Det Annie Macpherson 01 - Primed By The Past

by Speake, Barbara Fagan

  Later on, after they loaded the dishwasher and Annie poured them each another glass of wine, they went into the living room. She decided it was as good a time as ever to pick up on Charlie’s earlier question.

  ‘The results of the autopsy are back. Bronski and I reviewed them today.’

  ‘So, did he commit suicide?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No?’ Charlie took another drink of wine, while he waited for Annie to continue.

  ‘It was certainly made to look like suicide. But Moorcroft was suffocated, to be exact. I could give you the technical details, but that was the gist of the report.’

  ‘So does that mean what I think it does?’

  ‘We are definitely dealing with a homicide.’

  Charlie took another drink of his wine. ‘So, the note, the admission?’

  ‘Someone typed it, presumably the person who suffocated him and then staged the hanging.’

  ‘So, we are no further forward. I guess the next obvious question is, if Jim didn’t attack Angie, then are her attacker and Jim’s murderer the same person?’

  Annie took a sip of wine herself, before responding. ‘That would be my guess, but we have to keep an open mind. Bronski and I are going back to the house tomorrow to make sure we haven’t missed anything. Forensics is still looking through his computer. So far, they haven’t found much, apart from his penchant for porn.’

  ‘Gee, what was Jackie putting up with?’

  ‘She may not have known about the porn. When we asked her about the computer, she said she never used it.’

  ‘How do you live with someone and not know these things?’ Charlie put his glass down and leaned back on the couch, stifling a yawn. ‘God I thought Afghanistan was complex. At least there I knew what I was doing. Here it’s another story: nothing is as I expected it to be and no one is who I thought they were.’

  ‘Charlie, we are going to solve this.’ Annie got up to use the bathroom, touching his arm as she passed him. When she came back a few minutes later, he had drifted off to sleep on the couch, his arms folded across his chest. For once there were no lines of worry on his face. As he slept, Annie went back into the kitchen and retrieved the scrapbook. At first it seemed to be in some chronological order, but then Annie realised that some items appeared to be years older in relation to other articles. She was fascinated by some of them:

  CHEERLEADERS WIN CHAMPIONSHIP

  The article discussed the recent win of the Westford High School squad at the Regional heats held in Boston. The now faded photograph showed a 16-year-old Angie, the Westford captain holding up the trophy while the other girls formed a semicircle on the floor behind her.

  Juxtaposed on the opened out page was an engagement photo of Angie, with no date but describing her as a 21 year old. Dennis Cullen was named as the fiancé. The next several pages contained other engagement announcements and photos of marriages, all of which Annie assumed were friends of Angie’s. The only name Annie knew from Angie’s past was Carol Wojinski, but no one in any of the articles was called ‘Carol’ and there was no mention of a ‘Gus’.

  Annie felt herself nodding off reading the yellowed pages and Charlie was still sleeping. She realised that nothing had been said about whether Charlie was going to drop her home, or whether she was going to stay in the spare room again. As quietly as she could, she retreated to the kitchen and made herself a coffee. Looking around for a taxi number, her eyes scanned the cork message board that still reflected Angie’s time in the house. There were numbers for Pizza delivery and the local fitness club, as well as Jim and Jackie and a taxi company. When she unpinned it, she also noticed a Christmas card behind it.

  Carefully, Annie unpinned the card, checking first that Charlie was still asleep. As she opened up the card, she noticed it was signed by Carol and Gus, but both names were in the same handwriting, presumably Carol’s. There was also a note inside.

  ‘Hoping you have a relaxing Christmas. Don’t want to spook you, but I am sure I saw him 2 weeks ago – walked by the shop, looked in and stared. I just caught a glimpse, but you can imagine the effect. Maybe just my imagination, keep trying to forget it. It’s been too long since we’ve met up. I’ll get in touch in the New Year.’

  Annie tapped the card in her hand. She would have to ask Charlie if she could take it. Bronski needed to see this and she also realised that Gus might have more information. Who was the ‘him’ that Carole was referring to? Why was she so spooked? And more importantly, why had forensics not had a look at the card?

  Annie walked back into the living room and took her seat again, putting the card on the coffee table in front of her. Again she flicked through the scrapbook, scanning each item, even the seemingly irrelevant ones, just in case she’d missed anything. She smiled reading about Charlie’s exploits on the football field at Westfield High School. Angie had saved various articles about him. She looked across at his relaxed face and decided not to wake him yet. His High School team got to some regional finals. Annie didn’t have a clue about American football, and Charlie looked really different with all the equipment on, including a big helmet. There was also an obituary notice for their mother. It just said that she had died at home but no cause of death was reported. There was nothing about their dad, at least nothing so far.

  Annie sipped her coffee as she continued reading. Towards the end of the scrapbook, she found a double page spread from a newspaper, folded over several times. No particular article had been cut out of it, like the usual pattern in the scrapbook. It also struck her that, unlike the others, this one was not from a local newspaper, but was from the Georgia Gazette. Spreading it out on the coffee table, she began to scan the pages, wondering what was relevant. Just as she smoothed the paper out to get a better view, Charlie woke.

