by Diane Capri
Many times we’d turned right at this intersection to continue on toward Mackinaw City and then to romantic getaways on Mackinac Island. But today, we’d turn left to downtown Pleasant Harbor.
The light turned green and we travelled a bit farther into town before George said, “Looks pretty much the same as the last time we were here, don’t you think?”
“It’s hard to tell with the snow covering everything, but I don’t see very many new buildings, if that’s what you mean.” I wanted conversation, but discussing the town or the weather seemed so banal now. I didn’t feel like socializing. My thoughts continued to return to the murder as if a video loop replayed in my head. There was something else about it that was odd, but what was it?
“What if we take a short ride through town and head to Eagle Creek Cafe? It’s late, but we might still get lunch.” I didn’t say anything. “Or we could go directly to the cottage now, if you’d rather get unpacked.” More silence. “Willa?” He took his right hand off the steering wheel, where it had been firmly planted since we’d returned to the Jeep, and placed it over mine in my lap. His gloved fingers intertwined with mine.
I said, “I’ve seen murder victims before. I just didn’t expect to find a gruesome one this afternoon.”
“I know.”
“The landscape looked soothing, so pristine and beautiful.”
“I know.”
“A man murdered in a tiny, peaceful hamlet shakes your faith.” That was my problem. I kept forgetting that the gun lobby is right about some things. It is people who kill people. Environment didn’t change basic human nature.
“Confining humans in a small space as harsh as this one and expecting them to peacefully coexist is probably too much to ask for.” George squeezed my fingers a little tighter to signal that he needed his hand back. I let him go and felt immediately bereft.
Snow was falling faster now. He increased the wiper speed.
Something more about the crime scene still niggled at the back of my brain. But it disappeared around the corners whenever I almost grasped it. The best thing was to treat it like a timid kitten and wait until it came far enough into the open to seize it.
George had turned the Jeep onto Main Street. “Let’s get some lunch. We can meet up with Marc and maybe find something else to talk about for a while,” he said.
“You just want to get to Marc and talk shop, don’t you? Have you forgotten you’re on vacation?”
He laughed and said, “Have you forgotten you’re on vacation, too?”
“Fair point.” After that, I sat with my thoughts.
We traveled over the drawbridge on the west end of Main Street, which was perpetually down in the winter since the river froze and no boats could pass through anyway. The snow had been plowed from the grates of the bridge and the Jeep’s tires chirruped as we passed over.
George turned right and traveled along the winding street that followed the shoreline, the frozen edge of Lake Michigan stilled now in ice hard enough to drive snowmobiles across. On the left side of the street sat stately nineteenth-century mansions from a bygone era when the town was ruled by lumber barons.
Nothing much seemed different, though.
Back when George and I were Detroit residents, we visited Pleasant Harbor often. It was a lovely resort town, summer and winter, back then. The deep, cold lake was beautiful in a way completely different from the Gulf of Mexico that surrounds our home in Tampa. Golf resorts and ski resorts and wineries and outdoor activities abounded nearby. Although the population triples with tourists who bring along their Grosse Pointe and Birmingham and Chicago suburban money as well as their big city values, I’d never felt threatened or vulnerable to violence here.
Had the town changed that much since we’d moved south?
True, only those sturdy souls who can survive over 200 inches of snow and subzero temperatures with high levels of humidity, exist here full time. Theirs wasn’t a lifestyle for the faint of heart. Meaning it wasn’t a place where George and I chose to survive. We’d known that back when we lived here and we knew it now.
I considered what George had said about the harsh winter conditions these folks lived in. Maybe, if you were forced to stay here year round, it was like a prison. A beautiful frozen prison, sure. But still a prison. Perhaps cabin fever set in too easily and led to depraved inmate behavior. Seems I read something about cannibals in Wisconsin once.
Which wasn’t an excuse for murder. Never had been. Never would be. We prosecute those who kill in prison, too.
The curious thing was how pink Richards’ body was. I’d seen it before in autopsy photographs of carbon monoxide victims. But this guy hadn’t died from any kind of poisoning, obviously.
The more I concentrated, the less I understood, so I let it go. Temporarily.
CHAPTER EIGHT
We crossed over into what had once been no-man’s land and was now, perhaps, some of the most desirable real estate in Pleasant Harbor.
Milliken Boulevard was a picturesque four-lane that had once divided the town in half, separating the regular citizens on the east side from those confined in the asylum on the west side. A train ran between them alongside the boulevard for good measure.
“Would you have lived there?” George asked, pointing toward the castle-like estate ahead.
The former Eagle Creek State Hospital had once been another type of prison. A jewel in the crown of medicine so bright it had boasted a two-year waiting list for new patients. I believed the waiting list had resulted back then partly because conditions in the asylum were better in many ways.
“I’d have tried,” I said, only too happy to embrace the distracting change of subject.
“Why?”
“The hospital was fully equipped with electricity long before the town. That alone would have enticed me to enter.”
“Because?”
I was a constant reader and he always teased me about it. “Light to read by at night instead of an oil lamp or a candle.”
