Take the Bait

by S. W. Hubbard

  Frank sat in silence for the rest of the trip down the dirt track. As they finally turned onto the paved road, he said, “Asshole.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “That fraud, Pablo. I’d like to roust him out of that stupid compound of his just to wipe the smirk off his face. But if his story checks out, we can’t even charge him with anything.”

  The hint of a smile played over Meyerson’s stony features. “Maybe no criminal charges, but we might be able to make it a little difficult for him to stay the guru-in-chief.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Oh, I just happened to notice a few things that other branches of the government might be interested in. Like Pablo’s outhouses seemed kinda close to that little stream. Human waste contaminating a watershed preserve area—the Department of Environmental Protection tends to frown on that. And then that wood-burning stove didn’t seem to be properly vented, did you think?”

  “I believe you’re right, Lew,” Frank agreed. “That would be a building code violation. And certainly driving a car with the rear window obscured with books could result in a person receiving a citation. And speaking of those books, does Pablo strike you as the type of fellow who would report to the IRS any profits made from the sale of books?”

  “He may not be diligent in that regard.” Lew smiled serenely. “Funny how one little problem can lead to another, isn’t it? Yes, I think our man Pablo may be in for an unfortunate run of bad luck.”

  “Pity.”

  23

  MINUTES AFTER A PLEA for information was broadcast on the Tuesday evening news, a truck driver called to report that he had picked up a young woman a quarter mile from the spot where the dirt road to the compound joined the main road very early Sunday morning. He had driven Janelle as far as a truck stop near the entrance to the Northway, where he left her with five dollars.

  A waitress at the diner confirmed that the driver had departed without Janelle. She had noticed the girl making a phone call, then hanging around outside. When she had looked out again after the lunch rush, the girl had gone. Try as he might, Frank couldn’t prod her to remember how or with whom Janelle had left.

  He left state police headquarters at noon on Wednesday, with nothing to show for his efforts but a splitting headache and a sheaf of printouts from the phone company listing every number that had been dialed from the diner’s two pay phones. When he got back to his office in Trout Run, Earl was waiting for him.

  “Mrs. Guttfreund called again. She wants to know if you found out who was tailgating her on Sunday.”

  “Oh, let me see…Sunday, Sunday…wasn’t that when I was interrogating that poor hiker? And why didn’t I do it on Monday? Oh, could that’ve been when I was getting my ass chewed out by the Council? Tuesday I was discovering that I just missed finding Janelle at the compound. And this morning, well, I’ve just been sitting around scratching my butt, haven’t I?”

  Earl, uncertain whether to be amused or wounded, simply said, “It’s the third time she’s called.”

  Frank flung the phone reports on his desk, where they narrowly missed upsetting a two-day-old Styrofoam cup of coffee. “I tell you what, Earl. Why don’t you take over the Guttfreund investigation. You’re always wanting to be in charge of something—here’s your big chance.”

  Earl said nothing, intuitively sensing that this was the best way to preserve what little dignity remained to him. He went over to his desk, and in a few moments, Frank could hear the strident tones of Mrs. Guttfreund’s voice floating across the office from the receiver of Earl’s phone.

  As he stared at the list of phone numbers, Frank assuaged his guilt by telling himself it was really time that Earl showed a little more initiative. Suddenly, a number on the list leaped out at him—it had the same exchange as every number in Trout Run. Quickly, he dialed it.

  “Hello,” a man’s voice answered on the second ring.

  “Jack?”

  “Yeah, who’s this?”

  Frank recovered from his shock and identified himself. “Janelle called you Sunday morning. Why didn’t you say something?”

  “What the hell are you talking about? Janelle didn’t call me!”

  “I have a telephone report here that shows a call from the diner where she was last seen, to this number. Could Dorothy have answered?”

  “Right, and then it just slipped my sister’s mind that Janelle called? No, she must have got the answering machine and not left a message. I only bought the thing since she’s been gone.”

  “The call lasted two minutes, Jack. That’s too long for someone to just listen to your greeting, then hang up.”

  “What are you insinuating? That I talked to her and told her to stay away?

