Knife Creek

by Paul Doiron

  Hurriedly, I began unfastening the heavy ballistic vest and dropped it to the ground. The olive fabric that covered the Kevlar had an expanding hole in the center that was ember red around the edges and smoking. I stamped on my vest like a man trying to kill a snake.

  Dani gazed into the white-hot center of the inferno. “Was anyone in there?”

  “I’m pretty sure they left last night. I think I scared them off when I showed up at their door.”

  “What happened?”

  “It was propane. They sealed the house up tight and then turned on the stove. The gas built up until it reached the electric light upstairs.”

  “You think this was deliberate?”

  “I know it was.”

  She began to cough into her fist. “I need to call this in.”

  The heat, even from this distance, was intense; the smoke poisonous and thick; the glare blinding. Dani got on the phone to Dispatch.

  Birnam didn’t have more than a single volunteer fire truck. The nearest department was probably in Fryeburg, twenty minutes north. If firefighters didn’t get here soon, they might find themselves facing a genuine wildfire, the kind that had rampaged through these same hills in the late forties, laying waste to dozens of homes.

  We could do nothing but wait for the engines to arrive. The fire was beyond our ability to battle.

  “This would be a good time for you to tell me what you found here last night.”

  When I’d finished recounting my activities over the past twelve hours, she frowned and crossed her arms. “You should have called Pomerleau and told her about those weird sisters.”

  “Do you really think she would have raced out here based on one of my hunches?”

  Dani considered the question for a while. “You could have been clearer in your e-mail to me, at least.”

  “I wasn’t sure you’d take me seriously either.”

  For the briefest moment her stony expression gave way and I saw real, raw emotion in her eyes. Was it disappointment? Or was it hurt?

  “You really don’t know me at all, do you, Mike?”

  * * *

  The first engine to arrive wasn’t even the Birnam town fire truck. The local volunteers must have had trouble mustering at their station. Instead it was a brand-new Pierce pumper with the town crest of Fryeburg on the driver’s door. The men who jumped off it wore heavy tan coats with fluorescent stripes around their chests. They wasted no time outfitting themselves in helmets and other gear and unspooling their fabric-covered hoses.

  A compact, square-jawed man approached us carrying his fire helmet under his arm as if it were a football. He had a salt-and-pepper flat top and the confident bearing of a fire chief.

  “Do we know if anyone was in there?” He directed the question at Dani rather than me. She was a state trooper after all, while I was a mere game warden.

  “No.”

  He adjusted the helmet on his head and fastened the chin strap. “You said it was a propane explosion? How do you know?”

  “The warden here smelled propane when he knocked at the door.”

  The chief finally made eye contact with me. “You’re damned lucky you were able to get clear in time.”

  “Warden Bowditch’s got nine lives,” Dani said with uncharacteristic amusement. It revealed dimples I had forgotten she had.

  She could come across as such a plain person, but she had one of the most beautiful smiles I had ever seen, one of those beaming grins that so thoroughly transforms the face, you can’t believe it’s even the same person.

  “Maybe you could lend a few of those extra lives to my men,” the chief said. He gazed up at the burning hillside beyond the remains of the house. As soaked as the forest was, the trees were still burning. “What about unexploded tanks?”

  “I saw three propane tanks when I was here yesterday. I assume they all went up with the initial explosion.”

  “I can’t afford to make assumptions when my men’s lives are at stake.”

  Finally, the Birnam truck came rattling down the road. We watched the outdated engine and its ragtag crew, struggling with their clumsy coats and boots. The Fryeburg chief was going to need a lot more help if he was going to stop the fire from spreading up the hillside.

  The summer had been damp so far, which was a help, but a fair number of dead and diseased trees were up on the hillside—ancient hemlocks plagued by adelgids, pines going rusty from some yet-identified scourge—and these caught fire easily. Great funnels of smoke rose into the morning sky. Sparks leaped like animate objects from one treetop to the next: a contagion of flame.

