by Bob Moats
“Joyce,” I called to her.
She whipped around looking spooked and squinted. Then I could tell by her expression she realized it was me although we hadn’t seen each other in years.
“Jimmy, damn, you startled me.” She looked frazzled.
“Sorry. I was just at the diner waiting for you. Having problems with the lock?”
“Oh, I’m having all kinds of problems today. It started when I heard about Dee.” She managed the lock and opened the door for me. We both went in.
“Yeah, I couldn’t believe it when I called her place last night and ended up talking to the police.”
She gave me a weird look and asked, “You never talked to her about her problem?”
“No, I didn’t get her email till almost eight last night, then I called but I was too late,” I said quietly.
“Shit, she was hoping to get hold of you,” Joyce said, sounding like a sailor.
“What was it about? What did she have to be afraid of?”
“She called me here day before yesterday, saying last week she got an email with a warning.” She paused, thinking. “It said she was going to be the first classmate to die. She thought it was some kind of joke at first, but then it started to bother her. After a while it just wasn’t funny.”
“Why didn’t she call the police?” I questioned.
“She got more of those threatening letters afterwards, one saying if she told the police she would die faster.”
“Dying sooner or later, what’s the difference? The police might have kept her alive!”
“You know Dee was never the brightest bulb. She was scared. I told her to call the police, but she just wouldn’t listen.”
“I don’t suppose you saw any of the letters?”
“No, I never saw her in person, just talked to her on the phone. I hate to say it, but my business keeps me so busy I never got to visit her.”
“Maybe lucky for you that you didn’t,” I responded.
“Yeah,” she choked. “I thought about that today when I heard it on the news.” She looked a bit more shaken. “What are you going to do now?”
“Well, I’m not a cop or a detective, but I may just snoop around a bit to see what I can do to help.”
Joyce was getting her office opened as she talked, flitting around turning on computers and lights. She finally sat down at her desk and waited for her computer to boot up.
Joyce looked up at me and said, “I don’t have any idea who would want to hurt Dee. She was a really sweet girl. And why was she the first classmate to go? Who’s the classmate who wanted her dead, and is there a second classmate to go? This is scary.”
I was wandering around her office noticing how successful she was as a realtor by all the plaques on the walls. I heard her make a small chortling sound and turned to see her staring at the computer screen, her face flush. I walked over and looked at the screen where she had opened an email. I read:
“Joyce, congratulations, you are chosen to be the second classmate to die!”
Joyce was still making gurgling noises, and I had to shake her to bring her back to reality.
“Joyce, relax, no harm is going to come to you. We will show this to the police and you’ll be safe!”
She was still shaking, but looked at me. She was in her 60s also and graying worse than I, but I could almost see the rest of her hair turning a dull white as I spoke.
“This is insane! Who would want to kill me?? I’ve done no one any harm! Neither did Dee! Who is this sick fuck who is threatening me!?”
I took out my flash drive I always carry and told Joyce to download the email to it. She looked at me with wild eyes but took the drive, plugged it in, copied off the email to the drive and returned it to me. I told her not to mention this to anyone. She sat back and wept. I picked up the phone, dialed information, asked for the Clinton Township police, and asked them to connect me. I waited a bit then got the operator and asked for Detective Sergeant Trapper. It took a bit of waiting, so I went over, locked the front door to the office and rehung the closed sign. Trapper came on the line, and I reminded him who I was then related what had just happened. He told me to set my ass down, that he was on his way.
Joyce and I sat in silence for a bit then she looked to me and asked, “Who would do this? I haven’t hurt anyone.”
“This could be someone from our school who has serial killer tendencies. For some reason he’s snapped and acting out, his sick twisted mind making him do this.” I knew it wouldn’t soothe her nerves but I had to say something. I probably could have toned it down a bit.
She said no more, and I was at a loss for any more words. A person has been threatened with murder, what do you say? Sgt. Trapper arrived and pounded the door until I opened it and let him in. He gave me a nasty look, like why was I popping up when there was a murder or threat of murder. I spent about an hour in a small room in Joyce’s office explaining over and over why I was there and what did I have to do with it. Trapper didn’t seem to like me for some reason. I tried to be as polite as possible, but he still had an annoyed look in his eyes when he questioned me. Having read a great number of crime books, I knew police were suspicious of any person in close proximity to a crime. It didn’t make me feel any better.
I could see Joyce through the open door. She was holding together better now that the police were there. After a bit they sent me out, brought Joyce into the room and questioned her for a shorter time than they did me. Finally Trapper came out of the room.
“Richards, get out of here but stay available. We’ll need you to come in and make an official statement tomorrow.”