  ‘Sorry, can’t believe I dozed off. Have I been asleep long?’ He stretched and then rubbed his face. ‘Not very good manners falling asleep in front of a guest.’

  ‘Don’t worry, you obviously needed it.’

  ‘What have you got there?’

  ‘Just something I found in the scrapbook, only it wasn’t pasted in like all the other stuff, like the photos of you and your football exploits.’

  Charlie smiled. ‘I didn’t give you it for that, I can assure you.’

  ‘Oh, aye. You just wanted me to know what a local hero you were, I know.’

  Charlie smiled. ‘I didn’t even know she’d kept that stuff.’

  ‘Angela was obviously a proud big sister, but I can’t quite work out what this double page spread is about. There’s lots of articles.’ Annie smoothed the pages in front of her.

  ‘Is that the Westford paper?’ Charlie glanced across.

  ‘No, the Georgia Gazette.’

  Charlie got up and came and sat down beside Annie. ‘Let’s have a look. She was stationed in Georgia when she enlisted at eighteen.’

  Charlie and Annie scanned the two-page spread together and in the bottom half of the second page, an article struck her first.

  SECOND LIEUTENANT FACES CHARGES IN COURT MARTIAL

  ‘Charlie, what about this?’ Annie started to read the article out loud:

  A court martial heard evidence today against Second Lieutenant John Hardman relating to the stalking of a Private in his company. The Private, a new recruit having completed basic training and pursuing her nurse training alleged that the Lieutenant had started to stalk her after she spurned his advances. He then subjected her to months of harassment, including leaving her scores of messages on her phone and accessing her quarters and leaving gifts for her. When she tried to complain, her Sergeant didn’t believe her. If it hadn’t been for her own persistence and that of a fellow colleague who was able to gather irrefutable evidence, the case might never have gone to court. That and the fact that his ultimate act of stalking was to
rape her just prior to their deployment to Germany.

  The Commanding Officer, who heard the case ruled that all charges were upheld and that the Second Lieutenant should be dishonourably discharged and should serve a minimum of ten years in a military prison for the torment he had subjected the Private to over a number of months. Her name has not been released nor that of her main witness.

  Annie looked across at Charlie as she finished the article. His face was ashen.

  ‘My God, I’ve never seen this before. Angie was a Private. She left before her two years were up, which is really unusual. She always said that it was because mum was ill and she needed to help her with me, but what if?’

  ‘What if this is Angela in the article and what if the witness was Carol Wojinski? Charlie I need to show you this. I found it in the kitchen on the cork board.’ Annie passed the Christmas card to Charlie.

  He read the words and looked up at her. ‘Gus said that they knew each other in the service. We need to know if he knows anything about this article, don’t we?’

  ‘Charlie, how far is it to Springfield? Would it be better if we went to see him tomorrow? The guy is still in a state of shock and he doesn’t know about Angie. I might have to contact the detective in charge of his wife’s case, if he can give us anything to go on.’

  ‘I could call him back, what do you think?’

  ‘Let me ring Bronski first and see what he advises. He could start getting a trace on the guy in this article. It may be nothing, but I just feel that this article is significant.’

  70

  He answered on the second ring.

  ‘That wasn’t what I wanted to hear.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘I’ll have to think this out.’

  ‘Don’t take too long, this needs to be finished.’

  ‘And I don’t know that?’

  ‘I know, I’m sorry.’

  ‘Have you sorted out the rest of it?’

  ‘Of course, you told me to do that, and I always do what I’m told.’

  ‘I know, this time I’m sorry.’

  He clicked the cellphone off and deleted the number from the call register.

  71

  They were up very early the next morning, neither of them having slept well. Annie had stayed up an hour after Charlie, still sifting through the rest of the scrapbook and some more of the diaries. But the diaries with the relevant years of Angela’s army service appeared to be missing.

  It was a lovely summer morning, the sun already shining and no hint of a breeze. The humidity was still a couple of hours away. ‘So how long will it take to get to Gus’s?’

  ‘I guess about an hour or so, depending on the traffic. If I’ve timed this right, we’ll miss the rush hour at this end at least. If we get there too early, then we’ll stop somewhere for coffee.’

  Annie would be ready for a coffee by then. Waiting for an opportune moment, Annie continued. ‘Charlie, last night I finished off the scrapbook.’

  ‘Anything else relevant?’

  ‘No, but I also flicked through some diaries again. We seem to be missing the two years that she was in the army. Do you think those diaries could be somewhere else?’

  Charlie was thoughtful for a moment. ‘That’s strange, but now that you mention it, when we went up to the attic the other night I had a feeling that the trunk had been opened not long ago. I thought it was my imagination, but now that I think about it.’

  Signalling right, he turned on to the highway and increased his speed. Annie waited sensing that he wanted to say something else. ‘Hey, do you think her attacker knew about the diaries? Only if it was that guy from the article ...’

