Fort Point (Maine Justice Book 2)

by Davis, Susan Page

  “How sweet of him,” Jennifer said.

  “We’ll have to buy some furniture, and I guess one of us can move in,” Harvey said, surveying his new home.

  “That should be you,” said Jennifer.

  “Think so?”

  “Yes. I’d like to stay with Beth until the wedding.”

  “All right.” When they went upstairs and peeked into the bedrooms, he said, “Say, have your parents booked a hotel?”

  “Yes. For them and Grandpa and Abby and Leeanne and Travis and Randy.”

  “Tell them to cancel it. They can stay here.”

  “Really? Do you think we could do it?”

  “I don’t see why not. There are still two beds here. We’ll work it out.”

  “I’ll call them.”

  They were getting Mr. Bailey’s small oak library table with four Windsor chairs in the sun room, and the wicker furniture. Chairs, rugs, and baskets in the living room would be useful. A couple of side tables looked to Jennifer as if they ought to be in a museum.

  “I wonder why Mr. Bailey’s daughter didn’t want this stuff,” she said.

  “Probably her house is full.”

  A small framed copy of Murillo’s The Divine Shepherd hung in the living room, next to the doorway into the sun room. “He told me that’s our wedding present,” Harvey said.

  Jennifer gazed at the picture of a little boy who sat with a thin rod in his right hand, his left hand resting on a lamb’s back. “I like it. Is it real?”

  “No, it would be worth more than the house if it were.”

  “It’s still nice.”

  “Very,” he said.

  They looked into the master bedroom. The Baileys’ bed was still there.

  “I thought he was taking that,” Jennifer said.

  “Changed his mind. You want the sleigh bed in here?” Harvey asked. She’d seen his bed a couple of times when he was injured, and she liked it.

  “I think … yes.” She couldn’t quite look at him and talk about the bed they would sleep in.

  He put his arms around her. “Jeff or Eddie can help me move this one upstairs.” She only let him kiss her once, then pulled away and went into the kitchen. He followed her. She opened one cupboard door after another, finding a lot of pans and utensils that had been left behind.

  “Mr. Bailey’s daughter must not have needed any of this,” Harvey said.

  “My gain.” She smiled, surveying her cupboards and her refrigerator and her dishwasher.

  “So what do we need?” Harvey asked.

  “Not much. You have a microwave. I have a coffeemaker. We may have to have a yard sale to get rid of extra stuff.”

  She bent to look in one of the base cabinets, and her hair hung down, almost sweeping the floor. She pulled out a bread pan. As she straightened, Harvey took it from her hand and set it on the counter.

  “This is going to be perfect.” His voice was husky. He stroked her cheek and slid his fingers under her hair, against her neck. She didn’t look away this time, and he took his time kissing her. Anticipation shot through her. She sighed and cuddled in against him, but only for a minute. “Come on, we’d better get going,” she said.

  They ate supper out, and she asked him about Jeff.

  “He’s good. I think he’ll fix the apartment up and enjoy living there.”

  Jennifer smiled. “He called me. He told me that he’s been talking to you about God and church and the Bible.”

  “Yeah, some,” Harvey said. “We haven’t had much time together, but it’s been great. I’m glad I’m getting to know him.”

  When he took her home, they sat on the couch, and Jennifer showed him the basket full of RSVPs that had come in for the wedding. Over two hundred guests confirmed. She was a little nervous about that.

  “The church is big enough,” Harvey said.

  Beth’s phone rang, and she took it into the kitchen and didn’t come back.

  After a while, Jennifer went to the kitchen for ice cream. Beth was sitting at the table, still talking on the phone and laughing. “That’s terrific,” she said. “I’m so glad everything went well today.”

  Jennifer dished up two bowls of ice cream, keeping half an ear on Beth’s conversation, and then took the bowls to the other room. “I think she’s talking to Jeff.”

  “It might be somebody else,” Harvey said.

  “No, she’s got that look.”

  “What look?”

  “You know, sort of…” She looked right at him with a wistful sort of gaze, then smiled. “Your eyes are so blue.”

