Dead Investigation

by Charlie Price

  “No, it doesn’t. They have rodeos and events at the center that last till midnight.” Pearl didn’t seem nearly as nervous as Murray.

  “Not this part. Stable’s only for event stock, a couple a renters. Kids messing around disturbs the horses. I got a call.”

  “Does the person who called you own a big gray truck?”

  Murray wished Pearl would just shut up but he knew telling her would be useless.

  “You’re too young to be mouthing off to a cop. Does your ol’ man know you’re here with this boy?”

  That shut Pearl up.

  In the momentary silence Murray was aware of voices … the ones from before. He shot a quick look at the stable. No. Was a van parked nearby? He didn’t see one. He put the voices out of his mind.

  “Are you a policeman?” Murray asked. He didn’t think so. RPD wore dark blue uniforms, and even in the poor light Murray could see the man wore a gray shirt with dark pocket flaps, gray pants with a dark stripe down the leg.

  “Let’s just call this girl’s parents and see how much of a policeman I am,” the man said, pulling his phone out of a belt holster.

  “We’re leaving.” This from Pearl, and she was already walking toward the trees south of the Dumpster.

  Murray sensed her plan. If the man tried to stop her she’d run for cover, probably the thick patch of trees beyond the old skating rink. If the guy followed she had several options including jumping in the canal if she got desperate. When Pearl was mad, she was fearless. Murray’s thoughts were interrupted by a hand on his shoulder.

  “I’m watching you, son. Don’t do this again. Next time, you’re arrested, sure as shit.”

  Murray wondered if the guy could hear his heartbeat, wondered if the guy had any idea how scared he was. Too scared to speak, for one. He twisted out of the man’s grasp and ran.

  AFTERMATH

  Gates drove away from the Barker house with an uneasy feeling. All these years in law enforcement, had he learned anything? At this moment he wasn’t sure whether he’d advanced his investigation or destroyed it. He knew for certain that the anger he’d felt confronting Barker was dangerous. He’d learned it second day of training: “When you’re angry blood leaves the brain and goes to arms and legs, fight or flight.” Questioning a suspect was best done dispassionately.

  Gates turned west on Placer up to Texas Springs Road and parked in a favorite turnout with a view of Montgomery Ranch Lake. Went over the exchange to the best of his memory.

  He wasn’t sorry he’d confronted the man at his home. That, if anything, could lead to more careless remarks than an official setting. Gates believed if he’d brought Barker to the department for questioning the man probably would have lawyered up. Immediately. The prior experience of being interrogated by FBI officers in a federal investigation will do that to a person. Gates had hoped he’d get a better read on Barker’s responses to the questions about Payne. Unfortunately, he came away wondering whether the man was growing increasingly anxious in response to the closeness of Gates’s guesses, or simply agitated that he couldn’t throw a punch. Every time Gates had seen him, the man’s immediate response to something he didn’t like was aggression. And Barker challenged Gates: “Did my wife call you?” So something was still wrong at home, deteriorating by the look of his wife. More bothersome, the man continued to show no concern for his son. Gates couldn’t imagine. Then he could.

  Barker had been momentarily rocked by the question about the FBI investigation. Admitted he’d talked to Payne recently but may have been surprised by hearing Payne was dead. The question had stopped Barker short of his front door, but he didn’t turn around, and Gates had no way to discern the man’s expression or the emotions behind it.

  What was next? Gates needed to speak to Mrs. Barker again. See if he could learn what was sapping her vitality. See if she knew what Barker did on his evenings and weekends. It takes substantial time to kill people and hide their bodies. He’d have to drive them out in the wilderness and bury them well enough to dissuade animals. Even then, some would eventually be found.

  Now that Homeland Security had guards and cameras watching the dam at Sierra Lake, the most convenient corpse disposal method had been eliminated. Barker didn’t own a junkyard with a car-crusher or a cement manufacturing company, but didn’t his company help create office buildings and shopping centers? Was Trask involved in any project that would accommodate several bodies in foundation work?