  ‘It’s a possibility. He may have got her to hand them over, but let’s be careful not to get ahead of ourselves here. We still have a long way to go on this …’

  Before Annie could finish her sentence, her cellphone rang.

  ‘Where are you now?’ Bronski asked.

  Annie fed back Charlie’s description of the route numbers. They made sense to Bronski, but Annie had never travelled in a car out of Westford before, so they meant nothing to her.

  ‘I’ve got Ellison working with the Department of Defense, trying to get more information about the guy in the article. They’re being really cagey, so if you can get anything more substantial from Gus Wojinski, especially if he can verify the story is relevant, then we can push a bit harder. Also I spoke to Detective Malin. He’s going to meet you at the house. Said he’d let Mr Wojinski know he was coming.’

  ‘Good, we need some luck. Let’s just hope this leads us somewhere.’

  ‘I’m here all day, keep in touch.’

  An hour later, they found themselves on a tree-lined street. Nice neighbourhood, Annie thought, the sort of place where you’d feel safe. Gus Wojinski and his late wife lived in a red Cape Cod. At least that was the description Charlie gave her of the house type. The lawns outside had been carefully tended, but the summer sun and lack of rain had started to dry them out and some patches were turning brown. Annie imagined that the state of his lawns was probably the last thing on Gus Wojinski’s mind right now.

  Although they were about ten minutes early, as the car pulled up, Gus appeared at the screen door. He opened it as Charlie and Annie got out of the car and walked down the path to greet them. Annie was struck by his composure, but on the other hand suspected that he might only just be holding it together. Back in the house, he led them into the kitchen, where he had poured out glasses of fresh orange juice.

  ‘So what can I help you folks with? I wasn’t really sure after your phone call.’

  Charlie looked at Annie, not sure who was taking the lead. Annie nodded for him to make a start.

  ‘Gus, we know this is an awful time for you. I never met your wife. I was only a kid when my sister was in the army and met your wife there.’

  ‘You’ll have to excuse me, I can’t seem to hold it together for very long’. Gus wiped a tear away. ‘Carol enlisted straight from school: always said that a career in the army had been her dream. I think Angela joined around the same time, I know they met nearly right away.’ He paused for a moment to drink some of his juice and Annie noticed that his hand was shaking as he lifted the glass. Neither she nor Charlie interrupted.

  ‘They were inseparable, as much as you can be. Carol always used to say that Angie was the sister she never had.’ His voice choked for a minute. ‘But something happened. Carol told me parts over the years, never the whole story all at once.’

  This was starting to confirm what Annie had suspected, but had never clearly formulated. ‘Anything you can tell us would be a great help.’

  ‘You have to remember that I am going on snippets told at different times, and I never met Angela myself. I sensed that most of the time it seemed like a painful thing for Carol to discuss so I never pushed it. But what I understand is that Angela started a relationship with one of the officers, I don’t know what his name was or even his rank.’ Gus hesitated.

  ‘That’s OK, just tell us what you know,’ said Charlie.

  ‘I guess Carol tried to tell her it wasn’t a good idea, and I think at first it put some strain on their friendship, so Carol had to back off. As I said, as I understand it, Angela was really attracted to this guy, at least at first.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Annie came in a bit more abruptly than she intended.

  ‘Apparently quite quickly, Angela realised that it was only an infatuation, and that there were things about him she didn’t like. She tried to break it off but he wouldn’t have it. Carol said that it started to get quite scary. That’s when the two of them got close again. Angela needed her support. It seemed that everywhere they went, this guy would just turn up. Angela had gotten so she wouldn’t leave the base on her own. S
o if Carol was on duty, Angela stayed in the barracks, but that didn’t stop him.’

  Gus shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

  ‘Gus, I appreciate that this is difficult for you, but we really need to know,’ said Annie.

  After another drink of his juice, he continued. ‘Carol said that he would get the master key and let himself into Angela’s room while she was sleeping. Sometimes she would wake up and he would be there, just looking at her. The first time it frightened her to death, but he promised he wouldn’t do it again. I guess just the thought of it affected Angela and her work started to slip, because she was too frightened to sleep. She never told anyone, apart from Carol, what was happening.’

  ‘That must have been difficult for your wife, seeing her friend going through that and knowing that a fellow soldier was the cause of it.’

  ‘That was the part that she found the hardest, but neither did she want to breach her friend’s confidentiality, that and the fact that he never kept his promises and kept letting himself in. Sometimes Angela would wake in a fright to see her door just closing and then she knew he had been there again. Carol started to notice that Angela was becoming obsessive about showering and would scrub her skin until it was nearly raw. I remember her saying that this one time, her skin was really sore and then they were out on exercises and it was really hot and Angela got sunstroke. She was confined to the hospital wing for a couple of nights and the nurses asked her about the skin problems, but Angela wouldn’t say anything.’

  Gus hesitated and stared at Charlie. ‘I’m sorry, this must be hard for you, hearing all this about your sister, and especially being an officer yourself.’