Dog Eat Dog

by David Rosenfelt

  Laurie has dealt with people like McCaskill in her former police-officer life, and she just relies on her training. And her smarts. And her gun, if necessary. I rely on my wits, which is to say I am unarmed.

  But that she’s not nervous doesn’t mean she isn’t careful. We lay out exactly how we will approach McCaskill, verbally as well as physically. We talk about what we want to find out, and how we will go about accomplishing our goal.

  It is extremely unlikely that this effort will help in Matt Jantzen’s defense. But I see no possibility it will be counterproductive, so it is worth a try.

  We are going to play to our strengths, meaning that I will be doing most of the talking, and she will be doing all of the protecting. We go over it one more time on the way there, but adjustments will have to be made, depending on what McCaskill has to say.

  We pull up about three doors down from McCaskill’s house. That is so that he will have less time to see us coming. We’d like to surprise him to the degree that we can.

  As we get out of the car, I take one last look at my phone. Laurie sees me doing that and asks, “Still no word from Corey and Marcus?”

  “No.”

  I’m surprised that we haven’t heard from them; they should have gotten to Vermont quite a while ago. I’m not terribly worried, and I doubt that Laurie is either. Corey is capable of handling himself, and with Marcus by his side, I would be confident if they were invading North Korea.

  McCaskill’s car is in the driveway, a sign that he is home. Another good sign is that we can hear music coming from inside the house. He plays his music loudly; I can’t make out what it is, but it’s a good bet it’s not a show tune.

  I ring the bell, but McCaskill doesn’t answer, possibly because of the music. Another ring gets a similar lack of response. I’m willing to abort and go home, but Laurie is of a different mind, and she pounds on the door.

  No answer.

  Laurie doesn’t give up easily. Without saying anything, she walks down the steps and into the driveway, looking in windows along the way. I sure as hell don’t want to be alone on the porch if McCaskill finally opens the door, so I follow her.

  She’s near the back of the house and I’m about twenty feet behind when she calls out, “Andy.”

  As I get closer, I see that her gun is drawn and she is scanning the area. Finally I am close enough to see what she sees. The back door to the house is open and McCaskill is lying prone, half in and half out of the doorway, his back covered in blood.

  Laurie has her phone out and is talking into it. “I want to report a shooting.” She provides the address and her name. “I believe deceased, but I am about to confirm that.… Yes, we are at the scene. Please alert the officers that I am a licensed private investigator carrying a weapon.… We will remain here.”

  The only words I am able to get out at the moment are “Holy shit.”

  It takes four hours for Laurie and me to get back to the hotel.

  The police at the scene took their time with us, questioning us separately and then getting us to make our written statements.

  We’d probably still be there had not Agent Nichols arrived on the scene, more evidence that the FBI is interested in McCaskill and the operations of the group to which he belonged.

  Nichols vouched for us to the cops, which hastened our departure. But before we left, he said, “We had an information-sharing agreement.”

  “You must be kidding,” I said. “We haven’t heard a word from you.”

  “I have nothing of interest to your case. But you’re apparently very involved in mine.”

  “I do have one news flash for you, actually. McCaskill is dead.”

  “Don’t mess with me, Carpenter.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it. But I may have something for you tomorrow.”

  “What? There’s an urgency to this, Carpenter.”

  “Tomorrow. If I have something, I will call you.”

  Three messages are on each of our phones from Corey, telling us to call him so that we can meet tonight. He has a lot to tell us and wants to hear what happened on our end. We call and head back to the hotel, where he, Marcus, and Sam are waiting for us.

  Laurie and I describe the fun evening we had. After we do so, Laurie says, “My guess is that McCaskill knew his killer and did not consider him a threat until it was too late.”

  “Why?” I ask, since she hadn’t mentioned that earlier.

  “Because there was no sign of forced entry at the front door, and I didn’t see any open windows, at least on the side we were on. There is a nearby neighbor on the other side, so if the killer was going to come through a window, it would have been where we were.

  “Unlikely that he came in the back door, because McCaskill was running out that way. He wouldn’t have been running towards the killer.”

  When we’re done, Corey describes his and Marcus’s time in Vermont, which makes our evening sound like a fun walk in the park.

  When they’re done, Laurie asks, “What’s your sense of it?”

  “I think it was more of a home base rather than anything else. I doubt they were doing anything there other than biding their time and waiting, though I don’t know what they were waiting for.”

  “So you saw four guys, including the one Marcus decked?”

  “Yes, but there were likely others. There could have been more in the cabin, but there were almost certainly more perimeter guards. That place could have been approached from all sides; it’s likely a number of guards each had their sector.

  “He was unlucky that you chose his area,” Laurie says.

  “I’m sorry we ran into him,” Corey says, “because now that they know they’ve been discovered, they’re going to leave. They might be gone already.”

  The general sense in the room is that we’re getting somewhere, a sense that I don’t share. I’m finding the whole thing a bit depressing.

