by Archer Mayor
Sam groaned. “You’re probably right. Gross. Maybe she did commit suicide.”
Joe nodded wordlessly. Newell Morgan’s personality hadn’t come as a surprise. His findings at Michelle’s house and his chat with Linda Rubinstein had prepared him for it. What did keep tugging at his mind were less obvious loose ends—details of pattern and cadence, of inflection and body language. From Michelle’s posture on her bed to the recent bluster of her landlord, there had been subtle discordances. Not any of them alarming or even unusual, but all together forming a picture of incomplete parts. Joe was feeling like the only man on board a ship surrounded by calm water and fine weather, who was fighting the strong urge to seek cover.
“It does always end up going back there, doesn’t it?” he asked almost rhetorically.
“Where?” Sam asked.
“The body,” he said. “What, exactly, did her in?”
He reached for his cell phone and dialed Beverly Hillstrom, the chief medical examiner. They had long used each other as sounding boards over the years, forming a bond he was pretty sure she shared with no other cop, most of whom were stymied by her aloof and rigorous personality. He knew that side of her—he’d all but smacked into it on their very first meeting—but he’d soon discovered that couched behind it was a woman who merely demanded higher standards than the norm and showed her impatience with all who fell short. On that level alone, she’d quickly seen Gunther as a kindred spirit, even if his style was far from her own. In fact, to this day, in observance of her sense of propriety, they still referred to each other by title and always kept strictly to business.
“Doctor Hillstrom,” he therefore started out once she answered the phone, “it’s Joe Gunther.”
“Agent Gunther,” she said shortly.
Even given her normal manner, this was unusually brusque, and generally unheard of once she knew he was on the line. He made a note to stay strictly on the straight and narrow this time. She was clearly preoccupied.
“I’m sorry to interrupt,” he continued, “but I’m wondering once again if you might indulge me for just a couple of minutes on a case.”
“I wasn’t aware VBI had sent us anyone recently.”
He pursed his lips slightly. Her tone was bordering on hostile. “We didn’t. It came through the state police. Technically, in fact, it’s still theirs, but it’s got some questions attached that’ll probably—”
He didn’t get to finish.
“If it’s still theirs, then you better have them make the contact. And make sure,” she added pointedly, “that they follow proper protocol. This office does have a full-time police liaison. Things have begun to slip along those lines.”
“Right, I promise I’ll—”
But the phone had gone dead.
Gunther closed the cell and slipped it back onto his belt, feeling the warm breeze on his slightly reddened face through the car’s open window.
The view he’d driven here to enjoy remained unappreciated. Fighting his own immediate disappointment and embarrassment, he stared sightlessly into the distance, struggling instead to see a connection, if any, between his last two conversations. Both of them had certainly been straightforward enough—Newell Morgan had clearly stated his dislike of Michelle, his lack of regret at her passing, and what seemed to be the makings of a solid alibi. And Beverly Hillstrom had responded to his request for a special favor with an official thumbs-down. Yet each exchange had contained undertones that made him wonder if what he’d heard had in fact been the whole truth. The trick was to discover if the timing and tone of both were coincidental, or if they were tied to the evolving mystery that had made Joe initiate them in the first place.
“That didn’t sound good,” Sam suggested, watching him closely.
He started the car. Morgan’s background and alibi would take some footwork to check out. Hillstrom was a friend. For that reason alone, she merited his attention first. But he wasn’t kidding himself, either—he now had frankly ulterior motives beyond mere friendship.
“It wasn’t,” he told Sam. “Looks like I better drop you off back in Bratt, pack a bag, and head up to Burlington. Something’s up with Hillstrom, and it’s gotten her all prickly. If I don’t smooth it out somehow, we may never discover what else poor ol’ Michelle Fisher has to tell us. And that, I’m starting to think,” he added after a pause, “would be a real shame.”
Chapter 6
“Under the B, twelve. That’s B-twelve.”
