by Tom Grace
‘Hey, Fred,’ he said sarcastically when the other man came on the line, ‘guess what I just dug up?’
‘Don’t tell me you hit the steam tunnel.’
‘No, we’re well clear of that. Guess again.’
‘Bud, I don’t have time for this. What the hell did you hit?’
‘I didn’t hit nothing, Fred. I dug up somebody’s fucking arm. I looked at all the as-built drawings for this site, and I don’t remember seeing the word cemetery anywhere.’
‘All right, Bud. Just sit tight. I’ll make a few calls and then I’ll be right down.’
21
JULY 17
Ann Arbor, Michigan
‘Hey, Darrell, you ready to go back to work?’
Darrell Jones walked over to where Bud Vesper sat in the excavator and hesitantly peered down into the pit. ‘Did they get all those dead fuckers out of the hole?’
‘After knocking my schedule off by a week, they better have. Fuckin’ med school.’
‘Med school?’
‘Yeah. Up until the late 1800s, the med school had a couple of buildings down here. The Gross Anatomy building stood right about where we were digging.’
‘That arm I found looked a lot fresher than the 1800s.’
‘It wasn’t. The university sent a pathologist down here to collect what we’d found. He told me the reason we didn’t find bones was that the parts were too pickled to rot and buried too deep for anything to eat ’em. The guy also said that back then there were rumors about the med school robbing fresh graves to get their cadavers. He assured me that they don’t do it like that anymore.’
‘I should hope the fuck not!’
‘Anyway, they’re all gone now and on their way to a decent burial.’
‘Glad to hear it,’ Jones said as he picked up his story pole and began climbing down into the hole.
By midafternoon Vesper had widened the excavation along the side of West Engineering, but as he dug closer to the old building, he began to encounter construction debris.
‘I’d like to beat the crap out of the guy who left all this shit down here,’ Vesper said as he pulled out another bucketful of shattered bricks.
Vesper lowered the hydraulic arm back into the hole. When it hit bottom, a loud hollow sound echoed from below. Jones quickly motioned for him to pull out. Vesper parked the bucket off to the side, shut the Cat down, and walked over to the edge of the hole.
‘What the hell did I hit now?’
‘Beats me, Bud, but it sure sounded funny.’
‘Might be a branch off the steam tunnel. What’s the invert elevation?’
Jones placed his story pole down in the hole and eye-balled the depth.
‘It’s about thirteen off the original grade.’
‘Too deep for a tunnel. What the…’ Vesper thought for a moment as he looked at the masonry, trying to envision the whole structure from the exposed fragment. The rubble they’d cleared appeared to be confined to a circular area ten feet in diameter. ‘I gotta check something.’
He climbed out of the hole and walked over to the site trailer that served as his local office. He flipped through a set of drawings he had for the project until he found the campus master site plan. Vesper located the area they were working in, and there, next to a dashed circle, read a note: STACK REMOVED 1948.
‘It’s a fucking smokestack,’ Vesper growled.
Shaking his head in disgust, he picked up the phone and called Murrow.
‘Hey, Fred, it’s Bud. How’s that contingency fund holding up?’
‘What is it now?’ Murrow sounded as though he could use an aspirin.
‘Nothing much, just the foundation of a goddamn smokestack that was yanked out back in ’forty-eight.’
‘How bad?’
‘The architect wants to put a column right smack on top of the goddamn thing. Looks like there’s a cleanout tunnel coming out of one side. Sounds hollow, so it won’t bear the weight. The whole thing’s gotta come out.’
‘Okay, Bud, but take it easy on me. At the rate we’re going, the contingency money will be shot before we even get the foundation in.’
‘I’ll be gentle. See ya, Fred.’
Vesper clipped the phone to his hip and returned to the latest discovery.
‘What’s the story, Bud?’ Jones asked.
‘Once upon a time, there was a big old smokestack right here.’ Vesper pointed at the ring of shattered masonry. He then walked about ten paces west. ‘The stack was connected to the boiler house, which sat right about there. When they demolished the stack, they chopped the tree down but left the stump. I talked with Murrow, and he gave the okay to rip it out.’