  “Blue is recessive.” Harvey set down his ice cream. “Our kids don’t stand a chance.” He gave her a very unscientific kiss. “I’ll be so glad when this case is over.”

  Jennifer said, “I’ll be so glad when the wedding is over.”

  “You’re not serious. I mean. . .” He eyed her suspiciously.

  Jennifer laughed. “What?”

  “Well, I think that. I’ve said it to Eddie a thousand times. But I didn’t expect to hear it from you. I thought the wedding was your main focus in life.”

  “Only for the next nine days.” Jennifer dug her spoon into the peppermint ice cream.

  “What will you concentrate on after that?” Harvey asked.

  “You, of course. I intend to make you supremely happy.”

  He took that as an invitation and set her ice cream bowl beside his on the table. By the time Beth came back smiling, Jennifer was sure her hair looked like a bird’s nest, and Harvey was practically purring.

  “How’s Jeffrey?” He picked up his bowl of melting ice cream.

  She smiled bigger. “Fine. He’s just fine.” She didn’t tell him that visiting hours were over, or call him names. She just went over to Jennifer’s CD player and put Vivaldi on soft, then went down the hall to her room.

  “Wow,” Harvey said.

  “Yeah.” Jennifer looked at him.

  “I think our chaperone just copped out on us.”

  “Does this mean we’re mature adults and can be trusted?” she asked.

  He looked into her eyes and slid his hand along one of her long tresses. His eyes held that look she couldn’t resist. To her surprise, instead of kissing her again, he stood up.

  “Not me. Time to say goodnight.”

  Chapter 19

  Friday, July 9

  Mike came into the office at 8 a.m. Harvey was just turning on his computer.

  “Hey, Mike! What’s up?”

  Mike tossed a folder on Harvey’s desk. “Just came to tell you, Nate’s transfer is permanent. Go over this with him.” He looked around the room.

  “Miss the Priority Unit?” Harvey asked.

  “Maybe a little.”

  “Itching to get in on an active case?”

  “Maybe.”

  “We’re close, Mike.”

  He grinned. “Got someone you need arrested?”

  “Not quite yet.”

  “Aw, too bad. See you later.”

  “Mrs. Dixon is bringing Joel in,” Eddie crowed from his desk.

  Mike back-pedaled. “Mind if I sit in, Harv?”

  “Feel free.”

  Joel and his mother stepped off the elevator seconds before Terry Lemieux brought Cathy Wagner up the stairs. Harvey decided to take on Mrs. Wagner himself.

  “Eddie, you and Pete show Joel Mrs. Blake’s pictures out here,” Harvey said. “Mrs. Dixon can sit in if she wants to.”

  Mike and Harvey took Mrs. Wagner into the interview room. Harvey had been thinking of her as the girlfriend and wife of Thomas Nadeau, and seeing a 52-year-old woman anchored him in reality. She was still trim, wearing white slacks and a red-and-white-striped top, but she wore bifocals, and her dark hair had a few gray streaks.

  “Mrs. Wagner, thank you very much for coming,” Harvey said.

  She looked around nervously. “Let’s get it over with. My husband really didn’t want me to come.”

  Harvey had set up the video recorder
in advance, and Mike activated the cassette recorder, so they would have a separate audio record. Harvey gave the time, date, and name of the interviewee.

  “Mrs. Wagner, could you tell me first about the burglary that happened your junior year of high school?”

  She sat still for a moment, then began quietly. “I heard about it the night it happened. My boyfriend came to see me.”

  “What time was this?”

  “Oh, midnight. He threw pebbles at my window. He did that sometimes. My parents didn’t know. I snuck out and met him in the back yard.”

  “What was your boyfriend’s name?”

  “Tommy Nadeau. Thomas.”

  “So, what happened when you went out that night to see Tommy?”

  “He told me he and his friends had broken into somebody’s house. Nobody was home, and they thought they’d sneak in just for kicks.”

  According to the news clippings, Fairley’s house had been royally vandalized, but Harvey let it pass. He said, “The owner came home while they were there.”