  “Maybe Clyde was right after all. You’ve gone off the deep end. You have your own ideas and you just twist the facts to fit them. If Janelle called me once, she’ll call again, and this time I’ll make sure she doesn’t get some stupid machine. I’m just going to sit here by the phone and wait. Now don’t call me again and tie up the line.”

  Frank sat studying the receiver after the line went dead. Earl watched from his desk, waiting expectantly to be filled in on the latest development. Instead, Frank immediately dialed Meyerson.

  “Lou? Frank here. Hey, tell me what you make of this. Janelle made a two-minute call to her father Sunday from the diner, and he denies ever getting it.” He beat his pen against a notepad, listening intently. “All right, I’ll hold.”

  Frank’s eyes were fixed on the Idaho-shaped water stain over the file cabinets as he pondered the significance of Jack’s lie. And it had to be a lie.

  Somewhere he heard a voice, but he was so lost in thought that it took several seconds to process the sounds into meaningful words. “What?” he asked Earl. “What was Janelle wearing? Jeans and a pink shirt. Why?”

  “Because Mrs. Guttfreund says the truck that was following her…”

  “What are you talking about, Earl? What’s Agnes Guttfreund got to do with what Janelle was wearing?”

  “Well, if you’d let me finish, I’d explain,” Earl said with an edge in his voice that was entirely unfamiliar to his boss.

  “Mrs. G. says a red pickup was tailgating her, then it passed her. A little later, she came around a bend and she saw the truck pulled over, and two people were starting off into the woods.”

  Forgetting that he had been waiting for Meyerson to come back on the line, Frank hung up the phone. “Jack Harvey drives a red pickup!”

  “No, it couldn’t have been Jack. Mrs. Guttfreund went on and on, calling the guy a young punk.”

  Dismissing this objection with a wave of his hand, Frank headed for the door. “Oh, Agnes is so old she thinks anyone under fifty is a young punk.”

  “No! Don’t you see?”

  The frustration in Earl’s voice brought Frank up short. He spun around to face his assistant and saw Earl recoil. “What is it, Earl? What don’t I see?”

  “I…I didn’t mean it like that. I just—”

  “It’s okay. Tell me…please.”

  “Tommy drives Jack’s truck sometimes. If Jack says he never got Janelle’s message, maybe it’s because Tommy answered the phone and talked to her.”

  Somewhere deep inside himself, Frank felt the coiled spring of anxiety unwind a few turns. This damn case was on its way to being solved. “Earl, I do believe you’re right,” he said as he reached for the phone. He paused before dialing and met Earl’s eye. “Absolutely right.”

  “Hello, Mrs. Guttfreund. Frank Bennett here. Just fine, ma’m, and you? Well that’s what I’m calling about. I just wanted to clarify something. When you passed the truck…when it had pulled off the road…can you describe the two people you saw go into the woods?” Frank held the receiver away from his ear as Mrs. Guttfreund’s tetchy voice boomed over the line.

  “It was dark and I just saw them from behind. If I’d recognized them I wouldn’t be asking you to trace the truck, now would I?”

&n
bsp; “No, I know you didn’t recognize them, ma’am, but I wonder if you noticed any details of their appearance. Height, clothing, hair color?” Frank listened, tapping a pencil. “Yes, ma’am, I understand. You certainly couldn’t take your eyes off the road. But would you say it was a boy and a girl?”

  “How should I know?” Mrs. Guttfreund had worked herself into a state of high umbrage. “Today the girls wear jeans and work boots and the boys have long hair. They all look the same.”

  Frank clenched the receiver and counseled himself to patience. “That certainly is true, ma’am, but maybe something about their size, their build…”

  “My night vision isn’t good. That’s why I don’t like driving late, even at dusk. All I can say is one was taller than the other, and they were both thin.”

  “Okay, Mrs. Guttfreund. That’s a help. We’ll get right on it.”

  “Do you know who was tailgating me?”

  “Yes, I think I do. I’ll take care of it, I promise.”

  “So Tommy was helping Janelle hide out in the woods, huh?” Earl asked as they went out to the car.

  “Maybe. Maybe not.”

  “But what else could it be?” Earl asked.

