A Long December

by Richard Chizmar

  I was too exhausted to laugh, but I managed a smile. “Come back to bed, you nut.”

  She listened and crawled in next to me. I covered us with a blanket and we held onto each other in the dark.

  “It’s a mistake,” she whispered, and a short time later she was snoring again.

  She’s right, I thought to myself. It has to be.

  But then what was inside those body bags?

  Sleep was a long time coming.

  Wednesday, Dec 4

  We sat at the breakfast bar and watched the morning news on television in stunned silence, our food going cold on the plates in front of us.

  The story was everywhere. The announcers, with their oh-so-serious expressions and suitably grim tones of voice, had to work extra hard to keep their excitement in check. Every once in awhile, one of them would slip and you’d see the joy in their sparkling eyes or hear the glee in their giddy voices; they just couldn’t help it.

  The sound bites came at us one after the other:

  James Wilkinson, age 60, a fugitive…

  Charged with multiple counts of first-degree murder…

  Body parts from multiple victims discovered in his basement workshop…

  Authorities working to find out the victims’ identities…

  Multi-state manhunt under way…

  Their words expertly interwoven with the stark images:

  A close up of Jimmy’s house in the early morning light.

  A long panning shot showing a comfortable, middle class neighborhood, including our own home.

  Jimmy’s faculty headshot from the university, a bold black headline centered above it:

  LOCAL MAN POSSIBLE SERIAL KILLER?

  “Jesus, so now he’s a fucking serial killer,” Katy said, pushing her plate away in disgust and getting up from the bar stool.

  I gave her a minute, and then I followed her into the den where I found her standing in front of the fireplace, staring at the framed photographs on the mantle.

  I came up behind her and hugged her, resting my chin on her shoulder. She wrapped my arms in her own arms and squeezed. Neither of us said a word.

  There were three photos on the mantle: the first of Katy and I on our wedding day, youthful and smiling and scared to death; the second of two young boys, my brother and me, both of us bare-chested and tan and trying to look tough; and the third of Jimmy and Grant and me, standing on a pier somewhere in the Chesapeake Bay, each of us grinning like a fool and holding up a stringer full of rockfish.

  “I feel numb,” she finally said, breaking the silence.

  “Me too.”

  She took my hand in hers and turned around to face me. “Do you still think it’s all a mistake, Bobby?”

  I couldn’t read her expression. I didn’t know what she wanted to hear, so I just told her the truth. “I don’t know.”

  I used the remote control to open my garage door and warily drove out into the circus that had sprung up overnight.

  There were cops everywhere next door. Some still filing in and out of the house, while others searched the garage and the shed out back. Two officers were using what looked like metal detectors in the flower beds and on the back yard lawn. Another was busy doing something on the roof.

  Jimmy’s entire yard had been lined with yellow police tape, and two big tents had been erected in the side yard. More cops gathered in and around the tents doing God knows what. The usually quiet street out front was crammed with nosy neighbors and reporters and television cameras. More police officers stood in the road, doing their best to control the crowd and direct traffic.

  I slowly drifted down my driveway, trying to attract as little attention as possible, but as soon as the reporters noticed my car, they swarmed toward me in a hungry pack. Panicked, I sped up, trying to escape, but had to stomp on my brakes when I discovered a WBAL news van was blocking my exit. I started blowing my horn.

  Cameras and microphones slammed against my car windows. Frantic, sweaty faces pressed against the glass and screamed my name, machine-gunning questions at me:

  “Robert…!”

  “Did you have any idea?!”

  “Bob…!”

  “Do you know where he’s hiding?!”

  “Robert…!”

  “Did you know?!”

  “Bob…!”

  “You had to know something…!”

  “Robert…!”

  “C’mon, give us two minutes…”

  “What did you tell the police…?!”

