by Bill Bernico
While he did that, Ferguson walked around to the passenger’s side front door and tried that handle. It hadn’t been latched all those years ago and opened with a creaking sound, like a door in a haunted house with rusty hinges. “Over here, Sarge,” Ferguson called over the top of the sedan.
Bentley gave up trying to pry the driver’s door open and joined his partner on the other side of the car. He helped Ferguson pull the door open the rest of the way and then stood back to take in the scene. The medical examiner, a man named Wallens, took up a position next to Bentley. “Take a look, Doc,” Bentley said.
Doctor Wallens leaned in for a cursory examination of the skeleton behind the driver’s seat. He only spent twenty seconds in the car before he stood straight up again and turned to Bentley. “Yup, he’s dead all right. No amount of CPR is going to do him any good.” He tried to remain professional and keep a straight face. “I can hazard a guess as to the cause of death.”
“Okay,” Bentley said. “Give us your professional opinion, Doc.”
“That one died from a single gunshot to the head,” Wallens said and then took a quick look at the two back seat occupants. He saw the same kind of bullet hole in those two skulls as well. “Them, too. But I noticed something peculiar with all three victims.”
“What’s that, Doc?” Bentley said.
“None of them were wearing any clothes at the time of their deaths,” Wallens said.
“Wouldn’t the clothes just have rotted away or disintegrated?” Bentley asked.
“There’d still be remnants even decades later,” Wallens explained. “No, these three were stripped of their clothes either before or after they were killed. Whoever killed them didn’t want to leave any traces that could be identified. A professional hit would be my guess.”
Matt and Nick rose from the picnic table and tried to get a closer look but had been stopped by a pair of cops who had recently arrived. Bentley looked over and nodded to the cops, who allowed Matt and Nick to approach. “Are there just three of them?” Matt said.
Bentley nodded. “So far,” he said. “There had to have been a fourth one who’s still out there somewhere, if he’s even still alive.”
“Still alive?” Nick questioned.
“Well,” Bentley explained. “That car’s been down there for at least thirty-seven years, according to the renewal sticker on the rear license plate. That’s about as cold a trail as it gets.”
“Any guesses as to their identity?” Matt asked.
“You know,” Bentley said. “Back when this thing happened, no one knew anything about DNA testing and probably figured they’d be home free if and when the bodies were discovered, what with no way to identify them. They hadn’t counted on today’s technology. They’ll be able to get DNA samples out of the bones and teeth of these three.”
“But wouldn’t you need something to compare the samples with to get a match?” Nick said.
Bentley shook his head. “If we can just get a suspect list together, we can always test immediate family members against these three. If they’re related, the sample will show that and then we can narrow down our suspect list from there.”
Matt leaned over and glanced into the front seat of the Pontiac. The car’s shifter was in neutral and the key that still hung from the ignition switch was in the ON position. He looked at Nick and nodded slightly. Behind him, other cops were stringing crime scene tape around the whole area while another pair of officers rappelled down the side of the cliff on ropes.
Curiosity finally got the best of Veronica. She made her way under the crime scene tape and stood next to her father and brother. “What’s going on over here?” she said.
“I can fill you in later in the car on our way to the Grand Canyon,” Matt said. “Right now we’d better get out of their way and let them do their jobs.” He turned back to Sergeant Bentley. “We’ll be leaving now, Sergeant. Thanks for letting us have a closer look. You have my number. Call if you need anything else.”
“No,” Bentley said. “Thank you. It’d be no game without you. Enjoy your vacation, Mr. Cooper.”
Matt walked back to the picnic table with his children, packed up their food and drink containers and returned to their car. He pulled out of the rest area and got back onto the highway.
“Now will you tell me what they found?” Veronica said, not a quarter mile down the road.
“You sure you want to hear this?” he said, as much to Chris as to Veronica.
Chris waved him off. “I’ve heard it all and seen it all before,” she said. “You can’t tell me anything new.”
“Where have you seen this kind of thing before?” Matt asked.
“On CSI,” Chris said. “They run into this kind of thing every week on television.”
“But this is real life,” Matt said. “It won’t get solved in forty-two minutes, like they do on that show.”
“I know,” Chris said. “Seems like today’s television has hardened most people to the reality of life. Used to be a big deal to come across some kid on the street who scraped his knee falling off his bike. These days it would take a messy car accident just to get people to leave their easy chairs to come out and take a look.”
“I know what you mean,” Matt said. “Last week I ran into some guy on the street. We got to talking and I noticed that he was missing two fingers from his left hand. I looked down at it and asked if he had an interesting story to go with it.”
“You didn’t,” Chris said.
“I did,” Matt replied. “And it seemed like he was glad to tell me the circumstances surrounding the accident. He told me later that most people who saw his hand would look away or act like they hadn’t noticed it. I think he liked that I asked about it. It gave him a chance to tell the story to someone interested enough to listen.”
“And?”
“And what?”
“And how did he lose those two fingers?” Chris said.
