Ames To Thrill: Three Full-Length Gripping Mystery Thrillers

by Dan Ames

  "Well," he said, "Tim and I were competitors, but in my mind, it was always a friendly competition. To be honest, I'm not sure how Tim viewed our relationship. I always considered him a friendly rival, and there was never a...a lack of respect between the two of us. Whenever we needed each other, whether it was to help out with research, or read through a synopsis, we were always eager to help out." He spread out his hands. "At least I was," he said. "Maybe Tim felt differently. He was sometimes hard to read."

  I tried to ignore the feeling I was getting that Vanderkin didn't mind speaking of Tim in the past tense.

  "The willingness we had to help each other out was kind of the reason I wanted to talk to you, Mr. Ashland," he said. He waited for me to say, 'please, call me Michael.' I kept him waiting.

  "If there's anything I can do to help you tie up Tim's loose ends, I'd be happy to help out,” he said. “I'll probably also be taking over some of his classes, completing a project or two. I believe the best way to honor his passing would be to carry on his work to some degree." He spread his big hands in a gesture of supplication.

  "I'd love to help you out, but Tim didn't really discuss his work with me," I said. "I'm not much of an academic. I’m more of what you’d call a… whore for commerce."

  This time, the chagrin on Vanderkin's face was genuine.

  "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that."

  Suddenly, his face brightened.

  "Tell you what, if you want, if you think Tim would approve, give me whatever files and documents, whatever you might come across in the next week or two, and I'll help you figure out what best to do with them."

  "Anything in particular you want me to look for, Professor Vanderkin?" I asked, barely managing to keep the antagonism out of my voice.

  "No. No, nothing particular. Just trying to help out you know."

  I nodded. "I really must be going..." I said, and uncrossed my leg. My foot caught the edge of the stack of books in front of me, and I sent them crashing to the floor. They, in turn, knocked over Vanderkin's brown leather briefcase which spilled its contents onto the office's tile floor.

  One of the items that fell out was Vanderkin's wallet. It was a thick bi-fold and when it landed, it landed open.

  Just before Vanderkin scooped it up from the floor, I got a quick glimpse of the photo in the wallet's first plastic picture sleeve.

  I stood, stepped past the edge of his desk and started picking the books up.

  "That's quite all right, Mr. Ashland. Thank you," Vanderkin said quickly. He put the wallet back in the briefcase and used his foot to push the books aside.

  He turned to face me, and stuck out his hand, indicating our session was over.

  "Good luck,'" I said and shook his hand, which was warm and slick with sweat.

  I stepped into the hallway and breathed slowly, letting the tension work itself out of my body. I clenched and unclenched my hands, a movement that barely lessened my desire to choke the living shit out of William Vanderkin.

  The corridor led to a door, which opened out onto a stairwell. I took the stairs up to the fourth floor, where Tim's office had been.

  My mind was racing, wondering what Vanderkin had to do with Tim's death.

  I had found a motive. A good reason why William Vanderkin would have wanted Tim killed. In fact, not only was the motive feasible, it had been put on arrogant display in Vanderkin's wallet.

  It was a picture of Emily Lyons.

  Tim Bantien's ex-wife.

  9

  Nine

  I left Vanderkin’s office, climbed another set of stairs, and stood in front of Tim's office door. I produced the narrow strip of metal that I always carried in my wallet.

  I pushed aside the crime scene tape and slipped the jimmy into the keyhole of the ancient wooden door. I looked at the glass before me. Dr. Timothy Bantien, it read.

  I felt around inside, then withdrew the jimmy from the lock, gave it a slight crimp about an eighth of an inch from the end, then slipped it back in. This time, with a slight twist of the wrist, the lock clicked open and I slipped inside Tim's old office.

  The smell of old books washed over me along with the memories.

  I closed the door behind me and locked it, then slipped the jimmy back into my wallet.

  The office was bigger than Vanderkin's, nearly a perfect square with a window directly across from the door. Tim had pushed his desk up against the wall, beneath the window, with his computer on the center of the desk. That way he could type and look over the monitor out his window while he worked.

  On many occasions, I had come to see him and as I stood in the open doorway, I would see Tim, his hands clasped behind his head, fingers interlocked, staring out the window into the sky.

  The wall to the left was a floor-to-ceiling bookshelf, all of the tomes arranged neatly and in alphabetical order. I sat in the visitor's chair, suddenly overwhelmed by sadness. I imagined him sitting in his chair, turning and looking at me through his thick glasses, talking about some obscure item he'd dug up in an old journal somewhere, or asking me about a case I was working on.

  I stood and went to Tim's desk, then sat down in his chair. The computer was an old Macintosh. I looked for the power button on the keyboard to turn the machine on, but couldn't find it. Then I remembered that the older Macs had a power switch at the back. I felt around the back. Found it. I was about to turn it on when I heard a whisper of movement behind me. I froze, listening.

  Someone was standing just outside the door. And I cursed myself; if I was going to nose around, and begin questioning the circumstances of my good friend's death, it was time to carry something more than a wallet and car keys.

  Slowly, the doorknob began to turn. I relaxed. If they didn't have a key, they weren't going to get in.