  “The other possibility is Tommy wants to be sure Janelle never comes home.”

  “You really think Tommy would hurt Janelle?”

  “I’m afraid he could.” Frank gunned the engine.

  “But Tommy’s her cousin,” Earl protested.

  Frank didn’t bother to answer. Earl turned his head and leaned against the passenger side window. Frank could see him blinking furiously. Discovering that Janelle was definitely still alive had boosted everyone’s morale; now he had taken that reassurance away.

  Frank felt the all-too-familiar stab of remorse. But Earl annoyed him. He thought being a cop meant strutting around with a gun on your hip, telling people what to do. He needed to find out that too often it meant finding out things about people that you just couldn’t believe were true, but were.

  They didn’t speak until Frank turned into the drive leading to Jack’s and Dorothy’s houses. “Don’t say anything about how we know Tommy and Janelle were together,” Frank warned as they walked up the steps to Dorothy’s front porch.

  Frank’s insistent pounding brought Dorothy to the door, looking like a mole who had been flushed from her hole into unfamiliar daylight. She squinted up at Frank. “Jack’s home, you know. Maybe he didn’t hear you knocking.”

  “I didn’t come to talk to Jack. Where’s Tommy?”

  Instantly, her face contracted with fear. “Tommy? He’s…he’s…not home.”

  “Earl, go check the back bedrooms.” Sharing none of Meyerson’s concerns for civil liberties, Earl did as he was told.

  “What is it?” Dorothy asked, her voice quavering pathetically. Frank ignored her as he marched through the kitchen and headed down to the basement. “He just went camping for a few days with a friend,” she called down after him.

  When he got back to the living room, Earl was waiting. “He’s not back there. I checked the closets and everything.”

  “When’s the last time you saw him?” Frank asked.

  “I tried to tell you. He and Dennis Treve left for a camping trip on Snowshoe Mountain Monday morning. They had three days off school for teachers’ conferences. Why? What’s wrong?”

  “Was Tommy driving Jack’s truck Sunday evening?”

  “Well, I suppose he could’ve been. Jack and I went to dinner at Malone’s in my car. Tom didn’t want to come. Said he had to get ready for his trip. Maybe he took the truck to go to the Store or something. Why? Was there an accident?”

  “When do you expect him back?”

  “Well, tonight sometime. He didn’t really say—you know how boys are…” Her voice trailed off.

  “Is this his hat?” Frank picked up a dirty Yankees cap from a small table by the door. When Dorothy nodded, Frank shoved it in his pocket and left without any further explanation. Dorothy stood in the doorway and watched them drive off.

  “Do you think it could have been Dennis that Mrs. G. saw go into the woods with Tommy?” Earl asked.

  “It’s easy enough to check—we’ll go over to the Treves’ right now. But even if it was Dennis, there’s something mighty convenient about the timing of this campout.” Frank thumped the steering wheel. “I should have pressured Tommy more, right from the start. I should have taken him into custody until he told me what was going on with those animals.”

  A brief conversation with Mrs. Treve confirmed that Dennis had indeed been away since Monday morning, when her husband had dropped them off at the Snowshoe trailhead.

  “What about Sunday evening? Was Dennis with Tommy then?”

  A hard-faced woman with two toddlers clinging to her fat legs, Mrs. Treve did not seem particularly concerned with the whereabouts of her eldest. “How should I know? He’s eighteen. He comes and goes as he pleases.”

  “When’s he due back?” Frank asked.

  “He has school on Thursday. He better be home by then.”

  “Are we just going to wait ’til Tommy and Dennis come home?” Earl asked once they were back in the car.

  “No way. I’m done with waiting. We’ll go back to the office and I’ll call the park service to send some rangers and a dog over to meet us at the Snowshoe trailhead. You fill up our water bottles and get some sandwiches to put in the packs. We’ll need food if we’re going to search from now ’til sundown.

  “And Earl,” Frank called when he was halfway through the door. “Pack some hand shovels.”

  At three, Frank and Earl met three young rangers from the park service at the spot where Agnes Guttfreund had seen Tommy and his companion enter the woods. The trail that led up Snowshoe from Route 51 was a steep one. The rangers had brought walkie-talkies, and gave one to Earl. Frank eyed their medium-size, shaggy dog skeptically. “That doesn’t look like a trained bloodhound to me.”

