Murder in the Dell

by Bert Entwistle

  “I don’t know Felix, I still get the feeling we’re missing something, but I don’t know what it is . . .”

  “That’s the way these cases go. They haunt you with the idea that there should be something else you should be doing, but in reality it’s a waiting game. Waiting for a new piece of evidence or for someone to give you a tip, or even a confession,” said Felix, shuffling through the files. “But I doubt we’ve missed anything significant on this one.”

  “Maybe not.”

  “Remember, we don’t have a single crime scene to investigate or a single witness to the any of the killings, or the dumping of the bodies. Not one of these girls were associated with each other in any way and they all disappeared from different places. We just do everything we can and wait for the next piece of the puzzle to come our way.”

  “We have a witness to a four door car with one of our victims possibly in it,” said Deacon.

  Felix shrugged. “A possible sighting of a possible victim by a nightclub bouncer late on a dark, snowy night? How many light colored, four door cars do you think there are in this part of the world? It’s not nothing Deacon, but it has a long way to go to be an important item right now. I’m heading over to Superior to question some of the staff at the college. Call me if you need me.”

  He nodded, the nagging feeling that he missed something still bothering him. “Sure.”

  Walking back to his desk, he opened his drawer and pulled out a pack of chewing gum. When he was struggling with a problem he often chewed gum, it seemed to help his concentration. For the next hour he chewed, shuffled papers, organized his desk and cleaned up his paperwork. After pulling everything out of his in-basket he went through the stack one sheet at a time. A sheet with the logo of Shoreline Towing and Storage was in the middle of the pile. It was the report from the day their driver found the severed arm.

  Sheriff Davis,

  Our driver, Pete Peterson, was dispatched to pull a car from a ditch at 2:45 pm. The car was a white, 2014, four-door Toyota Camery. Driver/owner was Mrs. Sinclair Crawford, of Bayfield County. The tag number and VIN number are noted below. Our driver had the car out quickly and was paid by credit card the minimum charge of $100.00.

  If we can do anything else for you please feel free to call.

  Sincerely,

  Shoreline Towing and Storage.

  “Shit!” said Deacon, slamming his fist on the desk hard enough to make Angie jump. “Goddamnit—goddamnit . . .! Call Pete Peterson, the tow truck driver, right away and tell him I need to see him as soon as possible.”

  “What’s up? You find something important?”

  “Just make the call.”

  “It’s dialing already.”

  Deacon read the report again, barely able to contain himself. Here’s what had been bothering him, just sitting on his desk the whole time. It wasn’t about one of the bodies, it was about the arm.

  The tow truck driver walked over to Angie’s desk. “I was driving by when they called, you wanted to see me?”

  “Hi Pete, thanks for coming down so quickly, Sheriff Davis does, he’s in his office.”

  Deacon waved him in. “I have a couple more questions about when you found the arm.”

  “Sure, ask away.”

  “When you got to the car in the ditch, was Mrs. Crawford inside or outside of the car?”

  “Actually she was outside the car standing next to the open trunk. As I drove up she saw me coming and closed it as I got there.”

  “You said she slid into the ditch almost all the way to the rip-rap, is that right?”

  “Yeah, but it was still easy to winch her out from there.”

  “Pete, when she was in the ditch, how close was the car to the spot where you saw the arm?”

  “Uhh — maybe fifteen or twenty feet.”

  “Did Mrs. Crawford say much to you?”

  “She was glad to get her car out, but that was about it. She seemed real nice. I told you she gave me a twenty-dollar tip.”

  “Did you see the arm when you were hooking up her car?”

  “No. The winch cable was a little bound up on the spool. After she left, I pulled it all the way out and then rewound it. I saw the purple fingernails sticking up when I was stretching the cable out.”

  “Pete, thank you for coming down so quickly, I really appreciate it.”

  “I hope I helped.”

  “You did.”

  “Angie, call Austin and tell him to meet me here at seven tomorrow morning.”

  “You want me to call Felix too?”

  “No, wait on that until we go over this stuff in the morning.”

  “We? I’m coming in at seven too?”

  “Yes my love, you too. You are part of the team.”

  “What about Vince?”

  “He can come in at the regular time like usual, he can take the calls for the day.”

  The next morning he brought them up to speed on what he’d found, then instructed them to start the search on Sinclair and Sarah Crawford. “I want to know everything there is to know about these two people, from their ancestors to their sex lives. Angie is working on their financials and Vince will take all the calls today. Angie, that reminds me, you never looked him up for me. Will you find me some examples of Sinclair’s work please? I want to see what makes this guy tick.”

  “Sure, where are you headed?”

  “To find the district attorney.”

  Deacon sat across the desk from Jackson Hines, the District Attorney for Ashland and Bayfield Counties. Another local boy from Washburn, he had played football with Deacon in high school. They had been friends for years and still hunted deer together every fall.

  “A severed arm?” said Jackson, “you’re not bullshitting me, are you Deacon?”

  “Not at all, the pictures are in the file.”

  Hines went through the reports and looked at the pictures. “I assume this came from one of the bodies this killer has been dumping around here over the last two years?”

