Detective Tumbler and the Man in Brown (Detective Tumbler Trilogy Book 2)

by Jason Balistreri

“What kind of person are you then?”

  “To be honest, I don’t really know anymore. But you can trust me, I’m just here to ask you a few questions, then I’ll be on my way.”

  “How do I know you’re not a cop?”

  “You can see my car; does that look like a cop’s car?”

  “Cops can drive whatever they want.”

  “Listen, if I was a cop, I’d be showing you a warrant or asking your permission to enter and I’m not asking. Anything you tell me stays between us, I just have a few questions. Now this will all go smoothly if you lower that gun.” Tyler lowers his gun; he looks at Marshall’s gun. Marshall puts his gun in his holster, he takes his hat off.

  “So if you’re not a cop and you’re a detective, then who are you working for?”

  “Presently, I work for myself; it will stay that way for the foreseeable future barring any complications.”

  “I didn’t mean to be jumpy but you have to understand, the last person I knew who was a detective…”

  “Wasn’t the person you thought he was?”

  “You’re exactly right.”

  “You don’t have to worry about him anymore.”

  “I know, you’re the man that killed him.”

  “So we both know each other, now that we have the introductions out of the way, we can begin.”

  “I do believe I’ve disclosed what I know about you, what do you know about me?”

  “More than you’d like me to know, I’m sure. But in my business, it’s best to not reveal your hand until the end. Let’s begin with Carmen Parnassus, how did you meet him?”

  “He was a strange man. You should probably say that he met me, I’m not a criminal but I would never associate with a cop. I was raised to never trust them but Carmen was a friend of a friend and he didn’t act like a cop.”

  “Who was the friend?”

  “Wallace Williams.”

  “How did you meet him?”

  “We met after I had just finished college, we hung out at the same bar, he always came in with these beautiful women, I thought he might literally be a pimp.”

  “Can you describe Wallace for me?”

  “He’s a tall guy, probably six foot four, white with black hair, kind of pale.”

  “Eye color?”

  “Dark brown.”

  “Anything that stood out, piercings, tattoos?”

  “He had a tattoo on his left forearm, about here,” Ty says as he points to the same spot on his own arm, on the inside of his upper forearm.

  “Could you tell me what it was?”

  “It was a symbol; I don’t know what it stood for.”

  “Did you ever ask him?”

  “I think I did once, he never said what it meant. He didn’t let most people see it.”

  “Could you describe it for me or draw it?”

  “I can draw it for you,” Ty says, Marshall takes a piece of paper out of his notepad and hands it to him; Ty draws the symbol on it. He slides the paper back to Marshall; Marshall turns the paper towards him and looks at it closely.

  “Was it black like this?”

  “Yes, it was,” Ty responds. Marshall places the drawing in the back of his notepad.

  “Do you know how Wallace met Carmen?”

  “They were friends before I was a friend of Wallace’s, uh, he said that Carmen had helped him out before.”

  “Do you know what this help entailed?”

  “I’d rather not say.”

  “You don’t have to give me specifics, that information I can get later from other sources. Did you trust Wallace?”

  “I did.”

  “What happened?”

  “We had a falling out, he changed.”

  “How did he change?”

  “He was driven; he was a man with a large appetite whether it was for women, nice cars, high-dollar restaurants. I guess I always knew this city couldn’t keep him satisfied.”

  “How long were you friends with him?”

  “It was probably three years. The strange thing was, one day, he was just gone.”

  “I take it he didn’t tell you where he was going?”

  “No, he didn’t,” Ty replies, Marshall watches his eyes.

  “What happened after that?”

  “It was a few months later, I heard from Carmen, so to speak.”

  “What did he have to say?”

  “He called me and asked if we could sit down and have a drink, the guy always gave me the chills, I told him I was busy, he said it was important. I told him I’d meet him on Wednesday at a bar, we went, he started asking me about this girl that had been murdered, I had seen the story in the newspaper, I told him that I didn’t know her, he said he had been watching me, he said he knew I had paid for escorts.”

  “Had you paid for escorts?” Marshall asks, just to see how he’ll respond.

  “I told him I didn’t know what he was talking about; I had never seen that girl. But yes, I had paid for escorts once a month at the most, I never saw that girl that was murdered, I knew there was a second one, I knew where his questions were going, he asked me where I was on two dates, I knew they were the nights those girls were murdered, both were murdered on the weekend, thankfully I was out with friends both of those nights and they could verify my stories. He asked for their names, I didn’t want to give them up but I figured I had to so he didn’t have anything to hang over me.”

  “You don’t know how close you came to getting arrested; he was going to pin those murders on you.”

  “I believe you, my phone was tapped, I stopped seeing the escorts because I knew he was watching me, someone got into my place without forcible entry, I knew it was him.”

  “Did you think about leaving?”

  “I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder, I knew I was innocent. I figured if he was going to come after me, it would look awfully suspicious if I left town, I spoke to a lawyer, a friend of mine, just in case but six months later and nothing.”

  “And you never found out where Wallace went?”