  “Sam’s a very good tracker,” a young ranger with the name tag RUSTY claimed.

  Frank scowled. He found it hard to take a man with bright red hair and freckles seriously. “All right, you and the dog come with Earl and me.” Frank nodded toward the two older rangers. “You two cover the north side of the trail. Get way off the trail and bushwhack. Look for signs of their campsites. Radio us if you find them.”

  Frank watched dubiously as Rusty showed the dog Tommy’s hat and discussed it with him earnestly. Sam set off ahead of them, nose to the ground, guided by something only he could smell.

  The dense shade of the trees made the day seem pleasantly cool, but as soon as they started climbing the exertion quickly drenched them with sweat. This in turn attracted the scourge of the Adirondacks, vicious little blackflies that made mosquitoes seem compassionate by comparison. The men crashed through overgrown parts of the trail, wiping the stinging sweat from their eyes and swatting furiously at the carnivorous insects.

  The dog never hesitated, only occasionally veering off the trail, then returning to continue the progressively more vertical ascent.

  After two hours of searching, they paused to rest and eat. Sitting on a flat rock, Frank surveyed the woods they had just walked through. At this elevation the trees were mostly white oak and birch. The woods were very still. The only sound was that of water in a little stream rushing headlong down the mountain to join Stony Brook. Frank found it hard to reconcile the beauty surrounding him with what he believed he would soon find: Janelle hiding out in the woods because she was somehow involved in Tommy’s animal murders; or Janelle dead, her cousin’s victim.

  Try as he might, he couldn’t imagine a happy ending to this whole sorry mess. But he did know one thing—he couldn’t bear to be out here for one more day. The need to find Janelle, to have the whole thing resolved one way or the other, infused him with a rush of energy.

  “Let’s go!” Frank bounded up from his seat and set off again with renewed determination. But after another two hours of trudging uphill
, down, and back up again, blindly following that silly dog, Frank felt the seedling of despair growing. “Are you sure this dog is really following Tommy’s trail? How do you know he’s not just tracking a squirrel or something?”

  “He’s never lost the scent,” Rusty reassured them. “We’re on the right track.”

  Now the only way Frank could force himself to go on was by picking out a certain tree or rock and swearing he would not lift his eyes from the ground again until he reached it. He dragged himself up a steep outcropping of rock and practically stepped on Sam, who lay panting in the middle of the trail.

  “Well, Rusty, it looks like your dog’s pulling a work stoppage,” Earl said. “Guess he’s not going any farther ’til he gets a dog biscuit.”

  Frank was in no mood for jokes. “C’mon, Rusty, get that mutt moving again.”

  Rusty looked worried. “I think he’s lost the trail. Maybe it picks up again on the other side of that stream. C’mon, Sam.”

  The dog followed his handler dutifully through the water, but soon sat down. Rusty led him off to the other side of the trail, but Sam stubbornly returned to the trail, where he plopped down again.

  “This is it,” Rusty said. “This is as far as Tommy came.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous!” Frank snapped. “There’s no sign that they camped here. It’s too steep to even pitch a tent. I suppose you think Tommy just jumped off the side of this mountain.”

  “He must have gone back down the way he came up,” Rusty said.

  “He just hiked to this particular spot, turned around, and went back. Okay, I think I’ve had all the help I can take from the park service. We’ll get some state troopers in here tomorrow and do this search right.”

  Earl warned that they had better start working their way back down the mountain if they wanted to be back at their cars by dusk. He checked in with the other team by radio. They too had found nothing, and agreed to head back.

  Rusty, who was used to long hours of hiking, soon drew far ahead of Frank and Earl. Although the trip down the mountain was easier on the lungs and heart, it required strength to brace your legs against the steep descent. They struggled along slowly, concentrating on getting back to the trailhead. The dog ran back and forth between them, taking circuitous routes under bushes and down into gullies. Sometimes they would lose sight of him, but they could always hear him barking. Then he would tear back into view and sit below them on the trail, waiting.