The Boreal Owl Murder

by Jan Dunlap

  Or were they witnesses and knew it, but had kept that knowledge to themselves?

  I remembered my earlier suspicions about Thompson. If he was the poacher—and Eddie’s comments seemed to confirm that—and he had tangled with Rahr, he’d probably be happy to have Rahr out of the way. As in permanently. Who did it or why wasn’t his worry. As long as he could keep poaching in peace, he was happy to let the police continue to run into dead ends. The last thing he’d want to do was show up at the station with information that would lead Knott directly to his place of “business.”

  As for Montgomery, she’d have no reason not to report any suspicious activity along the road. What her reasons were for being in the area was anyone’s guess, though I had to admit that her association with Thompson made her a little suspect in my mind. What were the odds she’d be out for a drive just minutes behind Thompson?

  Another possibility reared its ugly head. What if Thompson hadn’t stumbled upon the killer, but instead, had deliberately gone to meet him that morning? What if Thompson had hired a killer, and his trip past Eddie’s place had taken him to a rendezvous during which he led the killer to Rahr?

  And what if Montgomery, then, had chanced upon the two of them?

  My stomach lurched.

  Was Montgomery in danger from Thompson? If she’d seen her friend meeting with a man in the woods near Rahr’s research site and then learned about the subsequent murder, she’d have to be terrified of Thompson and what he might do to her if she went to the police. At the same time, since she hadn’t already come forward, but had joined him for supper at the Splashing Rock, she could possibly be arrested herself as an accomplice after the fact. An accomplice to murder.

  Probably not something she’d want to include on her next job application.

  Unfortunately, the video couldn’t tell us Thompson and Montgomery’s final destinations that morning. Whether they had actually gone to the far site, met anyone, or just looped around Eddie’s property to the site Luce and I had just visited, was all conjecture. For all we knew, they’d each been out for a winter day’s drive through the forest and never had stopped anywhere at all. But it did seem that this was a very popular part of the forest, apparently.

  I turned to Eddie.

  “Before he left here last Friday morning, did Dr. Rahr say he’d seen anyone at the site here?”

  “No,” Eddie said, bringing his recliner upright. He put his hands on his knees. “He didn’t mention anything like that.”

  “Eddie,” I said. “Does your surveillance tape show Thompson and the woman returning that day?”

  Eddie looked me in the eye.

  “No.”

  “So they must have taken another route back out,” Luce concluded. “And that might indicate they went out by way of the other Boreal site.”

  “Don’t know that,” Eddie said. “But I got tape of them driving by the next night, too.”

  That was the night Mike and I had discovered Dr. Rahr’s body.

  “Both of them?” I asked.

  “Both of them,” Eddie confirmed. “Except that time, they were driving together in the truck.”

  Bottom line was that despite its visual definition, Eddie’s video couldn’t prove a thing. It couldn’t tell us where people had gone or why. Unless it showed Thompson hauling trees—or meeting with the man who had surrendered to Knott—I had nothing to support any of my suspicions.

  Luce and I got up to leave, but Eddie wasn’t done with the tape yet.

  “Wait a minute,” he said. “There were three more cars that came by after Dr. Rahr left. I forgot about it until I looked at the tape again. Maybe you ought to see.”

  Eddie hit the play button, and another vehicle approached the gate. We got a clear view of the driver as he went by.

  It was Bradley Ellis. That was odd. Last Friday he’d been preparing to go to Michigan to be with his father. Or so he said. Why was he up here?

  “Did he come back later?” I asked Eddie.

  “No tape of it,” he answered.

  The video was still running and I had to blink when I saw the face of the next vehicle’s driver.

  Alice Wylie.

  “Do you recognize her?” Luce asked when I made a choking noise.

  “Yes. I do. It’s Ms. Multiple.”

  And then, bringing up the rear a few minutes later, was a third car. I could have sworn that Stan looked right at the camera and smiled.

  Eddie was right—there had been a parade up here last Friday morning. But of all the participants, only Rahr never made it back.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “Call him, Bobby.”