  “You ever fought a forest fire before, Mike?” Dani said in a quiet voice as she gazed upon the burgeoning inferno.

  “No. Have you?”

  “Never wanted to. I had some bad experiences with fires when I was a kid.”

  It was the first confidence I could remember her sharing with me. Dani Tate wasn’t the sort to open up about her past. Or anything else, for that matter.

  “I guess we should block off the road,” she said, “so we don’t get curiosity seekers. You should stay here. Pomerleau’s on her way over. She’s going to want to hear the whole story from you. And don’t leave anything out this time!”

  More engines arrived, accompanied by an ambulance, and multiple cruisers from the two nearest sheriff’s departments and the state police. Fryeburg even pulled some of their officers off the river to come help.

  Pomerleau appeared half an hour later. The moment she saw me, she came over. She flushed so easily, being pale, and there was no mistaking her anger. “You promised me you wouldn’t knock on doors.”

  “Technically, I promised that I would only ask about the pigs.”

  “Technically? You must have freaked them out if they decided to blow up their own house—if that’s what happened.”

  “It wasn’t their own house. It’s a rental, owned by a company called Pequawket Properties.”

  Now her anger gave way to incredulity. “How do you know that?”

  “I was curious so I did a property search. Ever heard of them?”

  “Yeah, they’re backwoods slumlords. You don’t want to know how many calls we get to rental houses owned by the Nasons.” She removed a ballpoint pen and a small notebook from the inside pocket of her blazer. “So at this stage, it could be that some drunk passed out and left the gas stove on, and God only knows how many people are dead.”

  “Or it was set up to look like an accident.”

  Her pen stopped in mid-scribble. “What are you saying?”

  “The house was sealed tighter than a drum. Who closes all their windows on the muggiest night of the summer?”

  “Maybe they had air-conditioning.”

  “I didn’t see an AC unit.”

  “Maybe you missed it.”

  “I didn’t miss it.”

  “So now you’re auditioning to be a fire marshal, too?”

  “It’s no mystery what happened here. Someone sealed up the place and turned on the propane. Eventually the gas encountered an open electrical circuit. Then bang. The renters would have known it would take days or weeks for the fire marshal to determine that no one was inside at the time of the explosion. They burned the house down to destroy any DNA evidence that might have been inside.”

  “How do we know the house was empty when it went up?”

  “I found fresh tracks leading into and out of the drive. They weren’t there last night. The treads coming out were deeper—like the truck had been loaded up.”

  She shook her head in disbelief. “You wardens.”

  Evidently, even Ellen Pomerleau wasn’t immune from the elitism that was so common among state troopers. It left me feeling more disappointed in her than aggrieved.

  “We do our best,” I said.

  She coughed into her fist as a cloud of ash drifted by. “Tate told me you saw two women inside the house last night.”

  “The older one called herself Becky. I didn’t get the
other’s name. Becky said they were sisters, but I don’t think they were. And they were both wearing crimson wigs.”

  She stopped writing again. “OK.…”

  “I don’t think they were playing around with them. I think they were wearing them for real—like they put them on as disguises when they heard me drive up.”

  “Any obvious identifying marks? Aside from the fake hair, I mean.”

  I described them as best I could.

  “So what made you so sure that the younger one was the mom of our Baby Jane Doe?”

  “At first, I wasn’t. I just knew there was something wrong with her. She seemed drugged. And she had this strange expression on her face when she looked at me.”

  “Do you mean she looked guilty?”

  “No.”

  “Afraid that she might have been found out?”

  “No.”

  “Remind me never to recommend you as a witness in court.”

  Out of frustration I blurted out what I hadn’t even consciously realized. “She looked like she wanted me to rescue her.”

  She slid her pen behind her ear. “Explain to me what that expression looks like, please.”

  “She had this helplessness about her. Have you ever visited an animal shelter and seen a dog that no one wants to adopt?”

  “So she reminded you of a mutt?”

