Tahoe Silence

by Todd Borg

  “Not since a week or two ago.”

  “Was he okay? The school is wondering if something happened. He was supposed to be back from his break yesterday, but he didn’t show.”

  “Seemed well enough to me when he left,” she said. She looked at me with suspicion. “He a friend of yours?”

  “We’re business colleagues. One of my collaborators is close to him. We’re all working on the same project. I stopped by to go over some details. Any idea where he went?”

  “When I saw him he was loading up his van for a camping trip to Tahoe.”

  “That was a couple weeks ago?”

  “More or less. Not like I keep track. I was out walking and he was in the drive. I saw him checking out his tire chains, so I said that I didn’t think he’d need ‘em for two more months if at all. We’re only at twelve hundred feet. We don’t get snow but a couple inches once every year or so. But he said he was heading up to the lake, and the weather report was predicting snow at the higher elevations.”

  I wasn’t sure of the exact days, but she was talking about the time that Silence and Charlie were kidnapped. “He’s been here since then, hasn’t he?”

  She shook her head. “Not that I’ve noticed. But I don’t watch for him out the window.”

  “His van, is that the panel van my colleague mentioned?”

  “Sure. Old Dodge. Michael bought it used.”

  I thought about that a moment. “If you see him, could you please ask him to call Marlette?”

  “That your business colleague?”

  “Yes.” I took a step back as if to go. “Quite the wheels,” I said, gesturing at the Studebaker.

  “Yeah. A forty-nine. Needs a valve job and some other work. But the tranny and drive train are still good. Hope to have it running soon.”

  “Good luck.”

  She gave me a small nod, got down onto the dolly and slid back under the car.

  FORTY-TWO

  I leaned against my Jeep in Michael Warner’s driveway and called information for Sacramento while Spot leaned out the window and used his snout to push at my arm.

  “You want a pet?” I said. “How needy can you be? I just pet you last week.”

  He grabbed my wrist with his teeth, just as a voice with a Southeast Asian accent said, “What city, please.”

  “Spot, that hurts,” I said.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t understand what city, please.”

  “Sacramento,” I said as I pulled out the Catherine Timmeron card and spelled the name.

  They had a listing for a C. Timmeron and I dialed it as Spot chewed on my arm again. I pulled my hand out of my pocket and wrapped my arm around his neck. “You’ll never escape the Hulk Hogan Headlock,” I said to him as a small cultured voice said hello in my ear.

  “This is Detective Owen McKenna from Lake Tahoe calling for Catherine Timmeron. Is this Catherine?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’d like to ask you about a professor who teaches at your school. Michael Warner.”

  There was a pause. “How do I know you are who you say you are? And why should I talk to you?”

  Something in her tone made me suddenly think that she was in love with Michael and that she would be very protective of him even if he was a suspected kidnapper. She was also one of the generally careful ones, responding to all unknown people with skepticism. Although I respected her caution, I could tell it was going to be a pain and slow me down.

  “Okay,” I said, trying to stifle my heavy sigh and render it less noticeable. “I’m going to tell you a story about a kidnapping. If you think I’m insincere or of questionable character or working some kind of scam, hang up. If not, perhaps you could please answer a question or two that might help save a child’s life.”

  Catherine said nothing, an impressive control.

  I continued. “Michael Warner is an old friend of a woman named Marlette Remmick. Marlette’s two children were kidnapped two weeks ago. The boy was murdered. The girl is still missing and presumed alive. I’m an ex-homicide inspector from the San Francisco Police Department now working as a private investigator in Tahoe. Marlette Remmick hired me to help find her daughter.” I paused, thinking that if I explained Michael’s paternity it would make him look like a suspect and Catherine would be less inclined to help me.

  Instead, I said, “The kidnapped girl has demonstrated an interest in math and science. So her mother called Michael a few weeks ago and he agreed to meet the girl. Marlette drove her daughter down to Sac State. Michael showed her his lab and office. Call it a one-child, one-visit outreach program.”