“What are you going to do for Joyce?” I needed to know that she was going to be safe.
“She’ll get police protection until we wrap this up. Now get lost.”
I waved to Joyce and went out the door which was held open by a young uniformed officer. I got in my car and sat a minute gathering my thoughts. There was not much to go on. Adding together the little information Joyce provided along with the news article and Trapper’s lack of info, I had nothing. I drove out of the plaza and into traffic; I was going back to my room to examine the email on my flash drive.
Traffic was light. I arrived home in a short time, turned into the drive of my parents’ modest little house and guided the big Crown Vic into the garage. My mother greeted me at the back door and gave me all the day’s news from the home front. I wanted to get into my room to check out the email but I had to give mom her time, too. I found an opening to get away, made it safely into my room, and closed the door. My mom knew that a closed door meant privacy, as a door partly opened was an invitation for her to fill me in on what was going on with her reality shows. I couldn’t stand those; I didn’t need reality in my TV viewing.
I woke my computer from sleep and plugged in the flash drive then waited for the icon to pop up. I opened the drive, started up my mail program, and imported the email. I opened the letter using the full header mode and studied it. Most people don’t know that when an email goes out it picks up a lot of information telling everything from where the mail started, what program created it, where it went through the net from server to server and so forth. Like a postal letter that travels the world, it picks up stamps and info as to where it’s been.
The header on this email read:
________________________
Return-path: <[email protected]>
Envelope-to: [email protected]
Delivery-date: Sun, 05 Apr 2009 09:35:13 -0600
Received: from Pompo Deli by box505.Myhost.com with local-bsmtp (Exim 4.69)
(envelope-from <[email protected]>)
id 1LqUNJ-0004KZ-7o
for [email protected]; Sun, 05 Apr 2009 09:35:13 -0600
X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.2.4 (2008-01-01) on box505.Myhost.com
Received: from mail-gx0-9.google.com ([209.85.2.159])
by box505.Myhost.com with esmtp (Exim 4.69)
(envelope-from <[email protected]>)
id 1LqUNI-04Jx-Vp
for [email protected]; Sun, 05 Apr 2009 09:35:09 -0600
Received: by gk3 with SMTP id 3s4828gxk.8
for [email protected]; Sun, 05 Apr 2009 08:35:08 -0700 (PDT)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Received: by 10.11.4.20 with SMTP id a200ybk.7.123266; Sun,
05 Apr 2009 08:35:08 -0700 (PDT)
Date: Sun, 5 Apr 2009 11:35:08 -0400
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Subject: Your next
From: <[email protected]>
To: “Joyce Harper” [email protected]
X-user: ::::209.5.217.19:box505.Myhost.com::::::
X-Identified-User: {5214:box505.Myhost.com:Pompodeli.com} {sentby:program running on server}
X-Antivirus: AVG for E-mail 8.0.238 [270.11.39/2038]
Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary=”=======AVGMAIL-49D8E275=======”
__________________________
Well, a bit Greek to anyone who didn’t know how to look at a header but it told me a few things. The person who sent it called himself (or herself; I wasn’t sexist) “whipit,” a flashback to the days of DEVO. Or a bondage freak. It was sent from a place called Pompo Deli, I presume a cyber cafe using a mail program on their server for the web based gmail program through Google. Most likely a faked email setup for just this purpose. It might be hard to track down for me as I’m not a total computer geek, but I knew a bit of where to start.
One thing I noticed, the line: To: “Joyce Harper” [email protected] suggested that the person sending the mail had an address book set up since the email printed out the full name of Joyce Harper. I wanted to know who else was in that address book. If I could have only seen the email sent to Dee I might have been able to figure out more. I was sure the police had seen all this, too, and were probably at Pompo Deli right now asking questions. Then again, maybe not. Maybe they hadn’t had time to take the email back to their lab for examination.
My cell phone rang, and I answered, “Hello?”
“Richards, Trapper here, did you bring a cup of coffee to Joyce Harper’s office, or did she bring it?”
“Well, I hate coffee, and I didn’t bring it. I don’t even know if she drinks it. She had a bunch of stuff in her arms when she got there, but I didn’t see a coffee cup. Why?”
“She took a drink from a cup on her desk and started to convulse. We got an EMT wagon in, but it was too late. We think she was poisoned. Nobody else came into the office before I got here?”
“No, just her and me.”
“You need to come down to the station and make a statement. I don’t like people dying on my watch, and you seem to keep being around when it happens.”
“Yeah, I can come down. I’m not hiding anything. I’ve told you everything I know which is not much. I’m being sucked into this, too, you know.”
“Make sure you get there. I don’t want to have to chase you down.” His tone wasn’t friendly.
