Riders Down

by John McEvoy

  It wasn’t until they’d sped through Fennimore and crossed the Mississippi River at Prairie du Chien and turned north on Highway 26 that Bledsoe reached over the front seat and handed Ottmar Liebert’s “Nouveau Flamenco” tape to Vera. “My turn for music now,” he said, and Vera didn’t argue. She was in a great mood.

  They were all feeling good on this early autumn afternoon, the beginning of what Bledsoe had described to Vera and Jimbo as an “adventure weekend.” He’d presented the idea to them two nights earlier when they’d met for drinks at Doherty’s Den.

  “Partners,” Bledsoe said, leaning forward from his side of the booth, gray eyes intense, “I think we deserve a little break. We’ve been under a lot of pressure. But with three major scores behind us, it’s time to start enjoying some of this money. In moderation, mind you,” he emphasized. “We don’t want any big splash, any flashing a lot of cash around. That’s what leads to most of the jerks who get caught getting caught. There’ll be plenty of time to spend this over the next few years, just as we agreed. Even if the money wasn’t actually stolen, there’s no percentage in drawing any attention to ourselves. But,” he added expansively, “I think we can start putting a little of it to some fun use. What do you say?”

  Jimbo and Vera raised their bottles of beer in agreement. Although Vera was aware that her definition of “fun” was for the most part quite distinct from Bledsoe’s, she responded enthusiastically. “Hear, hear,” Vera said. “I’m ready for something different. We both are,” she said, jabbing Jimbo in the side with her elbow. “What’ve you got in mind, Claude?”

  Bledsoe reached into his jacket and extracted a four-color brochure extolling the merits of a houseboat shown moored on the bank of the Mississippi. The brochure came from Crandall’s Houseboat Rentals in little Lansing, Iowa, almost one hundred miles straight west of Madison. Crandall’s was a firm with nearly forty years of experience providing, as the brochure cover claimed, “vacations of a lifetime.”

  As Vera and Jimbo began to read the brochure, Bledsoe looked up when the front door of the bar opened and said, “Oh, Christ. Here comes Son of the Morning Star.”

  Vera, puzzled, said “Who?” as a paunchy, elderly man approached their booth, wearing western boots and hat, replicated blue U. S. Cavalry pants, and a buckskin jacket. His long white hair hung to the shoulders of his fringed buckskin shirt. .“Hello, professor,” Bledsoe said, forcing a smile. “Don’t tell me I’ve missed another deadline.”

  Professor Karl Brookings threw his head back and laughed loudly, causing some of the drinkers at the bar to turn and look. “Claude,” he said, “we go back a good ways, do we not? So, I know very well that you know you owe me your paper on the history of the Crazy Horse monument. You don’t want to jeopardize that ‘A’ you have working, do you?” He laughed again.

  Bledsoe said, “Of course not. I’ll have it for you by tomorrow morning. Sorry it’s late, but I’ve been very busy lately.”

  “I look forward to reading it,” Brookings said. He nodded at Jimbo and Vera. The buckskin fringe of his jacket flounced as he moved off, lugging his laden briefcase in one hand, waving with the other to some graduate students he recognized at a table next to the back wall. He was warmly welcomed there.

  “What’s that getup for? What’s his story?” Jimbo said.

  Bledsoe said, “He was once the university’s top scholar on nineteenth-century western American history. But in recent years he’s turned into a delusional blowhard. He’s gotten so deep into his subject he’s started to role play. He’s an expert on Custer and Little Big Horn. Last few years, he’s begun to dress the part. Tenure keeps him on the faculty. A lot of people make fun of him. Some don’t,” he said, indicating the back table where the professor sat holding forth for the circle of youthful sycophants.

  Bledsoe sipped his beer as Vera and Jimbo pored over the houseboat brochure. After a few minutes, he said, “I thought we could drive over there Friday morning. Go out on the boat that day and Saturday, then return it Sunday afternoon and drive home. I called Crandall’s Rentals yesterday. The lady who runs the business said they’d had a cancellation for this weekend. On that model there,” he added, reaching across the table to indicate a craft called the Somerset Belle. “It’s the standard ten-passenger model, smallest of the three models they have, but it’ll give us plenty of room. Two queen size beds, a sofa, kitchen, air-conditioning, TV, microwave, you name it.”