  I continued, “Marlette knows how brilliant and perceptive Michael is. Now that Michael and the girl have met, Marlette thinks that Michael could help figure out this kidnapping case.

  “Of course, it is a reach to think so, and I for one am not confident that the brilliant professor can extend his insights into a kidnapping up in Tahoe. But the police and I haven’t been successful. We need every scrap of information and every useful thought that any intelligent person can provide. It would be a shame not to talk to Michael and see if he can help. So this is a long way of getting around to my request that you help me find him. I went down to the school and found out he took two weeks off. And he didn’t report back to work Monday as planned. His neighbor said he was going camping in Tahoe. I’m hoping you can tell me where exactly he was going or how to reach him.”

  Finally, Catherine spoke. “If Michael only met the girl once how could he possibly be of any help?”

  “Something I haven’t told you yet is that the girl is autistic. She won’t have anything to do with adults other than her mother and one teacher. Michael was the first exception in years. That puts him in the unique position of being the only other adult to have spent any time conversing with the child.”

  “I still don’t understand,” Catherine said. “How could he illuminate any aspect of her kidnapping?”

  “We have reason to believe that she wasn’t a random victim. There is no ransom note. We think she was chosen for a specific reason. Michael was one of the last people to spend time with her. I’m wondering if he noticed anything unusual, or if she gave him any indication about any recent changes in her life. A stranger approaching. Someone she knows who began acting differently. Something she recently learned that made her a threat to someone. Her mother and her teacher haven’t been able to help. Any input from Michael could make the difference.”

  I waited a long time. “Catherine? Are you still there?”

  After another long wait, Catherine said, “Michael had a friend, a fellow grad student from back in his days at Berkeley. For many years they used to go camping together at an old cabin in Tahoe that belongs to the friend’s uncle. The friend died from cancer a few years ago. The friend’s uncle works in the American Embassy in Paris. He rarely gets back to the states. Michael said that the uncle not only allows him to use the cabin, but he appreciates that Michael checks on it from time to time. Michael has a key. I think that is where he was going.”

  “Did Michael plan his break from school in advance?”

  “No. It was quite sudden. He came to me a few weeks ago and said something had come up, and he needed to get away to work on it. We went over the schedule and figured out that Ms. Scola, one of our other professors, could take his classes. So we let him take two weeks off. With the weekends on either side, that would give him a long break. But of course he didn’t come back to classes Monday, so it has been longer than he planned. Frankly, I’m worried about him.”

  “Any idea what he was working on?”

  “No. Just some kind of project, I imagine. Knowing Michael, I’d say it was almost certainly something in his professional field.”

  “Why would he go to a cabin in Tahoe to work on a project?”

  “You have to understand that Michael is a brilliant scientist. He’s probably on the verge of a new theory. He’s the kind of man who could potentially come up with breakthrough insight
s into physics. A man like that, well, he needs to simply think uninterrupted. For scientists like Michael, it’s only the prosaic work that is done in the lab. The real work is done in the brain. I’ve seen it. He walks and thinks. He sits and thinks. He’s not even aware of the details of life. He’s completely distracted. He loses track of the hours, even of the days. Of course, I don’t know that he went to the Tahoe cabin. But I surmise that he did because it would fit with his needs.”

  “Where is the cabin?” I asked.

  “It is at Fallen Leaf Lake. But I’ve never been there.”

  “Do you know the address?”

  “No.”

  “Have you a picture? Did Michael ever give you a description?”

  “I’ve never seen a picture of it, but I remember him talking about it. He said it is an old log cabin, quite primitive. He said it sits way back from the road and that it is up on a slope.”

  “Did he mention which road?”

  “No. He only said that he likes to go out on the front steps at night when the moon is out because Mt. Tallac reflects in the water of Fallen Leaf Lake. Does that help?”

  “Yes, that helps a lot.”

  “If you see him, please have him call me?” She sounded frightened.