  * * *

  The following morning Gates pored over the engineering company’s description. Designing and building commercial sites: office buildings, apartment buildings, shopping centers, hospitals. Founded by Charles R. Trask. In 2007 the man split his ownership, retaining 70 percent, and giving the remaining 30 percent to his son, Roth, who’d joined the company earlier that year. January 2008, C. R. Trask died, leaving everything to Roth. In 2009, Chuck Barker purchased 10 percent.

  Add a partner? A comptroller who’d been questioned in an FBI investigation the year before? Why? Extortion? Did Barker know something Roth wanted to keep hidden? Or did he just need to raise cash to offset company losses? And yes, Barker had been Payne’s supervisor; his signature appeared on Payne’s termination papers.

  Roth had declined to meet with Gates on advice of his lawyer? Seemed ultra-cautious for an everyday Riverton businessman. Gates turned to his personal investigator, Mr. Google.

  * * *

  Roth Trask: Born 1973, graduated Chico State University 1995. Air Force after college. Gulf War fighter pilot, honorable discharge 2004. Joined firm in 2007. One thing Gates hadn’t known. The years between discharge and company employment? Roth Trask became the teaching pro at the local Ponderosas Golf Club. A scratch amateur golfer, playing and placing in several western state pro-am tournaments, he gave up the game after failing to qualify for the Professional Golf Association tour ’05 through ’07.

  DEAD VENTRILOQUISM

  Murray barely caught the whisper as he bolted past the old skating rink running for home. He made sure he was out of the fat guy’s sight before he stopped.

  “Over here. Don’t let him see you.”

  Pearl didn’t need to worry. That was Murray’s first priority. He wanted to keep running, but he couldn’t leave Pearl. She’d hurried south, and when the rink blocked the guy’s view she slid behind the trees to see what was going to happen. He knew without a doubt she’d have run back and attacked the man if he’d gotten aggressive.

  “Let’s get out of here.” Murray was puffing more from fear than sprinting.

  “Just watch.”

  “We can’t do anything.”

  “Who called him? Where’d this guy come from? Bother horses, my butt! Let’s see if anybody meets him.”

  “If nobody does?” Murray was desperately searching for any argument that would get her out of here.

  “See how long he stays around. Like he’s guarding that hill? That can’t be his job. Security stays on the move, patrols; supermarkets, hospitals, the museum—places with valuables.”

  “Horses are valuable.”

  “Did you hear any? Do people store an expensive horse in an empty public stable?”

  “We didn’t look in the stalls.” Murray knew he was wasting his breath.

  “Hang on. One of us may have to run for Dad.”

  When Murray zeroed in, the guy had a cell phone to his ear and was slowly walking back and forth scanning the hill as he talked. He stopped, held the phone away, and looked in the direction Murray and Pearl had run. Made a slow three-sixty before resuming his conversation.

  “See?”

  Pearl had whispered right in his ear, so close he had briefly felt her lips.

  “Somebody asked him about us. Not about horses.”

  Murray had to admit it looked that way.

  The man holstered his phone, adjusted his pants higher on his waist, and went back to lean on his car hood. Stayed that way, looking at the hill another fifteen minutes before driving away. />
  By that time it was cold and Pearl and Murray had a different problem. Night. It was past time for dinner.

  * * *

  When they opened the cottage door the whole place smelled like tomato sauce and spices and garlic bread. Janochek was sitting in his comfortable chair shuffling a deck of cards. Murray had never seen him do that before.

  “Thought I’d try my hand at fortune-telling,” he said to neither in particular. “I asked the deck when my daughter and her friend might be home for dinner but it didn’t know.”

  Murray wanted to say something, break in, but absolutely nothing came to mind.

  Pearl started, “Dad—”

  Janochek spoke right through her. “So I asked what my daughter and her friend were doing, and it answered right back. ‘They’ve gone to look at the graves.’ And then I threw my genie. And while I was picking up his pieces, I was thinking, good thing it wasn’t a crystal ball.”