“Doing something stupid,” Matt replied. “He was cutting a board on his table saw and he didn’t have the blade guard attached.”
Chris winced with a gory mental picture playing in her head.
“The piece of wood kicked back, knocking this guy off balance. He started to fall and stuck his hand out to break the fall. His handed landed right on the spinning saw blade. You can guess how that turned out.”
“He’d have been better off to take a lump to the head and let himself fall on the floor,” Veronica said from the back seat.
“That he would,” Matt said.
Nick leaned forward in his seat to offer his two cents worth. “Before you left did you hold up your hand and tell him to give you a high three?”
Matt rolled his eyes. Chris turned around in her seat and gave her son a stern look. “Really, Nicholas.”
“Well?” Nick said.
The Cooper family made it to the Grand Canyon National Park a few hours later and spent the rest of the day just taking in the sights from the rim. Once Matt got a look at the donkeys and the trail, he decided not to risk his life on some dumb animal. Nick and Veronica, however, were not as overly cautious and took the trip down to the canyon floor while their parents enjoyed the ground level activities and the charter flight over the majestic canyon. They got back from their flight about the same time their two kids made it back up the trail on their pack animals.
The four of them met in the restaurant parking lot a few minutes later to discuss their plans for dinner. “What an ass,” Veronica said.
“I think they’re called burros or donkeys,” Chris told her.
“I was talking about that son of yours,” Veronica said, slapping Nick’s shoulder.
“All right,” Matt said, looking Nick in the eye. “What did you do to your sister?”
Nick’s face took on an innocent, cherubic look. “Nothing,” he said shrugging and spreading his hands.
Veronica spoke up now. “Nothing? You call almost making me tumble over the side nothing?”
“What?” Chris said in a loud, stern voice.
“She’s exaggerating,” Nick said. “Not even close.”
“Okay, Veronica,” Matt said. “Suppose you tell me your version.”
“We were on the trail,” Veronica explained. “And this idiot pushed me off my donkey and I fell over the edge.”
“Nick!” Chris screamed at him. “What’s wrong with you?”
Nick smirked at Veronica. “Go on; tell them the rest of the story. It would seem that you left out an important detail.”
“Like what?” Chris said.
Nick smiled again. “Like the fact that we were already on the bottom and this edge Veronica says I pushed her over was just four inches higher than the spot her donkey was standing on.”
Silence fell over the group momentarily before Veronica spoke up. “Still, you didn’t have to push me off the donkey. I could have hurt myself.”
“Hey,” Nick said in his defense, “It’s not like a horse where you’re four or five feet up in the air. If that donkey you were riding was any shorter, your feet would have been dragging on the ground. Just put on your big girl panties and get over it. It was a joke, for crying out loud, and you’re fine.”
Veronica turned to her mother. “But he scared the hell out of me just the same,” she said.
“You two go on up to your rooms and get cleaned up for dinner,” Matt said. “We’ll all meet inside the restaurant in twenty minutes. Go.”
The four of them met in the restaurant and enjoyed their meal without further conflict. In fact, Matt thought things were a little too calm for comfort. He looked at his son and said, “Nick, you’re awfully quiet. Something on your mind?”
Nick shook his head. “Nothing, really.”
“I know that tone,” Matt said. “Something’s on your mind so why not share it?”
Nick thought for a moment and then finally said, “Dad, what do you suppose those three guys were doing in that car?”
“Are you still thinking about that?” Matt said. “It’s being handled. Forget it and move on.”
“Aren’t you even curious, Dad?”
“About what?”
“About what they were doing there in that car,” Matt said.
“Probably the same thing dead songwriters do,” Matt said offhandedly.
“Huh?”
“Decomposing,” Matt said, a smirk playing on his face.
“No, seriously,” Nick said.
“Oh no,” Veronica said, looking sideways at her brother.
“What?” Chris said.
“I know what he’s up to,” Veronica said. “He wants to look into the case.” She turned to Nick. “Don’t you?”
“Is that it, Nick?” Matt said. “You think this is a case for you to solve? To what end? What’s in it for you? Besides, what do you care about those three guys in the car?”
Nick laid his fork down and stared at his plate. “There’s just something about that whole thing that gnaws at me. I can’t exactly explain it. It’s like a puzzle that needs to be put back together; a riddle that needs to be solved. I don’t know, Dad. I just think there’s more I could be doing about it.”
“Like what?” Matt said.
Nick shrugged and spread his hands. “That’s just it; I don’t know, but I’d at least like to have the chance to look into it.”
Matt finished the last bite from his plate and then turned to Veronica. “And what about you?”
“What about me?” Veronica said.
“Don’t you have any interest in this?” Matt asked.
“Not really,” she said. “I have to admit I’m curious and all, but not enough to want to waste any of my own time looking into it.”
“Come on now,” Chris said. “This is supposed to be a family vacation and here you three sit talking about some four-decade old murder case as if it was your duty to be the one to solve it. Can’t we just enjoy the rest of the week in peace?”