  The doorknob hit the lock and stopped, then slowly turned back as whoever it was relaxed their grip.

  They stood there for a moment longer and I debated about throwing the door open to confront them, but decided against it. I had a pretty good idea who it was. I heard the footsteps leave, eventually fading to nothing.

  I turned back to the computer and flipped it on. As it powered up, I opened Tim's desk drawers. I looked at the mess inside, the papers jammed into small piles of disorganization. I knew instantly that the desk had been searched. He’d always kept his desk neat and organized, the antithesis of the harried, eggheaded professor.

  By now, the computer had warmed up and the screen appeared before me, a neat row of folders on the right hand side. I double clicked on the first one and scanned the contents, then closed it and repeated the process for all of the folders. Nothing in there but treatises, lecture notes and articles. I double clicked on the hard drive, and searched through that but found nothing.

  I located the Find File command and typed in the words "Personal" and hit search. After several moments, the answer came up: no documents found. I tried the same technique with the words 'confidential,' and 'private,' all with the same result.

  I went up to the menu bar to see if Tim had a feature called Recent Documents that does just what it sounds like it should do: it catalogs the most recent documents opened on the desktop.

  There was one document listed.

  It was called 'Beer Money.'

  I highlighted it, and the computer showed me where it was located; buried within several increasingly obnoxious names such as 'order forms,' 'index file' and 'cross-referenced tabs.'

  I pulled a zip drive out of my pocket, plugged it into the computer’s USB port, and copied the files onto it, then ejected it from the desktop. I powered down the computer, then sat at the desk for a few more minutes.

  This was where my friend had wound up. We'd know each other since we were kids, had gone to high school together, then college. Tim had always loved history. Loved talking about it. Studying it. Immersing himself in it. And eventually, he had loved making a career out of it. He had dedicated his life to it, and now that life was over.

  I stood and
went to the door, then listened for any sound. I heard none. I looked back at Tim's office one more time. I knew it would be the last time I ever set foot in it.

  It was a bigger, better office than Vanderkin's, and with a better view.

  I figured William Vanderkin would be moving in any day now.

  10

  Ten

  The Milwaukee County Historical Society at the intersection of Old World Third Street and Kilbourn Avenue was an impressive building, designed in the French Classical tradition with massive pillars and elaborate detailing. It sat on the banks of the Milwaukee River, next to Pere Marquette Park, named after the French explorer who in 1677 was the first white man to set foot there.

  I entered the main doors of the Historical Society, the smell of dust and sequestered humanity was overpowering. I spotted the information desk where an older woman with a light blue shirt and dark blue sweater complete with a Historical Society name tag looked up at me. Her face was a mixture of kindness, curiosity and more than a bit of surprise. Apparently she didn’t get a lot of visitors.

  "May I help you?"

  "Yes," I said. "I was wondering if there might be someone who could help me identify people in an old photograph."

  "You'll want the reference desk," she said, her wrinkled cheeks swinging with each word she uttered. She raised a hand with bulging arthritic knuckles and pointed to a balcony behind me. "Second floor, northeast corner."

  "Thank you."

  "There are exhibits on the first floor here," again, a vague wave around the area, "as well as on the second floor."

  I headed for the stairwell, then stopped to take in the impressive interior. The space was oblong, with a stairwell located in the center, leading downstairs. Two stairwells on either side of the main room led to the second level and more exhibits. Giant marble pillars led to an elaborately painted ceiling, replete with complex scrollwork. The outer walls were broken up into sections, each section being an exhibit. I looked them over. There was a World War I exhibit featuring Milwaukeeans who fought in the great war. Another exhibit chronicled the history of the Milwaukee River. Another one focused on the great fire that destroyed the Third Ward in 1892.

  I took the stairwell that led to the second level and spotted the research library across the divide. I walked around the second floor, past more exhibits until I found myself in front of a door with a small placard next to it that read simply enough, 'Research.'

  The sign said there was a one dollar charge for utilizing the research library's resource, unless you were a member of the historical society.

  I pushed the door open and went inside. The room was a long rectangle, dominated by two large windows at the far end. Closest to the windows were six circular tables with four chairs each. A service desk sat unoccupied and along the far wall, a door to a small office was partially opened, with soft yellow light spilling out onto the faded tile floor.

  I crossed the room knocked gently on the door.

  "Yes?" a man said.

  The door swung gently inward and a short, portly man looked toward me. He had heavily worn, frayed wool pants, a white Oxford shirt and an equally frayed tan sweater. Small eyeglasses were perched on the end of his nose.

  His office was small and cramped, his desk covered with papers and legal pads, manila folders and newsletters, and a nameplate that read: Mr. Paul Jenkins, Ph.D.

  "What can I do for you?" he asked.

  I pulled the still frames of the hairy man and the young girl from my pocket.

  "My name is Michael Ashland and I’m a private investigator, looking into the death of a friend of mine. I was wondering if you could help me find out who these people might be."

  I set the photographs on the desk in front of him. He produced a white handkerchief with a flourish, pulled his eyeglasses gently from his face and wiped the lenses vigorously. The glasses had left an impression. A red, sweaty horizontal bar across the bridge of his nose.