  “No. All of the bodies that were found had all of their limbs. This is something altogether different.”

  “What does the FBI have to say about it?”

  “You know the bureau is doing the investigation on the bodies. When they said the arm is not from one of their victims, the Bayfield County Sheriff’s Department gets the case.”

  Deacon gave him the details of the arm and the tow truck driver’s story and what Doc Baker found when he looked at it.

  “I have to admit, it’s a pretty interesting case, but we’re still a long way from a search warrant. You’ll need more evidence than this to make a case against Sarah Crawford. Christ, Deacon, have you met her before? She looks like everyone’s perfect grandmother.”

  “I’ve met her, she is sweet and grandmotherly. In fact I like her and Sinclair both. But some young woman had her arm cut off and probably lost her life. It’s my job to find out what this is all about.”

  Hines nodded and pushed the file back to him. “I agree a hundred percent Deacon, but you’ll need a lot more evidence before I can get a warrant. Besides, you know who Sinclair is, a wealthy landowner, businessman, benefactor to the county and every small town around here.”

  “Don’t forget his recent donation to the hospital,” said Deacon. “Apparently he’s also a successful writer from what I hear.”

  “I’ve heard that too. I’d say pursue your investigation, but just keep it out of the public eye as long as you can.”

  Hines walked him to his car. “Deacon, keep me posted on this thing. It’s not too often little Bayfield County has a working serial killer and a severed arm turn up at the same time.”

  Deacon walked next door to the county assessor’s office and explained to the manager that he was looking for a plat map of Washburn and the forest area to the northwest of town. After a few minutes, she found what he was looking for and he spread it out on the table. He followed the road to the south side of the Crawford family estate. It was a ful
l section of land, 640 acres and almost completely covered with trees. The deed had been in the hands of the Crawford family for nearly a hundred years.

  Asking the manager to make a copy, she said she would drop it by the office when it was done. At the office, he went straight to the computer, clicked onto the Google Earth program and typed in Washburn, Wisconsin. In seconds the satellite picture settled in on Washburn. Expanding the picture slightly, he moved the cursor to the northwest and then zoomed in on the Crawford property.

  “Austin, Angie, come here and check this out.”

  “What are we looking at boss?” asked Austin, leaning over his shoulder.

  “This is the Crawford property. Here’s the entrance, it’s the only road in. It bends through the trees for quite a ways then comes out at the house and the out buildings. There’s a good-sized cleared field in there, but it’s all in the middle of the property, surrounded by thick trees.”

  “My kind of place,” said Angie.

  Austin pointed at the screen. “Look how isolated it is. I’d love to have a place that big and private myself.”

  “Yeah, me too. Let’s go and have a closer look at the Crawford compound. Angie, we’ll be back in a couple of hours.”

  “Austin, You ever been in there before?” asked Deacon.

  “Once or twice when I was a kid. There’s a couple of ponds on the north end, one pretty good sized, all of them surrounded by trees. My buddy and I snuck in after dark once to fish in the biggest one, but never caught anything. Another time we went in during the day just far enough to see the house.”

  “What was that like?”

  “Just a big, old white house, a barn and a couple of smaller buildings. I think one of them might have been an old dairy barn. It was all pretty boring, so we never went back.”

  They pulled the car up to the black iron gate with an arched ironwork sign above it that said: CRAWFORD - 1916. A cattle guard stretched from one side of the entrance to the other.

  “You know if they had a fence?”

  “As I remember it, it was kind of a rusty chain link, maybe five feet high, all the way around. In some places the bushes had grown through it and it was in pretty bad shape.”

  What they could see of the fence was well concealed by the pines were maples and a lot of scrub oak, all without leaves.

  “I wonder if they have security cameras around the place?” asked Austin.

  They both jumped when the voice came out of speaker on the post. “Sheriff Davis, what can I do for you?”

  “I guess that answers that question,” said Austin.

  “Is this Sinclair?”

  “It is, can I do something for you?”

  “I’m sorry to bother you, but you know about the serial killer who’s been dumping bodies around here? I’d just like to ask you a few questions.”

  “No problem, come on up.”

  The gates swung open and Deacon made the short drive to the house. It looked pretty much as Austin had described it, a big white house, a barn, several older out buildings and one newer metal building with two double garage doors.

  “Don’t mention anything about the arm,” said Deacon, “just pay close attention and observe everything you can.”

  Crawford met them at the front porch. “Deacon, deputy, come on in and get warm, I just put on a pot of coffee. You drink coffee, right?”

  “Sure do, and it sounds really good right now,” said Deacon.

  A black lab bounded into the kitchen and immediately jumped up on Austin, trying to lick his face.

  Sinclair grabbed him by the collar and put him outside. “I am so sorry, he’s just a big friendly pain in the butt, are you all right?”

  “No problem sir, I love dogs. I have one like that myself.”

  “Deputy, I’ve seen you around before but I don’t think we have been formally introduced yet, I’m Sinclair Crawford,” he said, extending his hand giving and giving him a firm handshake.

