by Parnell Hall
Johnny snorted angrily. “I’m outta here.”
Cora put up her hands. “Sorry. I’ll stop talking about me. Let’s talk about you. You’re an army man, right? You were in Iraq?”
“Afghanistan.”
“How many tours of duty?”
“Three.”
“Lose many buddies?”
“What do you think?”
“Take a lot of drugs? Odds are you did. Three tours of duty. I’ll bet you got hooked pretty bad. You come back home, your parents are dead, your sister’s your ward. You ship out she’s a skinny tomboy; you come back she’s Courtney Love. No surprise you’d go nuts. Particularly with the drugs. You’ve seen what drugs can do. Here’s your innocent little sister hanging out with construction workers who want to get her high and get into her pants. No wonder you’d want to kill them.”
“I didn’t kill anyone.”
“I know. You know how I know? A crossword puzzle said you did. And crossword puzzles lie. It’s in their nature. Nine times out of ten a crossword puzzle tells you something, it’s a load of crap. Did you threaten those guys? I know you did after the murders, but I’ll bet you did it before. They were real druggies, weren’t they? Messing around with your sister. It’s hard to imagine you not killing them.”
“I thought you were on my side.”
“I am, but the facts are the facts. These guys represented access to a considerable quantity of dope. Your sister wanted that dope. You didn’t want her to have it. On that we both agree.”
“I didn’t agree to anything.”
“No, but let’s say you did. Just for the sake of argument. Both of the victims, you warned them off your sister, didn’t you? You told them to leave her alone. Threatened them if they didn’t. I would say that threat led directly to their death.”
“But you’re on my side,” Johnny said sarcastically. “You don’t think I killed anybody.”
“Johnny, I know you didn’t. At least I don’t think so. But it’s a little hard to demonstrate with all the constraints that have been placed on me. I’ve been arrested. I’m out on bail. You’ve been arrested, but you got released pretty quick when the cops got someone better. So you got nothing to gripe about. For a guy who looked so incredibly guilty, you came out smelling like a rose. And I’m beginning to think I know why.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re out of your league. You’re in the game with master manipulators, and it turned out it’s more convenient for you to be innocent.”
“Now you’re just talking weird.”
“I know. But do me a favor. Not that you owe me one. And not because you necessarily appreciate what I’m doing. But just because it’s the right thing to do.”
“What do you want?”
“Did you threaten Fred Winkler and Jason Tripp?”
“Are you wearing a wire?”
Cora chuckled, shook her head. “Oh, God, if you could only search me. But you’re much too young. No, I’m not wearing a wire. Not that it matters. A bloody murder weapon trumps a few idle threats any day of the week. No, I’m not attempting to entrap you. I’d just like to know if you did. Just between us, did you threaten those two guys?”
“I’d rather not say.”
“No matter. I’m like the media. No comment’s as good as a yes. So tell me something else. Why didn’t you want us to search your room?”
Johnny was startled by the sudden change of subject. “What?”
“I thought it was because you found your sister’s puzzle in your room and you didn’t want us to think you stole it, but that wasn’t it, was it?”
Johnny couldn’t meet her eyes.
“You backslid, didn’t you? You’re lecturing your sister about drug use, and you’ve got a stash in your room. Probably just pot, which wouldn’t be a big deal if you weren’t a big brother. So you couldn’t let us search your room.
“And to make matters worse, you had found your sister’s puzzle in your room, so you trashed it. And turned in a bloody knife. You took an old hunting knife, and you cut yourself, arm, leg, somewhere it wouldn’t show, and you called the cops and told ’em you’d found it under your pillow. To confuse the issue and account for not wanting your room searched. A delicate balancing act, but you pulled it off.
“Except you gave the killer ideas. Knock someone off with a hunting knife, you’ll probably get the blame. Which is how you got arrested. The flimsiest possible frame, it couldn’t possibly work, there had to be more to it. But before there was, a better suspect turned up.
“Anyway, that’s how it all started, and that’s how we got into this mess. And now it’s out of control. And I’m gonna try to clean it up.”
Johnny stood defiantly, admitting nothing.
Cora put her hand on his shoulder, smiled ruefully. “Try not to hate me too much.”
Chapter
70
Cora drove down to the police station.
“Fit me with a wire.”
Chief Harper was startled. “Why?”
“Johnny Dawson asked me if I was wearing one. It seemed like a good idea.”
“You’re going to talk to Melvin with a wire?”
“There’s an idea. But I don’t think so. If I talked to Melvin with a wire for ten minutes you could probably indict us both.”
“Who’s it for?”
“I’ll let you know if it works.”
“If it doesn’t, you won’t?”
“Much as I know you glory in my failures, I’d just as soon keep this one under wraps.”
“Am I going to be happy if it works?”
“Define happy.”
“Cora.”
“You’ll catch a killer. It may not be the one you want.”
“You really are exasperating.”
“You’re stalling. Could it be the Bakerhaven police don’t have a wire?”
“We have a wire. I’m considering the logistics.”
“Logistics?”
“Ordinarily you’d have a female officer wire you up, but we don’t happen to have a female officer.”
