He half-hobbled, half-hopped to the safety of the car parked in the darkness on the other side of the road. He jumped in, swung it around and sped back to the intersection, not switching on his headlamps until he’d gone a hundred yards down the highway.
He’d been seen.
But, more importantly, he’d seen.
TWENTY-ONE
Despite the snow that began falling at dawn, the tiled lobby of the red-brick, white-columned Cook County sheriff’s suburban headquarters was mobbed by news creatures at eight o’clock the next morning, as Glet surely expected. And there wasn’t a thing Joe Lehman could do about it, also as Glet must have known. Glet was the man of the hour, the holder of the thunder, the cop who was closing in on the killer of the Stemec Henderson boys, and maybe much, much more.
The desk officer yelled at the crowd of newsies that they were wasting their time, that there was no presser scheduled. Announcements would be forthcoming to elaborate on Glet’s tease only when more facts were ascertained, he said.
But it was snowing heavily outside and there was no place else for the reporters to go, at least until the snow let up. The reporters, like Rigg, could wait inside, where it was warm, until Glet came in.
They didn’t have to wait long. Jerome Glet, dressed for the press in a shiny black suit devoid of the soup spots and cigar ash that adorned his other suits – and brand new, judging by the thin manufacturer’s tag he’d forgotten to remove from the left sleeve – pushed his way through the throng at eight-forty and went up the stairs to stand on the landing. He took a moment to drape the equally new-looking tan trench he was carrying on the railing, as if it were a king’s robe, and waved his hands for quiet.
‘I’ve got time for your questions, boys and girls, so wait your turn and I promise to call on each of you.’
And so he did, until almost noon.
STEMEC HENDERSON MURDERS SOLVED?
Milo Rigg, Chicago Examiner
Cook County Sheriff’s Deputy Jerome Glet held an impromptu, far-reaching briefing at the sheriff’s headquarters today to follow up on his surprise announcement yesterday that the alleged killer of Bobby Stemec and the Henderson brothers, the October before last, was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives on an unrelated weapons distribution charge. Kevin Wilcox, a worker at the Happy Times Stables in northwest Chicago, was arrested there by the ATF ten days ago for the unlawful distribution of firearms. Deputy Glet was called in simply as a courtesy but soon began to suspect that Wilcox might have been involved in the murders of Stemec, 14, Johnny Henderson, 13, and his brother Anthony, 12. Wilcox has denied any involvement in the three murders that galvanized all of Chicagoland, but Glet announced that his investigation, which he termed ‘tireless and never-ending’, has turned up evidence, still unspecified, that at least one of the three boys came in contact with Wilcox sometime immediately prior to being murdered.
Glet was pressed for comparisons to the murders of the Graves sisters and Jennifer Ann Day. ‘I admit there are compelling similarities to the murders of the Stemec Henderson boys,’ he said. ‘The three girls were found naked, similarly close to roads and bodies of water, and all were young, aged twelve or in their early teens. Also, all three girls had gone missing well before Wilcox was arrested by the ATF.’ But Glet stressed that any efforts to link Wilcox to the girls’ slayings was premature, and reiterated what he’d said at his ATF press conference, that his focus for the present was on investigating the murders of the boys, and, he said, on other, perhaps related, matters that had come to his attention. Pressed as to what those were, Glet said only that his responsibilities as the sheriff’s most senior deputy required him to be alert to all crimes of consequence in Cook County. Neither Cook County Sheriff Joseph Lehman nor Cook County Medical Examiner Charles McGarry was at Deputy Glet’s briefing, and both were unavailable afterward to comment for this story.
‘Sounds like Glet’s saying DNA links Wilcox to the boys,’ Aria said.
‘Interesting that there’s been no official word from the M.E.’s office, but McGarry must have gotten a swab from Wilcox and tipped Glet that it matched the unidentified DNA that was found on one of the boys. It’s also interesting that Glet said at least one of the boys had come into contact with Wilcox, when foreign DNA was found on two of the boys: Bobby Stemec and Johnny Henderson. Glet wouldn’t elaborate, and McGarry hasn’t returned my calls.’