‘Then let’s rip.’
Vesper climbed back into the cab of his excavator and carefully began digging out the edges around the stack’s foundation. It took almost two hours to expose the base of the demolished smokestack. Vesper widened the trench he’d dug around the stack on the side opposite the presumed access tunnel.
Vesper rammed the bucket into the bricks; a fissure opened in the brittle mortar joints, and two more hits widened the crack that ran top to bottom. Vesper then dug the teeth of the bucket into the upper lip of the cylinder and drove it downward, peeling away the masonry shell. Broken bricks spilled out of the fractured vessel amid a cloud of dust and ancient ash.
Jones signaled for Vesper to wait while he took a look inside – with their recent luck, he was afraid of what they might find. He switched on his flashlight and pointed it into the tunnel. The dust was still swirling but slowly settling.
‘No steam pipes, no wires. So far, so good,’ Jones muttered to himself. ‘Nothing but broken bricks on the—’
Jones dropped his flashlight and jumped back from the darkened opening, cursing.
Vesper leaned out of the excavator. ‘Hey, Jones, what did ya see?’
‘Sweet mother of Jesus! I just do not fucking believe this. I’m working in a goddamn graveyard! I don’t need this shit, I really don’t!’
Jones was pacing in a circle. Vesper could see panic in the man’s eyes. He leapt from the Caterpillar and ran over to the tunnel.
‘Darrell, you okay, man?’
‘I thought you told me all the dead people were gone! You said we weren’t going to find any more! You fuckin’ promised me, Bud!’
‘I swear, man, I thought we got ’em all.’
‘You know how I feel about this shit,’ Jones said, slowly recovering his composure while his heart was still trying to pound its way out of his chest.
Vesper nodded, then turned to investigate the latest discovery. He crouched down and peered into the dark tunnel and saw Jones’s flashlight lying on a pile of shattered bricks, its beam pointing down. Vesper picked up the flashlight, rotated the bezel for a wide beam, and aimed the light down into the darkened space.
About six feet ahead he saw a body lying prone on the floor of the tunnel. The fully clothed figure of a man looked as if it had been cast aside, like a rag doll, the arms and legs unnaturally askew. Off to one side lay a dust-covered leather briefcase and a rumpled hat.
Somehow, Vesper thought, I don’t think the med school put this guy down here.
22
JULY 18
Dexter, Michigan
‘Kilkenny residence,’ Audrey said, answering the phone.
‘Ma’am, this is Detective Brian Ptashnik of the Ann Arbor Police Department. Is Martin Kilkenny there?’
‘No, he’s out running some errands with our grandson. This is his wife, Audrey. Is there something I can help you with, Detective?’
‘I’m afraid not, Mrs Kilkenny. We just need to speak with your husband. Could you have him contact me as soon as he returns?’
‘Certainly, or if you like, I could call my grandson on his cell phone.’
‘I’d appreciate that, ma’am.’
As Nolan and his grandfather walked out of the Dexter Mill with some supplies, the phone clipped to the waist of his jeans purred. He s
et the large bag of dog food down and answered the call.
‘Nolan, is Martin with you?’ Audrey asked abruptly.
‘Yeah, Grandma, he’s right here. Did he forget something?’
‘No, dear. I just need to speak with him.’
Realizing that something was wrong, Nolan took the bags from his grandfather’s arms and handed him the phone.
‘Hello, Audrey.’
‘Martin, I just received a call from the Ann Arbor police – a Detective Brian Ptashnik. He needs to speak with you.’
‘A detective? I wonder whatever for. Did he say what about?’
‘No. He just said that you might be able to help them out with something and that he’d appreciate a call from you.’
‘Looks like I’ll just have to call him and find out. What’s his number?’
‘What was that all about, Grandpa?’ Nolan asked after Martin ended the call.
Martin momentarily ignored the question as he quickly dialed the number before forgetting it.