“And don’t you think that’s way overdue?”
“I don’t want to fight that fight right now. I’ve got enough problems to deal with.”
“Like seeing me naked?”
“That’s not going to be an issue. I’ll show you where it should go and you can change in the bathroom.”
“Spoilsport.”
“You are going to let us hear this recording, aren’t you?” Harper said ironically.
“If it’s any good.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.”
“Okay. On one condition.”
“What’s that?”
“If I get what you need, you let me talk to Melvin.”
“With a wire?”
“No. Alone.”
“If you get what we need, Melvin will be released.”
“No. You let me talk to him first. And you hold the arrest until I do.”
“That may be a deal breaker.”
“Then I won’t tell you what I get. Becky can talk to Melvin, and I’ll decide if we want to share.”
Harper shook his head. “Then you don’t get a wire.”
“So I’ll buy a digital at Staples, wire myself, and take all the credit. I can’t see Henry Firth being too happy at that.”
“You think you know what happened?”
“Not everything. But I think I know who did it.”
“In your version it wasn’t Melvin.”
“That’s what I’d like to determine.”
“But you think you know.”
“I have a theory I’d like to test by wearing a wire. I don’t have to, but that’s the way it helps you.”
“You are so infuriating.”
“Thank you.”
Chief Harper sighed. “Okay, if you get the goods, I’ll hold the arrest until you speak to Melvin.”
“Deal.”
Harper pressed the intercom. “D
an. Set Cora up with a wire.”
Chapter
71
Peggy’s truck was parked out at the construction site. The girl herself was wrapped around the neck of one of the crew. Cora recognized him as the guy she had asked when the shift ended. He seemed torn between the forbidden fruit and the evil eye of the foreman urging him back to work. From the way Peggy kept pleading and showing her watch, Cora figured it must be near the end of the shift.
The foreman won out. Peggy huffed on the sideline while her prey headed back to the building under construction and climbed up into the girders. Peggy paced up and down impatiently.
“Jonesing, are you?” Cora said
Peggy looked up startled. “What?”
“Can’t wait for your next fix. Or hit. Or toke. Or whatever they call it with crack, or freebase, or whatever they call however they’re doing cocaine these days. You shooting it yet? I don’t see any marks on your arms, but then you’re young.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Of course not. Because I’m an old hippie, and you’re a perennial millennial. You must have read in the paper that I figured out the puzzles. Well, you probably didn’t read it in the paper, but maybe you saw it on TV. Bother is brother, and your brother’s license plate number is in play.
“Of course that was the second puzzle. The first puzzle was a noncommittal did he do it? Which bothered me for a while. Before I remembered that the first puzzle was stolen and only found later.”
Peggy said nothing, continued to fidget.
“You ever see the movie The Bad Seed? Of course not. You’re much too young. It was in black and white, for goodness’ sakes. Patty McCormack was this sweet little girl. Blond hair, pigtails, cutest little thing. Well, she kills people. Later in the movie it turns out she was adopted and her real mother was actually a criminal. The Bad Seed, you see. It’s quite a movie. Scary as hell. Except for the end. They tacked on a last scene where her mother puts her across her knee and spanks her. It’s like a ha-ha-we-were-only-kidding scene to let the audience go home feeling good. Total cop-out. I hated it, of course. Anyway, that’s The Bad Seed.”
“So?”
“You weren’t adopted, were you? You had a genuine mother and father. Lived with them in the City up until last year when they had a little accident. Drove their car off the road.”
Cora put her arm around Peggy’s shoulders, leaned in confidentially as if she were the director coaching a young starlet. “This is the part in the movie where you say in a voice that’s positively chilling, ‘It wasn’t an accident. I cut their brake lining.’”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m auditioning you for the role. Trying to see how well you’d do. I’m afraid you’re not that bad.”
“You’re acting really weird.”
“That’s what Johnny said. Must run in the family.” Cora chuckled. “He must have been a real shock, wasn’t he? Tough soldier, back from the wars. You figured he’d be your buddy. You figured he’d be on your side. Big shock when he doesn’t want to do drugs. Instead he wants to keep you away from the guys who do. Mom and Dad were bad, but they were squares. They had no idea what was going on. Johnny’s hip and won’t play games. You can’t wrap him around your finger. He’s a huge wet blanket. I mean, here you are, acting like a grown woman, and here’s big brother, treating you like a naughty child, grounding you and cutting off your allowance.
“Could it be worse? I don’t think so. You like drugs, you’re being cut off. You like boys, you’re being cut off. You can sneak out and meet ’em in the middle of the night, but that’s schoolgirl games. Just the image you want to avoid.
“What you really need are some drugs to tide you over until the humiliation stops.
“And that’s when you started making crossword puzzles.”
“I never made any puzzles.”
“Yeah, you did. You made one and you told me about it. But you didn’t bring it with you, that was the interesting thing. You would think, if you were hoping to meet me and ask me to do a puzzle, that you’d have the puzzle. At the time I didn’t wonder why, I was just delighted you didn’t. It made it easier to palm you off on Harvey Beerbaum.