  Jimbo said, “How big are these things?”

  “Says right here,” Vera answered, pointing at the pamphlet. “Fifteen feet by forty-eight. Engine’s a hundred and seventy horsepower. Cabin’s thirteen by thirty-one. That’s nice and roomy.”

  “Right,” Bledsoe agreed. “So we’ll easily be able to stay out of each other’s way. Besides, there’s a nice deck on top. You can fish from there, or sunbathe, or sleep, whatever. Either of you ever been on the Mississippi?”

  They shook their heads no. “Well, neither have I,” Bledsoe responded. “It’ll be an adventure for all of us. I’m told it is a great experience.”

  Vera looked enthusiastic at the prospect. Jimbo, however, was dubious. He said, “What is this boat going to run us? Got to be expensive. And who’s going to drive the damn thing? Hell, I’ve never been on anything like this.”

  Bledsoe laughed expansively. “Jimbo, my man, not to worry. First thing is that I’m paying for this rental. My treat, okay? A little reward for all the good work you and Vera have done. Lagniappe.”

  Jimbo interrupted to ask, “Lon who?”, but Bledsoe ignored him and continued. “As far as operating the boat, they have people there who give you instructions and take you out on a little practice run before they release the boat to you. People do it all the time. How hard can it be? This isn’t the Queen Mary II in the North Sea. Besides,” Bledsoe said before he drained his beer glass, “you should know by now that I’m a quick study.”

  ***

  They reached Lansing late Friday morning. Before proceeding to the houseboat headquarters, Jimbo pulled into the parking lot of an IGA supermarket. “We’ll buy the weekend provisions,” he announced, handing Vera a wad of cash. Jimbo fancied himself a master of the barbecue grill and had been delighted to learn that the houseboat came equipped with a small Weber. “I’ll handle all the cooking,” he had announced. Vera extracted their grocery list from her purse as she exited the car. “You two go ahead and shop,” Bledsoe said. He got out of the car and stretched as they entered the store. Then he quickly checked the trunk to make sure that the concrete blocks remained hidden from view.

  At the boat landing, Bledsoe went into the office to register. “Is cash okay?” he asked the woman at the desk. “We never refuse it,” Janet Crandall said with a smile. Bledsoe quickly filled out the customer questionnaire, using the phony Illinois address that appeared on the fake driver’s license he showed the woman. It had been created for Bledsoe by a Madison man, Dom Incarvino, who specialized in fake IDs for underage students determined to patronize the city’s numerous beer bars. The license identified Bledsoe as Bob Remsberg of Bannockburn, IL.

  Two hours later they were proceeding slowly north on the broad, brown expanse of the upper Mississippi, a breeze in their faces, sun high in a nearly cloudless blue sky. Bledsoe was at the helm. He perched on the swivel chair behind the wheel, steering perfectly, as if he’d done it for years. Jimbo sat on a lawn chair on the little foredeck, just outside the door to the pilot house, drinking beer and waving merrily to passing boats. Vera was sunning herself up top. “This is pretty damn perfect,” Jimbo said for the third time in the last half-hour. “Another one of your best ideas, Claude.”

  “Thanks, man,” Bledsoe replied, eyes scanning the west bank of the river. Fifty minutes later he slowed the Mercruiser motor and began angling the prow of the houseboat toward a small, sandy beach. It was located on a slight bend in the river that was shaded by towering cottonwoods, perfect for a single boat whose passengers could dro
p two anchors, one in the river, the other planted in the sand on shore. “This looks like a good spot for the night,” Bledsoe said. “Gives us some privacy. Jimbo,” he ordered, “get Vera down here so she can help you with the anchors. I’ve got to keep the boat steady while you’re dropping them.”

  “Aye, aye, captain,” Jimbo grinned. He staggered momentarily after getting out of his chair. The afternoon sun, combined with a half-dozen cans of beer, had turned his skin a brighter shade of pink.

  With the boat secured, its prow nestled a few feet off the bank in shallow water, Vera jumped into the water for a swim. The men declared it cocktail hour as she floated in the warm water near the rear of the boat. Bledsoe took a gallon bottle of margarita mix from his duffel. He matched it up with a 750ml bottle of Jose Cuervo tequila and began mixing drinks. Vera came up the side ladder. Dripping water onto the deck, Vera said, “Hey, wait for me.” Her face was aglow in the late afternoon sun. Bledsoe thought he had never before seen this usually glum woman look so happy. He made two powerful drinks along with a light one for himself.