‘It appears the police in Ann Arbor want to have a word with me. Why don’t you finish loading the stuff in your truck while I give this detective a call and see what he wants.’
As Nolan opened the back of his SUV, Martin waited for his call to be answered.
‘Major Crimes Unit. Detective Ptashnik speaking.’
‘Detective, this is Martin Kilkenny. I’m returning your call. What can I do for you?’
‘Well, sir, first off, are you the Martin Kilkenny who worked for the University of Michigan back in ’forty-eight?’
‘None other. Why do you ask?’
‘Frankly, given the age of this report, I wasn’t sure you’d even be alive, much less still residing locally. Something has come up on a very old case and, well, your name was in the file. I can’t believe I’m even working on a case that’s older than I am.’
‘And what case might that be, Detective?’
‘In December of 1948 you filed a missing-person report on Johann Wolff. Do you recall that?’
Martin placed a hand on the side of Nolan’s SUV to steady himself; he felt the blood rush from his head.
‘Are you okay, Grandpa?’ Nolan asked when he saw Martin falter.
Martin nodded to Nolan. ‘I remember that quite clearly, Detective.’
‘Good. Would it be possible for you to meet me down at the Washtenaw County Medical Examiner’s Office later today?’
‘Certainly. But why?’
‘We may have found your friend, sir. I realize that it’s been a long time, but I would appreciate your help in identifying the body. Are you sure you’re up to this, Mr Kilkenny?’
‘Johann was my friend. I owe it to him. Would two-thirty be soon enough, Detective?’
‘That’ll be fine, sir.’
‘I’m going to hand you over to my grandson, Nolan Kilkenny. Would you kindly tell him the particulars about where we’re going?’
Martin handed the phone to Nolan, opened the passenger door of the black Mercedes, and sat with his head bowed. Nolan jotted down the detective’s instructions in his planner and ended the call.
‘Grandpa, are you sure you’re okay?’
‘Johann Wolff is dead, Nolan. My friend is dead. They found his body.’ And with that, Martin Kilkenny released the tears that he’d been holding back for more than fifty years.
23
JULY 18
Ypsilanti, Michigan
At two-thirty Nolan and his grandfather met Detective Ptashnik in the lobby of a nondescript municipal building on Ypsilanti’s East Side that housed, among other things, the offices of the Washtenaw County Medical Examiner.
‘Thank you for coming down so quickly,’ Ptashnik said, greeting them as he extended his hand.
‘It’s not a problem,’ Martin assured the detective.
‘If you’ll both follow me, we’ll be meeting with Dr Porter back in the morgue. She’s expecting us.’
They followed Ptashnik through a painted steel door marked AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY and down an antiseptic corridor dimly lit with cool fluorescent lights.
Martin broke the silence. ‘I’ve been meaning to ask you something, Detective.’
‘Go right ahead.’
‘After all this time, how did you come to the conclusion that this might be my friend Johann?’
‘We found some ID with the remains.’
‘And where did you find him?’
‘In the base of a demolished smokestack not fifty yards from where, according to the report you filed, you last saw him.’
Martin paled slightly, horrified at the thought of Wolff’s body lying buried for years just outside his shop in West Engineering.
The short walk ended at the entrance to the medical examiner’s office suite.
‘Hey, Martha,’ Ptashnik shouted in a friendly voice, poking his head into the reception area. ‘I’ve got a pair of visitors that I’m taking back to see Bev.’
‘She’s expecting you.’
‘Thanks.’
Ptashnik led them through a pair of doors clad in stainless-steel protective plates. The room was brightly lit, cold and sterile. The only splash of color amid the whites and muted grays was the strawberry-blond tresses of the woman waiting inside.
‘Dr Beverly Porter,’ Ptashnik said, ‘I’d like to introduce Martin and Nolan Kilkenny.’
‘A pleasure, gentlemen, though not under the best of circumstances.’
‘Dr Porter, the disappearance of my friend has been like an old wound that refuses to completely heal.’