  I turned to see Luce watching me as she took the last items from the room’s mini-fridge to put into our cooler for supper.

  “It’s going to bug you all evening if you don’t call Knott and tell him about the video. I want to get that Boreal, and we won’t get it if your mind is still on that tape.”

  “But it doesn’t prove a thing,” I reminded her. “Except that Eddie is a frustrated surveillance expert.”

  She narrowed her eyes at me and shook her head in warning. I picked up the phone and placed the call.

  “Knott here.”

  “Are too.” I was going to miss this.

  “You’re a smart-ass, White,” he laughed.

  I laughed too. “Congrats, Detective. I don’t suppose it’s every day the killer you’re looking for walks right into the station.”

  The laughing stopped. “You’re right,” he said. “It isn’t every day. And it wasn’t today, either.”

  It took me a split-second to register what he’d said. “What?”

  “Our resident nutcase didn’t do Rahr,” Knott said. “This guy—the one who walked in today—shows up every year or so and takes credit—or whatever you want to call it—for the unsolved crime of the day. He’s a publicity addict. The veteran reporters know him, so they don’t fall for it when he calls in the tip that he’s about to make a confession at the police station. The new kids on the media block aren’t wise to him yet, so they’re the ones he calls, and they’re the ones who jump.”

  Well, I’ll be damned. Score two points for me, I thought. My counselor’s instincts must have been working subconsciously earlier when I first heard the radio announcement of the arrest. For some reason, I hadn’t felt the closure or relief I’d expected. Instead, I’d felt adrift or frustrated almost, like something was missing. Sure, I’d been impressed that the local media was on top of developments so quickly, but I hadn’t questioned that what I was hearing was accurate. Oops. My naiveté must have been showing.

  Again.

  First, it had been the truth about Montgomery’s pose-for-pay, and now, the integrity of broadcast news. I was beginning to think that nothing was what I thought it was. Even so, I couldn’t suppress a little twinge of triumph. Somewhere inside me, I’d known it wasn’t over, that Rahr’s killer wouldn’t just waltz into the station and everything would turn up roses. Hearing the news from Knott was bad, for sure, but it also gave me some affirmation, along with confirmation. Yes, those counselor instincts were still sharp, all right. And, more importantly, I definitely wasn’t ready to let Mr. Lenzen put me out to pasture.

  Or to job hunt, either.

  Which brought me back to the matter at hand.

  There was still a killer at large, and my job was still on hold.

  On hold.

  Like a paused frame of video.

  Like a paused frame of Eddie’s video.

  “I have something to show you,” I said. “How soon can you get here?”

  Ten minutes later, Knott was sliding the video into the player on top of the hotel room’s television. I explained to him how Eddie had played it for Luce and me after we had discovered the topped trees and driven back to Eddie’s house.

  “I don’t know if it can tell you anything concrete except who was where at one point last Friday morning,” I warned him. “Eddie can testify that he caught Th
ompson red-handed last fall with some illegally cut trees, but there’s nothing on the tape that can verify any poaching. As far as Rahr’s murder goes, the video might be useless for you, John, but I wanted you to take a look at it.” I socked him gently in the shoulder. “See? I meant it at lunch yesterday when I told you I’d learned my lesson about withholding anything connected with a case.”

  “Good call, Bob. I knew there was a reason I didn’t wring your neck yesterday.” His gaze fastened on the television screen. “We’ll go after Thompson, I promise. And if this tape can give us anything to work with, I’ll give you an honorary detective badge. How’s that sound?”

  “Keep the badge, John. Just get me back in my office chair on Monday.”

  Luce and I watched the video again while Knott jotted down names and times. When Stan appeared on the screen, Knott paused the tape.

  “Who’s this?”

  “This is Stan Miller,” I informed him. “Just another guy in full camouflage gear out for a drive in the forest. You know the type. Stealthy, well-armed, non-existent. Doesn’t play well with others.”

