by Aric Davis
“All right,” said Betty. The answer wasn’t all that satisfying, but it did go along with what she knew about the trial, and with what Nickel told her in the park. The cop’s words also meant that the idea had been vetted by the detectives as they investigated the case, and that despite what the Free Duke site might say, there was a good reason why the roommate wasn’t investigated further.
“I know you’ve got more than that,” said Van Endel, the warm half smile back. “That sheet looked pretty full.”
“I heard from talking to some people that run a Free Duke website that there was a man in a green jacket seen running from the house. Do you know anything about that?”
“Of course I do,” said Van Endel with a smile. “Whoever you were talking to, they really know their stuff. We did investigate the man described by Duke, but the only man the neighbors saw in a jacket like that was Duke. You compound that with the fact that Duke was very high on heroin when he made his initial statement, and you have a very unreliable witness.”
“Isn’t it possible that no one but Duke saw the other man? That wouldn’t mean he wasn’t there just because there wasn’t a witness around to watch him leave.”
“True,” admitted Van Endel. “The problem is that we never heard anything, even from Duke, about who that man might’ve been, or any other shred of evidence that could lead us to him. Contrast that with the evidence supporting Duke’s involvement: he was covered in blood, high on drugs, and Mandy had been attacked very brutally—” Van Endel stopped himself, looking uncomfortable. “Betty, I’m not sure how bluntly I should speak with you. This is some pretty awful—”
“I’m fine, Detective. Really. I’ve already learned a lot of pretty graphic stuff about this case. I know what I’ve gotten myself into.” Not that Betty was actually sure she did, but even to her ears, she sounded pretty sure of herself.
“OK, then,” said Van Endel, apparently convinced. “Another damning bit of evidence was that Mandy’s face had been covered by her shirt after the attack. Duke removed it before we got there, but the coroner put it all back together. An attack like that, the violence of it and especially the covering of the face, typically indicates that the murderer knew his victim and is ashamed of what he has done. Duke might not feel bad for what happened nowadays, but when he gave his confession he was very remorseful about how he’d let her live during that time, and he remembered very little of what had happened in the house that day.”
“But Duke said later that he only confessed because he was held so long.”
“Duke was held so long because of his toxicology,” said Van Endel. “Those hacks on the Internet are right to think there are a few odd things about this case, but Duke being held wasn’t one of them. He was hospitalized, not stuffed in some room at the back of the police station, and when Phil did speak with him it was for very limited periods of time and under the supervision of a doctor. Duke’s confession was given under those circumstances as well, and it was strong enough evidence to stand up in court. Duke might not like that he all but convicted himself, but he was the one that confessed to that crime.”
“OK,” said Betty, giving a look to the notes. So far all the answers that Van Endel had given her seemed sound. The website had all the conspiracy theories and emotions, but Van Endel had facts, cold and hard ones at that, and Betty wondered how the creators of that site would feel if faced with such evidence. “What kind of timeline do you have on the event?”
“I can’t recall exactly,” said Van Endel. “Truth told, I think old Phil might even have trouble with that part after so many years. What I do know is that Duke went home, did what he did, and eventually called 911. There wasn’t anything out of whack, at least not timewise, and from what I recall, everything happened pretty quickly. To play devil’s advocate, if Duke were innocent then he walked into that home seconds after the attack.”
“Wouldn’t that support his story about walking in just after the man in the green jacket walked away?”
“If there was any other evidence that such a man existed, then absolutely. Unfortunately for Duke, there was no one else that saw him, and in his confession Duke didn’t mention the man again. By the time the trial rolled around, there was no mention of green men at all.” Van Endel caught himself with a chuckle. “Men in green jackets, I mean. Not that there was any mention of little green men, either.”
They smiled at each other, but it felt weird to Betty to do even that when they were talking about stuff like this. “So, where was the house?” she asked.
Just like that, his smile was gone. “Why do you want to know?”
“We want to go take some pictures of it,” said Betty, “assuming it’s still standing, of course. Don’t worry, I don’t want to break in or anything. That’s just plain creepy.”
“Fair enough,” said Van Endel. “Sorry for using my cop voice on you, it comes out pretty easily. I’ll get the address tomorrow at work and send it over to your mother.” He shifted in his chair. “But I will be pissed if it’s still standing and you go inside. It was in pretty serious disrepair back then, and I can’t imagine how it must look now.”
“Just pictures, I promise,” said Betty with a smile, and the cop smiled back at her. “I just have a couple more and then I’ll be done. Is that all right?”
“It’s fine,” said Van Endel. “No rush. Barring anything particularly unfortunate happening, I’ve got the rest of the day off, and this beats anything else I might have had planned, even if you are sleuthing around a case I considered solved a long time ago. Still, better you than one of those nuts that think Duke Barnes really is without-a-shred-of-doubt innocent. I can understand doubt, but if you read some of the stuff we’ve had mailed to the station, you’d think Phil all but put a knife in Duke’s hands.”