  “Dad—” Pearl tried again but her father held up his hand.

  “While I was down on my hands and knees I wondered what I would have done at your age. You never met him, but I loved my father, and even respected him. He was what they called a common man, a laborer, a sawmill worker. I was proud of him and tried to please him when I could.”

  Peripherally, Murray could see tears. See them make a line down Pearl’s face toward her chin.

  “Dad, please—” The hand again cut her off.

  “Before I got all fifty-two I knew I would have promised one thing and done another, even though I loved him. I knew that some things made me so curious I had to see for myself and no reason or promise in the world would keep me from it. And I knew that willfulness did not mean I loved my dad any less. It just meant that sometimes I had to live my own damn life and suffer whatever consequences.”

  Murray found his tongue. “It was my fault. I asked her,” he said. Blackness filled the air in front of him, like he’d entered a tunnel.

  Janochek shook his head and the motion brought Murray back to the room.

  “Son, you don’t have it in you,” he said.

  A sob escaped Pearl, but she caught it and shut it off.

  “In a minute or so, we’re going to sit down and have some spaghetti,” he said.

  His voice was so even Murray couldn’t begin to guess what was coming next. This might be his last meal, his last night in the cemetery.

  “Before we eat we’re going to have an understanding.”

  He rose and got two straight-backed chairs from the table, faced them a couple of feet in front of his easy chair and sat again, motioned the pair to join him.

  Murray snuck a glance at Pearl, at her face, now flushed and a little swollen.

  “Disobedience is unwanted, mostly unwarranted, usually unpardonable between a father and fourteen-year-old … No, forget that, it’s not what I wanted to say.” He rubbed his face and started again. “Lying now and in the foreseeable future is unacceptable. Unacceptable … Do you hear me?”

  The man hadn’t raised his voice but his words were crystal clear. Murray nodded, as did Pearl.

  “We’ll not further discuss the disobedience. We will discuss what you saw and what you learned and what you’re going to do in the next days and you will tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the goddamned truth. And keep telling it whenever we’re together … Because I’m afraid.” He paused, pursed his lips just for a second. “I’m afraid if you don’t, something infinitely precious will be lost between a father and a daughter. Something that we may never be able to retrieve.” He let that stand for a few seconds before adding, “And, Murray, if I can’t trust you, you can’t live here. You understand that, don’t you?”

  Murray did. He really did. He did so fully, he didn’t think answering the question with words did the question justice. He’d answer in blood if he could.

  Janochek once again rose, but this time he went to the stove and began filling plates from a large skillet.

  * * *

  Later, Murray awoke on the small couch in the cottage. He’d slept over, still reluctant to stay so far away in the shed. He remembered the dream that woke him. The dead were walking. Groaning as they moved. He was pretty sure what brought that on. Why was there only one voice when he and Pearl climbed the hill a few hours ago? Where were the rest of them? But at the bottom, he’d heard them when he and Pearl were with the cop. How could that happen?

  He thought about waking Pearl or Janochek but was more afraid of doing that than walking to the hedge by himself. He pulled on Janochek’s canvas jacket and quietly opened and closed the doors. Picked his path cautiously, trying to stay on the grass and avoid sticks that would break under his weight. Ten feet from the hedge he could hear her. Her. Not the others. That sent a chill through him, sent him back to the cottage.

  He sat in Janochek’s easy chair … Wear his coat. Sit in his chair. Ought to drink his porridge. But the chair and coat were comforting. That’s as close as he could come to a justification.

  What about the voices? Had someone moved the bodies? Was that the parking and climbing he’d heard the evening he first climbed the bluff? Somebody going up to take the bodies and untie the rope? Why leave the woman? Didn’t have time to get them all? Hard to believe. What if somebody was planning to finish the job yesterday, but held back when he saw them messing around the stable? Murray shivered. That could be why he’d called the cop. To get them out of there so he could move the last body. But he hadn’t. The woman’s voice was still up where Murray had first heard it. Didn’t make any sense.