  Knott leaned closer to the image on the screen and said nothing for a moment or two. “Son of a gun,” he finally whispered, “I wondered what had happened to him.”

  Luce and I traded a look of total disbelief.

  “You know Stan?” I asked him.

  “His name isn’t—wasn’t—Stan. Yeah, I know him. University of Minnesota, Class of 1984. An expert marksman and a brilliant mathematician. Got snapped up by the CIA for field work shortly after graduation.” Knott grinned. “He was my college roommate. Almost my brother-in-law, until my sister couldn’t take his three-word sentences anymore.”

  “He’s up to five words, now.”

  Knott laughed and looked back at Sam’s face frozen on the screen. “Son of a gun,” he repeated, then whispered to the screen, “What in the world are you doing in this?”

  I breathed a sigh of relief. Well, at least my sister wasn’t involved with a mob hit man or an escaped lunatic. Thank God for small favors, right? I wasn’t sure about the CIA part, though. That could be good or bad, depending on which part of the CIA he was working for. And then I remembered the MOU rumors about him.

  “Is he still working for the CIA?” I asked Knott. “Do you know?”

  The detective pushed the eject button on the tape player and grabbed the tape as it slid out.

  “Last I heard, he was on some kind of rehab leave. The grapevine said it was permanent, that he’d come home to Minnesota and set himself up as an independent contractor, working jobs for the government.” He snagged his jacket off the back of the desk chair in the room and headed for the door.

  “So your gut was right, Bob,” he said, smiling. “You can definitely trust Stan Miller on this one. Whatever job he’s doing, it’s for Uncle Sam, not Uncle Guido, and if you want to go owling tonight, there’s no one better to have watching your back.”

  He stopped just before leaving the room. “Thanks for the video. And the poaching angle. Like we said, Bob, it’s all about the location. I’ll be in touch.”

  Only after I closed the door behind him did I realize he hadn’t told us Stan’s real name. “How about that?” I asked Luce. “Scary Stan really is a former CIA agent. I guess that means I don’t have to worry about Lily being safe with him anymore.” And although I still didn’t know what he was using her for, or what “contract” he was working on, I decided that if Knott could vouch for Stan’s character, then it was okay that the man was dating my sister.

  Scary, but okay.

  “So, do you still want to try for the Boreal tonight?” I asked Luce. The idea that Rahr’s killer was still out there somewhere, along with the still-too-fresh memory of my close conversation with a bullet yesterday, had me thinking more than twice about resuming our chase for the owl.

  Luce, however, was steady as ever.

  “You know what they say about getting right back up on the horse that threw you,” she said. “I know Knott said we need to be careful, but there’ll be the two of us, and I’m totally willing to give this a try. Besides, this is our night to find the owl, Bobby. I can feel it.”

  Funny thing was, so could I.

  “But,” she added pointedly, “let’s take my car, just in case. My license plate isn’t quite the advertisement that yours is.”

  I had to agree. Traveling incognito had a definite appeal to it tonight.

  As I pulled the hotel room door closed behind me, Luce was already in the car, checking to make sure we had our night binos as well as our regular ones. I asked her what was in the cooler, and she described the menu for the evening: a wild rice and sesame chicken salad, crusty French rolls, marinated snow peas with carrots and for dessert, fudgy brownies. A perfect feast for a night of owling. Or for anytime. Alan was right. I’d better marry this woman.

  Eventually.

  “I hope Eddie’s video helps,” Luce said as we pulled out of the lot. “It sure seemed to cheer the detective up, at least.”

  “At this point, I’m sure he’s grateful for any leads. His job is on the line, too. He needs to catch a killer pronto, or he’ll have the whole community, as well as city hall, on his tail. In comparison, I’ve only got Mr. Lenzen.”

  “Oh, Bobby, I’m sorry.”

  “Not your fault. I’m the one who found Rahr and got involved in a murder investigation.” I flashed her a smile. “The least I can do is get the owl out of it.”