“Well,” said Betty, “I just don’t want to be annoying.” Van Endel waved a hand as if even the suggestion of such a thing was impossible, and so Betty asked him, “Did Phil ever mention if Mandy had kept a diary?”
“Is this another one of your Internet tips?” Van Endel asked the question with an even tone, but Betty saw a flash of something hard pass over his face. Not much of a tell, but I bet if he plays poker he has some friends that know that look.
“Yeah,” said Betty. “I was told that Mandy had kept a diary, but that it never appeared anywhere after she died. Did Duke ever mention it?”
“He did, on numerous occasions, but if there really was one, it was never recovered,” said Van Endel. “It drove Phil about nuts. They tore that house apart looking for it, but came away with nothing. That diary was either more BS from Duke, or it got swiped or tossed in the trash before Mandy was killed.” Van Endel shrugged.
“I was really hoping that part might have been true,” said Betty wistfully, and Van Endel nodded.
“That would have been a heck of a thing to look through. I’m sure it wouldn’t have been a smoking gun pointed at Duke or anyone else, but it might have made some of this conspiracy crap go away.”
“It could have given that conspiracy crap a boost, too, right?”
“That’s true,” said Van Endel. “I suppose in that regard there would have been a hell of an incentive for Phil to destroy it. Here’s the problem though: Phil wasn’t that kind of cop.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean he didn’t have some vendetta against Duke or anyone else. There was no reason for him to have had one, and he just wouldn’t have, in any case. Phil just wanted to catch the bad guy, not railroad some junkie.” Van Endel drew in a breath, and by the time he let it out, his warm half smile was there. “You know those baby toys with the different-shaped holes, and the different-shaped pieces you’re supposed to put in them?”
“Of course,” said Betty.
“Being a cop and trying to fit a man for a crime is a lot like one of those,” he explained. “There might be a time or two where a square peg gets shoved into a circular hole, like we’re questioning the wrong guy, but p
art of being a good cop is realizing when that’s happening.
“Duke Barnes is in jail because he fit that crime perfectly. If he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, then he sure did a good job of getting himself there.” Van Endel paused and spun his head as the door to the basement opened and Ophelia walked through it.
“Detective Van Endel, what a pleasure to see you,” said Ophelia, and then Betty watched as her mother hugged the cop, the sight of it bizarre in ways that she’d never experienced. I get that Andrea knows him, but since when did she bring that part of her work home?
TWENTY-THREE
The time after Van Endel left the house passed uneventfully. Betty’s scribbled notes on the pad of paper felt like little threads of a far greater failure, and even looking at the Free Duke site felt a little silly now, childish even. If everything Van Endel had said was true, then there was no way Duke was going to be freed, no matter how many famous friends he might make. The site had described Duke as a hard man whose hard history had gotten him framed for a crime he didn’t commit, but when Van Endel spoke of Duke, he didn’t sound like he thought the prisoner was a dangerous man, just a pathetic one.
The only other useful thing to come out of the day had been the conversation with Nickel and his oddly helpful tips. Sure, the detective had cast doubt on all of them, but everything the boy in the park had mentioned at least had some bearing on reality. Betty believed the cop on all fronts, but unlike some of the things the detective had disproven outright, all the stuff Nickel had mentioned remained in the maybe-possible column.
The thought came to Betty with such finality that her mouth dropped open. She and June had tossed it out as a pie-in-the-sky possibility the other day, but the conversation with Van Endel had proven it to be a stone-cold necessity: she was going to need to convince the moms to let her go with June to Jackson to speak with Duke. He was the only one that would be able to answer their questions.
Not to mention, traveling across the state to speak to a man convicted of murder would be a serious boost to the project. Even if they ultimately failed in deciding Duke’s innocence or guilt conclusively, she would still be able to say they had done everything they could in order to find out what had really happened to Mandy Reasoner.
Easy to say, but she knew there were going to be a lot of hoops to jump through. Betty had no idea how one could even go about setting up a meeting with a prisoner they didn’t even know. And even if she did convince the moms to let her and Duke said he would meet her, there was still the matter of getting him to actually talk in front of Andrea, who would certainly insist upon coming along.
Even worse, if I ask her and she says no, then there’s no way I’ll be able to go. Maybe June will have some ideas.
This last thought set Betty’s face to fire. She hadn’t talked to June since the stupid fight at school. She hadn’t even responded to her texts yet. She needed to make things right with June—this was her project, too. Hell, it had more to do with June than it did her. Mandy was her aunt, after all. And now Betty had so much to share with her. She needed to tell her about the meeting with Van Endel, about the house, and especially about the odd boy in the park.
Betty grabbed her phone from the desk and punched in a text to June that said, “Sorry 4 freaking out & being a bitch. Love you, and I need to tell you about today and ask you a couple of questions tomorrow. Still besties?”
Betty had only set the phone down on her desk maybe thirty seconds ago when it began to buzz.