  “C’mon, don’t be an asshole, Robert…”

  “You were his best friend, you had to know something…”

  A pair of baby-faced troopers finally arrived and corralled the reporters out of the driveway and away from my car. An older man with long, greasy hair climbed into the WBAL van and moved it out of my way.

  I nodded my thanks to the troopers, turned right out of the driveway—“You were his best friend, you had to know something…”—and headed for police headquarters.

  (TRANSCRIPT 17943C)—THE FOLLOWING TRANSCRIPT CONTAINS THE COMPLETE, UNEDITED INTERVIEW WITH WITNESS ROBERT JOSEPH HOWARD CONDUCTED ON DECEMBER 4, 2016. INTERVIEW CONDUCTED BY DETECTIVE LINDSAY ANDERSON (A3343). CORRESPONDING VIDEO FILES LABELED AS FILE 104A AND FILE 104B.

  DETECTIVE LINDSAY ANDERSON: State your name for the record please.

  ROBERT HOWARD: Bob…Robert Howard.

  DETECTIVE: Age?

  ROBERT: 49.

  DETECTIVE: Occupation?

  ROBERT: Regional Sales Manager at Stark Industries.

  DETECTIVE: Residence?

  ROBERT: 1920 Hanson Road, Edgewood, Maryland.

  DETECTIVE: Marital status?

  ROBERT: I’m married…to Katy Holt Howard. I don’t know if you wanted her name or not.

  DETECTIVE: That’s fine, Mr. Howard.

  ROBERT: Sorry. I’m a little nervous.

  DETECTIVE: I understand. I want to first thank you for coming in today under such unfortunate circumstances. We certainly appreciate your cooperation.

  ROBERT: You’re welcome.

  DETECTIVE: Do you have any children, Mr. Howard?

  ROBERT: A son. Grant. He’s a sophomore at Richmond University.

  DETECTIVE: You are currently acquainted with a Mr. James Lee Wilkinson?

  ROBERT: Yes…I am.

  DETECTIVE: And what is your relationship with Mr. Wilkinson?

  ROBERT: We’re friends. He lives next door to me. At 1922 Hanson Road.

  DETECTIVE: How long have you resided on Hanson Road?

  ROBERT: Let’s see…we bought the house in ’05…so it’ll be 12 years this spring.

  DETECTIVE: And when did Mr. Wilkinson move into the house next door?

  ROBERT: Oh, boy…I don’t remember exactly…my wife probably does…I would say somewhere around eight years ago. I know Grant was in middle school at the time.

  DETECTIVE: So Mr. Wilkinson moved into the residence at 1922 Hanson Road somewhere around 2008?

  ROBERT: That sounds about right.

  DETECTIVE: And that was the first time you had ever met Mr. Wilkinson? There was no prior relationship?

  ROBERT: That’s right. My wife and I met him on the day he moved in.

  DETECTIVE: What was your first impression of Mr. Wilkinson?

  ROBERT: He seemed like a real nice guy. Older and a little quiet at first. Maybe even a little shy, like he wasn’t used to being around people a lot.

  DETECTIVE: You say that he was older. Can you provide any other background information regarding Mr. Wilkinson?

  ROBERT: I know he was eleven years older than me and a widower. It felt like we didn’t have a lot in common at first…but that changed with time. Ummm, what else? He said he and his wife had never had any children; she wasn’t able to. She had died a few years before he moved to town. A heart attack in her sleep. He grew up in a small mill town in upstate New York; I can’t remember the name. Lived there until he joined the Army and then lived all over the place until h
e got out. He ended up going to college to get a teaching degree.

  DETECTIVE: Any specific family background?

  ROBERT: Nothing very specific. He told me both his parents were deceased; he didn’t talk about them very much, didn’t have pictures of them around the house or anything like that. And he’d lost a younger sister to cancer right before he went into the Army. Her name was Mary, and he took her death very hard, I know that. They had been very close growing up.

  DETECTIVE: You mentioned that at first you didn’t have very much in common with Mr. Wilkinson…but this changed in time?