  “Austin Stone, good to meet you Mister Crawford.”

  “Are you Roger Stone’s boy?”

  “Yessir, he was my dad. Did you know him?”

  Crawford nodded. “I did, he loved to talk about sports, and he loved to talk about you, particularly about your college football.”

  “Thank you Mister Crawford, it’s nice of you to say that.”

  “Please, call me Sinclair.” He poured the coffee and invited them to have a seat at the kitchen table. “You wanted to talk about the serial killer, is that right?”

  “Yes,” said Deacon, taking a sip of the steaming coffee. “By now everyone knows at least a little about the bodies that have been turning up around here. There are seven dead girls over about two years. They all turned up in Bayfield County, wrapped in black plastic.”

  “You’re right,” said Crawford, “everyone has heard things about them.”

  “We’re just interviewing everyone we can, particularly folks who’ve been around here for a long time.”

  “That would be me,” said Crawford. “My family has been right here on this land over a hundred years now. Ask me whatever you would like.”

  “The biggest thing,” said Deacon, “is that we’re looking for anyone that has noticed something out of the ordinary. Strange vehicles, strange faces, even tracks from people or snow machines or four-wheelers. Anything, no matter how insignificant it might seem, could be important.”

  Crawford shook his head. “No, I don’t really notice anything around my place, except the deer, foxes, and raccoons, or the occasional badger. We don’t have any snowmobiles, just one old four-wheeler I use for hauling firewood. Our place is kind of landlocked, it’s just us.”

  After an hour of conversation and several cups of coffee, Deacon closed his notebook and handed him his card. “I think that’s it for now. We just ask that everyone please be very aware of what’s going on and that they report anything out of the ordinary.”

  Crawford walked them to the door. “Thanks for stopping by Deacon. I will let you know if I see anything that’s not right. Austin, it was good to meet you.”

  Standing on the porch, Deacon looked over the property. “Sinclair, what do you grow in this field? Potatoes?”

  “Mostly. Over the years we have grown potatoes, wheat, rye, whatever we thought we could make a little money at. Years ago my grandfather tried to make a cranberry operation out of the place, but moving the water around proved to be too much trouble and he went back to potatoes.”

  “Was there a dairy operation here before?” asked Deacon, pointing to the shed.

  “He had a small one for years, but I don’t think the family ever ran enough cows to be profitable. Anything else today sheriff?”

  “No, we’re good. Please say high to Sarah for me.”

  Angie had a new file ready when they got back to the office. It was marked S.T. Crawford—Financial. “It’s everything I’ve found so far on Crawford’s finances.”

  Deacon opened the folder. “Is he rich?”

  “And then some. It looks like he’s living off old family money. He’s worth around eight million or so. The land has been in the family for generations and from what I heard, they have a pretty checkered past when it comes to how they made their fortune.”

  “So how did the illustrious Crawfordfamily come to be a one percenter?”

  “I ran into Henrietta Baumann, the librarian, when I went to the diner for lunch and I asked her about the Crawford family history. She knows everything there is to know about the history of this place since the Indians first settled here.”

  “Shit, that old woman was here to greet them when they arrived. What is she now, 98, maybe a hundred?”

  “Deacon — stop, she’s a very nice lady.”

  “Every time I went into the library when I was a kid, she yelled at me to be quiet. Once or twice she even kicked a couple of us out.”

  “Were you making noise?”

  “Probably.”

  “Moving on. The legend has it tha
t they started out as farmers, struggled to make a living at it then met up with someone who made moonshine. By the time prohibition hit in 1920, they were already in the illegal booze business anyway, so they hooked up with bootleggers and for the next thirteen years catered to the who’s-who of the bootlegging era.”

  “That’s a pretty interesting back story for sure,” said Deacon. “What about Crawford himself?”

  “Believe it or not, he was the only child of an only child, his father was Sinclair Dean Crawford. Even more unusual, his grandfather, Arvin Dean Crawford, was one of two kids, a boy and a girl. The girl, Eva, disappeared around age nine and was never found.”

  What about the original Crawford, the one that was there first, anything on him?”

  “Not yet. But Henrietta says there is a lot of material from the early days in storage if you want to come down and look through it. She’ll be happy to help.”

  “Do Sinclair and Sarah have any children?”

  “None that I could find.”

  Deacon read through her notes and looked at a pair of photographs she found on line. It was a dreary looking winter day with fresh snow on the ground. The dairy barn on the Crawford property looked nearly new and three men stood outside the door, two of them holding shotguns. The second picture showed a big man with a shotgun over his shoulder and a small boy and girl standing in front of a 1928 Studebaker sedan. Arvin and Eva I presume, thought Deacon.

  Chapter 8

  “Austin, what did you make of the place? Did you see anything that makes you suspicious?”

  “Nothing really stands out, there was an old tractor parked at the end of the milking shed with a bucket on the front and a backhoe on the back. Probably used for clearing off their road after a snowstorm. Just the normal amount of junk laying around for such an old farmstead. No tracks in the fresh snow of any kind, but there’s no telling what the snow may be hiding.”