She nodded and smiled. Then she reached up and kissed my cheek. “Sure,” she said. “And thank you.” She stood up and pivoted to face me. She reached up with both hands to fluff her hair. It was pure seductiveness, the more so because I sensed that it was done without conscious calculation. She posed that way for a moment, hipshot, her breasts thrusting against the front of her blouse, her fingers in her thick hair. “Well,” she said, “are you coming?”
“Not just yet,” I answered. “You go ahead. I’ll be along in a minute.”
She smiled quickly. “Okay.”
I watched her walk away. I waited until she was out of sight before I stood up and turned to try the door to the cabin. It was unlocked. I pushed it open.
The cabin that Phil Rolando and, before him, his brother, Ken, had stayed in was similar to all the others at Raven Lake—a single room, furnished spartanly. There were no electric lights, no indoor toilet facilities. This, as Tiny often reminded me, was the way the city sports seemed to prefer it.
Against the right wall as I entered twin beds jutted into the room. “Beds,” Tiny had once told me, “are important. You don’t skimp on the beds. No matter how primitive the sports pretend they want it, by Jesus they better sleep well or they don’t come back. Good box spring, good mattress. That and good food are more important than good fishin’ for most folks.”
Against the back wall stood a ceiling-high wood cabinet with two doors. On the left was a stove and an untidy stack of firewood, with a few chairs arranged around the flat hide of a black bear that had seen better days.
One of the beds was neatly made. An open duffel bag lay on top of it. The other bed had been slept in. The covers were thrown back, as if someone had leaped out in a hurry.
I went over and sat on the unmade bed. Beside it lay a pair of moccasins and the rumpled top of a pair of striped pajamas. Rolando’s, I assumed. He was barefoot and topless when I found him floating under the dock. On the table beside the bed was a windup alarm clock, a small pile of change, a wristwatch, a flashlight, and the stubs of a pair of candles set into simple glass holders. I picked up the watch. It was a Seiko. It looked expensive. I found no inscription on the back.
I opened the single drawer in the table. Aside from a small scattering of what looked like mouse turds, it was empty.
I moved around to examine the contents of Rolando’s duffel bag. If the police had been in there ahead of me, they had treated Rolando’s belongings with unusual respect. I would have expected to find his stuff strewn all over the room. Instead, everything was more or less neatly packed away—several changes of underwear, half a dozen pairs of socks balled up together, blue jeans, a sweater, a sweatshirt, two neatly folded flannel shirts, one dress shirt in cellophane.
In the bottom I found a leather toilet kit. I unzipped it. Razor, toothbrush, toothpaste, a can of Rise shaving cream, English Leather after-shave, dental floss, a wooden hairbrush, a bottle of nonprescription cold capsules, a bottle of generic aspirin, and a well-squeezed tube of Preparation H.
I emptied each pill bottle. To my inexpert eye and taste, each contained exactly what it purported to contain.
Having emptied the duffel bag, I held it upside down over the bed and shook it. No badge fell out. Nor did I find a wallet or a lethal-looking Colt Python .357 revolver.
For that matter, no plastic baggies full of cocaine fell out, either. Or big wads of high-denomination bills.
I got down on my hands and knees to look under the beds. Under the unused one I found a small leather suitcase. I slid it out and placed it on the bed. Its contents essentially duplicated those of the duffel bag. I looked at the labels of the undershirts and compared them to those that were in the duffel bag. Those in the suitcase were large. Those in the duffel bag were medium.
So the suitcase probably had belonged to Ken Rolando. Polly had said he was taller than his brother. But I found no identification in the suitcase.
It made no sense to me that these two men should travel with no identification whatsoever. No initials on the luggage. No inscription on the watch. No papers, no wallet. No badge.
Polly had been quite definite about Phil Rolando’s badge.
It took only a modest application of intellect for me to deduce that Rolando had hidden some things. If I could find them, I might learn why he had hidden them.
I lit a cigarette and sat on the foot of the bed. I could slit open mattresses and pillows, pry up floorboards, and in general trash the place the way television spies do when they’re searching for secret documents.
