by Mike Befeler
A councilwoman next made a statement. Smoothing the hair from her forehead, she said she had played platform tennis and, although understanding the neighbors’ concerns, she agreed that the necessary mitigation steps had been taken.
“One to one.” Ben put an index finger up from each hand.
Four other council members took clear positions. The final man, the only one wearing a tie, made a very ambiguous summary of the issues.
“I can’t figure out if he’s for us or against us,” Ben said. “It’s three to three with one swing vote.”
The mayor called for a vote. As Ben had predicted three hands went up in support of the motion to keep the courts.
Mark watched the one undecided council member. “Come on, put your hand up,” he urged.
The man straightened his tie, looked around at the other council members and finally raised his hand.
“The motion carries four votes to three to retain the platform tennis courts at the North Boulder Recreation Center,” the mayor announced. “The next topic on the agenda is . . .”
Mark and Ben bolted from their seats and charged out of the auditorium and down the stairs.
Outside the building, they gave each other a high five as they stood in the cold night air.
“We won!” Ben screamed.
Mark gave a subdued smile. “Yes, it’s over. After all the obstacles and hearings, we’ll still have courts to play on.”
“What a battle,” Ben said with a smile. “Do you want to stay at my house again tonight?”
“No. I think it’s safe to go back to my place. Thanks for putting me up.” Mark looked out into the ominous darkness. “Now, we just need Manny’s murderer to be arrested.”
“Please be careful, Mark.”
Ben had parked in the small parking lot next to the municipal building, so they parted. As Mark strolled over the bridge toward the other parking lot, he hummed the Beatles’ “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” remembering it from the radio earlier in the day. He threaded his way along the sidewalk and suddenly realized the light that had illuminated this corner of the parking lot when he arrived was out. Uh-oh. He tensed at the sound of rustling in the bushes. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw some movement in the shadows. Suddenly, a figure appeared. Something flew toward his head.
CHAPTER 34
When Mark awoke, his head spun like a wobbly top, and his cheek burned like it had been branded. He felt some jostling movement, but couldn’t figure out where he was. He lay on his stomach in the dark. He couldn’t move. Someone had bound his hands behind him.
He wriggled his fingers and felt a substance smooth on one side and sticky on the other—duct tape constrained him. He saw a brief flash of light and discovered he lay in the backseat of a car, on a leather seat, with his face in a pool of drool. His ankles were also bound. The car jolted. It felt like a speed bump. Must still be in Boulder, he thought.
He tried to raise himself, but didn’t have the strength to sit up. He saw the back of the driver’s head, but there didn’t seem to be any head peeking above the headrest on the passenger’s side.
He decided not to let his assailant know he had awakened. With his limited field of vision, he couldn’t spot any identifying insignias in the dark. Now the car made sweeping turns and seemed to be going up an incline. He spotted periodic flashes of car headlights, then darkness again.
The car thumped over a bump, and the back of Mark’s head banged into something on the seat. He turned his face to try to see the object, but it remained too dark to tell. Then lights appeared from an oncoming car. Mark squinted to make out the writing on the box. Samoas. Girl Scout cookies. Melinda Daggett had said that Lee loved Girl Scout cookies. Lee Daggett!
Mark turned his face away from the box. After a while, the car made a sharp turn and the top of Mark’s head banged into the door. Then the seat began vibrating and Mark found himself bouncing up and down. He could hear the sound of gravel crunching underneath the car’s tires. He no longer saw any flashes from headlights. The car passed over a smooth section of road, but moments later Mark heard the sound of gravel once again, and the car quivered from what seemed to be a washboard pattern on the road.
Mark’s face pushed into the seat as the car headed uphill, and then he slumped back as the car crested a hill and headed down. The car lurched and turned numerous times before skidding to a stop. A car door opened and slammed. The door that his head had been periodically bumping into opened. Mark stayed limp.