Nancy Martin scanned the eight paper cards spread before her, saw three spots numbered 12 under her assortment of B’s, and hit them quickly with her bright pink dauber.
Mel glanced up at her from his place across the table, having perused his own four cards without success. He muttered, “Shit—wish I could figure a way to cheat at this.” The woman beside him, with fifteen cards and a daubing hand as quick as a hummingbird, shot him a scandalized glance.
The caller at the head of the stuffy room held up another ball, extracted from the hopper by his side. “Under the I, twenty. That’s I-twenty.”
Nancy kept her eyes on her cards, hitting only one spot this time. She wasn’t having much luck tonight, and she sure wasn’t having any fun.
“Bingo,” Ellis shouted in a loud and startled voice, causing the quick-handed woman to groan under her breath. Nancy had to sympathize, despite her happiness at Ellis’s success. He had but a single card centered before him.
“Hold your cards, ladies and gentlemen. Hold your cards,” the caller droned, as one of the bingo hall attendants wormed her way through the crowd toward Ellis, who was now waving his paper card in the air so she could more easily reach it.
While the attendant read the winning numbers to the caller for confirmation, there was a muted chorus of rustled paper as everyone else in the hall ignored the caller’s instructions by crumpling up their cards to make room for new ones.
Ellis kept laughing at his moment of victory. “I can’t believe it. I never win at things like this. I’m the reason slot machines were invented.”
“Why’m I not surprised?” Mel said in a low voice, clearly irritated, dropping his wadded-up paper ball onto the floor beside him, avoiding the trash bag in the aisle.
The attendant finished confirming the numbers, extracted a twenty-dollar bill from the pouch around her waist, and handed it to Ellis.
“Congratulations, sir.”
Mel reached over and snatched the bill from between Ellis’s fingers. “You loser—you owe me at least that much for beer,” he said, and shoved it into his shirt pocket.
The smile crystallized on Ellis’s face for a split second, and then it widened paradoxically as he cut a quick look at Nancy and said, “When you’re right, you’re right, Mel. Happy to share.”
Nancy covered her smile with a hand.
“What’re you laughing at?” Mel growled at her.
She lowered her hand and pointed to a fictitious spot over his shoulder. “Just a kid acting funny over there.”
She knew he wouldn’t look, and he didn’t. “You and damned kids. Give it a rest.” He turned to the woman next to him and demanded, “When do things wrap up here?”
“Last round’s at ten,” she said, not bothering to look at him, her lips pursing afterward.
“Christ,” he muttered, and began spreading out a new set of cards.
They were at a rural bingo hall outside Bennington, owned and operated by a volunteer fire department as a weekly fund-raiser. Mel had actually come up with the idea, based on information he’d been given but wasn’t sharing. His companions knew they were “on a raid,” as he called these outings, but not its nature. The amount of cash being handled around the hall, however, pretty much spoke for itself. Someone, somehow, was going to have their stash lifted.
Nancy didn’t much care. Ever since that afternoon with Ellis, when he’d made sure she’d had three orgasms before he let her go—a gift her husband hadn’t attended to in living memory—she hadn’t been able t
o think of much else. She’d always liked Ellis. He’d always been polite to her, and she appreciated his quietness. But she’d also always seen him just a bit as her husband did—a loser. In a world of loud men with demonstrative habits—from her abusive father to a string of violent boyfriends, and now Mel—Nancy had formed a habit of pegging such behavior to manhood. Anyone not fitting the mold was probably either weak-willed or gay. In any case, not worth her attention.
Ellis had opened her eyes. Never before had she been so catered to. He’d not only worked hard to build her excitement and bring her to climax, but when he’d finally joined her, he’d made his own enjoyment enthusiastically clear, bringing her own satisfaction to a new height. Sex had always been something she’d assumed she was there to provide—not a feast two people could share.