  “Yes. Tommy was laughing about it.” She closed her eyes for a moment, and shook her head bitterly. “He told me they’d tied the old man up, but he’d get loose by morning.”

  “Who were the three boys who did that?” Harvey asked.

  “Tommy and David and Philip.”

  “When you say David, you mean Maine’s Congressman, David R. Murphy.”

  “Yes. He was Tommy’s best friend in high school.”

  “And Philip was…”

  “Philip Whitney.”

  “Was there anyone else involved?”

  She hesitated. “There was one boy who drove the car, but he didn’t go in with them.”

  “Who was that?”

  “Luke Frederick.”

  “And Tommy told you all of this the night of the burglary, before either of you knew Mr. Fairley was dead.”

  “Yes.”

  Mike stood up and motioned Harvey toward the door.

  “Excuse me just a moment, Mrs. Wagner.” They stepped out into the office. Nate, in in his uniform, was sitting at Pete’s desk. “Nate, would please go in and stay with Mrs. Wagner while I talk to Mike?”

  When the door to the interview room was closed, Mike said, “Do you want me to go to the courthouse for the warrants?”

  “I think we’re ready,” Harvey said.

  “I think you are. If I go personally, it should cut some red tape for you.”

  “Thanks, Mike.”

  Eddie came from his desk holding Martin Blake’s pictures. He held out the one of Tom Nadeau and David Murphy on the rock. “Joel Dixon’s identified the man who hit Frederick,” he said.

  “Who?”

  “The man in the blue sweater, Nadeau. He recognized them all right away.”

  “Be ready to move on Nadeau and Murphy when I come back,” Mike said.

  Harvey went back into Interview. Cathy Wagner was drinking coffee, and Nate was sitting at the far end of the table. Harvey sat down near the tape recorder.

  “All right, Mrs. Wagner, let’s continue. Is there anything else you can tell me about the night of the burglary?”

  “That night…” She looked up at him, then down again. “That night, Tommy brought me something. He asked me to keep it for him.”

  “What was it?”

  “A box. A metal box. Like a small fishing tackle box. It had a padlock on it. He said to keep it for him for a while.”

  “What was in it?”

  “He didn’t tell me.”

  “Weren’t you curious?”

  “Of course. He said it was something they took from the old man. I thought maybe it was money.”

  “So you took it.”

  “Yes. I was a little scared, but I would have done anything for him then. I took it up to my room when he left, and I kept it.”

  “How long?” Harvey asked.

  “Until we got married.”

  “How long was that?”

  “Five years. Until I graduated from college.”

  “You kept this locked box for five years without knowing what was in it?”

  “Yes.”

  Harvey supposed that was possible. He’d have had it open within a week. “Didn’t anyone else ever see it?”

  “My sister did. She asked me about it a few times, but I just told her it was something of Tommy’s, and after a while she quit asking.”

  “He never came and got it, or asked you to give it to him?”

  “No.”

  “And the next day you heard the home owner was dead.”

  “Yes, the whole school was shocked. When Philip Whitney was arrested, it was even worse.” She stopped and sat staring at the coffee cup.

  “Did your boyfriend talk to you about it?”

  “He said they didn’t kill him, just tied him up and left him. Tommy was scared. They all were. At lunch, David came over and ate with us, and Tommy kept saying, ‘We don’t know anything. We weren’t there.’ Alison brought her tray over, and David said, ‘Shut up. She doesn’t know.’ She was saying how awful it was, and we all had to pretend we were shocked. Well, we were shocked, but … we had to make her think we didn’t know anything about it.”

  “You, Thomas, David, Philip, and Luke were the only ones who knew?”

  “I think so. David was really mad that Tommy had told me. When Philip was arrested, we all thought for sure the other boys would be. Philip must have gone through a lot. I know the police questioned Tommy at least twice, and lots of other guys, too. But they never found out who else was there. And Philip hadn’t been a regular friend of theirs. I thought for a while they suspected his buddy, Matt Beaulieu, but I guess he was somewhere with his parents that night.”

  “What did Tom and David do when Philip was arrested?”

