Black Beast: A Clan of MacAulay Novel

by R. S. Guthrie

  In 1874, a canal was built to connect Sloan’s Lake to Cheltenham Heights, almost halfway to downtown Denver.

  When I was little, my maternal grandfather would buy us sour lemonade and pink cotton candy at Lakeside Amusement Park and tell us stories about the first steamship in Colorado: thirty-five cents for a horse-drawn trolley ride from Denver to the boat dock at Cheltenham Heights to catch a cruise around the lake on an idyllic summer afternoon.

  The business prospects of the canal eventually failed and the canal itself became a dumpsite before it was filled in years later.

  The only discernable body parts—heads, torsos, legs, and arms—were found in half a dozen locations across Merriman Field and along the south shore of the lake.

  One of the heads was discovered floating in the shallow water, having been carried back in by a slight tide.

  An early morning runner spotted the milky flesh of a single arm and called in the location around 3:30 a.m.

  “You walked?” Burke said.

  I nodded.

  Senior Forensic Scientist Margaret Duchamp was in charge of the crime scene. She was the team lead, already expanding the initial perimeter that had been established by the responding officers.

  Margaret was a congenitally dislikable behemoth with sooty hair, waxen skin, and impenetrable, marble-shaped eyes sunken in a fleshy, hound-like face.

  My guess was her adolescence was no picnic: a graceless gestation amongst henpecking, womanish girls, and rangy, gregarious boys—none of whom paid much attention to her—other than to ridicule.

  She struck me as the kind who had been bullied mercilessly—a frumpy, acne-scored girl who excelled in quadratic equations and organic chemistry.

  Her terse, arrogant, hardscrabble demeanor and particular disaffection for me was understandable, even though had I been there with her, I’d have been more the type to pin the ears back on such horrible peers. Nevertheless, hers was the green-eyed hatred of those who found their social niche effortlessly and relatively unscathed.

  To her, even though I was now handicapped, I was still the embodiment of those ferocious umbrae of the past and there was no try or compensation I could muster that would change that fact.

  She was the highest-ranking member of CID Forensics. I knew her to be an icy academic with shrewd vision and a chip on her shoulder for everyone, particularly ham-handed detectives.

  Protocol put the catching detectives in charge of the overall investigation, but Forensics called the shots at the murder scene.

  Margaret was a damned good investigator, but one of the duties of a team leader was the synergy between forensics, law enforcement personnel, ancillary agencies and individuals. Synergistic she was not.

  “Talk to me, Ned,” I said to my partner.

  “I met with Margaret. You know the score, Mac. She runs the show. She wants us to help with the tape measurements.”

  “Great. Who was the first to arrive?”

  “Patrol car in the neighborhood took the initial call. The young kid and the big guy over there. They work out of District One Station over on Decatur. Margaret chewed them out pretty good. They didn’t seal off the pedestrian path.”

  I knew the more senior officer, Olson. He was talking to a forty-something man in a navy jogging suit, canary-yellow headphones dangling around his neck plugged into an iPod on his hip. Even in the poor lighting of the park I could see the jogger’s complexion was sickly.

  “Crimeny, how many people traipsed through here?”

  “With all the joggers, who knows? It’s early. Half a dozen, maybe, before Margaret closed it down,” Burke said. “Rollins—the kid—he didn’t take it very well.”

  “Margaret has that effect.”

  “Never seen this much blood, sport. Forensics is giddy.”

  Flashes were popping as the forensics contingent documented the scene and Margaret sunk her teeth in. Our forensics department was good; any one of them could work the big metropolises—New York, Chicago, L.A.

  Some had.

  They would photograph, collect any physical evidence left behind: blood, hairs, remnants of clothing, fibers, semen, sweat secretions, skin follicles. If there was a drop of spittle, Margaret and her team would find it and bag it.

  I decided against arguing with our assignment—I didn’t want any of her bullshit this morning.

  “Let’s hook up with Wu.” I said.

  Cindy Wu was the sketch artist.

  Burke, who was still sucking on cold, 7-Eleven coffee, looked relieved.

  The man was shit-scared of Margaret.

  “I’m with you, partner,” he said.

  I knew powerful women caused Burke great discomfort. He was gallant. Should have lived in the earlier part of the century.

  In his mind women were slight waifs—tender things that troubled with car doors, slick salesmen, and lived for the rough, boorish comfort of a good man.

  He reminded me of my father: 50-something, tall and wide like a lineman; big but not too fat. His was a round face that scrunched and un-scrunched in deep thought. He had large, startling blue eyes sunken in the flesh mass that padded his orbital sockets.

  He was a grand man, on and off the job. His wife lost a lifelong battle with lupus two years before Isabel discovered the lump in her breast. We’d grown close in the following years, like a father and eldest son. And though his views were antiquated and no longer political, I knew most women could do far worse.

  As we approached Wu, Margaret saw me and waved me over.

  “Stay here,” I said to Burke, who didn’t need to be told twice.

  “Detective Macaulay,” Duchamp said, as nicely as I had ever heard it said by her.