“But a funny thing happened on the way to the puzzle. It disappeared. Someone stole it. The Purloined Puzzle. I’m sure it was supposed to show up in Johnny’s possession, but before it could, something else did.
“A bloody knife. Which made no sense to anyone since it showed up a day before the murder.
“And that’s where the comedy of errors begins.
“In most cases, A triggers B and B triggers C. In this case, B triggers A and … Well, I can’t sort it all out in the abstract, my head would come off. So let’s go back to real life.
“You made up a puzzle and you wanted me to find it and solve it.”
Cora put up her hand. “Don’t protest. Otherwise you’ll be protesting all afternoon, and you’ll never get your drugs. You made up the puzzle. You wanted me to find it and solve it. More to the point, you wanted me to find it and solve it after your brother had apparently tried to suppress it.
“Only Johnny wouldn’t play along. When the cops wanted to search his room, he wouldn’t allow it, and before they could get a warrant he voluntarily surrendered a bloody hunting knife he claimed he found planted under his pillow.
“Well, you didn’t plant that knife.”
“Thank you,” Peggy said sarcastically.
“But it gave you ideas. Johnny’s got a bloody knife. Suppose someone were killed with the knife? Suppose someone Johnny didn’t like were killed with that knife? Specifically the guy who’d been giving you drugs?”
“Yeah, like I’d really want to kill him.”
“Well, let’s examine that,” Cora said. “The downside is you lose a drug-dealing boyfriend. On the plus side, you rip off his stash. And you frame your brother, who’d become a real pain in the ass, for murder.”
“And then I undermine all my good work by planting the actual murder weapon in some other guy’s car.”
“Of course not. You didn’t do that. And you were shocked when you heard someone did. That can’t be the murder weapon. You’ve got the murder weapon. What the hell is another knife doing in the equation? It simply makes no sense. You gotta admit, for your first murder things are going unusually wrong. Here you had your brother neatly framed for the murder, and some interloper crashes the party. Where the hell did he come from? You were just about to spring the puzzle accusing your brother, and suddenly he’s not the suspect anymore. Talk about reversals of fortune.
“Luckily, you haven’t turned in the crossword puzzle yet. You have time to whip up a new one. And what is it? A message casting doubt on the guilt of the current suspect. I don’t know who this guy Melvin is, but he certainly didn’t do it. Which you know all too well. You turn in that one, saving the brother one for when you get the focus back on him.
“Only it doesn’t happen. Melvin’s too good a suspect. He’s got your brother beat all to hell. The cops focus on Melvin, and your brother’s all but forgotten. In desperation, you play the puzzle card. It’s got a cryptic message that says ‘brother,’ and it points to his license plate number in a Sudoku.
“It still doesn’t work. Your brother’s the original Teflon man. Nothing sticks to him. Defying all logic, the other guy remains in jail. What the hell is that all about? Why hasn’t he fought himself out by now?
“And yet the fact that he hasn’t yields a flicker of hope. Being in jail is a perfect alibi. If someone else were killed, Melvin couldn’t possibly have done it. And the police would have to look around for somebody else. All you need is another victim who fits the pattern. I would say that young man you had your arms draped around is probably not long for this world. Particularly with your brother bawling out the guys on the crew in front of half a zillion witnesses.
“Meanwhile, this guy just keeps looking guiltier and guiltier. The blood on the k
nife in his glove compartment came from the victim? How the hell did that happen? You’ve got the knife with the victim’s blood on it. At least you used to. The police have it now. They just don’t know it. They took it out of the back of the second victim. Only it’s got so much of his blood on it they can’t find the first victim’s blood. Oh, they could if they looked for it, but that’s the last thing they’re looking for. And you can’t run down to the police station and say, ‘Hey, schmuck, it’s the same knife, test it for the first guy, too.’
“I suppose if we gave you enough time you could come up with a crossword puzzle that explained it, but it would have to be so complicated that even Will Shortz couldn’t solve it with CliffsNotes and a map.”
“Will who?”
Cora rolled her eyes. “Oh, that’s the part that bothers you. You’re in trouble, kid. Your brother isn’t taking the fall for murder. You probably are, but even if you don’t, you’re not going to be happy. Because your plan failed, and your brother’s going to be as big a pain in the ass as he’s ever been. More so, if the guys you hang out with keep getting killed. If you have an overprotective guardian, that’s not the way to go.”
“How do you know so much?”
“I hardly know anything. I know the guy in jail’s innocent. I know your brother’s innocent. I know the two dead guys are innocent. That doesn’t leave much else. If I were you, I’d start binge-watching Orange Is the New Black. Bone up on your new lifestyle.”
“I’m underage.”
“So you’re allowed to kill people? I don’t think that’s how it works. You want me to look it up? I got a great lawyer. I don’t think she’ll take your case, but she can tell you what you’ll get.
“If you stop now and go to the cops, you might catch a break. If you kill someone else, they’ll take a dim view.”
“How’d you figure it out?”
“The knife had to be in one of two places. At the bottom of a lake or in the back of the victim. It’s more useful to me if it’s in the back of the victim, so I decided on that. If I’m wrong, feel free to correct me.”