  “I will, Catherine.”

  FORTY-THREE

  I thought about Michael Warner as I drove back up to Tahoe.

  Warner learned he had a daughter, met her and then she and he spent some time in private. A short time later she was kidnapped. No ransom demand was sent. Warner also had a panel van. He lived alone. He packed his van for a camping trip, presumably at his friend’s uncle’s cabin on Fallen Leaf Lake.

  Around the time Warner met Silence, he made a request at the university for two weeks off. His last day of class before his week off was a Friday. Charlie and Silence were kidnapped five days later on Wednesday.

  I knew that a large percentage of kidnapped children are taken by parents who don’t have custody. Marlette had said he was unusual, a little bit off.

  Normally, I would call Mallory at the SLTPD as well as the El Dorado Sheriff’s Department and fill them in on my likely kidnapping and murder suspect. But given that I’d made myself unwelcome in the local law enforcement community, I’d have to pursue it alone. If I found direct evidence of Michael Warner’s involvement in the kidnapping and murder, I’d call them in.

  The highway up Echo Summit was remarkably void of traffic, a benefit of the shoulder season. The tourists who are the economic lifeblood of the basin and who fill the highways wouldn’t return in force until the ski resorts opened come Thanksgiving. I made good time until I hit snow flurries at 7000 feet.

  Coming down from the summit, I drove back out of the snow. I made a left turn onto North Upper Truckee Road. North Upper Truckee winds through a large middle class neighborhood. One third of the houses are owner-occupied. The other two-thirds sit vacant except for when the vacation homeowners come to town.

  Several miles to the north I made a left turn onto Tahoe Mountain Road and climbed up into the Angora Heights neighborhood, a small area of million-dollar homes, some of which had the ten million-dollar view over Fallen Leaf Lake. With Mt. Tallac looming over the opposite shore and reflecting in the sparkling waters, it is one of the grandest views in all of the Sierra, and the area has been used in many Hollywood films.

  I made several turns through the neighborhood to access the one-lane road that crawls down to Fallen Leaf Lake. At the intersection with Fallen Leaf Road I turned left and drove along the lake, grateful that Spot was lying down in back, less likely to attract attention.

  I watched up to the left, looking for any cabin that could fit the description the university’s dean had given. Eventually, I came to the end of the lake where the entrance to Stanford Camp angles to the right and the trail to Glen Alpine Falls goes to the left.

  I turned around in the parking lot and headed back the way I’d come. Most of the cabins and houses on the lake were deserted this time of year because the snows could come at any time and Fallen Leaf Road is not plowed. Nevertheless, I didn’t want to take a chance on being seen, so I continued until I found a stretch without cabins where I could pull well into the woods and park unnoticed.

  Spot was now awake and curious about the lack of car movement. I let him out and let him wander the woods for a minute. Then I called him, took hold of his collar and put my finger across his nose, the signal for quiet.

  I bent my head down for emphasis. “No sound, Spot. Nothing.”

  He ignored me, suddenly watching the woods on high alert because he realized I was up to something.

  We started into the forest, choosing a high line where we’d be far from the lake road and above all the cabins. Although the sky was still a bright blue, the sun had set behind the peak of Mt. Tallac, 3400 feet directly above us. The forest is thick and the pine and fir trees tall, so that even though their highest branches were enjoying the late afternoon daylight, the forest floor was already moving into twilight. Most of the birds of summer were long gone, trading the cold Tahoe evenings for the warm humid sunsets of Guatemala and other points south. The few remaining birds, the Steller’s jays, the Mountain chickadees, the crows and ravens had gone quiet.

  A little red Douglas squirrel, quivering with angry energy, advanced down the trunk of a Sugar pine, screaming at Spot and me for our thoughtless intrusion into his landscape. Spot tensed, but did not pull away from me as the first of the two cabins I wanted to investigate came into view through the trees.