  We discovered a dead militia guy, and Corey and Marcus discovered a bunch of live ones. It will give me a great story to tell Matt Jantzen when I go visiting him during his life prison sentence, but it does not give me a story to tell the jury.

  Sam has taken the digital photos that Corey shot and printed them out. The faces of the men are clear and distinct, but I don’t have the slightest idea who they are.

  “Please email them to Agent Nichols on my behalf. Ask him if these people mean anything to him.”

  “Will do,” Sam says.

  “Thanks. I’ve got an early court date in the morning, so Laurie and I are going to walk the dogs and go to bed.”

  I can see that Matt Jantzen is upset when Chris Myers takes the stand.

  I had told him that Myers was on Steinkamp’s witness list, but it is still upsetting to Matt to see a person he considers a friend testifying for the prosecution.

  “Mr. Myers, do you and the defendant know each other?”

  Myers nods. “Since we were little kids. Matt moved into our neighborhood when we were both five years old.”

  “And you went to school together?”

  “Yes, both grammar school and high school.”

  “Would you describe yourself as good friends?”

  Myers does not look at Matt; he hasn’t looked at him since sitting down, and I suspect that won’t change. “Until today, yes.”

  “You intend to tell the truth today, do you not?”

  “I do.”

  “When was the last time you saw the defendant, prior to today?”

  “About two years ago.”

  “Please describe your relationship back then.”

  Myers thinks for a bit. “We hung out together. I mean, we were part of a group, but we’d also do things just the two of us, or with one other person. You know, fishing, playing pickup basketball, that kind of stuff.”

  “What happened two years ago to change that?”

  “Well, for one thing, Matt left Maine.”

  “Did that take you by surprise?”

  “Sort of;
by then I knew that something was going on.”

  “What do you mean by that?” Steinkamp asks, as if he doesn’t already know.

  “He had been acting strangely, not himself. He still hung out sometimes, but he was like only half there.”

  “Did you ask him why?”

  Myers nods. “A bunch of times; I asked if I could help, but he just cut me off and said nothing was wrong. I mean, he had lost his mother not that long before, and his girlfriend broke up with him. Then another one of our friends, Carl Blanchard, died of cancer. I figured it was all of that, so I didn’t push him.”

  “Do you remember where you were the night of the murder?”

  “I can’t be sure, but we were probably at Parker’s … that’s a pub in Nobleboro. We went there a lot.”

  “Did you ever talk about the murders with the defendant?”

  “I’m sure I must have; it’s all anyone was talking about for a few days. And we knew Tina.”

  “You knew Tina Welker?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did the defendant know her?”

  “I can’t say for sure, but I would assume he did. She hung out with all of us sometimes.”

  “So two weeks after the murder he left Maine, where he had lived all his life?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did he ever say why?”

  “Not to me.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Myers.”

  I frown slightly as I stand, as if annoyed that I have to deal with this nonsense. “Mr. Myers, you said that Mr. Jantzen had lost his mother and a good friend?”

  “Yes.”

  “And his girlfriend broke up with him?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you were puzzled as to why he seemed out of sorts?”

  “Well, I figured it was all of that.”

  “Good figuring.”

  Steinkamp objects that I am badgering the witness. Judge Pressley sustains and admonishes me to be careful. They’re clearly touchy here in Maine.

  “You were close friends with Mr. Jantzen from the time you were five until two years ago?”

  “Yes.”

  “You did favors for each other, like friends do?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you ever bail him out of jail?”

  “No.”

  “To your knowledge, was he ever arrested?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Ever in a fight? Ever violent?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Did you ever see him with a handgun?”

  “No.”

  “Ever commit a robbery? A home invasion?”

  “Not to my knowledge.”

  “Ever worry that he would shoot somebody?”

  “No.”

  “You said that he might have known Tina Welker; did you ever hear them argue?”

  “No.”

  “Ever hear him say a bad word about her?”

  “No.”

  “Ever hear him say any word about her at all?”

  “Not that I remember.”

  “Thank you. No further questions.”

  I put on my annoyed frown as I head back to the defense table, this time coupling it with a slight, disapproving shake of the head. I am the De Niro of defense attorneys.

  Judge Pressley surprises me after lunch by announcing that she has important business to attend to, and she is adjourning court for the day.

  I’m not unhappy about it; the longer the trial takes, the more time for divine intervention to somehow give me a case to present to the jury.

  As Charlie and I are leaving, I see Agent Nichols standing in the rear of the courtroom, obviously waiting for me. “You and I have to talk.”

  I’m about to say something sarcastic and obnoxious, but based on Nichols’s face and tone, this is probably not the right time for it. Instead I say good-bye to Charlie and follow Nichols to his car, parked in a spot reserved for court personnel.

  Once we’re in the front seat, I ask, “Where are we going?”

  “Nowhere. We’re going to talk right here.”

  “Are you the important business that Judge Pressley had to attend to?”

  “Think of it as intergovernmental cooperation. You sent me photographs. I want to know everything there is to know about them, starting right now.”