Or I could open the doors to the wooden cabinet. Which I did. And found it completely empty.
I tried to imagine what Rolando might have been thinking. Had he wanted to secrete his possessions against a careful, professional search, then I had no chance. But if he simply had taken the precaution to put things out of the sight of casually prying eyes, such as those of Marge or Polly when they came around to tidy up, that was a challenge I felt up to. And if he had hidden his badge after Polly left him the night he died, then it was likely his hiding place was somewhere in this room.
My eye fell on the wood stove. It was small, dull black, cast iron on stubby legs. I went over to it and unlatched the front-opening door. A cloud of wood ash burst out at me. I went back to the bedside table and got Rolando’s flashlight, returned to the stove, and shone the light inside. The ash lay thick in the bottom. It probably hadn’t been used since the cool spring evenings, more than a month ago.
I picked up a stick of kindling from the stack beside the stove and poked around in the ashes. I prodded something solid. Squinting my eyes against the billowing dust, I reached in and pulled out a plastic bag. It had been knotted. It was too dusty for me to see what it contained. I undid the knot.
Two wallets. Two thin black leather folders. Two weapons—one was indeed a Colt Python .357 revolver. The other one was a big-bored automatic.
The black folders fell open to reveal identical silver badges. Five-pointed stars surrounded by a circle.
Both Rolando men had been, as I suspected, U.S. marshals.
One wallet contained a variety of credit cards, licenses, and other documents belonging to someone named Kenneth Sadowski from Albany, New York. The second had ridden in the pocket of one Philip Genetti. Also of Albany.
Polly was right. The Rolando brothers hadn’t been brothers.
Nor had they been Rolandos.
But they had both been federal marshals, and I knew enough to realize that the job of federal marshals is to chase down fugitives. It hadn’t changed since the days of Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson.
Of course, I reminded myself, U.S. marshals had every right in the world to take fishing vacations in the Maine wilderness.
But I doubted that they routinely traveled under assumed names when they went fishing. Nor did they normally disappear or get themselves murdered and scalped while on vacation.
I returned the items to the plastic bag, knotted it, shoved it back into the wood stove, and pushed the ashes over it with my hand. Then I closed the door to the stove.
I stepped back and brushed my hands on my pants. A thick film of wood ash lay on the pine-plank floor. I picked up the corner of the bearskin and dragged it back and forth over the dirty area. When I slid it back to its original spot, the floor looked reasonably clean.
I went over to the bed and repacked the duffel bag and the suitcase. I slid the suitcase under the bed. I left the duffel bag where I found it.
I stepped back and stood by the door. To my eye, the room looked exactly the way it did when I had first entered. I went back outside, closed the door, and sat on the step.
What had I learned? A U.S. marshal named Kenneth Sadowski, but calling himself Rolando, had come to this place. On business, I had to assume. Within a couple days, he disappeared. Tiny Wheeler dutifully notified the man he assumed was the missing man’s next of kin. A brother, he was supposed to believe, but in reality probably Sadowski’s partner. This s
econd man, whose real name was Philip Genetti, came to Raven Lake, claiming to be concerned about his missing brother. Shortly thereafter he was fatally wounded in the neck with an arrow, scalped, and dumped into Raven Lake.
I also knew that sometime earlier the law firm of Boggs and Kell had tendered an offer to Vern Wheeler to purchase the lodge and all the land that went with it. This, I concluded, just might not be an unrelated fact.
Then my friend, the Indian guide named Woodrow Wilson Pauley, was neatly framed for the murder of Phil Genetti, aka Phil Rolando, the U.S. marshal. And who should take Woody’s case but the law firm of Boggs and Kell.
Then an airplane exploded in the middle of Raven Lake. The pilot was killed. Gib had seemed to both me and Polly Wheeler to be a man burdened with a guilty conscience. He wanted me to go with him on his airplane, to help him with what he called “lawyer-type” problems. Polly thought he had been doing something illegal in Canada.