‘I hope this will bring you some closure, sir.’
Porter led them into a procedure room where a shrouded figure lay beneath a halo of task lights on a stainless-steel table.
‘A word of warning, gentlemen. The body is not in the best of condition.’
‘Body?’ Nolan questioned. ‘There’s more than just a skeleton left after all this time?’
‘The section of tunnel where the body was found acted like a vault, keeping the space inside cool and dry for over fifty years. The environment inside was ideal for preservation. Still, what you are about to see may be a bit of a shock,’ Porter explained.
Nolan and Martin both nodded, mentally preparing themselves for an unholy sight. Porter picked up the edge of the cloth and respectfully exposed the head of the corpse. What they saw looked much like an Egyptian mummy – a figure all flesh and bone with the skin shriveled, dark and stiff. Wisps of light brown hair still clung to the head, a subtle reminder that this was once a living person.
Nolan exhaled quietly. In combat, he’d seen more than his share of mangled bodies and gruesome remains – the images in his memory far worse than what he now beheld.
‘May I?’ Martin asked, indicating that he’d like a closer look.
Porter stepped back to give him room. Martin gazed down at the withered face and compared what he saw with his memories.
‘It’s Johann,’ he said with a mix of sadness and relief.
‘Are you sure?’ Ptashnik asked.
‘Aye, as sure as I can be.’
Martin took out a handkerchief, dabbed at a stray tear, and blew his nose. ‘How did he die?’
‘He was murdered,’ Ptashnik said with absolute certainty. ‘His killer nearly decapitated him.’
‘Who the hell would want to do a thing like that?’ Martin asked angrily. ‘Was he robbed?’
‘That was our initial thought, but then we found that he still had his briefcase and a wallet with ten bucks in it.’
‘If it wasn’t for money, then why?’
‘Grandpa, what about the rumors?’ Nolan asked.
‘Rumors?’ Ptashnik repeated.
‘After Johann disappeared, there was talk about how perhaps the government found out he’d done something during the war and deported him or imprisoned him or simply had him killed. Others said maybe some dark past was catching up with him, and he ran away. It was all a load of hooey; the government cleared him of any wrongdoing
before they let him in the country.’
‘Detective, you said that Wolff’s briefcase was buried with him. Can we see it?’ Nolan requested.
‘Why?’
‘A few weeks ago a physicist I’m working with – a guy named Ted Sandstrom – inherited a collection of letters written by Johann Wolff. Some of the material contained in those letters deals with Wolff’s theoretical research. The man who bequeathed these letters, a physicist named Raphaele Paramo, believed that they might help Sandstrom solve a technological problem he’s encountered in his own work. After reading the letters, Sandstrom agrees that the answer he’s looking for may be somewhere in Wolff’s research. Until today, I haven’t found any information that could lead me to Wolff or his research. I’m hoping that there might be something in his briefcase that will help.’
‘Since you two are the closest thing we have to a next of kin, I don’t see any harm,’ Ptashnik answered. ‘Where are his personal effects, Bev?’
‘They’re boxed and waiting to go to the state police crime lab. I know this isn’t a great time to ask, but who’ll be taking care of the arrangements? I’ll be finished with Mr Wolff by the weekend.’
‘I’ll take care of everything,’ Martin volunteered. ‘The funeral parlor in Dexter will be giving you a call. Thank you for the respect you’ve shown my friend.’
‘You’re welcome.’
As the Kilkennys followed Ptashnik out of the procedure room, Porter gently placed the shroud back over Wolff’s head.
In the anteroom, Ptashnik located the box Porter had set aside for him on a metal gurney.
‘Before you touch anything, I’d like you to put these on,’ Ptashnik said as he pulled out a pair of white latex gloves from a wall-mounted dispenser. ‘I’m going to have the lab people take a look at this to see if they can find any evidence that might identify the killer.’
Nolan and his grandfather complied with the request; Martin’s thick callused hands pushed the limits of the glove’s claim that one size fits all.