Someone grabbed him under the armpits and dragged him out of the car. Mark’s feet bumped along the seat and then crashed onto gravel before his assailant dragged him along the pebbles and away from the car. Unceremoniously, his attacker hurled Mark to the ground.
“As soon as you wake up, you can join Manny and the old vagrant,” a gruff voice announced.
Mark continued to keep his eyes closed.
He heard crunching steps on the gravel and a car door opened. The door closed and footsteps approached. Then a liquid hit his face. He spluttered.
Cold coffee, cream and sugar entered the corner of his mouth.
“Time to wake up, sleeping beauty.”
Mark shook the coffee off his face and struggled to a sitting position.
“So why’d you bring me all the way out here?” he asked.
“Simple. You’ve been a pain in the butt and getting in the way.”
In spite of the cold, Mark began to sweat. He tried to think of any bargaining chip he had to play. He only had one ploy. “It wouldn’t do any good to kill me. I’ve left a sworn statement on all I’ve learned in a safe with instructions to my lawyer to open it if something happens to me. It even has your name, Daggett.”
A laugh emerged from the face hidden in the dark. “Nice try. You didn’t know enough before coming up here to cause any problems. Now it’s too late for you to talk to anyone.”
Mark thought back to what he had found out. It was true. He had a smattering of facts, but nothing conclusive. He had mentioned his suspicion to Ben, but he had no concrete proof to support his conclusion.
Lee Daggett reached down and cut the duct tape from Mark’s ankles but not his wrists.
“There,” Lee announced. “Now you can come for a stroll with me. Time for swimming lessons.”
Lee raised Mark up under the armpits and set him on his feet.
“March!”
Mark felt a push in the back and he stumbled down a gravel driveway. Off to the side he could make out the faint outline of a house—a three-story, wooden structure with two decks. He stumbled past a woodpile.
“This place belong to friends of yours?” Mark asked.
“Let’s just say it belongs to someone who is out of town. Don’t expect to find anyone around to help you. Keep moving.”
When they reached the end of the driveway, Daggett steered Mark toward a path that wound through some trees. A few minutes later, Mark found himself facing a steep beach, giving way to a large body of ice-covered water. Another shove directed him to the right, along the pebbly beach.
Mark tried to think where he could be. He estimated they had traveled for no less than thirty minutes, but not longer than an hour. Within that travel time from Boulder, there existed two large reservoirs: Gross and Barker. The route to Gross Reservoir would have entailed more steep grades and hairpin turns than he’d experienced. This must be Barker Reservoir.
He stumbled along, tripping once and sprawling on the gravelly sand. He felt small sharp rocks dig into his chin.
Daggett grabbed him and lifted him up like a child picking up a doll.
“Keep going.”
Another push.
They rounded a point, and Mark could faintly see the ice. He staggered on as they curved around an inlet, and he stepped through a dry stream bed. He stumbled again on the steeply slopping shoreline and desperately fought to retain his balance. In the distance he saw the headlight of a car and a faint reflection across the ice surface of the wide body
of water. That must be the Boulder Canyon road, Mark thought. They were on the far side of the reservoir.
Daggett broke the silence. “How’d you like the present I left on your doorstep?”
Mark didn’t answer.
“I found that deer caught in netting I’d put in my backyard. I had to tranquilize it to bring it to your place. Thought it would help convince you to back off. You might have lived if you’d paid attention. You’re too stubborn. Even a little fire didn’t seem to convince you.”
Mark pictured Lee lugging the deer to his front door and slitting its throat. Then he recalled the image of his burning garage. This guy had definitely gone over the edge. He acted cocky and might slip up. Mark had to think of a way to get him cocky enough to slip up.
Mark tugged at his wrists. They remained firmly constrained. He needed something to tear the duct tape. Once he could force a break in the tape, he could snap it apart. Just like he did when ripping duct tape to put on his tennis shoes before each platform tennis game.
“Bet you also enjoyed the note I left you,” Daggett bragged. “I got the idea from Howard Roscoe.”