As far as I knew, nobody else possessed all of these seemingly separate pieces of information.
Except, probably, the murderer.
I got up and went back inside the cabin. I reassured myself that I had left behind no evidence that I had searched the place. I wasn’t sure why I wanted to disguise it. But I did realize two things.
I didn’t know who I could trust.
And I was in over my head.
Fifteen
MIDAFTERNOON THAT SAME DAY the police seaplane buzzed overhead and splashed down in the middle of Raven Lake. Tiny and I walked down to the dock to watch it taxi in.
A bulky state trooper climbed out first and made fast. Then Thurl Harris, the sheriff, slouched out, followed by Asa Danforth, the assistant district attorney. Danforth wore a dark green blazer identical to the ones they give the winners of the Master’s golf tournament every year. Otherwise, he didn’t look much like Jack Nicklaus.
We shook hands all around and headed up to the lodge. “So how’s the fishin’ been?” Harris said to Tiny as we walked.
“Good. Damn good, Thurl. You oughta try it sometime.”
“Keep meaning to. Like to get into some of them salmon. I would.”
Tiny and Harris chatted in that vein until we entered the lodge. At that point Danforth took over. “We want to talk to whoever saw the accident,” he said to Tiny.
“That’d be Brady, here, and Bud Turner. They were the only ones.”
“Who’s Turner? I don’t remember him.”
“Our cook. He and Brady were out on the porch when it happened. Far as I know, no one else saw it.”
Danforth glanced at his wristwatch and frowned. “Well, let’s get to it. We’ll use your office.”
Tiny shrugged, and Thurl Harris followed me and Danforth into Tiny’s little cubicle. We sat as we had the previous time, with Danforth behind the desk and Harris and me side by side in the straight-backed chairs.
“Tell me what you saw, then,” said Danforth without preliminaries.
“First,” I began, “I had a conversation with Gib last night. I was going to fly out with him this morning, but—”
“Just tell me what you saw, please.”
“If I say something else, you will instruct the jury to disregard it, is that it?”
He waved his hand. “You can say whatever you want, Mr. Coyne. But first, describe the accident, will you?”
I did, as well as I could. When I finished, Danforth said, “Would you say that the explosion came first?”
I shook my head. “It all happened so fast…”
“Or did the plane flip and then explode?”
I hesitated and closed my eyes. All I saw was that orange flash and the cartwheeling airplane, caught in a still frame in my mind’s eye. “I think the explosion came first. But I’m not sure. It all seemed to happen instantaneously, do you understand?”
He nodded. “It exploded first, then.”
I shook my head. “I’m not sure.”
“It makes a difference, Mr. Coyne.”
“I know.”
“If it exploded first, then he didn’t hit a snag or something. We can surmise that the engine was the cause. If he flipped first, then we would assume he hit something and that was what caused the explosion.”
“Which,” I said, “would make it an accident.”
“Either way it could have been an accident. I just want to know what kind of accident.”
I sat forward. “Listen. Don’t forget that there has already been one murder up here. Quite likely two. This could be the third.”
Danforth fussed with the knot in his tie. “I know of one murder,” he said carefully. “We believe we know who did it. He is nowhere near here. And there is a missing person.”
I shook my head. “This doesn’t change your opinion on Woody, then?”
“Not at all.”
I took a deep breath and let it out loudly. “I believe Gib intended to fly to Greenville this morning to talk with the sheriff.” I glanced at Thurl Harris, whose face revealed nothing. “I believe Gib knew something about Rolando’s murder. Maybe about the other Rolando’s disappearance, too. He asked me to go with him. To give him legal counsel. I believe he was killed so that he couldn’t talk.”
“You believe,” said Danforth.
I smiled. “Yes, I do.”
“That’s interesting, Mr. Coyne. And with beliefs as firm as those, you must also have a belief as to who this murderer is. So let’s have it. Who did all these killings? Who arranged for this airplane to explode this morning?”
“I have no idea whatsoever.”
“I don’t suppose you’d care to speculate.”
“Right. I wouldn’t.”
“Is there anything else you think I should know?”