He laughed. “But surely that’s not all?”
“Two more things.”
“Which are?”
“Remember I took that tour of the place when we were here last time? Did you know it had two sets of underground tunnels, one for its sophisticated steam heating system and another for moving people that connected the buildings? Thus,” I raised my index finger, “heat without hassle. I wouldn’t have had to chop wood or haul coal. And,” I raised my second finger, “asylum residents never needed to venture outside in the damn frozen tundra. That sounds like heaven right about now.”
We’d entered the grounds. Various buildings were spread over several acres of what was probably lawn under all that snow.
“This place is amazing and beautiful and awful and creepy all at the same time, isn’t it?” George asked.
It was.
Through sixty years of its history, the grand old buildings served as an asylum for patients with communicable diseases, mental disorders and, it was said, a place to imprison uncontrollable menopausal women.
As treatments and vaccines and pharmacology improved, budgets dwindled until the facility eventually closed. That was long before we moved to Tampa. Over the decades, some of the buildings had been condemned and demolished. Restoration of the others had to have been a nightmare.
“What happened to the patients, I wonder?” George asked.
“Our tour guide said there weren’t many left at the end. The last few were simply released. They literally opened the doors and let them walk away. Which increased the local homeless population exponentially,” I replied.
Could one of them have murdered Leo Richards? I quickly shook my head as soon as the idea surfaced. The murder was too well planned and executed to have been the work of a mental patient.
These days, the entire Eagle Creek Village complex had been reborn into a multi-use historical district filled with specialty boutiques, offices, condominiums, apartments, an inn, and restaurants. Some th
ings hadn’t changed much, though. Eagle Creek Village also boasted a two-year waiting list as its predecessor had.
“They’re doing a masterful job with the restoration,” he said.
George turned left down a two-lane driveway that opened onto a flat gravel lot. He parked the Jeep near the front door of what had once been the sprawling main building of the hospital and was now called Eagle Creek Village Center. This was where our friend Marc had relocated his Cafe.
There was no sign out front. For many years the only five-star restaurant in Northern Michigan, Marc’s tony eatery didn’t need a sign to advertise its presence to potential diners. Word of mouth had kept the restaurant full to overflowing when it had been located a few miles south of town. Now that it was housed in prestige and surrounded by history, reservations stacked up like magic.
George turned off the Jeep and looked toward me. “Let’s not talk about the murder to Marc. I’m sure he’ll find out soon enough.”
“Works for me.”
Trooper Kemp would be calling this afternoon. More statements would be required after that, maybe testimony at some point. The process would be endless, even if the locals were up to the challenge of apprehending the killer. If that didn’t happen quickly, then I’d become more involved than I already was. A quiet hour or two before the next episode seemed like a great idea.
George took my hand and squeezed it. “Come on, Mighty Mouse. I’ll buy you lunch. Fortify you for crime fighting later.”
He jumped out before I could hit him with a snappy comeback.
CHAPTER NINE
George came around to open my door and I left the warmth of the Jeep’s interior for the unrelenting cold. Snow was falling heavily.
Under the snow, Eagle Creek’s grounds were beautifully landscaped with wild English gardens. The lawns were dotted with tables and chairs under tents around a large lily-pond for alfresco dining. One of the old buildings had been demolished and its foundation converted into a bocce court. George and I had spent many idyllic evenings engaged in just such pursuits.
None of that was visible now.
It was March second. In three weeks, the calendar would declare spring. In Pleasant Harbor, Mother Nature would ignore the declaration for at least eight weeks. I remembered one Fourth of July when the temperature only reached forty-four degrees and the crazy ones in our group had insisted on swimming anyway. The memory alone made my teeth chatter.
The parking lot had been plowed to pack down the snow, but bits of gravel showed through here and there. Snow piles higher than my head outlined the edges of the lot. Several other vehicles, including a few snowmobiles, were parked and snow dusted, suggesting they’d been there a while. The entire grounds, except the entryway to the main building, were covered by even more snow.
“Let’s get inside,” George said, as he pulled his parka hood to cover his head and took my arm. I raised my hood and followed along, head down. We slid along the length of the plowed sidewalk, trudged up the stairs to the front door and stepped into a warm and inviting piece of history.
We waited at the hostess stand because the Cafe’s main dining room was busier than we’d expected. Restaurants are usually quiet at three o’clock in the afternoon and the chef is busy with preparations for dinner. But Eagle Creek Cafe buzzed with conversation.
A couple of minutes later, the hostess returned to seat us. “Are you folks joining the bridge club? Mrs. Trevor didn’t tell me she expected more members. You’re a bit late and we’ve already closed the buffet, but we can find you a table in the back if that’s okay and we’d be happy to serve you something from the menu.”
“We’re not with the club. Simply here for one of your amazing meals, please,” George replied.
She collected the menus and, a little relieved, said, “Certainly. Right this way.”