  “I’m speaking metaphorically.”

  “Metaphorically. Now, there’s a word I’ve never heard come out of a game warden’s mouth before. Hunches aren’t leads, Bowditch.”

  I knew Pomerleau was only teasing me, but I felt a need to defend myself. “What convinced me that she was the infant’s mother was a conversation I had this morning. I stopped at Fales Variety on my way over here and saw they had a display of baseball shirts with the same MLB.com collar tags as the shirt we found wrapped around the cadaver. I spoke with Mrs. Fales and she remembers selling a pink Red Sox shirt to a woman matching Becky’s description. Does that qualify as a solid lead?”

  The amusement melted from Pomerleau’s face. “Yeah, I would say that qualifies.”

  “You might want to have someone interview Mrs. Fales. But what do I know? I’m just a game warden.”

  The detective studied me quietly for a while. “I was out of line before. It sounds like you found something that’s potentially helpful. I’ll talk with Mrs. Fales myself. Do you think you can describe these women well enough for us to get sketches using the Identikit?”

  In an earlier era, police departments employed artists to draw the rough portraits of suspected criminals and missing persons. Now, as with everything else, they used computers to create facial composites. Some of the cops I knew didn’t have much use for Identikits; they said the programs ended up making faces look the same. I’d seen “Becky” clearly enough and had confidence I could describe her features well enough to get a decent likeness. But her shy “sister” might be more of a problem.

  “I think so,” I said.

  Just then Dani’s cruiser came speeding back up the road, lights flashing, followed by a crystal-white SUV. The Cadillac SRX Crossover looked as if it had been washed and waxed only hours earlier. I noticed that it had a New Hampshire plate: LIVE FREE OR DIE. What Granite Stater was important enough that Tate would have provided the person with a police escort onto the scene of a fully involved fire?

  Pomerleau seemed to know the answer. “How did they get here so fast?”

  Both vehicles stopped. Dani emerged from her Interceptor and fastened on her campaign hat.

  Then a chunky, middle-aged man climbed out from behind the wheel of the Cadillac. He paused a full minute, spellbound by the raging fire, before circling around the front of the SUV. He was dressed in a dress shirt that had come untucked in back, pleated chinos, and heavily scuffed work boots that didn’t match his office casual outfit. Strands of black hair were combed across his mostly bald head and stuck there with some gluelike substance.

  He opened the passenger door and stretched out his arm to the person behind the tinted windshield. I got a glimpse of jewels on the tiny hand taking his. Then a tight-faced woman stepped out from behind the door. She had blue-black hair styled like that of Michelangelo’s statue of David, skeleton arms visible to her shoulders thanks to a sleeveless white blouse, tight pants that did nothing to flatter her skinny legs, and a neck no wider than one of my biceps.

  “Who are they?” I asked Pomerleau.

  “Deanna Nason and her son Steven. They own Pequawket Properties. This is one of their rental houses—or it used to be.”

  12

  The mother required that her son hold her hand elevated as she walked, like a queen crossing a puddle with the assistance of a courtier.

  As they approached us, Pomerleau leaned close to Dani. “Who called them?”

  “I have no idea, ma’am.”

  “Well, someone must have called them.” Pomerleau removed the pen from behind her ear and stepped forward to intercept the mother and son. “Mrs. Nason! I didn’t expect to see you here so soon.”

  “Why not? It’s our house.” For all her gold jewelry and regal airs, her accent was pure trailer park. You don’t see much plastic surgery among Maine people, but Deanna Nason had a face less expressive than a Halloween mask. Her gaze drifted disinterestedly toward the conflagration.

  “I’m Detective Pomerleau with the Maine State Police. This is Trooper Tate and Warden Bowditch.”

  Deanna Nason had irises the color of a greenhead horsefly. Colored contacts, of course. “What a horrible, horrible thing. I hope the Cobbs weren’t at home when it exploded.”

  “The Cobbs?”