  “No, I never heard from him again. I figured the only person who might have known was Carmen and I sure as hell wasn’t going to call him and ask. I moved to a different apartment, after a year I was back into my old habits.” Marshall takes his flask out and takes a swig of whiskey; he flips back through his notes. “Would you mind if I asked you a question?”

  “No, go ahead.”

  “How did you feel when you killed him?”

  “I felt disappointment in myself.”

  “I know what he did to you. You did the right thing.”

  Marshall thinks about telling him that he didn’t but he doesn’t want to get into reliving that night, instead he looks up from his notepad and says, “I think I have everything that I need. If anything else comes up, I’ll call you. If I come by again, do me a favor and keep the gun put away.”

  “I will, I need to ask you though, what was this all about?”

  Marshall places his hat back on, he looks up, “I would be remiss if I didn’t tell you that there are people out there that you should fear besides Carmen Parnassus.”

  “In a city like this, I believe you. I sleep with that gun under my pillow.”

  “I understand. I can tell you that I’ve really only just begun my investigation but I’m looking for the murderer of those two women. I thank you for your time,” Marshall says, he puts his coat on and lets Ty open the door.

  “It was nice to meet you; I hope that you find the person responsible.”

  “I hope so too, we’ll see where it leads,” Marshall says as he steps back into the biting cold, he lets his car warm up for a moment as he looks around to make sure no one is watching, he backs out of Ty’s driveway and heads back home. After he pulls into his garage, he walks into his kitchen and puts his coat up, he takes his hat off and drinks more whiskey, he pores over the files on both of the women, both were in their early twenties, both had all of their blo
od drained from their bodies, Marshall looks at the coroner’s report, both women had their livers removed, both died from the cuts to their neck which were made first, each in one large cut, cuts on the wrists were down the entire length of the forearm, cuts made to the thighs were to drain excess blood, each woman had her ring finger on her left hand removed at the second knuckle, the fingers were not found with either body, neither victim had been raped, no DNA was found under their fingernails. One of the women was named Bryce Kingsman, the other was named Anna Frau, Marshall looks over the coroner’s notes detailing the marks under each woman’s armpits, marks that went across their chests, on their upper arms, around their wrists, some were found across their hips and ankles, Marshall can tell that both were suspended face down in a harness, he is also able to see that the harness had to be suspended from a high point on the walls or from the ceiling, operated by pulleys so that the murderer could lower them and raise them in the harness, he knows this because the bruising was deeper on their wrists and chest, he was raising or lowering the top half of their bodies first. Both of the bodies were found in barrels, Marshall looks at both locations and notes the person that discovered Bryce’s body and the person who discovered Anna’s body, Marshall tags both locations on a map in red, Marshall looks up Wallace Williams but, as he suspected, there is no record of the man, Marshall marks the bar that Ty met Wallace at on the map, he knows Wallace Williams probably lived within close proximity of it, Marshall marks the location of Frederick Fiord’s cabin in green, then he marks the place where the head of Penelope Parsons was found in green as well, he then steps back to look at the map, he then looks at his map of the state and places green marks on every city and town where he knows the man in brown was active. He drinks some more as he reads the clippings about Penelope Parsons, the location of her parents could never be verified, she had no family to claim her, the rest of her body was never recovered, Marshall saw Carmen’s comments urging anyone who knew the girl to come forward or anyone who knew what happened to her, he knows Carmen knew the man in brown but he doesn’t know the connection that they had to each other. Marshall knows that the key will be knowing the real identities of the two men, there are still so many questions that he needs answers to, Bryce, Anna, and Penelope deserve the truth to come to light, they needed someone to fight for them and what they got was Carmen, Marshall knows both cases need to be solved quickly for even if they’re both not currently active, he knows that any day that could change. He knows he must also discover their motivations, he knows the man in brown is capable of influencing others to murder but what he gets out of it is still unknown and Jackson Addler must be after something bigger than the murder of women, there has to be something driving him, the constant use of aliases is not easy to uphold over such a long period of time. He knows that one of them had to make a mistake somewhere in the past, he knows he just needs to discover it; one break could blow either case open. Marshall calls the Kirksville Police Department; he looks out across his snow-covered lawn.

  “Hello, this is Marshall Tumbler, I’m a detective out of Kansas City, can I speak to your captain?”

  “Sure, what is this regarding?”

  “That boy that you found in the woods.”

  ‘This is Captain Stroud.”

  “It’s Detective Tumbler, we’ve spoken before.”

  “Oh, yes, I remember, we talked about those dismembered bodies. We still haven’t made any progress there, what about you?”

  “I’m still working on it.”

  “So, what can I do for you?”

  “I’d like to talk to that boy that you found in the woods.”

  “The kid has some issues. He doesn’t know who the hell he is; he hasn’t seen civilization in a long time. I can’t quite recall anything like it.”

  “I think I know what might have happened to him.”

  “Do you know who he is? That’s what we really need to know.”

  “I don’t know who he is but if you let me talk to him, I think I can get some answers.”

  “I can let you talk to him but I’m serious, the kid doesn’t know his own name.”