The very thought of their time together made her squirm slightly in her chair. Now that they’d done this once, nervously and spontaneously, she couldn’t wait to try it again with more forethought and planning. She was going to make sure Ellis had never had anyone better.
The last game wrapped up close to when their neighbor had said it would. The three of them stood in line along with the hundred-plus other people in the hall and began shuffling toward the door. Ellis made sure he was last in line behind Nancy and Mel so he could occasionally brush her butt with his hand, pretending he was being jostled. Mel couldn’t figure out why his wife was so cheerful.
In the back of her mind, however, was still the question about what they were doing here. Playing bingo was hardly one of Mel’s enthusiasms, and his manner during the event notwithstanding, he’d even made an effort to change his appearance, if only slightly, by wearing a collared shirt and tying his long hair back with a rubber band. He was up to something. The question was, now that they were filing out into the parking lot, what?
The answer wasn’t forthcoming as they fit into the pickup but remained parked. Mel stayed quiet, his hands on the steering wheel and his eyes on the crowd still streaming from the firehouse doors. His mood had improved, however, and there was a gleam to his eye that he got as every raid began gathering steam.
Ellis had noticed the same thing. He sat motionless beside Nancy, attuned to her presence but with his fingers interlaced in his lap, working to keep his focus on Mel’s lead. He knew from long experience that anything could happen from this point on, and probably would, and that his own survival would depend on thinking clearly. Because one thing was consistent with Mel—he never had your safety in mind when he acted.
The parking lot was thinning out. Mel lit a cigarette and watched meditatively as car after car slowly filed onto the road. His companions knew better than to ask questions. There was a balancing act to observe here, after all. Something between showing trust and getting enough information to stay alive.
Ellis made a small reconnaissance into this minefield. “Lot of money changes hands at these things.”
Mel nodded, his eyes on the string of flaring taillights. “That it does.”
“Kinda makes the mind work.”
Mel let out a short, quiet laugh. “Can’t talk for you, Ellis, but it did get me going.”
The subject now seemed officially open for discussion. Nancy spoke softly. “That is something you know how to do.”
Mel reached out and patted her knee. “Well, somebody’s got to keep us fed. Christ knows, you two can’t. What did you see tonight?”
Neither of them could go too far wrong at this point. “A bingo game,” Nancy said.
“Money,” Ellis contributed. “Like I said.”
“Yeah,” Mel drawled, leaning forward slightly to turn the ignition key, bringing the truck noisily alive. “Money coming in from a whole bunch of pockets and ending up in one.”
He pulled the truck forward and slipped into the line of departing vehicles.
“Right,” Ellis said appreciatively. “Kind of like a bank.”
Mel cut him a look and a quick smile. “For a dumb drunk, you do get lucky every once in a while.” He pointed at the building they were passing on their way out of the lot. “Exactly like a bank, without all the inconveniences.”
Nancy was staring straight ahead, feeling the tingle of apprehension she’d last experienced outside the armory, during the theft of the two guns. Thus far, she didn’t know what to do with it. Was Mel speaking philosophically and therefore still in the planning stages, or had that been a tactical comment? Were they about to go active? The military words and phrases clattered in her head, put there by constant repetition. Mel used them constantly—the frustrated combatant who’d been dishonorably discharged from the very Guard unit they’d just ripped off.
She found she was clenching her hands together and willed them apart, placing them flat on the tops of her thighs.
Mel swung out onto the road and picked up speed, leaving the firehouse behind. Nancy was just thinking about relaxing when he slowed again a few hundred yards later, pulled into a dirt road, made a tight U-turn, and parked just shy of the intersection. He switched off the lights, helping the black truck blend into the dark stand of trees beside them.
“Field glasses,” he ordered, his eyes fixed in the direction they’d just traveled.
Ellis extracted the binoculars from the glove box as Nancy shut her eyes, feeling her heart rate double. Whatever it was, it was happening tonight.