  ROBERT: It did. We became close friends.

  DETECTIVE: And what do you attribute this closeness to?

  ROBERT: Well, a lot of things, I guess. Proximity. You see a guy every day, even if it’s just a wave hello, or the occasional beer shared across the fence, you get to be friends with the guy. And, the more we talked, the more I think we realized we had a whole lot in common after all. We both liked fishing and golf. Photography. I taught him how to kayak; he taught me how to fly fish and play chess. We both liked history and documentaries. The first time he told me he was going to be teaching history part-time at the university, I threatened to enroll in all his classes. He laughed about that. Let’s see, what else? We both came from broken homes and we had both lost a sibling when we were younger. It was…something we didn’t talk about a lot, but it was there between us…like an unspoken bond, I guess you could say.

  DETECTIVE: I’m sorry, Mr. Howard. Did you also lose a sister?

  ROBERT: No. (pause) My older brother drowned when I was ten years old.

  DETECTIVE: Again, I’m very sorry. (shuffling papers) Okay, you say you both liked to fish and play golf and had an interest in photography. Did the two of you participate in these activities together? If so, how often and where?

  ROBERT: Mostly, we just went fishing together. Usually over by the dam or we’d rent a boat and go out on Loch Raven Reservoir. Grant used to come with us a lot before he went away to school. He liked Jimmy a lot, and the feeling was mutual.

  DETECTIVE: I understand that Mr. Wilkinson is your son’s godfather.

  ROBERT: Who told you that?

  DETECTIVE: Some of your neighbors, I believe.

  ROBERT: He is…but not in the traditional sense. Grant was never christened in a church or anything like that…but yeah we all agreed a couple years ago that Jimmy was Grant’s de facto godfather. It’s almost like an inside family joke.

  DETECTIVE: So you all went fishing together. How often did this occur?

  ROBERT: Maybe three or four times a month during the summer. Less in the spring and fall.

  DETECTIVE: No secret, secluded fishing spots for you and Mr. Wilkinson? A cabin tucked away in the woods somewhere?

  ROBERT: No, nothing like that.

  DETECTIVE: Okay, you mentioned golf and photography next.

  ROBERT: Golf maybe once a month from spring to fall. He joked that we were better at watching golf on television and talking golf than we were at actually playing it. And photography was just something we talked about and traded books about. He was a lot more experienced than I was. He had a little darkroom in his basement and played around with developing his own photos. That’s about it.

  DETECTIVE: Did Mr. Wilkinson have any other friends? Any romantic ties? A dating life?

  ROBERT: He played a lot of chess online, and poker with a regular group from the college. The game rotated from house to house, and I usually joined in when it was Jimmy’s turn to host. But those were the only guys I ever saw over there. He liked his privacy, I know that. And women? No, I never saw any women at his house, nor did he ever really talk about women with me.

  DETECTIVE: Why do you say Mr. Wilkinson liked his privacy?

  ROBERT: He just seemed very set in his ways. Never unfriendly or anti-social, I don’t mean that. My wife would tell you those words describe me a whole lot more accurately than Jimmy. He just…had his routines. He cut his lawn on Saturday mornings. He went to the grocery store on Thursday nights. He visited the library every other Friday. He liked to be home by a certain time in the evenings. In bed by a certain time. Lights out by a certain time. He guarded his reading and writing time very closely.

  DETECTIVE: (shuffling papers) What kind of writing was Mr. Wilkinson working on? Did you ever read any of his writing?

  ROBERT: Actually, no, I never did. I think it was too personal to share. He said he was keeping a journal, about his life, his experiences and travels, and I know he worked on it every evening.

  DETECTIVE: Did he write on a computer? Notebooks? An actual journal?

  ROBERT: I couldn’t tell you.

  DETECTIVE: Okay, you said Mr. Wilkinson never discussed other women with you. Did you get the feeling this was because he still felt loyal to his deceased wife?