  “I don’t know who he is but I need to see what he knows.”

  “When do you want to come up?”

  “I can be there on Friday, late Friday, but if you can get me in to see him on Saturday, I would appreciate it.”

  Marshall drives to Kirksville and arrives there by 5 P.M., ahead of the time he had planned; he heads to the police station and speaks to Captain Stroud. “Detective Tumbler, you caught me before I was leaving.”

  “I just had a quick question about the boy.”

  “He’ll be ready to talk to you tomorrow; just don’t expect to get anything useful out of him.”

  “Have there been any missing people within the last three years?”

  “In a town this small, we look after our own. No one stays missing for long around here.”

  “No one’s dropped off the grid?”

  “We’re a town of 17,000, if you mean have we had people leave? Then the answer would be yes.”

  “If you remember, could you give me their names?”

  “I guess so; there were ten people that left in the last three years.”

  “Write their names down for me.”

  “I will, I trust you’re here for more than that.”

  “Those three people that were dismembered, I assume there haven’t been any revelations concerning the rest of their bodies.”

  “No, we haven’t found the rest of them. Do you need to look in the evidence room again?”

  “No, I’ve got the pictures and my notes, I was just curious to see if someone found the rest of them.”

  “We’ve never had anything like that happen here; I don’t really know what’s normal in a case like that.”

  “In cases like that, all notions of what constitutes normal get discarded. I’ll tell you this much, I think the two are related, the boy and what happened to those three people.”

  “How so?”

  “The boy mentioned a carpenter.”

  “Yes, the boy also doesn’t know his own name or the names of his parents; all he would tell us was that they were dead.”

  “The boy could very well be an amnesiac, he could also just be playing all of you but the carpenter that he talked about, it’s the same man that’s surfaced in towns and cities all over Missouri leaving dismembered bodies in his wake.”

  “So I should be looking at carpenters in the city?”

  “No, you shouldn’t bother, he’s not from here, I don’t even know his real name, he went by Frederick Fiord but that’s not his real name, I don’t know where he came from but those three bodies, if we can call them that, those three heads were his work or the work of those close to him.”

  “So you’ve been tracking this guy’s movements?” Captain Stroud asks, he hands Marshall the list of the ten people who left Kirksville in the last year.

  “I know where he’s been but he hasn’t been active recently. I haven’t ascertained his current location, otherwise I would be there. He always lives in the woods, he always amasses followers, his motives are uncertain.”

  “So this is some kind of hippie Charles Manson?”

  “His angle is not peace and love which discounts him from being a hippie, he just chooses to live in nature, off the grid, but he is insane and has his followers murder people so the Manson reference may be applicable.”

  “And you think the boy knows about this man?”

  “He knew of him at one point and that gives me a reason to talk to him, if he knows anymore then I’ll find out tomorrow. I aim to deduce his identity as well.”

  “I will happily await your results, assuming you choose to share them. This is the address of the facility he’s being held at, they know you’re coming, just make sure you show identification.”

  “I thank you for your time, I’ll be in touch,” Marshall says as he takes both pieces of paper and places them in
his coat pocket, then he walks back out to his car, his cheeks biting in the bitter wind, he watches flakes blow across the snow drifts like sparkling pieces of stars.

  When Marshall gets back to his hotel room he looks up the ten people on the list that Captain Stroud gave him, three didn’t show up as having a residence after leaving Kirksville. With the list reduced to three, Marshall gets back in his car and drives to the cabin where the man in brown once resided, Marshall parks his car along the side of the road and trudges a mile through the snow to the cabin, he had been there before. It is boarded up but he takes pictures of it again, he stands on the ice-covered porch, he peeks inside again just out of curiosity, then he goes back to his car and drives back to the hotel, he drinks whiskey while he writes down questions in his notepad. Around midnight, he looks up and sees her sitting in a chair at the circular table by the window.

  “Are you afraid of him?” Gina asks.

  “I don’t know. I think I was when I was younger, when Spoiler and I found his cabin in Kansas City, the ominous note that he wrote.”

  “You still kept going out to that cabin looking for him. Why did you stop?”

  “He had moved on, I was hoping he would show up again but he never did.”

  “Those people that follow him believe there is something special about him, he must be charismatic but this has gone beyond his control.”

  “So he didn’t want anyone to die?”

  “You’ll have to figure that out, he has an agenda, his followers do unspeakable things, but he has a weakness that you can exploit.”

  “Do you know what this weakness is?”

  “No, I don’t. But you will discover it. Don’t lose hope.”

  “I’ll try not to.”

  “Just remember that inside all of us is the same substance that makes up stars.”

  “Even those of us that have fallen?”

  “Yes, but you haven’t fallen, you’re still shining bright. You just can’t get outside your own head.”

  “If I do, I’m afraid I might lose you again.”

  “There are dangerous times ahead. You must stay sharp to survive.”

  “I know. I feel like, when it comes to you, I can’t move on.”

  “If you can’t move on, then there’s no growth, you’re going to have to let me go.”