I thought of telling him about the true identities of the men who called themselves Ken and Phil Rolando. I decided to hold on to that information until I could make some sense out of it. It was irresponsible, I knew. Irresponsible, as an officer of the court, not to be forthcoming with any information relative to a felony. Irresponsible to allow my feelings for Danforth to cloud my professional judgment.
The hell with it. I didn’t like Asa Danforth. I didn’t trust him. And I wanted to talk with Charlie McDevitt before I talked to anybody else. Charlie would give me hell. I deserved it. But Charlie could help me make sense of it all, and I’d be damned if this abrasive power seeker Danforth was going to climb into political office on my back.
“No,” I told him. “That’s it. That’s all I know.”
Danforth spoke to Harris. “Get the other one, the cook, in here, then.” He lifted his eyebrows at me. I took that as a dismissal. I stood up. “Appreciate your help, Mr. Coyne,” said Danforth, flashing me his well-practiced smile, as polished as the buttons on his Master’s jacket.
I tried to think of a suitably sarcastic rejoinder. Finding none, I walked out without saying anything.
I took up my favorite Brumby rocker on the porch, and I was still there a half hour later when Harris and Danforth came out of the lodge, accompanied by Tiny. They stopped beside me, and Danforth looked down at me. “Thanks again for your help,” he said.
In the intervening half hour, I still hadn’t come up with a reply. I lifted my hand. “Anytime,” I said.
Tiny walked with them down to the dock. I got up and went inside. Nobody was in the dining room. I found Bud Turner in the kitchen.
“What did you tell them?” I said.
Bud grinned crookedly. “Same as you, I imagine. Gib’s plane blew up.” He shrugged. “They didn’t seem that interested.”
“I had the same feeling.”
“They want it to be an accident,” said Bud.
“What do you think?”
“Oh, I s’pose it was an accident, all right. What else could it be?”
“You know.”
“Ah, hell, Mr. Coyne. They got old Woody put away somewheres. He’s the only one killing folks around here.” He lifted his eyebrows at me, and I nodded. I didn’t agree
with him, but neither did I care to discuss it.
“When will you be driving into Greenville next?” I asked him.
“Two, three days, I guess.”
I frowned.
“You need to get to town?”
“Yes, I do.”
He nodded. “That’s right. You were flyin’ out with Gib this morning, weren’t you?”
“Yeah. Listen, Bud—”
“Let me talk to Tiny. No reason I couldn’t go down a couple days early. I’ve got a feelin’ that until he finds somebody who can drive airplanes in here, we’re gonna be doin’ a lot of truckin’.”
“I’ll speak to Tiny myself, if you want.”
“No problem,” said Bud. “Check with me after dinner.”
I wandered out of the kitchen, wondering if there was anyone at Raven Lake who hadn’t known that I was scheduled to be on the airplane with Gib.
It was easily arranged, and after breakfast the next morning Bud and I climbed into his pickup, bound for Greenville. Turner had just got the engine going when Fisher, the young man with the Adam’s apple and the blushing bride, came running to the truck.
“Hey, wait,” he huffed.
Turner leaned out the window. “What’s up, Mr. Fisher?”
“Are you headed for town?”
“Ay-yuh.”
“Well, I—that is, Mrs. Fisher—we’d like a ride.”
Turner shook his head. “Sorry. No room. Tiny’ll have another plane up for you in a day or so.”
Fisher’s young face beseeched Bud Turner. “You don’t understand. My wife won’t fly. She—she heard the explosion. And there was Mr. Rolando who got murdered. She’s in our cabin now crying her eyes out. She’s petrified. I have to get her out of this place.”
“I can’t take you in the truck.”
Fisher looked at me. “Why not? He’s going.”
“Mr. Coyne works for Mr. Wheeler.”
Fisher’s shoulders slumped. “Oh.”
“Sorry,” said Turner.
Fisher shrugged and turned back to the cabins. His first marital conundrum. I silently wished him luck. “We could have put them in the back,” I said.
Dead Meat Page 18