We were led to a table close to the kitchen and near an exit door, past several full tables of bridge players and a couple of lingering groups who seemed to be finished but reluctant to leave the warmth inside for the blizzard outdoors. Or maybe they weren’t aware of the blizzard because the Cafe was located in what had once been the basement of the building. The windows were small and square and high on the walls. Seated diners would have to look above their heads to notice the storm and they were more focused on their meals and bridge games.
“I’m sorry that this is our last table. But the bridge club has filled the restaurant to capacity. Usually they’re gone by now, but Mrs. Richards said it was tournament day or something like that,” she said.
Mrs. Richards? The name hit me like a quick Taser hit.
George, ever the gallant restaurateur, replied, “This will be fine. The food will be marvelous no matter where we’re served, I’m sure.”
“Thank you for understanding,” she said, leaving our menus and dashing off to a table of four women, three of whom looked enough alike to be sisters, and a fourth who seemed to be annoyed at their lack of concentration.
George grinned. “The dreaded Mrs. Trevor calls, I presume.”
“Maybe,” I said, quietly. “But is Mrs. Richards the victim’s wife?”
“In a town this small, she’s got to be a relative, at least.”
Once upon a time, the cafe’s kitchen was the site of the hospital morgue. Not an appetizing factoid right at the moment, to be sure, so I didn’t mention it to George. Instead, we talked about this and that, avoiding the subject of our grisly discovery until after our food was presented.
One thing about a gourmet restaurant, it’s usually stocked with fabulous ingredients for all sorts of wonderful food. Even if a guest arrives in the middle of the afternoon, on a weekday, in the middle of a blizzard, they won’t go hungry.
We ordered Gouda cheese omelets with fresh chives, toast with butter and locally made tart cherry jam, and a stainless carafe filled with nectar of the gods. Until the coffee aroma wafted to my nose, I hadn’t realized I was so hungry.
George fell in like a man who hadn’t eaten in a year. I picked up my pace.
The conversation noise level in the room and our isolation near the kitchen and the exit presented an opportunity for a private discussion. There was only one subject on my mind.
“Premeditated murder, obviously,” I said. I willed him to test my conclusions aloud, hoping I’d made an error or missed something important.
He nodded between mouthfuls.
“I’m thinking the right handgun from the proper distance would produce those results,” I said. “It looked like a rifle shot, but sometimes it’s hard to tell for sure before the forensics are completed.”
These had to be the best eggs ever. I actually hate eggs, so maybe they tasted great because I hadn’t eaten anything at all today and my stomach had been tied in knots since I’d first seen the Toyota. The cheese probably had something to do with it, too.
I finished my thought process to get us on the same wavelength. “The killer put something in the road to stop the car with a flat tire. He’s close to the car and the victim. He wouldn’t have remounted the snowmobile, returned to the field, aimed and fired a rifle to cause the effects we saw at the scene. That would take time and be a huge hassle and someone could easily have come along to witness everything. None of that is reasonable. A handgun is a better answer.”
“Makes sense,” he said. He warmed up his coffee from the carafe and poured more for me. “Unless the victim was the unlucky lotto winner of a random shooting.”
“Then why not just shoot as the vehicles passed by and hope to get lucky instead of setting up a flat tire to stop one?”
“And the accomplice?” he asked.
“There to help make the job go faster, probably. Or maybe they were worried the driver would put up a fight and they’d need two people to subdue him. We won’t know what their thinking was unless we find them and they tell us,” I said.
“So someone who knew the victim knew he would be traveling that road this morning. The killers laid in wait to execute
him,” George said. “Is that about it?”
This was the only reasonable conclusion and I’d reached it an hour ago. But I’d wanted another answer and after a while, I’d found one.
George piled tart cherry jam on the toast before taking another bite.
“Actually, I think it’s worse than that,” I said.
There certainly were worse ways to die than being shot in the head. I had presided over countless criminal trials and accepted dozens of guilty pleas. Killers admitted variously depraved murders for both logical and insane reasons. I refused to organize killers into classes, some better and some worse. Killing another human being was crossing a Rubicon to me. Justice for that should always be swift and sure.
It was the intellectual aspect of the murder that had captured George’s imagination, though. He was a good strategist. One of the best. He enjoyed figuring out both the good and bad puzzles in life. So I waited to see if his conclusion was the same as mine.
Finally, he said it. “The killer arranged for the victim to be in that place at that time.”
My breath snagged. I’d wanted to be wrong. An orchestrated execution with a high level of premeditation. A smart killer, a planner. Someone who deliberately intended to end a human life and get away with murder. Someone who knew how to make that happen.
If killers were classified by degree of guilt, and that is how our legal system operates, then the cold-blooded executioner was the most heinous.
What could a Pleasant Harbor hardware store owner with a wife and young daughter have done to inspire such malice? Sometimes, the depravity of my fellow humans made me want to hide in a hole like a groundhog, never to come out, even to predict the spring.
George continued talking almost to himself now, trying to work it out. “Predictability was required. What makes the most sense to me is the killer called Richards on a cell phone and told him something that caused him to travel that road at just the right time.”