Eight in the Box

by Raffi Yessayan

  “Maybe there was a little too much partying over the weekend,” Connie said. Andi shot him a look, so he offered, “Maybe he hooked up with some buddies from law school. I’m sure he’s fine.”

  “Monica, have you called around to the local hospitals to see if he got into an accident?” Mitch asked.

  “Good idea,” Liz said. “Andi can help you.”

  “Liz, I’ll cover for Monica and Nick in the sessions.” Brendan was already putting on his suit jacket.

  By lunchtime, Liz had called Nick’s parents in Roslindale. They hadn’t heard from him either.

  Connie pulled Liz and Andi aside. “I’m going to shoot over to Nick’s condo. I’ll take Mitch with me. I can have Alves meet us over there. If there’s any problem,” he whispered, “we’ll have the police with us. I’ll call as soon as I find out anything.”

  Even though Andi offered to get her some lunch, Monica said she wasn’t hungry. The two of them had called all the local hospitals, asking about accident victims.

  “What about the hospital the cops call the Stairway to Heaven?” Andi asked.

  “Called it,” Monica said. “Nothing.”

  The two women sat in silence. Monica seemed worn out. She hadn’t bothered to put on her lipstick and her hair was uncombed.

  Liz pulled up a chair and joined them, her face showing signs of strain. She studied Monica for a moment. “Connie called in from the condo. There’s no sign of Nick. Let’s notify the DA and file a report.”

  CHAPTER 69

  Connie knew the two detectives from the Homicide Unit who showed up on Tuesday morning. The somber mood in the courthouse was heightened by their presence. Although no one wanted to think the worst, Nick’s disappearance was being investigated like a homicide.

  The detectives were a couple of old-timers named Taylor and Campbell who’d been assigned to Homicide for years and were biding time until their retirements. Connie had met them at several homicide scenes.

  “What’s up, guys? Anything new on Nick?” Connie asked as the two men walked past the secretaries toward Liz’s office.

  “Nothing,” Taylor said. He looked worn down. “We need to talk with everyone in the building to see if they saw anything out of the ordinary last week.”

  “Connie,” Campbell said, “when was the last time you saw Nick?”

  “Friday night. We were both working late. Us and Mitch Beaulieu.”

  “Mitch Beaulieu?” Campbell asked.

  “Another prosecutor. He’s at his desk right around the corner if you want to talk with him.”

  “How late were you here?”

  “I left around six thirty. Nick was still here. I’m not sure if Mitch was here.”

  “Did you leave alone?” Campbell asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Where was Nick?”

  “At his desk. Everyone else had gone home. The three of us were joking around about how we were big losers, working late on a Friday night. I told him I’d had enough, I was going home. He said he was going to stay a little longer, so he wouldn’t have to come in on the weekend. We said good night. That was the last time I saw him.”

  “Did he say what he was doing over the weekend?”

  “I didn’t ask.”

  “Where was Mitch?”

  “That’s what I’m not sure about. He was working in the conference room, but kept coming back to his desk for stuff. I went to the bathroom before I took off. He wasn’t at his desk, but I just assumed he was still in the conference room.”

  “I’ll check with him,” Campbell said.

  “Did you see anyone hanging around outside when you left the building?” Taylor asked.

  “It was deserted out there. This whole thing is pretty upsetting.” Connie shook his head. “Could I have been the last person to see him?”

  “You or Mitch,” Taylor said.

  “Do you guys think he’s all right?” Connie asked.

  “I don’t know,” Taylor said. “Nobody’s seen him in more than three days. It doesn’t look like he made it home Friday night. And it doesn’t look like he’s gone on a trip either. According to his parents, all of his luggage and travel bags were in his closet.”

  “And he didn’t mention going away,” Connie said.

  “Let us know if you think of anything else,” Campbell said. “I’m going to go talk with Mitch. You said he’s around the corner here?”

  Connie nodded.