  “Good morning, Margaret. We were just getting ready to offer our assistance to Wu.”

  A small tick flared on the left side of her round face. I wondered silently if it was disappointment. Perhaps she’d been hoping for a fight.

  “Don’t bother,” she said. “I want to show you something.”

  “You’re the boss,” I said.

  No sarcasm.

  You picked your battles, and I didn’t even want a skirmish.

  “Good. Come this way,” she said. “Watch the evidence markers. The Keystone Kops over there didn’t secure the pathway. My guess is we’ve had half a dozen runners tromp through already.”

  “I heard.”

  “What do you think about these?” she said, shining her flashlight back and forth.

  We were standing at one of the more saturated locations. Blood was strewn everywhere—on the leaves, grass, gritty rock near the water. And there were sets of footprints all around us. But they weren’t like any feet I’d ever seen.

  “Well,” I said. “Those footprints are obviously not from the victims. They don’t look human. I’d say from the pattern and spread, they are likely from a single assailant. A big one.”

  “How so?” she said.

  “They’re all the same size and also in sets of two. The depth of the impressions implies a heavy attacker.”

  “An upright assailant,” Margaret said. “I agree. But who? Or what?”

  “A bear?”

  “You think that’s possible,” she asked.

  “Maybe. We’re not too far from the foothills. Based on what I’m seeing, I’d say it’s at least a reasonable theory at this point.”

  “I was thinking the same thing,” she said. I figured. Duchamp loved to test people.

  “To do this kind of damage, though,” she continued, “we’re talking one helluva big bear.”

  “I don’t know if I’ve ever heard any stories of grizzlies in the city,” I said. “But I’ll check with the Forest Service. I guess a brown bear is pretty big, too. And could inflict a lot of damage.”

  “The grizzly is a brown bear, Detective,” Duchamp said.

  “I didn’t know that,” I said.

  “Kodiaks, too.”

  The sun would be up in another hour or so. I looked back and saw floodligh
ts being positioned to illuminate the area. With the devastation I’d already seen, I wasn’t sure I wanted a clearer view.

  Or any more conversation with Margaret Duchamp.

  CHAPTER THREE

  WHY DO we let the bad times rent space in our heads? It’s something I’ve never been that good at: letting the ugliness slide off me like watershed—off the duck’s back and all that.

  In fact, for me, the pain builds up over time—like a splinter left unattended under your thumbnail. You try to ignore it; pay no attention to it. But without thinking, your other fingers pick at it. Squeeze it. Scratch the itch.

  And after a while—over a period of days or weeks or even years—this small, seemingly insignificant prickle has become swollen and infected and full of bad juice. It’s then the pain begins to swallow up the better things in life.

  I’m not proud of my failure in this area. Most would say I should’ve long ago unloaded to some shrink from the comfort of a leather couch. But that kind of release is no good for me.

  It doesn’t work—I clam up.

  Even though I realize letting things pile up in my head is no winning strategy for any person, much less for a cop, I still can’t share such personal insights with a complete stranger. Unfortunately, there are a great many things stacked up in there—like a multi-car pileup on a foggy highway.

  It’s also my theory that too many shrinks have a rosy, optimistic view of the world; they come at you from a singsong vantage that just doesn’t ring true.

  I’m not saying Nietzsche had it right. God is not dead. But at least Friedrich wasn’t running through the flower patch, dancing like a deranged idiot, or climbing the twelve steps to enlightenment.

  Speaking of God, I know many people who believe we are inherently good—built in his image. I used to feel that way. I used to go to mass and read the passages and bow my head in prayer.

  (For the record, few shrinks I know have ever put that much faith in a greater power, much less God himself.)

  But when I became a homicide detective, my faith began a slippery descent. I’d seen some pretty awful things when I was on patrol—not the least of which was the murder of my partner—but when I started investigating the crimes; when I began to understand the machinations behind the mayhem—well, let’s just say my faith could only stand so much testing.

  Don’t get me wrong. I did not stop believing in God. That would have been easy. Just chalk it up to no one’s home upstairs and call it a day. To me, God is real—just as real as the day I first attended mass with my father and mother.

  Now I just hold him less accountable.

  What has happened over the years is that I have relinquished a part of my understanding. My grip on the bigger picture has been loosened. No. Loosened doesn’t cover it these days.

  Being one hundred percent truthful? It sometimes feels like I’ve lost hold entirely and have entered a kind of spiritual free-fall.

  So do I have issues with God?

  Yes.

  Has my faith been shaken?

  Most definitely.

  In light of all this, do I still maintain hope?

  I have to.

  If there is not a bigger picture—if there is no purpose to this lousy existence—I wouldn’t know or understand how to proceed. What thing in life is worth doing if there is no outcome?

  So here’s my nutshell—the World According to Macaulay:

  God is up there. And he’s tired. He’s so damned tired of it all. He sees the handwriting on the wall—that we can hardly mess it up any more than we already have.

  If you’re a parent, then you may know what this helplessness feels like:

  You’ve done everything you possibly can to provide for your child. You’ve loved them, clothed them, and procured everything they needed to survive. You’ve even thought about their future—saved for it.