  We stayed well back and above and walked an arc around it. It was made of logs, darkened over the decades. Each wall had two small windows. The door was in the center of the front wall. In one corner rose a crooked metal stove pipe. The roof was low and built at a shallow angle, its shingles covered with green mossy nap. There was no vehicle in front of the cabin, and there were no lights on inside. But it didn’t mean much as I saw no power lines either. Someone could be living by candlelight, not easily seen from the outside.

  Because Spot’s coloring is the opposite of camouflage, I stopped at a place where we were hidden from the cabin and said, “Sit-Stay.”

  He reluctantly sat and looked up at me, wondering what craziness I was about to engage in at a time when I should be home preparing his supper.

  I took a step away and turned to him. “Stay,” I said again.

  I walked away, staying largely in Spot’s view to lessen his temptation to run and give our location away. There were many large trees and I kept them between me and the cabin as I approached.

  My path took me to the pine needle-covered drive where I stopped and looked at the ground. Many of the needles were unbroken and had not been disturbed. My guess was that no one had pulled into the drive in many weeks.

  Spot was still sitting when I came back. I praised him lavishly and he jumped up and put his front paws on my shoulders, his nose to my nose, to celebrate his grad-school-level skills. Then we continued on into the woods.

  I’d barely gotten a glimpse of the second cabin, a dark shape through the trees, when Spot whined. It was a high plaintive cry, unlike what you’d expect from a 170-pound animal whose growl can break windowpanes.

  The second cabin was just as old and dark as the first, but it was much bigger and appeared to have a second floor loft under a steep roof. As we approached, I could see that there was no vehicle in front, yet even in the dim light it was clear by tire tracks that a vehicle had been in and out recently. Perhaps someone was inside, watching, but I doubted it. Spot’s whine had changed my perception of what I was dealing with, so I kept him with me this time, walked up the front steps to the front door and knocked.

  I turned around and looked through the trees at the jaw-drop view. Mt. Tallac and Cathedral Peak filled the sky through the trees, and the waves on the lake below scintillated in the waning light like the lights of Atlantis.

  I let go of Spot. “You can run, boy. Go ahead, it’s okay.” I gave him a little pat
on his rear and he walked down the steps, out from the cabin, and lowered his nose to sniff the needles. Then he lay down next to a Manzanita bush, looking enervated instead of energetic after being stuck in the Jeep for hours. I knocked again, wondering about Spot, hoping he was okay.

  When no one answered, I walked around the cabin. The windows were all double hung. None of them slid up as I pushed on them. When I peered inside nothing was visible in the dark other than a glimpse of wooden floorboards here and there. The second floor had one window on each end, tucked under the roof gable. But I saw no easy way to get up and look inside. I went back around to the front.

  Spot still lay on the ground, watching me.

  On the front side of the house the ground sloped away enough that three feet of the foundation wall showed. There was a cellar window on either side of the front steps. They each had two hinges on the top edge so they could swing out at the bottom. Peering through the dusty, spider web-covered glass I could see the little rod that could be set in different notches on a metal track to prop the window open at various angles. I dug my fingernails into the edges of the window and pulled, but the window held fast, its prop rod firmly lodged in the track.

  I moved to the second basement window. It too was locked. I looked around at the forest and distant houses down on the lake and saw no one as I eased my toe against the glass. It made a soft ting and cracked diagonally across one corner. I moved my toe to the broken triangle of glass and applied more pressure. Another ting and the triangle split. It was easy to push the two little panes in. A fly buzzed out as the broken glass fell inside to the basement floor. I bent down to take another look, and it smelled like someone had put up a freezer full of steak and unplugged it a couple of weeks ago. I whistled for Spot and he came at a slow walk, stopped and looked at me.

  “Come here, Spot. Tell me what you think.” I tapped my foot near the broken window. He walked over, reluctantly, snout reaching toward the window. But he stopped five feet away, pulled back his ears and moved his head from side to side as he backed up. Another high-pitched whine issued from the back of his throat. Now I was certain why he’d cried from far back in the woods.