  I can be intimidated and scared by a lot of things. Tough guys, guns, mice, spiders, and Laurie when she’s pissed at me are just some of them. But words are not on that list, no matter who is speaking them. If Cindy Spodek described me accurately, she would have told Nichols that, along with that I am a pain in the ass.

  “Sorry, that’s not how this is going to work,” I say.

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  “It means I have a client to defend. I won’t say that’s all I care about, but it is sure as hell in first position. So if you want to know what I know, then first you’ll tell me what the hell is going on.”

  “This has nothing whatsoever to do with your client.”

  “It turns out that the way this works is I’m the judge of what impacts my client. And he is accused of murdering someone knee-deep in the drug world and the world of people who hang out in the woods taking target practice, people who are obviously of intense interest to the FBI.

  “So you go first, Agent Nichols.… I’d bet that Cindy Spodek told you that at the end of the day I could be trusted. This is the time to put it to the test.”

  Nichols hesitates, as if trying to decide what to do. It’s all bullshit, and it’s not as good an acting performance as I put on in the courtroom. He and his people had to anticipate this situation and would have decided what to do.

  The good news for me is that they don’t have a choice.

  He takes a piece of paper out of his inside pocket and unfolds it. It’s one of the photos of the three men in Vermont that Sam emailed to him. He points to the man watching the other two shoot.

  “That’s Darrin Jeffrey.”

  Nichols is talking about the militia leader said to have been killed eighteen months ago. “He looks pretty lively for a dead guy.”

  “We never believed he was killed; the whole thing was a setup. But he effectively disappeared, until you somehow got a picture of him.”

  “Why is he so important to you?”

  “These groups have expanded exponentially because of social media. Some of them have gone from Second Amendment people who see themselves as fighting for freedom to full-blown loonies that see a conspiracy under every rock. Their ideology is causing damage to everyone and everything that doesn’t agree with their cause, even though they can’t agree on what the hell their cause of the day is.

  “It’s all done online in various forms. Some is out in the open, some on the dark web, some encrypted, but most not. Between the Bureau and all the other agencies under Homeland Security, we’ve got an army of people tracking it all.

  “A while back, more than two years ago, we started picking up some chatter about a major event that they were planning. We believe they are going to detonate a significant device; we don’t know exactly what kind of device or why they have waited so long. But they clearly consider it a game changer. One thing is certain: Darrin Jeffrey is at the center of it all.”

  “Did they kill McCaskill?”

  Nichols nods, then hesitates. “McCaskill was an FBI informant; or at least we believed that he was.”

  “He was good at it. When I questioned him, he threatened me.”

  “You’re easy to dislike.”

  “What do you mean you ‘believed that he was’?”

  “He was what they call in the movies a double agent. We learned that when you said he called Helms. He had not revealed a knowledge of Helms’s whereabouts to us. We were in the process of deciding what to do with him when he turned up dead.”

  “So you didn’t monitor his phone because you thought he was on your side. That’s why you didn’t know he was in contact with Helms.”

  “Right.”<
br />
  “But why would they kill him if he was on their side?”

  Nichols shrugs. “No way to be sure. Maybe they didn’t fully trust him, or maybe they were just cleaning up loose ends. It speaks to the urgency of this.”

  “Where did Peter Charkin fit in?”

  Nichols shrugs. “We don’t know, but he was part of the chatter; he was definitely involved. Once they decided they didn’t need him anymore, they got rid of him.”

  “And framed Matt Jantzen.”

  “I have no information to back that up, so I can’t help you in court.… Your turn.”

  I tell him that we had located Helms in Vermont, and he stops me. “How did you do that?”

  I’m not about to throw Sam under the bus, so I say, “Let’s just say that if you used our methods, you would have to get a warrant. We are, as you can imagine, desperate to tie Charkin to bad guys capable of murder, so two of my investigators went up there to see what they could find out. That’s how they got the photographs.”

  “You’ll show us where the place is.” It’s a statement, certainly not a question.

  “Absolutely; I can even give you the exact coordinates. But I’m afraid it will be of limited value to you.”

  “Why?”

  “Our investigators were discovered by a guard with a rifle. They dispatched him.”

  “He’s dead?”

  “No, but there’s no doubt it took him a while to wake up, and he’ll be drooling for the foreseeable future. I would assume that Jeffrey would have taken the event as a sign to abandon the location.”

  “Your investigators were stupid.”

  That annoys me. “Which part? The part where they prevented themselves from getting killed, or the part where they found somebody that you couldn’t find for eighteen months?”

  Nichols and I drive in our separate cars back to the hotel. I call ahead and have Corey waiting to give him the exact coordinates of the cabin in Vermont, and to describe the terrain and surrounding area.

  I go to our room to update Laurie, take the dogs for a walk, and think about what, if anything, this new knowledge does for our case.

  When it comes to murderous bad guys that Peter Charkin was involved with, we have an embarrassment of riches.