  He put the eyeglasses back on and peered over the photographs for the better part of a minute before laying them back down on the desk and once again focusing on me.

  "Could you tell me where you got these?" he asked, his voice nasal and thin, like a badly scraped note during a violin recital.

  "No."

  He leaned forward. "Excuse me?"

  "I can't tell you where I got them from because they were given to me by a friend. This friend of mine is interested in history and seems to feel that these people may have some significance."

  "Local significance, I assume?" he asked.

  "Probably."

  He murmured a "hmm." He tapped the surface of his desk with his short, thick fingers. At last, he said, "I have good news and bad news for you."

  Out of habit, I asked for the bad.

  "The bad news is, and forgive me my immodesty here, even with my encyclopedic knowledge of local history, I can't tell you offhand who these people are. The girl," he tapped the photo, "the girl definitely looks familiar. But the man, no."

  He looked again at the picture, as if a second glance would give him more information.

  I waited and then said, "The good?"

  "The good news is, I'm intrigued. I will look into this for you, but first, you must pay a dollar, unless of course you are Society member.”

  Luckily, I had a single, which I pressed into his hand. I gave him my name and phone number and he said he would get back to me when he knew something.

  11

  Eleven

  The Wauwatosa Memorial Cemetery was located just off of 76th and Center. It was behind Roosevelt elementary school and across from a nursing home. A short, albeit inevitable trip for the elderly. The area was small, marked by a rolling hill and a few towering pine trees.

  It was a crisp, cold morning, with bright blue skies and a sharp wind that would occasionally pick up, dropping the wind chill into the teens.

  I parked on an adjacent street and walked through the winding path toward the small group gathered near the back of the cemetery. I passed by markers with names I didn't recognize, and absently checked the time elapsed between the dates. Mentally, I did Tim's.

  Thirty-five years.

  The wind whipped down from the pine trees above and I hurried to Tim's gravesite.

  The service itself had been simple. A very small group in the church. Both of Tim's parents were dead, and he was an only child.

  The group standing around the open grave in the middle of the cemetery huddled against the wind, their faces wrapped in scarves, their long coats doing little to protect them from the wind. The casket stood next to the grave. There would be no headstone until spring, when the ground was soft enough to pour the concrete. Until then, Tim would be buried in an unmarked grave.

  Emily was there. Her black dress was simple, a black hat with a white flower was perched on top of her head.

  As I watched, she looked up directly into my eyes and gave a gentle nod of acknowledgment. I nodded back to her.

  I moved to get a better vantage point of the crowd. I scanned the group and picked out faces that seemed vaguely familiar: a woman who attended a faculty party, a man both Tim and I knew in college, one of Tim's neighbors.

  Fred appeared next to me.

  "It's cold," he said to me.

  I turned to look at him. His nose was red, his eyes watery behind the big glasses. He was visibly shivering.

  I caught sight of a pale young woman with blonde hair. She had on jeans and a leather jacket and stood apart from the rest of the group. She was young; I guessed her to be in her early to mid-twenties and was probably a student. Tim had been a popular professor, one of the few who cared about as much about teaching as he did about publishing.

  The girl pulled a handkerchief from her pocket and wiped a tear from her eye. I would have to go back to the funeral home and go over the names of people who signed the guestbook.

  Finally, the priest began reading a passage from the Bible. I could barely hear him. I could see his breath
form words as they hung, frozen, in the air. At last, the priest blessed the casket and Tim was lowered into the ground. Someone threw the first shovel of dirt after him. The mourners turned as one to go. It had been a short ceremony, the bitter cold chasing Tim into his grave.

  I stayed, looked at the hole in the ground. The wind whipped around my head, stung my eyes, but I stayed. I wanted to remember it. Remember what it felt like to stand next to my friend’s grave.

  At last, a hand tugged on my arm. Fred was standing there.

  “That’s enough,” he said. “Let’s go.”

  He was right, but I knew that my true mourning would come later. After I’d found out who had done this. When that person was also fitted into a custom-made hole in the ground.

  I walked toward the parking lot, saw that the young girl had waited, too. She seemed to be lost in thought. I could see she was crying. As the crowd thinned out around her, I made my way over to her.

  "Excuse me," I said.

  She turned, startled. Her eyes were a brilliant, deep green, rimmed by red. Her nose was running and her lips were chapped.

  "Yes?" she said. Her lower lip quivered slightly.

  "My name's Michael Ashland and..."

  I stopped as her eyes grew wide, a startled expression on her face.

  "Burr?" It came out like a whisper.

  Now it was my turn to be surprised. "Yes and you-"

  "Look," she said. "I'd like to talk to you, but I've got to get going." Her face had paled. Her voice was unsteady. She started to move off.

  I fished a card out of my pocket.

  "Here, call me when you get a chance." But by then, it was too late and she was walking away.

  My eyes followed her down to the small parking lot just off the entrance to the cemetery. She turned a corner and walked off, disappearing among the small crowd.

  As I looked over the crowd departing, I once again caught sight of Emily. She was shaking hands with several people. A woman put her arm around her and gave a half-hearted hug.