  “They got hold of Luke Frederick in the hallway at school. David and Tommy kind of cornered him. They told him, ‘We weren’t there, and you weren’t there. Get yourself an alibi. You don’t know anything, and we never mention this again.’ And they didn’t.”

  “They never talked about it to each other after that?”

  “I don’t think so. I tried to bring it up once to Tommy, and he walked away and didn’t speak to me for two days. I learned from that. He did say once to David that he’d gained a lot of respect for Philip. Because he didn’t tell, I guess.”

  She didn’t seem to see anything odd in that.

  “So, when did you learn what was in the box Tom Nadeau gave you?” Harvey asked.

  “When Philip Whitney died.”

  “How did you find out?”

  “When we got married I asked Tom if he still wanted that old tackle box. He said he did, so I took it to our apartment, and later, when we bought a house, he took it there. I thought he would keep it in the tool shed with his fishing rods, but he didn’t. He kept it on the shelf in the closet, with his hunting stuff. Then, after Martin Blake’s book came out, we all read it. I mean, I’m sure everyone from our high school read it. You must have read it.”

  “Not until recently,” Harvey said. “I grew up in New Hampshire, and I would have only been six when the burglary happened.”

  She looked a little disappointed.

  “This hunting gear Tom had,” he said. “Did he go deer hunting?”

  “Every year.”

  “Did he have a hunting knife?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was it like?”

  “I don’t remember. About this long.” She held her hands eight inches apart.

  “Can you describe the hilt?”

  She shook her head.

  “All right, the tackle box was in the closet for a long time. When did you learn what was in it?”

  “It wasn’t long after Morristown came out that Tom came in one night looking pretty upset. I asked him what was wrong, and he said, ‘Nothing,’ and went straight to the bedroom. I was fixing supper, I think. After a minute I went in there, and he had the metal box open on the bed, and he was ta
king something out of it.” She turned and looked him full in the face. “A gun.”

  “So, then you knew you’d had this gun for fourteen years.”

  “Yes.”

  “What kind of gun was it?”

  “I don’t know much about guns. It was a handgun. You said it was a revolver.”

  “Can you describe it?”

  She shook her head. “Not really.”

  Harvey thought about his next question. “Mrs. Wagner, tell me what Tom Nadeau did when you saw him taking the gun out of the box.”

  “He turned around and saw me, and he said, ‘You didn’t see anything, did you, Cathy?’ and I kind of shook my head. He said, ‘That’s right. You didn’t see anything.’ Then he loaded it and put it back in the box. He took it and left. He didn’t come back for a long time. I sat up and waited. Finally he drove in. I looked out the window, and he went in the tool shed before he came in the house.”

  She took a drink of coffee, and Harvey waited.

  “The next day, I heard Philip Whitney had shot himself.”

  “What did you think?”

  “That it was awful. Then I started thinking about the gun. After lunch, I went out to the tool shed. Tommy was at work. I looked in there and found the metal box. It wasn’t locked anymore. It was empty.”

  “What did you do then?”

  “I got scared. I packed a suitcase and took my kids to my mother’s house. I told her we’d had a big fight. When Tommy called, she told him I wasn’t there. He came around the next day. I told him I didn’t want to live with him anymore.”

  “Did he make any sort of explanation?”

  She closed her eyes for a moment. “He said, ‘I had to, Cathy. Philip would have ruined us all.’ I didn’t know for sure what he meant, that he had given the gun to Philip to commit suicide with, or…” Tears rolled down her face. “I said, ‘Ruined you?’ and he said, ‘Us. You’re an accessory. You kept the gun, and you knew about the burglary. David is a lawyer, and he knows these things. He’s running for office, Cathy.’ He said it like David had the most to lose.”

  “What else?”

  She frowned. “I said his fingerprints would be on the gun, and he said, ‘No, they’re not. No one’s but Philip’s are.’ I threw him out. I cried and I cried. The next day I went to New Hampshire to stay with an old college roommate of mine and filed for divorce. Eventually I got a job and met Jack Wagner. I was afraid Tom would come looking for me. I never told anyone about this until … until you called me. Then I told Jack.”