‘Work Feldott. He’s normally available, isn’t he?’
‘He is, and he’s straight up, doing a credible job. You like him, too.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘You wrote a couple of admiring profiles of him for the Examiner. You implied he’s the hope of Cook County.’
‘He’s young, fresh and dedicated.’ She shrugged. ‘Any progress on this other business Glet is being so coy about?’
‘None, other than he keeps hinting that it’s big.’
‘Not Fernandez,’ she said.
‘He’s not disinterested, but he’s chasing something else.’
‘Not the girls,’ she said.
‘He doesn’t talk about them much.’
‘Despite the card listing the body marks on both the boys and the girls,’ she said.
‘Despite that.’
‘So, this other thing, not even the faintest idea what it might be?’ she asked.
‘No,’ Rigg said.
‘Maybe he’s just showboating. There are politics raging here.’
‘No kidding,’ he said. ‘New trench coat, shiny new suit.’
‘I don’t like Glet.’
He laughed. ‘Nobody likes Glet, but they’ll love him if he solves Stemec Henderson.’
‘Something about the guy …’
‘He plays angles, cuts corners?’ Rigg said.
The hint of a smile worked around her lips. ‘Like others?’
He told her about last night’s drive out to McGarry’s estate, the glint of a snow shovel, and climbing over the fence to find the mound of snow behind the mansion.
‘Richie Fernandez?’ she asked.
‘Whoever I saw wasn’t burying anything, not with a wide-blade aluminum snow shovel. But he could have been scooping snow on top of something that was already buried, to help the dirt settle when the ground thaws.’
‘Lehman, always suspected of beating suspects, went too far this time, as you’ve been wondering? And McGarry helped him bury the body on his estate? Isn’t that too risky?’
‘It’s perfect. The estate is secluded, fenced and protected by a security system. No one can stumble across the dig.’
‘You did.’
‘I didn’t stumble,’ Rigg said.
Aria pursed her lips, thinking. ‘If you’re right about Fernandez, change could come to Cook County. Glet could replace Lehman. So why isn’t Glet more interested?’
‘As I said, he thinks he’s got something even bigger.’
‘And, at the M.E.’s, Feldott could replace McGarry,’ she said. ‘What an odd couple they’d be: Glet and Feldott. Still, Glet’s like that new suit – too shiny.’
‘Feldott’s got the backing of the heavies at the Citizens’ Investigation Bureau, which means they already have him tapped for bigger things than the M.E.’s office. Maybe that means they’re eying him for sheriff.’
She nodded slowly. ‘We could help that along. A positive paragraph or two.’
‘We should help things along with more paragraphs about Richie Fernandez.’
‘You’ve got nothing on that, Milo. No witnesses.’
‘Corky hasn’t risen to anything yet, other than being affable,’ Rigg said. ‘He’s hiding stuff.’
‘Like what?’
‘Beatrice might have been penetrated.’
She caught her breath and leaned back in her chair. And for a moment she appeared to be looking past him, unfocused. And then she said, ‘That can’t be.’
‘Glet told me the same night he tipped me to the cabbie.’
‘He got it from where?’
Rigg shrugged. ‘Somebody at the M.E.’s, or maybe Lehman. He wouldn’t say.’
‘But not Feldott?’ she asked.
‘Don’t know.’
‘Nobody’s said anything about a sex crime,’ she said.
‘Nobody wants the sex crimes unit involved in this,’ he said, ‘but, if they found penetration, maybe they found semen.’
‘And that’s why Glet is shying away from linking Wilcox to the girls? The semen doesn’t match Wilcox’s DNA?’
‘If there’s semen at all,’ Rigg said.
TWENTY-TWO
‘GoPro,’ Pancho Rozakis said. Pancho, whose real first name was Juan, was half-Mexican, half-Greek, and all clever. He had been the Examiner’s chief photographer before he got laid off, six months earlier. Since then, he’d been scrounging freelance work for the Examiner and Chicago’s dozens of local neighborhood rags.
‘Those little cameras?’ Rigg asked.
‘Everybody’s using them. Realtors, surveyors, men living next door to ladies sunning topless.’