  ROBERT: I honestly couldn’t tell you. Katy asked me the same question one day. All I know is that he rarely talked about his wife, and he never talked about other women to me.

  DETECTIVE: And Mr. Wilkinson never saw other friends except for the occasional poker game?

  ROBERT: I know he played an occasional round of golf with friends from the college, but I got the feeling it was more of an obligation than a good time. And I believe he had some acquaintances from the library, but not like a regular book club or anything.

  DETECTIVE: Did Mr. Wilkinson drink alcohol? Take drugs?

  ROBERT: The strongest drug I ever saw Jimmy take was Nyquil and even then he put up a fight. But you don’t win many arguments with Katy, trust me. Drinking…in all the time I’ve known him, I probably saw Jimmy drink a total of fifteen, twenty beers. Never any hard liquor. And, remember, that’s over a period of like eight years. Jimmy took good care of himself; he was in great shape for a sixty-year-old.

  DETECTIVE: Would you say Mr. Wilkinson was a religious man?

  ROBERT: Not so much religious…I would say he was…spiritual. He was a pretty deep thinker. He could come up with some pretty heavy thoughts. He claimed to be a reformed Catholic. Had a big crucifix hanging in his den over the television.

  DETECTIVE: Did he travel much?

  ROBERT: Rarely. Maybe once or twice a year, he would visit an old Army buddy for the weekend or go on a solo fishing trip up north. He was excited last week at Thanksgiving, talked about going to see a couple guys from the old days.

  DETECTIVE: Those were his exact words? A couple guys from the old days?

  ROBERT: I think so, yeah. (pause) Maybe it was a couple Army guys from the old days. Or a couple guys from the old Army days. I’m not a hundred percent sure.

  DETECTIVE: I want you to think very carefully about this next question, Mr. Howard. In all the years you lived next door to James Wilkinson, did you ever witness anything suspicious or alarming or disturbing?

  ROBERT: (pause) No. Nothing.

  DETECTIVE: Mood swings? Unusual displays of temper? Sneaking around?

  ROBERT: Nothing.

  DETECTIVE: Ever notice Mr. Wilkinson attempting to change his appearance in any way?

  ROBERT: Never.

  DETECTIVE: One final question, Mr. Howard. If you had only three words to describe James Wilkinson to me, what would they be?

  ROBERT: (pause) Kind. Practical. (pause) Smart.

  DETECTIVE: (shuffling papers) Well, that’s all I have for now. I want to thank you again. I’ll want to speak to your wife at some point, but we can do that at your home. No need for her to make the trip downtown. And I may want to ask your son a handful of questions over the telephone, but that can certainly wait.

  ROBERT: That’s it? I can go now?

  DETECTIVE: Yes, sir, you’re free to go. Oh, it’s my understanding you had a little run-in with the press this morning. I’d prefer if you didn’t talk to any reporters about this interview.

  ROBERT: I definitely don’t intend to.

  DETECTIVE: Perfect. And be sure to let us know if any of them bother you or your wife.

  ROBERT: I sure w
ill. Thank you.

  END OF TRANSCRIPT 17943C

  After I called Katy and told her about the interview, I stopped at the McDonalds drive-thru and shot my diet all to hell. Two quarter pounders with cheese, large fries, and a chocolate milkshake. Comfort food, I told myself, and drove to the creek to eat in peace.

  Winter’s Run was a winding stretch of muddy water that ranged in depth from a couple feet to maybe ten at its deepest point. It mostly held catfish and carp and sunnies, but if you were lucky and knew what you were doing—pretty much the same thing when it came to fishing—you could pull the occasional largemouth bass or yellow perch out of its belly.

  I had fished the Run since I was a young boy myself, and once Grant was old enough and patient enough to hold a pole, it soon became our favorite spot. I credit nostalgia and location for that little favor; Winter’s Run was only a few miles away from our house.