  An hour later, after she had drunkenly declared that eating dinner soon had become a “neshessity,” Vera began to unsteadily put together a salad as Jimbo, swearing, finally managed to ignite the charcoal in the grill. They then again toasted one another, their lucrative recent achievements, and the brilliance of their leader, who kept topping off their glasses while merely twirling the liquid in his own. Vera and Jimbo went on drinking steadily. She located a country station out of LaCrosse and bumped up the radio’s volume.

  Dusk had crept over the river along with a slight mist when Vera joined Jimbo next to the grill on the foredeck, helping to assess the readiness of the thick sirloins. “One more round to go with dinner,” Bledsoe called from the kitchen. He got no argument. All he heard was the two of them giggling amid the smoke. Jimbo had a long fork in one hand and Vera’s right buttock in the other.

  The light was dim where Bledsoe stood at the kitchen counter, well out of sight of the drunken twosome. He carefully placed a massive dose of “roofies,” the date rape drug, into each of their glasses, then vigorously stirred the drinks, which by now were almost all tequila. He’d done his research: Rohypnol, he’d learned, was undetectable, odorless, and capable of rendering its victims unconscious within minutes. He’d had no trouble purchasing a supply from one of the football players he tutored, although the young man had evidenced surprise that Bledsoe wanted the powerful drug “at your age.” Bledsoe had winked at him and pocketed the pills.

  Bledsoe brought their glasses to Jimbo and Vera, saying, “Go on and relax. You’ve been working hard on the grill. Let me finish cooking the steaks.” They raised their glasses in yet another joyful toast, drinking deeply. Bledsoe took the fork from an unresisting Jimbo. Vera went into the cabin and sat down unsteadily on the sofa. After he had come stumbling over the threshold, Jimbo plunked down next to her. They snuggled together before leaning back to rest their heads. Their voices dwindled.

  Bledsoe heard the first glass fall—Vera’s—onto the wood floor six minutes later. He looked in and saw she was unconscious, her head on Jimbo’s right shoulder. Jimbo was also out. His glass had dropped silently onto his lap, the liquid staining his khakis.

  Bledsoe extracted the three steaks from the grill and threw them into the river. He wasn’t hungry. Adrenaline was giving him a rush that dwarfed appetite. Placing the cover on the grill, he looked up and down the river before going inside. The only people in view were some college kids waterskiing in mid-channel, and they were soon out of sight.

  The sleeping bags he’d brought were new. He cut the tags off and placed them inside the now nearly empty tequila bottle, which he threw over the side. Then he stuffed Vera into the green one. She was deeply asleep. So was Jimbo. With an eye cocked toward Jimbo, Bledsoe slipped an airtight plastic bag over Vera’s head, twisting the bottom of it into a tight ball, rolling his wrist over to achieve complete closure. Vera seemed to gasp for an instant, perhaps trying to say something, but Bledsoe held tight, the muscles in his big forearms taut. As with Marnie Rankin, it took longer than Bledsoe would have thought, but it had to be done. “Had to be done,” he whispered, though there was no need to whisper at this point. Meticulous as ever, he checked twice for a pulse before turning to Jimbo. Jimbo took a little longer, even shaking for a few seconds before it was over, and Bledsoe had some trouble inserting his large, inert form into the black sleeping bag. Finally, he dragged the bodies into the passage between the bunk beds, pulled up both anchors, and started the engine.

  It took Bledsoe nearly forty-five minutes to drive the boat back to the now deserted marina. He hustled to his car and took two concrete blocks out of the trunk and brought them to the boat, then returned for the other two. He was pleasantly surprised that he could dock in such isolation this early on a Friday night. He’d been prepared to wait out on the river for things to quiet down. “Folks here must tuck in early,” he said to himself as he cast off again.

  With his excellent night vision, Bledsoe had little difficulty locating the kind of area he required, a narrow inlet nearly five miles down river from the marina on the west bank. He eased the boat thirty yards into a narrowing bayou and tied on to a huge gnarled stump on the shore. He nimbly jumped onto the muddy bank and began searching. Within minutes he had found a dozen sizable rocks, which he carried back to the boat.