Mark thought he should try some delaying tactics, keep a conversation going. “Why’d you steal the folder from Barbara’s house?”
“I wanted to retrieve some papers.”
“I bet the contents of the folder surprised you.”
Daggett stopped. “What the hell do you mean?”
“Didn’t you read the papers?”
“No. I burned them.”
“Well, in that case I won’t shake your illusion that you destroyed what you wanted to,” Mark said.
Daggett whacked Mark’s shoulder. “Are you trying to game me? Move your butt.” He gave Mark another shove.
They reached a rock outcrop, and Daggett directed Mark up the steep beach. The sand ended against a pile of rocks. Mark stopped, unable to negotiate the uneven surface with his hands bound behind his back.
“Climb!” Daggett commanded.
Mark placed his left foot on a rock and received a rough boost from behind. He stumbled up onto the rock surface and struggled to retain his balance. After several precarious steps and further pushes, he reached the flat top of the rock.
“Sit down,” Daggett said, thrusting him downward.
Mark bounced and came to rest with his hands scraping against the rock.
“I’ll give you a moment to review your worthless life, and I’ll tell you a secret.” Daggett laughed. “So you’ll know what to expect, you’re going for your last swim. You’ll sail off the rock, fall through the ice and drown in the deep water. And the beauty of it is that your body will be under the ice so no one will find it until next spring at the earliest. Now I’ll fix your legs.”
Daggett wrapped duct tape around Mark’s ankles. As he lay there, Mark felt bile rising in his throat. Think. He felt a rock jabbing the small of his back. He moved his hands and started scraping the duct tape against the jagged rock. If he could only tear the tape in one place, he would be able to free his hands. As Daggett wrapped yet more tape around his ankles, Mark continued to rip the duct tape binding his wrists and could feel it giving way. He had almost worked it through when two arms grabbed him and pulled him up. Daggett dragged him down to another part of the rock surface.
In the distance another headlight briefly illuminated the ice, and Mark peered straight down. Some instinct made him look up just as a large stick of wood, partially illuminated by the car’s headlight, shot toward his head. He ducked enough so that the blow glanced off the side of his head. He felt a push. Dazed by the blow, but still conscious, he sailed through space.
CHAPTER 35
Mark struck the thin ice and broke through into the freezing water. The shock of the cold revived him from the blow. Now he had mere seconds to free his hands. He tried to wrench his wrists apart.
Nothing happened. His heart beat faster.
He needed to free his wrists in order to survive.
With all his strength he thrust his hands apart. He felt the duct tape give way, but not tear completely.
He needed air.
One more violent tug and his hands came apart.
He raised his arms and clawed at the water. Up he went until his head hit the ice. He felt his chest tighten.
He wondered if he could break through.
His lungs burned.
He pushed the ice.
Nothing happened.
He rammed his fist into the ice. The ice cracked. He punched again. The ice gave way.
His head popped through the opening.
He gasped for air.
The cold mountain air filled his lungs. Mark knew he had less than two minutes to escape from the water before hypothermia set in.
He heard a laugh in the distance. Lee Daggett had started back, and it appeared he didn’t know that Mark had freed his hands. Now Mark had to find the shore. Looking in all directions, he couldn’t make out any objects. Then a faint flicker of a distant headlight appeared. Mark stroked in the opposite direction, breaking the ice as he went. The ice was too thin to hold him so he had to act like an ice breaker to shred his way to shore.
His head throbbed, and the cold slowed his muscles. His arm hit rock. Too steep to climb. He pulled himself along the outcrop, breaking the ice as he went. His fingers had gone numb.
Finally, one of his shoes scraped the bottom. He shuffled onto a pebbly, sloped bottom and pulled himself onto a stretch of rugged beach.
He grabbed a jagged rock and tore at the duct tape on his ankles. His numb hand dropped the rock twice before he completed the task.