“NO PROB! Sory I wuz so mean, totes just joking around but it went too far. Cant wait 2 c u 2 morrow so we can talk about it.”
It was nice to have a person in her life she could fuck up with so totally and still call a friend.
The text conversation did remind her of Jake, though. Between everything else that had happened she’d nearly forgotten about her steady and his absolutely ridiculous request, and recalling it now made her feel nauseous. Being fodder for hallway mockery seemed far less a big deal to her now than it had earlier, but the idea of shattering a boy who obviously cared about her seriously made her feel like she might empty her stomach. Even worse was the fresh memory of walking through the hall and feeling like such hell because she was about to get dumped. Now it turned out he cared a lot more for her than she did for him, and she was going to have to turn around and put him through the same thing.
As Betty leaned back in her chair and let out a deep breath, Andrea called up the stairs that dinner was ready. Betty left the room determined to leave thoughts of Jake and Duke Barnes behind. There would be plenty of time for both of them soon enough, but right now she just wanted to be a teenager.
As she clomped down the stairs, Andrea shouted, “Hurry up, I want to hear about you and Dick.”
Both Betty and Ophelia burst out in juvenile laughter at that, and as she walked into the room to see the moms giggling at one another, it struck Betty just how lucky she was to be a part of this little family.
TWENTY-FOUR
Our conversation the day before must have jarred something loose for the both of us. I spent the night reeducating myself on the Reasoner case, and now that we’re together again at the park, it’s obvious that Claire’s been doing her own work. The first words out of her mouth are, “I want you to look into Jack.”
“Excuse me?”
“My ex-husband. I want you to look into Jack as well.”
“Yesterday, you said that—”
“I know what I said, you don’t need to remind me. I changed my mind. If he had anything to do with that . . . thing, I need to know about it, for June’s safety and my own sanity.”
I nod, still trying to take it all in. Then things start to make more sense. The liquor on her breath and the unexpected change of heart are both fairly indicative that our conversation yesterday hit her far harder than I imagined.
“I’ll need to do research more than just on him,” I say. “I’ll need to read about all the nuances of the Reasoner case all over again, but I need to remind you, I was in his house. There was nothing there.”
“You think I’m crazy?”
“No, not at all.” I’m trying to keep my tone neutral, but drunk divorcées that hire teenage investigators don’t exactly strike me as the most balanced social demographic. “I do think, however, that I planted an idea in your head. I also think that if you really believed this idea, you and June would have skipped town for parts unknown a long time ago.”
“I just want you to look into it,” says Claire. “The other man is still locked up, and this is just an insurance plan.”
“Is there anyone else it could have been? Anyone else that knew Mandy that the police looked into?”
“How should I know?” Claire asks, not even trying to hide her disgust. “The police never came around asking us any questions. They had their man, and that was good enough for me.”
“So why do you want me to look into Jack now?”
“You’ve seen my daughter. Can you imagine what that would be like for him if he had done it, to see the girl he murdered whenever he looked at his own daughter?”
The rest of the conversation is just a lot of smiling and nodding on my end and ranting on hers. I want to tell her that I need to go, that people are almost certainly noticing our little meeting, but I’m forced to just let the storm die out on its own. By the time Claire is done yelling and back in her car, I’ve missed a couple of pages, both from the same number. Frowning, I grab my burner and dial the number, and the quick answer is telling. History has taught me that you know you have a drug dealer’s attention when he answers on the first ring.
“Hello?”
“Hey, man, you paged me. Sorry about the wait.”
“And who the hell is this?”
I sigh. I have a strict code, no names on the phone. But Paul doesn’t care about codes, he only cares about proving to whoever’s listening that he’s in the power position. And it’s been way too long since I’ve moved weed, so I’m re
ady to compromise.
“It’s Nickel, man. I wanted to get together and talk about that thing.”
“Yeah, I know that, man,” says Paul, more bravado to back up the fact that the man has no backbone unless there’s a heater in his pants and a friend or two to impress. I know the setup already: Paul in front of a room full of class clowns turned criminals, all having a joke at my expense. I can practically smell the reefer and hear Madden through the phone.
“So can we get together soon?” I ask, hating myself for having to put up with this nonsense. I can’t believe I’m in this position. Not that it was my greed that put me here—it was all Gary’s, and it’s Gary’s mistake I’m paying double for.
Of course, Gary did get a worse end of the deal than I did. Eventually.
“Are you still holding enough to make this worth my while?” Paul asks.
“Yeah, I am, and I’m willing to work on the price. The sooner I get off of this, the better.”
There’s silence on the other end of the phone, I’m guessing for either a video game break or a bong rip, and then Paul is back. “All right, that’s good, that’s good. I want to hook up soon, see if this smoke is as good as you say it is—”
“It’s the same batch I gave you a bag of a few months ago,” I blurt out. Any possibility that he doesn’t think I’m desperate is gone now, and I wince, knowing I’m letting Dad down. I know what Dad would do with Paul and his friends, and it wouldn’t be broker a deal. This is the corner I’m in, though.