“Gotta do a little recon,” Mel murmured, fitting the glasses to his eyes and adjusting the focus. Ellis could still make out the firehouse lights through the intervening stretch of undergrowth, glimmering like a distant campfire. Traffic was almost nil by this point, and only rarely did a pair of headlights come sweeping down the road to flash briefly through their windows. Every time that happened, though, Mel lowered the binoculars.
Twenty minutes later he returned them to Ellis, put the truck into gear, hit his own lights, and resumed driving down the paved road. “We’re good” was all he said.
The village the fire department served lay less than a mile farther on. It was getting late by now; it wasn’t too large a place to begin with, and the few stores lining the square had all closed long ago. As they drove quietly into the downtown’s embrace, Ellis thought of the fake equivalents he’d seen in cheaply made movies, where there were no people, few lights, and an artificial cleanliness that had made him think that every wall was an inch thick. Even the brick bank building seemed made of Styrofoam, under the glow of the one sodium streetlamp standing guard over the sidewalk.
Mel backed into an alley between two dark stores and killed the engine. Opposite them, through the grimy windshield, the front of the bank was clearly in view.
Breaking the unwritten rules, Nancy blurted, “The bank? What’re you thinking?”
Mel scowled as he twisted toward her, making Ellis tense up. He’d seen Mel hit her before. He knew he wouldn’t be able to allow that again without acting in her defense, just as he knew he wouldn’t stand a chance. He was big enough but lacked the instinct to win that Mel had acquired through long practice.
“More than you are, you stupid cow. You think I’m going to drive through the front door? God almighty, girl. You couldn’t make money lying on your back. You are that dumb.”
He opened the door angrily and stuck one leg out. “Just do what you know how to do, okay? Put your hands on the wheel and get ready to go. Leave the thinking to somebody who knows how.” He glared at Ellis. “Move it.”
Ellis slid out the far door, exchanging one last hapless glance with Nancy, and joined Mel in front of the silent truck. The latter’s face was still brooding, but he was evidently back on track. He pointed across the street. “Night deposit box, right of the door. See it?”
Ellis nodded, the plan finally coming clear in his head.
“We got cover from the bush to the left, and that wood garbage can box with the lid on it to the right. The target should be here in five minutes, tops. You take the box and be the diversion.”
That was it. Mel jogged across the d
arkened street, barely a shadow even by the dull streetlamp. Ellis didn’t think twice before following suit. This was the flip side of Mel’s managerial style—in exchange for his survival-of-the-fittest dismissiveness, he inadvertently injected in those who did stay with him a certain quick-witted autonomy. Through an intuition born of years of association, Ellis knew not only what the plan was, but its goal and how to carry it out.
The garbage can box, about the size of three stacked steamer trunks, was painted dark green to blend in better with the shrubs it fronted. It had been planted parallel to the sidewalk and thus afforded the ideal hiding place for Ellis’s purpose. Settling in behind it, he half wondered why some preceding mugger hadn’t thought to leave a garden chair for convenience’s sake.
Not that he would have used it for long. Barely two minutes after taking cover, he heard a slow-moving car approaching from the direction of the firehouse and poked his head out to see an ancient rusty Toyota come to a stop at the curb before the bank. From it emerged an older man with a well-cared-for belly and a scraggly beard who took his time becoming upright. After casting glances up and down the street, apparently having considered what was just about to happen, the man extracted a swollen, zippered bank bag from the dashboard, circled the front of the car, his blue-jeaned knees flashing briefly in the headlights, and trudged toward the granite steps leading up to the bank’s front door and the night deposit box mounted into the wall beside it.
This was Ellis’s moment. Mel had told him he was the diversion, which could have meant merely stepping out into the open and asking for a light or the time of day. But one of Mel’s trademarks was to leave no witnesses, or at least none who could later identify any member of the raiding party—a lesson Ellis had taken pains to remember. It was also why he had made sure to leave no footprints behind in the soft earth of his hiding place, choosing only hard surfaces to step on.