‘You’ve got one?’
‘Several, and two drones.’
‘Legal?’
‘Sure, but since when did you care about that?’
‘I don’t want you to get arrested.’
Rozakis laughed. ‘So long as you’re not around, I’m safe,’ he said, and clicked off.
Rigg called Glet’s cell phone again, but the cell phone only wanted to take a message. He called the sheriff’s department and asked for the man of the hour. The operator didn’t hesitate before saying Glet was not in. Glet had been unavailable ever since his star appearance on the stairs of the sheriff’s headquarters.
He didn’t bother asking for McGarry when he called the Dead House, because McGarry was likely to remain a shadow until things settled down, much as he hoped the mound would settle down in his backyard. By now, Rigg was sure there was nothing else that would explain why McGarry had twice gone behind his mansion to move snow.
Rigg asked for Corky because, as he and Aria had agreed, Corky was almost always available.
‘At the beginning of the Stemec Henderson investigation,’ Rigg began, ‘McGarry said there was unidentified DNA on two of the boys. I assume you swabbed Kevin Wilcox.’
‘Mr McGarry won’t allow the release of information without his approval,’ Feldott said.
‘Since McGarry’s never available, you’d rather I speculate about why Glet is so positive Wilcox killed the boys?’
‘I can tell you off the record that we took a DNA sample from Mr Wilcox, but it’s out for analysis.’
‘It’s being compared to the foreign DNA found on both Bobby Stemec and Johnny Henderson?’
‘Mr McGarry—’
Rigg cut him off. ‘Someone from your office must have encouraged Glet, for him to sound so positive about Wilcox.’
‘The DNA is out for analysis, Mr Rigg. There’s been no encouragement that Wilcox’s DNA was found on Johnny Henderson.’
‘Or Bobby Stemec?’ Rigg asked.
‘The DNA is out for analysis.’
Rigg gave it up. ‘Glet’s not sounding like he’s seeing any link between Wilcox and the girls.’
‘As you know, nothing was recovered from the Graves sisters.’
The pup was fencing. ‘Not even from penetration?’
‘There’s been no mention of penetration.’
‘You’re sure? No signs of forced sexual activity?’
‘Darn it, Mr Rigg, you’re just throwing out wild questions.’
‘Jennifer Ann Day,’ Rigg said. ‘She was too long in the water to give you anything?’
‘Mr McGarry is rigid in instructing us to—’
‘When will McGarry be available?’ Rigg interrupted.
‘Off the record, he hasn’t been here in days,’ Feldott said. ‘He’s probably at Sheriff Lehman’s office.’
‘Helping to ready Lehman’s own warrant to arrest Wilcox, like Glet inferred?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You don’t know where McGarry is, do you?’
‘I can’t comment, Mr Rigg.’
‘I’ll take that as a no, meaning McGarry’s gone underground. Which leaves us with Richie Fernandez,’ Rigg said, mostly because he’d run out of other things to ask.
‘I can’t comment—’
‘McGarry accompanied Lehman to bust Fernandez.’
‘So you say, Mr Rigg. So nobody else corroborates.’
Rigg thanked him for nothing and hung up.
Pancho’s email came at five fifteen. He’d taken two dozen aerial pictures of McGarry’s estate. Seventeen of them showed the ground behind the last of the estate’s outbuildings. Despite the falling snow, the high mound far behind the house was easily visible.
Rigg’s cell phone rang a moment later. ‘See the pictures?’ Pancho asked.
‘They’re swell. No signs of life out there?’
‘It was snowing. Nobody was outside and, as you can see, no car was in the driveway.’
The evening, though young, was dark. Rigg made one more call.
‘I’m going to write that you’re blowing smoke,’ he said to the voicemail.
Glet eased on to the passenger seat of Rigg’s Taurus an hour later. Again, the deputy had parked elsewhere in the Robinson Woods.
‘You’re offering no proof. I’m thinking you got the wrong guy, Jerome,’ Rigg said.
Glet laughed. ‘Don’t bet against me on this one. Otherwise, you’ll be writing for that suburban stuffer for the rest of your life.’