  Eventually, however, they don’t care. Not a lot of them, anyway.

  Who are you and why are you looking for love, or even respect?

  It’s an ugly time, the teenage years. And I think that’s what we’ve become to God:

  Teenagers.

  So do I blame him for turning his back?

  Not really.

  But, like a teen, I also find it difficult to admit my culpability.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THERE WERE plenty of women in the world who had external beauty comparable to my wife. But most of them I’ve run into seemed to know it all too well.

  Isabel Dorn was the kind of woman whose allure was as much in her humility and self-admonishing ways as it was about her dark, perfect looks.

  She was the kind of woman who had no idea how attractive she was. You know the type. It makes them even more gorgeous.

  That who, me? look.

  By the way—who, me? beats come hither five to one in my book.

  So, yeah, I asked her out. I knew I didn’t deserve her. Or better, that she didn’t deserve me.

  I don’t kid myself.

  No woman deserves a cop. No man deserves one either.

  In other words cops make lousy husbands and wives; unless they are married to other cops.

  But the truth?

  That rarely works either.

  I read a report once that over seventy percent of the force was single. And if the numbers ever reached one hundred percent? It wouldn’t surprise me at all.

  But I asked Isabel Dorn on a date anyway.

  There were moments I wondered if it was luck that brought her into my life. We fit so well together I ended up ultimately believing it was pure fate. I’ve never been a huge fan of “love at first sight”—however, I probably should have been.

  Because I’m pretty sure I did love Isabel the first moment I saw her.

  Thing is, it took her a fair while longer to warm up to Bobby Macaulay. I’m not sure exactly what Isabel’s “type” was. But it was pretty clear, at least to me, that she was out of my league.

  After a while, though, she fell for me as hard as I fell for her. So I asked her to marry me. And she ended up saying yes.

  Even though I was wrong for her.

  Even though I was a cop.

  Yeah. It’s what we do.

  Isabel discovered the lump in 2002, just after her thirty-fourth birthday. I cannot describe the terror that seeps into your life once the word cancer has been given purchase in the mind and heart.

  Tests revealed my wife’s breast cancer was already past the terminal stage. It had begun to metastasize. Still, she wanted to try every option. She wanted to live. Not for selfish reasons—the last thing Isabel wanted was to put our families through unnecessary hope or suffering.

  She simply could not give up the fight with her son being only ten years-old. She figured, as a mother, she owed him one final battle. I couldn’t fathom losing her. The decision was exactly the one I was hoping for.

  So her cancer team rallied around her—recommending an immediate, full mastectomy, followed by round after round of radiation and chemotherapy.

  Her fight lasted almost three full years. That’s two and a half beyond what any of them told her. I know in the end she was sorry for having prolonged the inevitable—not because we should easily let go of life, but rather because of the way the treatments ravaged her and robbed her son of his mother anyway.

  When I buried her on that snowy Denver day in 2005, Cole bereft and trembling against my side, I told myself that I had left in the ground my capacity to ever love another. I hadn’t the slighted idea how I was supposed to go on another day, much less survive.

  Surviving meant years.

  Decades.

  And more importantly, I knew I had to raise my son, alone. Who was going to replace Isabel? She was such a fine woman. A wonderful wife and such a perfect mother.

  And me?

  I was the frog prince returned to toad. Fate had chewed me up and spit back out my one chance at the perfect woman; my golden opportunity at the fairytale life.

  The following year w
as excruciating. The job, my life—even my son, to an extent—became like background noise. Isabel was more than my love; she was my world.

  We may not feel immortal, or even invincible, but more often than not we don’t imagine the worst thing that could happen. We wake up each day contented, taking our happiness—and the happiness of those around us—for granted.

  Why wouldn’t we?

  Day in and day out, this is the way it is. Our perfect lives. And if we believe in God—if we feel we’ve done our part to be good people—good citizens, good spouses, good parents—then why would we dwell anywhere near the possibility of a tragedy looming just around the corner?

  Those who go through life worried about the next bad thing lurking in the shadows are labeled pessimists or fatalists and are shunned. So why would we act as though our lives were not fine—perhaps not all we dreamed they would be, but good enough?

  Yet so often, though we might want to ignore the warning signs, there might be horror waiting around the next bend in the trail. And it takes but a moment—one phone call from the cancer doctors—and solid ground slips so quickly from beneath our feet.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  FREDDIE JOE’S is a neighborhood bar where I can get lost when I need to feel no one is leaning on me or asking me for something or counting on me to deliver. We all need a place like Freddie Joe’s.

  Booze is optional.

  For me, the drink has never been an issue. When I need to unwind, I have a few. I think the fact that I’m a lightweight—and always have been when it comes to alcohol—has contributed more to my not becoming a drunk than any one particular factor.

  On this particular Wednesday night, my partner, Ned Burke—the grand man of no woman’s dream—sat beside me on a stool.

  (For the record, I never considered Ned’s presence as stifling my “alone” time. Ned was the kind of friend who understood enough about a person to leave him alone even while drinking by his side. It’s a rare talent.)