He hung up, and I put my computers to sleep again then headed out to the car after checking with Mom for any needs. I was starting to dislike the situation. I just knew I was going to end up a suspect. I hoped my name didn’t make it to the papers. My mom wouldn’t like that.
*
Chapter Three
Trapper was pacing around Joyce Harper’s office, fuming. He looked at the two uniformed officers, Becker and Davis, standing there looking about as vacant as two men could look. The ME people had left with the body of Joyce Harper, and the office was quiet until Trapper exploded.
“How in the hell did a cup of poisoned coffee just materialize without anyone seeing it?”
One officer said, “Maybe it was the CSU guy who came to copy the email off the computer, Sarge.”
Trapper’s eyes glazed over. “Just when was there a CSU guy in here, Becker?”
“Right after I let Richards out the door. He came up and told me he was called to extract an email. You and Davis were in the back room with the vic.” Becker winced.
“One guy?” Trapper asked.
“Yeah, just one,” Becker replied.
“When was the last time you ever saw less than two CSU techs at the scene?”
“Well, now you mention it, I thought it was strange.”
Trapper’s eyes glazed again. “What was he carrying?”
“One of those cases they all carry, I guess.”
“Did you watch him?” Trapper now moved into Becker’s personal space, just short of nose to nose.
“No, I was watching you and Davis with the Harper woman. The CSU guy was done in just a couple of minutes, and I let him out.” Becker wanted to move back from Trapper, but the desk blocked him.
“Just enough time to leave a cup of spiked coffee and….” He paused, and his face went blank. “Shit,” he spit out, went to the computer, and sat at the desk. He looked at the mail program still up on the screen and made a couple of hits on the keyboard. “Shit! The email is gone! He left the coffee and deleted the email. I don’t believe this, right in front of us.”
Trapper picked up the desk phone and dialed a number. “Yeah, dispatch, this is Trapper. Was there a call for CSU to come to my location in the last couple of hours?…Yeah, OK. Thanks.” He hung up the phone. “No one was sent here,” he said, speaking mostly to the air. “This was some real ballsy guy to waltz in and do what he did then skate out.”
He turned the chair toward Becker. “What did he look like?”
“About my height, dark hair under a CSU cap, tinted glasses. I could tell they were prescription since they made his eyes look huge. He had a mustache and a large nose.” Becker strained to remember.
“Glasses, mustache and a big nose, like those gag glasses, mustache and a big nose they sell in a novelty store?” Trapper said sarcastically.
“No, Sergeant, his were real.”
Trapper looked frustrated. He stood, walked to the door, turned and said, “You two wait here. Don’t touch anything until the real CSU shows up, check their IDs when they do, wait till they are done, then seal the place up. Can you do that?”
They both nodded, and Trapper stormed out.
Back at the police station, I was sitting on a hard wooden chair that was making my butt so sore I had to shift a lot to get comfortable. About three butt turns later Trapper showed up. He led me to his office.
“Well, Richards, you lucked out. It seems the killer dropped in to the Harper office and left a present while we all just stood around.” He wasn’t smiling as he briefly filled me in on the incident. “He left the coffee and deleted the email. We can’t even examine that now.”
I hesitated. “Um, I could help you on that. Before you got there I had Joyce copy the email to my flash drive.”
He stared at me and grumbled, “You suppressed evidence?!?”
“No, I copied evidence. It’s only suppressed if I didn’t tell you about it, which I’m doing now. You’re lucky I copied it.”
“Ok, I don’t care, just give me the flash drive!” he bellowed.
I thought this might happen so I had copied the email off to a blank SD card. I handed it to him.
“This is not a flash drive,” he observed.
“The email is on there. I moved it,” I lied. Joyce’s original email was now on my computer. “Oh, and Dee’s email to me is on there, too. I cooperate with my police.”
“Ok, fine. We got one up on the classmate killer now.” He looked hard at me. “I don’t approve that you did this, but thanks.”
“Are you calling him the classmate killer now?”
“Police have a way of naming perps so we are all on the same page.”
“Did anyone see the killer well enough to ID him?” I asked.
“We have a description, but I’m sure he was disguised. What I can’t figure is how he knew the routine and how he figured Harper would be the one to drink the coffee.”
“Where was
it placed?” I asked.
“On the desk, next to her computer.”
“Joyce was so shook up, maybe she thought she brought it and needed the caffeine,” I theorized. “He must have known Joyce’s habits, and he was confident that after Joyce found the email she would have called the police. Your guys would have arrived and done what good cops do, so he waited and did his thing. I’m sure none of your people would have drunk from the cup. He was just thumbing his nose at everyone. Guy’s got guts.”