  “I’m going down to the clerk’s office. I’ll meet you back up here,” Taylor said. He stopped and turned back to Connie. “How’s everyone doing with this whole thing?”

  “We’re all a little shaken. Everyone’s speculating as to whether this has anything to do with one of the cases Nick was prosecuting. It’s a little unnerving to think that something may have happened to him because of the job. A few of the women are in the conference room, basically holding a vigil for him. The judges are giving us continuances on everything until we clear this up. The DA is sending a few victim advocates from downtown to make sure everyone’s all right.”

  “You guys need to support one another right now. You shouldn’t be thinking the worst,” Taylor said. “At this point we don’t even know that anything’s happened to Nick. We always have missing persons who turn up after a few days. Sometimes the stress gets to people and they skip town for a while.”

  “I know how that feels. I’ve been so busy between court, prepping my cases, working at home all hours of the night. Throw in the Response pager and there are times I think I’m going to snap. That’s when I stop and take some deep Yoga breaths to clear my head. But if that’s what happened to Nick, why would he take off without any of his belongings?” Connie asked.

  “That’s the point. They want to get away from everything. That includes buying new clothes when they get where they’re going. You said that the two of you were here late on a Friday night?”

  “Yeah.”

  “There you have it. Who knows how late he worked after you left? Maybe it just got to him. Happens all the time. I know what you guys are worried about, but we have no reason to believe anything happened to Nick because of his work as a prosecutor. We called Liz Moore earlier, and she’s pulling all the cases he’s been handling so we can look at them. But we’re just doing it as a precaution. We’re also going to be increasing patrols in the area, so people should feel safe coming to and from the courthouse. We’ll even give personal escorts.”

  “Thanks,” Connie said as Detective Taylor moved down the hall. Connie knew Taylor would learn nothing from anyone in the clerk’s office. That place was a ghost town by the time he left on Friday night.

  CHAPTER 70

  “Connie, where’s Campbell?” Detective Taylor asked as he came running into the office. The detective probably hadn’t exercised in a while, his face pale and damp with the exertion.

  “I don’t know,” Connie said. “I think he’s in Liz’s office. What’s going on? Did you get something on Nick?” It wasn’t even noon yet. Taylor had been down in the clerk’s office for no more than two hours. It certainly looked like he’d hit on something.

  “I think I might have a lead on the Blood Bath Killer,” Taylor said.

  “What kind of a lead?” Connie asked as he followed Taylor into Liz’s office.

  “We’d better give Sergeant Mooney a call,” Taylor said to Campbell.

  Campbell pushed away a stack of files and stood, stretching as though he had been in one position too long.

  “I was talking to one of the women in the clerk’s office. She asked if we were going to solve Susan McCarthy’s murder. I told her it was still under investigation. Then she tells me that McCarthy seemed like such a nice woman when she sat on a jury last winter. She recognized her picture in the papers and on television. Felt horrible about what had happened to her. Susan McCarthy comes to this courthouse for jury duty a few months before she gets killed. Now we have a missing prosecutor from the same courthouse. Maybe it’s a coincidence,
but it’s worth looking into. This might be the break Mooney’s been waiting for.”

  It appeared that Campbell didn’t hear what Detective Taylor had just told him. He stood silently for a few seconds before looking from Liz to Connie. “Not a word about this to anyone. Not to other prosecutors, judges, anyone. We’ll talk with the DA himself and the police commissioner. We’re going to get Mooney and Alves over here ASAP.”

  Liz drew in a sharp breath of air. “Let us know if you need anything.”

  CHAPTER 71

  Richter pushed the 350 pounds off his chest as if he were doing a push-up. It had been a hectic day, with Alves and Mooney and what seemed like half the police department swarming in on the courthouse by early afternoon. Judge Davis had closed the courthouse early but had all of his staff stay to be interviewed by the detectives. Alves and Mooney told Liz she could let her people go home as long as they were back first thing in the morning to be interviewed. Richter and the other guys went to relieve some stress with an afternoon workout.