  * * *

  When Janochek shook his shoulder, Murray yelped and then got embarrassed when he remembered he was still sitting in the man’s chair and wearing the man’s coat. “I, uh, I—”

  “Didn’t mean to startle you. How about flapjacks and burger patties?”

  Murray composed himself, watching Janochek take down the big mixing bowl and gather the ingredients. He stirred the pancake mix together with eggs and milk and shook in some spices, finally adding a spoonful of what Murray recognized as vanilla. That done, he shaped the burgers and started them frying in one skillet, put butter in another and added three dollops of batter.

  “Smells good,” Murray said, rising. “I’m really grat—”

  “Pearl always razzes me about burgers for breakfast, but I notice there’s never anything left on her plate. I think she likes the meat-syrup combination.”

  Murray heard Pearl in the bathroom and postponed his own needs till she finished.

  DUCK LOVE

  After the dishes and pans were set to dry, the three returned to the table. “Got to figure the next step,” Janochek said, putting his clipboard in front of him and taking the ballpoint out of the old coffee cup that held assorted pencils and pens. “I believe we had our understanding last night.” He looked at each of them in turn.

  Each nodded.

  “Okay, what did you see?”

  “You were right,” Pearl said. “No rope. Um…”

  “A man called us off the hill,” Murray said, watching Janochek’s eyes widen. “He said he was a policeman and he had a cop-type car, but his uniform was gray with black trim. I think he was a rent-a-cop.”

  “There? By the stable?”

  Murray nodded.

  “Can’t remember seeing security around the rodeo grounds when there wasn’t an event.” Janochek looked away, thinking.

  “He said he was going to arrest us and then he said he was going to call you,” Pearl said, eyes on the table.

  “Well, we couldn’t have that, could we?” Janochek asked, scowling. “So you … ran?”

  “Yeah, but we hid by the skating rink, behind the trees at the canal, and watched,” she said.

  “He was on his cell to somebody,” Murray said.

  “Right after you left?”

  They both nodded.

  “And then he took the phone away from his ear and looked around the whole area like he was seeing if we were for sure
gone before he talked again. I think he called somebody about us.”

  “Could be. Or some citizen walking by the stable could have heard you and phoned security and he was just calling back to report that the situation was handled.”

  “Dad, we were whispering. Way up the hill. Nobody could have heard us.”

  “Yesterday I felt like somebody was watching us while you were looking around the hill,” Murray said. “I think somebody followed us when we left. And last night, a light-colored truck, a van, pulled away from the front doors of the auditorium just as we walked up.”

  Janochek’s face darkened. “Lord loves a duck! That’s just why I didn’t want you messing around there anymore!” He leaned away from the table, rubbed his eyes. “There’s probably a normal explanation. Cars and trucks stop under that portico all the time to load and unload. It’s a quick way into the auditorium’s kitchen.” He sat forward and made himself a note. “Kind of truck?”

  “Like a business truck. Boxy. Dirty. The back looked kind of rounded at the top.”

  “A Chevy or GMC? A lot of those are white.”

  Murray was at a loss. He didn’t know much about cars or trucks, didn’t drive, his mom didn’t have a car anymore.

  Janochek looked at Pearl.

  She avoided his stare. “Sorry. No idea. But I thought there was just one person inside. Didn’t it look like one of those?” She pointed to the newspaper, to a dealership ad Janochek had been skimming during breakfast.

  Murray nodded. “Maybe,” he said, “but that’s a side view.”

  Janochek shook his head. When he was a boy he knew the make of every car in town. “Rounded on top of the back doors,” he said, “probably one of those GM commercial vans.” Was going to add more but knew it would just confuse them. “Writing on the side or rear doors?”

  Pearl shook her head.

  “Don’t think so,” Murray said.

  “Okay, the cop guy. See the name of the security company?”

  Murray considered. It was a little too dark to see the emblem on the guy’s shirt and his car was facing them, no way to catch an emblem on the door.