No one said anything further for the next few moments. Finally Nick turned to his mother and said, “Okay, Mom. You’re right. We should just forget it and just have some fun together.”
“Thank you,” Chris said, laying her utensils down and wiping her mouth with her napkin.
It was silent again for a while before Veronica spoke up. “What are we going to do tomorrow?”
Chris and Matt looked at each other, neither one able to offer any suggestions. Chris said, “We could…” but couldn’t think of anything the four of them could do together. “Or there’s always…”
“Mom,” Nick said. “Why did we set aside a whole week for this vacation? After one day we’ve run out of things to do.”
The four of them exchanged glances with each other, none of them able to add anything further to the conversation. “Let’s just sleep on it and worry about that part tomorrow,” Matt suggested.
The next morning the four of them met in the restaurant for breakfast. The meal itself was nothing special, nor was the mealtime conversation. It was obvious that this vacation was not turning out like they had hoped. They all left their booth and walked out to the parking lot to have a look around. Each one sighed in turn and then looked at the other three. Matt finally hiked a thumb over his shoulder toward their hotel. “I guess I’ll just go and…”
“I’ll help you,” Chris said, taking Matt’s arm and walking up to their room.
Nick and Veronica stood there, trying hard not to look at each other. “Well,” Nick said.
“Yeah,” Veronica added and then headed toward her room.
Matt and his family had their car packed in half an hour. He settled his bill at the front desk and joined his family back in the parking lot. “You ready?” he said to no one in particular. When no one answered he just slid in behind the wheel while the rest of them took their places in the car as well. They headed back the way they’d come and drove without conversation for the first half hour, each family member staring out their own window.
Nick finally broke the silence. “Dad, do you suppose we could…”
“Stop at the crime scene?” Matt said, anticipating his son.
“Could we?” Nick said.
“To do what?” Matt asked.
“I don’t know; maybe just have a quick look around. You never know, the police might have overlooked something, anything. It could be interesting if nothing else. Think of it as, as, oh I don’t know. As kind of a working vacation.”
“And what about the rest of us?” Matt said. “What are we supposed to do while you’re scouring the scene for clues?”
“I’d like to have a look myself,” Veronica said. “We could get lucky and turn up something important.”
Matt turned to look at his wife. “What about you, Chris? You feeling like Sherlock Holmes, too?”
“Well,” Chris said.
“Am I the only one here who doesn’t see anything in this for us?” Matt said.
“Come on,” Chris said. “Admit it; you’re just as curious as the rest of us. You want to know what happened in that car all those years ago as much as we do.”
Matt bit his lip, took a deep breath through his nose and said, “All right, so I’m curious, so what? This isn’t like having an actual client who’s paying us to look into this case. It would all be for free.”
Chris rolled her eyes. “As if that really matters,” she said. “We’ve got more money than Aesop’s aunt and you’re worried about who’s going to pay you to look into this?”
“It’s not that,” Matt said. “It’s just that we, or at least I tend to take cases a lot more seriously when I’m working in someone else’s interest.”
“Dad,” Nick said. “Look at it this way. If you or any of us find something to help break this case open, just think of the positive publicity it would generate for Cooper Investigations in the paper, on the radio and on television. We’d have more business than we’d know what to do with if that happened.”
Matt had to admit that it didn’t matter to him, b
ut as far as leaving his children a successful and thriving business, it would make a big difference. “Okay, I’m in,” he said finally.
Nick reached over the seat and patted his father on the shoulder. “That’s the spirit,” he said. “This ought to be fun; kind of like The Hardy Boys finding the Applegate treasure.”
“The what?” Chris said.
“The Applegate treasure,” Nick repeated. “I found this DVD collection on the Internet. It was a Disney feature on the old Mickey Mouse Club that was on TV back in the late fifties.”
“I remember,” Chris said. “My dad used to watch that when he was a kid. I’ve never seen the whole thing, but I did see the last episode where Frank and Joe found the gold doubloons in that rickety old water tower. Is that the one you mean?”
“That’s the one,” Nick said. “Solving this case could be our Applegate Treasure.” He clapped his hands together and rubbed them in eager anticipation.
“Dad,” Veronica said. “What do you think we can find that the police haven’t already found?”
“I guess that would depend on how hard they looked,” Matt said. “And how big a priority they put on this long-forgotten case.”
“Yeah,” Veronica said, “But there has to still be someone left who was around when this originally happened. Granted, some of them might be retired or dead, but there just has to be someone who’d remember the details of the case.”
“Are you suggesting we start snooping around that town that’s near the crash site?” Nick said. “Those four guys may not have even been from around there. They could have been from somewhere else altogether and just wound up passing through this area. Then where would you start looking for clues?”
Veronica didn’t have an answer and just went back to staring out her window. Two more hours of boring scenery whizzed past the Coopers before the surroundings began to look familiar to them. Nick pointed to the wayside up ahead. “I think that was the spot,” he said.