  One thing Angel Alves mentioned was that the police were having trouble getting the archived juror questionnaires. The Office of the Jury Commissioner had claimed that the forms were confidential records that couldn’t be divulged, even for a homicide investigation. There had been a lot of legal wrangling, and the DA’s chief legal counsel was going before a superior court judge in the morning to get a court order for the records. Richter enjoyed watching everyone scramble around.

  Richter did nine more repetitions before he finally rested the steel bar back on the arms of the weight bench. While he was lifting the weights, he was in a zone, another world. He couldn’t hear the others urging him on, or the pop music playing in the background, or the chatter of the people who came to the gym to socialize instead of lift weights.

  Everything was working out well. In the locker room after their workout, Richter would take his time getting undressed and let the other two head for the showers first. Then he would be one step closer to deliverance.

  CHAPTER 72

  Still pumped from his workout, Richter followed Linda Bagwell as she left her office at Rosenthal & Fitch in the financial district. He kept his distance as she made her way down Federal Street and up Summer and then through the Boston Common and the Public Garden, heading toward her apartment on Marlborough Street. It was almost seven o’clock on a beautiful June evening, the first day of summer. A perfect night for a walk in the city. Richter pictured Linda shutting off her cell phone and relaxing on the couch with a book after a quiet dinner alone in her apartment.

  As she approached the statue of George Washington on horseback, she suddenly stopped. Had she seen him? Richter turned toward a bed of deep purple pansies, kneeling as if admiring them. He watched her from the corner of his eye. She seemed to be overcome by the history that surrounded her as she gazed at Washington’s statue at the west entrance of the Boston Public Garden, his stoic visage facing the statue of Alexander Hamilton less than a block away on Commonwealth Avenue. Comm Ave., a broad boulevard divided by a grassy mall and lined with stately brick town houses, was a taste of Paris in the heart of Boston, and any tourist who didn’t realize that Commonwealth Avenue and the Public Garden were built on landfill in the nineteenth century might actually picture Washington and Hamilton meeting in that very spot, planning the American Revolution and the new government of the United States.

  Richter touched one of the purple-and-yellow flowers that his grandmother said cheered her up. Each one was like a happy little face, she always said.

  “Why’s Gramma in bed crying?” the child asked. “Is she okay?”

  The old man sat quietly in his rocker on the back porch loading his rifle. “She’s fine, boy. Sometimes women just don’t understand men’s work.”

  “I understand, Grampa.”

  “Sure you do,” the old man nodded. “How old are you now?”

  “Seven,” the child said.

  “You want to help me do some men’s work?”

  “Can I, Grampa, can I?”

  “You go find old Butchy and meet me out by the barn. We’ll take him out so he can exercise his tired old legs.”

  The child was excited. He ran and found his grandparents’ old mutt sleeping on the rug by the mudroom. “C’mon, Butchy,” he said, shaking the dog. “We’re gonna go play in the woods.” The dog struggled to get his footing, before slowly standing up. “Let’s go,” the child called as he led the way out onto the back porch.

  The child ran to catch up with the old man who had already made it halfway down toward the brook. Butchy was straggling behind, going at his own pace, stopping to sniff at old rabbit and woodchuck holes along the way. “What kind of manly stuff are we going to do, Grampa?” the child asked. “Are we gonna ride the tractor or feed the animals? Maybe we can milk the cows.”

  “Not everything is fun like that. Sometimes men have to do ugly work. Are you ready to do ugly work? Are you ready to show me you’re a man?”

  The child was frightened by the way his grandfather was talking, but he didn’t want to show his fear. He wanted to make his grandfather proud. “I’m ready,” he said.

  “Good,” the old man said as they crossed over the brook. “You like Butchy?”

  “I love Butchy, Grampa.”

  “Well, old Butchy’s not the same dog he used to be. He was a great hunting dog, but now all he does is sleep and soil the rugs. We can’t have that in the house. It’s filthy.”