‘What’s making you positive?’
‘About Wilcox doing the boys? How about proximity?’
‘Proximity of the stables to Robinson Woods isn’t enough,’ Rigg said. ‘How about DNA?’
‘I was straight up with all of you reporters,’ Glet said, evading.
‘You weren’t straight up at all. You’re teasing, offering nothing concrete. You know you need more than proximity to charge Wilcox for the boys. You’re acting like you got a heads-up on a DNA match.’
‘I got plenty working for the boys.’
‘And for the girls?’ Rigg asked. ‘The fact that the yellow index card links the boys’ killer to the girls?’
Glet shifted his bulk on the seat. ‘More than that.’
‘What could be more than that, especially if the Feds already have in custody the person you’re convinced killed the boys? A little more work and you’ve got the guy who killed the girls.’
‘I’m looking into things.’
‘You’re holding back, or you’re bluffing.’
‘Wilcox was selling handguns out of a stable less than a mile from here.’
‘Proximity is nothing. All you’ve got is a suspicion that the boys were at the Happy Times Stables that day and saw something they shouldn’t have. DNA is more.’
Glet turned to face Rigg squarely. ‘I’m being very careful. You of all people should appreciate that. No mistakes this time, Milo.’
‘Feldott’s being cagey on the DNA. He’s saying it’s still out for analysis, that you’ve not been tipped to any match.’
Glet laughed. ‘Like I keep saying, Milo, I’m being careful. One step at a time.’
‘Richie Fernandez,’ Rigg said. ‘Lehman’s afraid of Richie Fernandez. And so is McGarry. He’s disappeared from the Dead House.’
‘I don’t know about McGarry.’
‘You need to chase Richie Fernandez.’
Glet pushed his way out of the car and turned to lean back in. ‘I ain’t saying Fernandez ain’t important, Milo.’
‘I need you to make a phone call,’ Rigg said.
He pulled into a drive-thru. It could have been a McDonald’s or a Burger King or something else. It didn’t matter, so long as they had cheeseburgers. He ordered two and a Coke. The Coke was good. The first burger was easy to eat as he drove, because it was thin and he was famished. But he had no appetite for the second. Whe
n he passed two raccoons ambling alongside a wood, he unwrapped the second burger and threw it at them. Likely enough, they’d be surer of their next steps than he was.
In his apartment, he sat for some minutes, staring at his wall of file boxes. And then he called Carlotta. She’d still be up. She was like him. She was always up.
‘Come over,’ she said.
‘Did your boys ever go to stables?’
‘Come over now,’ she said.
‘Did your boys go to stables?’
‘Those stables where that Wilcox man worked? I suppose. My boys went all over, bowling, swimming in the summer, Cubs games when they could sneak in.’ She started crying. ‘I don’t know about horses.’
He said he’d call soon, and, despicably, he hung up.
He made a weak Scotch and sat some more, staring at the files. He’d conned himself, thinking they held answers. There was nothing in them about any stables.
TWENTY-THREE
McGARRY ILL, STEPS BACK
Milo Rigg, Chicago Examiner
Cornelius Feldott, assistant Cook County medical examiner, announced this morning that he has assumed management of the department following the sudden illness of Medical Examiner Charles McGarry. Details of McGarry’s illness will not be made public, Feldott said, in respect for McGarry’s privacy, but he said that the illness is not life-threatening and that McGarry is expected to return to head the medical examiner’s office within the next month. ‘Our hopes and wishes are for his complete and speedy recovery,’ Feldott said.
McGarry’s illness comes at a difficult time, as his office is in the midst of assisting the Cook County sheriff’s department in investigating the murders of the Graves sisters and Jennifer Ann Day, and in the re-examination of the killings of Bobby Stemec and Johnny and Anthony Henderson, as announced two days ago by Sheriff’s Deputy Jerome Glet. The status of Richie Fernandez, who, according to witnesses, was arrested as a person of interest in the Graves case by Cook County Sheriff Joseph Lehman in the company of Charles McGarry, remains unknown.
The Black Cage Page 13