  We drove to an overlook that provided us with a panoramic view of Lake Superior. Luce dished out our supper, and we sat in the car, eating and admiring the big lake that was beginning to wake out of its winter sleep. Even from this distance, we could see the rhythmic roll of its surface and silvery glints on wave crests as they slowly slid to shore. The sky above had cleared again and was beginning to dim with the approaching night. We cleared our laps of empty food containers and repacked them in the cooler. I got back on the road, and we headed west.

  Somewhere ahead of us, the owl was waiting.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  We drove for about an hour. To alleviate my own anxiety about returning to the place where I’d barely avoided a bullet, I decided that we’d take a different approach to the Boreal site, one that skirted around that neck of the forest. On this route, there wasn’t much to break up the scenery; mostly it was trees and trees and trees. Occasionally, we’d pass a mailbox, most likely for someone’s summer cabin. The road wound in and out of national forest, and we could see old logging roads trailing off along fences that marked park boundaries. The sun was definitely setting as we got closer to our destination. In the growing dusk, we could just make out a few stars.

  I parked in an old trailhead access lot, and Luce and I geared ourselves up for the hike to the site: we pulled on our woolen caps, looped binos around our necks, grabbed our small flashlights and tucked a couple of water bottles in our parka pockets. Then we started walking.

  We followed an old trail that I assumed Rahr had used in the early years of his research; every quarter-mile or so there was a wooden marker nailed onto a tree at just about shoulder height. On the markers, dates and notes were jotted in permanent ink and covered in yellowed plastic. Next to a date, there were either dashes (lots of those) or the word call. My best guess was that this was some kind of record of where and when he heard the owls calling—as we went deeper into the forest, the call notation appeared more frequently on the markers. Using my flashlight, I checked each marker for the notes. When we came on one that noted call, Luce and I would stop walking and listen.

  After our second stop, we both took a drink of water and looked around the darkening forest. Somewhere off to our right, we heard a shuffling noise. It sounded like a fair-sized animal; I guessed it was a deer.

  At least I hoped it was a deer. And that was because I hoped it wasn’t a bear. Coming face-to-face with Smokey once in this forest had already been one time too many. And as far as I could tell, Stan wasn’t a
round this time to scare it off for me.

  Luce moved closer to me.

  “Do you think there are moose up here?” she asked in a quiet voice.

  I was worried about a bear. Luce was worried about a moose. Were we brave birders, or what?

  “We don’t have to worry about moose, Luce,” I assured her. “They aren’t predators. They eat grass.”

  “I know that,” she said, making that almost-hissing sound again.

  Luce the Goose, I thought. I could feel myself smiling. Oh man, she’d kill me for that one for sure.

  “I’m not worried that a moose would eat me. I just don’t want to run into one,” she explained, a note of annoyance in her tone. “They may be dumb, but they’re big. And strong. Not a great combination, if you know what I mean.”

  I knew exactly what she meant. I did, after all, work with big, strong adolescent males every day. Not to infer that they were dumb, but sometimes you had to wonder what in the world they were thinking … or not. So far, none of them—to my knowledge—had tried to take down a train, but in a high school counselor’s office, you learned to be ready for anything.

  Luce took another drink of her water. “Once, when we went camping in Wyoming one summer, we were up in the mountains outside of Laramie, and we hiked into this big meadow. We were about to lay out a picnic when I read a posted warning that said ‘Moose release area. Please use caution.’ Well, I was petrified. The only moose I’d ever seen in the flesh was a stuffed one, and that had scared the bejeebers out of me.” She capped her drink bottle and looked at me.

  “It was this huge stuffed dead moose with an enormous rack of antlers that stood in the lobby at the lodge we stayed in when we went to Thunder Bay in Canada when I was six years old. My mom wanted to take a picture of me with the moose, so I stood in front of it. I didn’t know my dad was hiding behind it, and just as my mom snapped the picture, my dad shoved it up against my shoulder and made a moose sound. I screamed and jumped about a foot straight up, hit the underside of the stuffed moose’s neck and fell back on the floor.”