  The boy felt a coldness creep over him despite the warmth of the day. They were at the edge of the woods now and the old man took the rifle off his shoulder.

  “I want you to show me how much of a man you are,” the old man said, handing the rifle to the boy. “Butchy’s not happy. He doesn’t want to live like this. If you really love him, you’ll take this gun and put him to rest.”

  The child pushed the rifle away. “I can’t hurt him. I love him, Grampa.”

  “That’s what I thought,” the old man shook his head sadly. “You’re no man. You’re still that little boy who’s afraid of the dark.” The old man pointed the rifle at the dog. The dog looked in their direction, his eyes milky and unfocused.

  “Don’t do it, Grampa!” the boy yelled. He lunged for the gun, taking hold of the barrel and pulling it down as a round fired into the ground. The old dog didn’t react to the crack.

  “Don’t you cry like a little girl,” the old man said as he swung and hit the child firmly with the back of his hand. The child let go of the barrel as he fell to the ground. “You’d better start acting like a man or you’re not going to last very long on this farm. If you don’t care enough about old Butchy to put him down, I guess I’ll have to do it.”

  The child lay on the ground sobbing as the old man raised the rifle and aimed it at Butchy’s head.

  The child covered his eyes and heard a loud pop. It seemed much louder than the first shot. And then silence.

  Richter looked down. In the cradle of his hands was the small face of a pansy, snapped from its stalk. As if it were scorching the palms of his hands, he tossed it away and stood up.

  Linda Bagwell hadn’t seen him. Inhaling and looking around with great satisfaction, she continued her leisurely stroll up Comm Ave. She turned right onto Berkeley and then left on Marlborough.

  Richter timed it so he caught up to her just as she reached her apartment building. He followed her up the granite stairs to the main entrance of the town house, which, like almost every other grand old home in Boston, had been converted into apartments or condominiums. She must have heard his footsteps, he must have startled her, because she spun around to see who was behind her.

  “Oh my God, you scared me,” she said, seeming to recognize him. She smiled. “You’re the man from the district attorney’s office. I sat on your jury last week. What brings you to the Back Bay? Do you live around here?” she asked with a smile. Richter could tell she was attracted to him as she tried to turn on her charm.

  “I have a fri
end who lives on the third floor,” he said. “I’m supposed to meet him for drinks. Do you live here?” Richter knew that she lived there, in the rear apartment on the first floor.

  “I live here for now,” she said as she unlocked the door, letting Richter into the main lobby. “Until I save enough to buy a condo on Beacon Hill.”

  He needed to take care of Linda Bagwell before Mooney and Alves got the archived juror questionnaires. Once they had those forms they’d learn that all the other victims had served their jury duty at South Bay. Then they’d be contacting every juror who had served in that court to let them know about the potential danger. Linda Bagwell might not have been as trusting of Richter if she’d received a call like that from the police.

  As they entered the building Richter scanned the lobby to make sure they were alone. They walked toward the stairs, which were adjacent to her apartment door. As she reached to insert her key in the lock, Richter heard a loud mechanical noise and a bell at the end of the hall. It was an old service elevator. Apparently it was still functioning. Someone was coming. He had to act fast.

  “It was nice to see you again, Miss…?”

  “Bagwell. Linda Bagwell. The pleasure was mine,” she said as she opened her apartment door. “Maybe we’ll see each other again sometime.”

  “Who knows?” he said. “With a little luck, maybe we’ll be seeing a whole lot of each other.”

  Richter lunged toward her and grabbed her from behind. He slipped his left arm around hers and pulled it back into a chicken wing. At the same time he reached his right hand under her chin, pulling back and to the right so she couldn’t make a sound. The Chin and Chicken was one of his favorite wrestling holds. Linda Bagwell was helpless. He lifted her into her apartment and kicked the door closed behind them. She’d done such a good job as a juror in his last trial that he couldn’t let her get away. And he could set up her apartment as the crime scene that would finally point Mooney and Alves in the right direction.