  “Our tenants.”

  Pomerleau flipped open her notebook again. “You wouldn’t happen to know their full names?”

  “Do you remember, Steven?” the mother asked.

  His eyes were dog brown, with utterly no light behind them. “Frank and Rebecca.”

  Pomerleau made a note. “So they were a married couple?”

  “Yeah, I guess,” the son said.

  “Well, if they weren’t brother and sister—” The detective took a breath to stop herself from going down the rabbit hole. “Did they provide you with identification as part of the rental agreement? Social Security numbers? Driver’s licenses? That sort of thing.”

  The mother stroked her son on the arm. “Steven, go get that file folder for the police officers that Mama asked you to bring.”

  He shuffled back to the Cadillac.

  “You brought a copy of the rental agreement with you?” I asked, unable to contain my disbelief.

  Deanna seemed perplexed—both by my official capacity here as a game warden and by the question itself. “When we heard about the explosion, we knew you’d need all the information in our files.”

  Pomerleau interceded before I could chime in again. “Who called you about the fire, Mrs. Nason?”

  “I wouldn’t know. My son answered the phone.” Deanna turned to us with an expression that begged indulgence. “Until recently all he handled for me was building maintenance. My younger son, Christopher, used to help with the business side of things, but lately I’ve been trying to pass responsibilities over to Steven.” Her son returned with a thin manila folder. His mother cooed, “Baby, who called you about the fire?”

  “A policeman.”

  Pomerleau, Tate, and I did a round-robin of glances.

  The detective accepted the folder from Steven’s hands. They were thick and callused from a lifetime of manual labor. “Do you remember the policeman’s name?” she asked.

  “He didn’t say.”

  I could guess what Pomerleau was thinking: Who would give the Nasons a heads-up that one of their rental properties had just gone kaboom? And why?

  Deanna removed a tissue from her pocket and pressed it to her nose as if the fumes from the distant fire might overwhelm her delicate constitution. “So were the Cobbs inside when it happened?”

  Pomerleau said, “I’m afraid we do
n’t know yet. The firefighters are still fighting the blaze, as you can see.”

  “Well, do you know what caused it?”

  “That’s for the fire marshal to determine, ma’am—again, after the fire has been extinguished.”

  “But it had to have been their fault. We maintain all of our properties above and beyond the fire codes. Isn’t that right, Steven?”

  “Yes, Mama.”

  Their reactions were so bizarre: Deanna Nason had barely acknowledged the dramatic incineration of her own property. Her son meanwhile kept staring at it with the mesmerized look of a Neanderthal gazing into the first man-made fire he’d ever seen.

  Pomerleau flipped through the rental agreement. “This is everything?”

  “What else would there be?”

  “Copies of their driver’s licenses. Credit-report information. Canceled bank checks. All I see here is a four-page agreement signed by Rebecca Cobb and you, Mr. Nason.” Pomerleau pointed the tip of her pen at Steven’s sternum.

  The mother interrupted, “We don’t require that sort of personal information if the renters seem like good country people. And as for payment, many of our tenants use money orders, so there is no need to keep copies.”

  “I would think the IRS would require receipts,” the detective said.

  “Are you implying something about our business practices? Because we run an ethical business. If you want to speak with our accountants, I can give you their names.”

  Pomerleau drew a breath. “This agreement is dated almost a year ago. Is that how long the Cobbs have rented from you, or is this a renewal?”

  “I have no idea,” Deanna said. “Whatever is in the folder is in the folder.”

  “Do you remember, Mr. Nason?”

  The slow-moving man said, “I don’t remember. You should ask Chris.”

  The suggestion brought a flash of color to the mother’s immovable cheeks. “Steven, let’s not drag your brother into this, please.”

  “What can you tell us about the Cobbs?” Pomerleau asked with a patience I found saintlike. “Do you know where they work?”

  “She said he’s in the merchant marine,” said Steven. “He’s at sea most of the time.”