He lay gasping for breath, feeling his heart pounding erratically. Putting his hand to his head, his fingers came away with a sticky substance. Blood! He began convulsing in shivers. His body needed warmth.
He raised himself and stumbled along the beach until he came to the rock outcrop he’d been pushed off. He crawled over the rocks and down to the beach on the other side.
He heard a car driving away.
Lee Daggett had left.
Mark looked for light along the coastline. Nothing. He had to keep moving.
He had lost all feeling in his fingers. Struggling along the beach and across the inlet, he rounded the point. Still no lights. He gauged where he thought the house would be—the house he’d seen when Daggett had parked his car.
If he went into the woods at the wrong place, he could wander forever.
Picking a likely spot, he staggered into the forest. For a moment he thought he’d entered in the wrong place. Then he saw a faint reflection off a window.
He passed a small shed and found a door to the house. Locked. He picked up a rock. He held it in his two numb hands and unceremoniously broke a glass pane on the door. He slapped his hands together to try to regain some feeling.
Then he reached inside and found the door handle.
His numb hand fumbled trying to grasp it.
Finally, he got a grip, turned the knob, and the door released.
He pulled back his hand, careful not to cut himself on the broken glass.
Stumbling through the entryway, he found the master bedroom and bathroom.
He clumsily removed his clothes, took a hot shower and wrapped himself in a blanket to keep warm. Other than his head now hurting, he had no other injuries.
Satisfied that he had escaped hypothermia, he explored the house. He found a desk and turned on a light. Rummaging through some papers, he found an address and name of the occupants. He jotted down the information, picked up the phone and dialed a number.
“Ben, I need your help,” he said.
“You woke me up. What gives?”
“I’ve been kidnapped and almost murdered.”
“Oh, my God! What happened?”
“Lee Daggett is the murderer . . . never mind, long story. I’m stranded in the woods near Barker Reservoir. Could you come and pick me up? I’ll explain everything when you get here.”
“If
picking you up is what it takes to keep our foursome going, sure. Sorry, Mark, that wasn’t funny. Just tell me where you are and I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
While waiting for Ben, Mark found a piece of cardboard and some duct tape. He covered the broken pane of glass. Then he wrote a note and removed fifty dollars of soaked cash from his wallet.
Forty-five minutes later, Mark heard a car pull to a stop in the driveway. He peered out the window to verify Ben’s silver Acura.
Mark picked up his soggy clothes and still wrapped in the blanket shuffled outside to meet Ben.
“You look like hell,” Ben said.
“I had a little unexpected nighttime swim,” Mark answered.
“But your head. There’s blood at your hairline.”
Mark put his hand to his head and felt the goose egg. “Lee Daggett added a little extra incentive for me to stay in the lake. He tried to kill me like he did with Manny and the street person down on the mall.”
“You better sit down with the police when we return to Boulder.”
Mark thought for a moment. “I need to do that, eventually, but not yet. Right now it would be my word against Daggett’s. He’d deny everything and have some alibi for tonight. Daggett thinks I’m dead. With the right element of surprise, I should be able to trap him.”
Ben slapped his forehead. “Come on, Mark. For a smart guy, you’re acting pretty stupid. It’s time to cut out the amateur-detective crap. You almost swam with the fishes. You’re over your head in dealing with these people.”
“Thanks for the concern, Ben. I may have stumbled along the way and being pushed off a rock into a frozen lake terrified me, but I’m close to finding a way to wrap this up for good. There remain a few elements of Manny’s murder that don’t make sense. I have to figure out the rest of it.”
“Like what?”
“I’m guessing Daggett murdered Manny to escape a large gambling debt, but it seems he could have solved that problem without resorting to murder. As I told you before, there’s the statement made by the street person, Old Mel, that still bothers me. He said the man who asked him to turn off the lights at the rec center identified himself as Manny. Old Mel adamantly stated Manny’s name, and it makes no sense. I need to see Daggett one more time to resolve a few final questions. He pushed me in the reservoir before I could obtain all the information.”