  Kneeling in the bedroom passageway, Bledsoe shoved three of the concrete blocks and half the rocks into the sleeping bag that held Jimbo’s corpse, zipped the bag, then looped fiber tape around it from top to bottom. Halfway through this task, he suddenly grinned. “Jimbo, you big dummy, you look like a goddam mummy with this stuff on you.” The sound of his barking laugh rang through the night before he abruptly stopped, turning his attentions to Vera.

  It was nearly 2:45 a.m. before Bledsoe spotted a decent break in the river’s steady commercial traffic. He had waited patiently as the powerful lights of the towboats pierced the darkness for a mile ahead of the long barges they pushed, their lights sweeping both banks as well as the water, the barges linked in the wake of the mighty horn soundings that bounced off the tall bluffs flanking the river. When he finally saw a good-sized interval in the procession, he was quick to act. With his lights off, he headed the boat to midstream, then kicked Vera’s bag off the rear platform and into this deepest part of the dark water. The weight of the concrete blocks and the rocks sucked her under at once. Jimbo, a heavier package, caused Bledsoe to grunt as he dragged the bag to the rear. Then it, too, disappeared.

  As he started the boat’s engines, Bledsoe recalled an Ethics and Morality course he had taken three years earlier and his professor’s concentration on Hannah Arendt’s famous “banality of evil” concept. Bledsoe laughed softly, feeling an adrenaline surge much like those he’d enjoyed when he had shot down the three jockeys and suffocated Marnie Rankin. “God help me, which I doubt very much he will, but there’s nothing banal about this to me,” he said aloud as, heart thumping, he pushed down on the throttle and turned on the boat’s lights.

  Back at the marina, Bledsoe carefully pulled the boat into an empty slip far down the long dock from the office. After moving the luggage to his car, he spent ten minutes wiping down every surface in the boat. On a Crandall Rentals pad he printed a message, explaining that a call to his cell phone had notified him of “an emergency situation back home,” forcing “my brother and his wife and I to cut short our river weekend. We’ll try to get back next year,” he wrote above the signature, “Bob Remsberg.” Using a paper clip, he attached to the note what he knew was more than enough cash to cover the gasoline costs incurred. Bledsoe shoved the note and the keys to the boat through the mail slot in the office door.

  Three hours later, nearing Madison, Bledsoe’s feeling of fatigue was replaced by another surge of energy. Spotting a half-filled dumpster at the edge of a small shopping mall’s parking lot, he stopped and deposited Jimbo’s old gy
m bag and Vera’s pink suitcase under a pile of refuse. Then he drove to their apartment on Dahle Street. Using the key he’d taken from Jimbo’s chain, he slipped into the apartment. He went directly to the bedroom with its ancient closet safe set into the floor, a feature of the apartment Jimbo had often bragged about. The first combination he tried was a string of numbers made up of Jimbo’s date of birth. It didn’t work. Then he tried Vera’s. The safe door creaked open, revealing the nearly $264,000 they’d foolishly entrusted to this obvious hiding place “just like the idiots they were,” Bledsoe muttered.

  “I’m over the top. I’m over the fucking top,” he said loudly, stuffing their cash into his duffel bag. He couldn’t help but laugh as he envisioned the delicious moment, now only nine days away, when he would stride into Altman’s office and dump a million dollars on the incredulous attorney’s desk.

  Back in his car, Bledsoe sat for a few moments, head back against the seat. He felt drained. I’ll sleep well tonight, he thought, but then I always do.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Friday noon, Matt got a phone call from Moe, who said, “Want to go to the Bears game Sunday night? It’s only a pre-season game, but it’s supposed to be a nice night. And you could stand to take a little time away from the horses. Besides, if it’s any consolation, they’re playing the Colts. By the way, you’re welcome to bring your Maggie. I’d like to meet her.” The two men hadn’t spoken since Matt had reported to Moe what he’d learned from Andrea Greco in Madison.

  “Well, you’ll just have to settle for me,” Matt said. “Maggie’ll be out of town. She’s running a horse Sunday night in a little stakes race down at Devon Downs. She won’t be back until Monday. Where will I meet you?”

  “I’ll have Pete Dunleavy pick you up at your condo at five. We’ll do a little tailgating before the game.”

  ***