided to avoid the difficult trail through the meadow by going down the road to Route 90 and back that way to Rocco’s office. The escape route was verified, and there was also an additional lead among the things he had heard today.
With its operator lost in thought, the motorcycle failed to negotiate the sharp right turn, crashed through a thin wooden retaining fence and shot off into space. Lyon found himself separating from the mottled red cycle as they both dropped into the waters of an abandoned quarry.
“Those wet clothes are going to mark the bench,” Rocco Herbert said as Lyon scowled.
It had been a two-mile walk to Sarge’s Bar and Grill, off Route 90. He had ordered a double sherry and called Rocco from the pay phone. Now, as the chief sat across from him in the scarred wooden booth and nursed a beer, Lyon heard himself squish loudly as he shifted position.
“That quarry’s dangerous,” he said. “Kids could get killed out there.”
“To my recollection you’re the only one who ever ran a motorcycle into it. Who in hell do you think you are—Evel Knievel?”
“I was thinking.”
“Oh, Jesus, typical. You know, of course, that we’ll never get your plaything out of there.”
“Well, it wasn’t much of a machine anyway.”
“I’ve sent two men out to make a cast of those tracks you found, although I don’t see how it’s going to help us.”
“One more thing to work with.”
“All right, you took a ride over the meadow, probably duplicated the killer’s route. You found cycle tracks stopping next to the tracks of another vehicle … fine, he probably loaded the trail bike onto a covered van. That would get him past any check points we managed to set up. I still don’t see where that puts us.”
“What about the rifle?” Lyon asked.
“Stolen three days ago from a home in Hartford.”
“Was ammunition taken at the same time?”
“Ammo? I don’t know.” Rocco pulled a Xerox copy of a report from his pocket and quickly scanned it. “This is a copy of the investigating officer’s report concerning the theft. Nothing at all was taken except the rifle and scope.”
“It’s unlikely that the burglar knew exactly what kind of rifle he was going to get.”
“True.”
“Which means that he wouldn’t necessarily have the proper caliber ammunition available, nor the time to make a trip out of state to purchase some.”
“So, you can buy ammo at most hardware stores, discount houses, sporting-goods stores … there’s probably tens of dozens of places in a fifty-mile radius.”
“Exactly,” Lyon said. “And only dozens.”
“What are you driving at?”
“Let’s create a matrix of probabilities. Now, when you buy ammunition you sign a register.”
“And can easily use a false name.”
“Why bother? The dealer asks to see a driver’s license as identification. Why bother with false ID when you’re buying something that’s seemingly as innocuous as ammuniton that’s available to anyone?”
“So our killer buys thirty-thirty ammo, signs the book with his own name. How in hell can we track that down when we don’t know who he is?”
“Hear me out. In this state, hunting is illegal with anything but a shotgun.”
“Right.”
“In addition, buying shells in July for a trip to Maine to hunt bear or deer which are out of season is unlikely. That means our killer is one of a few who are buying that type of cartridge at this time of year.”
“Someone could buy a rifle in preparation for the hunting season and buy cartridges at the same time, or a nonhunter, a marksman, might want ammunition at any time of year.”
“That’s only part of it. Operating a motorcycle requires a special kind of license from the motor vehicle department.”
“Yes. I am a police officer, Lyon.”
“Now, suppose we get a list of persons who’ve bought thirty-caliber ammunition in the northern part of the state during the past several days and run those names through the motor-vehicle department computer to match with licensed motorcyclists.”
Rocco drummed his fingers on the tabletop and stared off into space for a moment. “He could be from out of state, not a licensed cyclist; a lot of variables.”
“It’s all we have,” Lyon said.
“Damn it, you’ve got a point. There can’t be that many places selling thirty-thirty ammo at this time of year, and matching those names against the registered cyclists won’t be difficult. It just might work.”
Lyon sat back and sipped on his sherry. “Then you’ll try it?”
“Damn right, I will.” Rocco Herbert pulled a summons pad from his breast pocket. “Just one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Do you have a cycle license?”
“Of course not.”
Rocco wrote out a ticket and handed it across the table. “Circuit Court Fourteen in two weeks. Driving without a proper operator’s permit.”
3
“YOU WHAT WITH THREE HUNDRED DOLLARS AND THEN DROPPED IT IN THE QUARRY?”
Lyon Wentworth drove with one hand, reached across the seat toward his wife and turned up her hearing aid. “For a good cause, darling.” He turned his eyes back toward the road and steered the red Datsun through the light summer rain.
Bea gave a slight groan and leaned back against the headrest. “I wanted to re-cover the living-room couch,” she said in a small voice.
“To make it short, Rocco is running a check against everyone who’s bought thirty-thirty cartridges since the theft of the rifle and comparing that list against the registered motorcyclists in the state.”
“Don’t forget to take out a state lottery ticket; your odds are better.”
“Not really. If you break it down, how many people in a small state like Connecticut can fall into both categories?”
“I hope you’re right. I’m getting tired of having our friends in blue always around.”
As Lyon glanced in the rear-view mirror he could see the prowl car following them at a not-so-discreet thirty yards. “If we’d stayed home tonight instead of going to this party, we wouldn’t have an escort.”
“They’d be out in the bushes.”
“Maybe we should be thankful. Hey, do we really have to go to this thing? Damn, I hate cocktail parties.”
“You m
ean you hate political cocktail parties.”
“With us, it’s always the same thing.”
“How about those literary things you drag me to in New York?”
“That’s only once a year. Who’s going to be there tonight?”
“Our fearless majority leader, Big Mouth Mackay.”
“Rustling support for his candidacy?”
“They don’t even wait for the body to get cold. Everyone knew I was backing Llewyn, and I’ve already had calls asking me to switch support to Mackay.”
“Well,” Lyon said as he turned into the long driveway, “I do get a kick out of Dawkins’s Castle; the evening won’t be a complete loss.”
Dawkins’s Castle wasn’t a castle, although it pretended to be. Built fifty years earlier by Colonel Dawkins out of massive blocks of rock from a nearby quarry, it perched on a high promontory over the river and was a skewed cross between a Rhine castle and something angry children might build on a sandy beach.
The colonel had been dead ten years, and now the house was occupied by his son Wilkie, who, although not adding to the massive stone exterior, had filled the interior with an abundance of electronic gadgetry.
Lyon stopped before the lighted portico, and together he and Bea ran through the summer rain toward the protection of the house. Lyon raised the heavy knocker and let it fall while Bea peered at the several cars parked in the wide drive. “Mackay’s already here.”
“Advance and be recognized,” a voice said from a speaker above the door.
“The Wentworths,” Lyon replied, and almost instantly the large double doors swung open. The couple stepped into a long hallway where recessed lights in the stone walls cast a dim illumination across the tiled floor.
A wheelchair swung into sight at the end of the hall. The man in the chair pressed a small button on the arm, and the massive doors swung silently shut behind them.
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