Fire and Flint

by Andrew Grey

  Judge Crawford stood behind his desk. “I saw you escort someone out of court.”

  “Yes. He looked suspicious and I talked to him. I don’t believe he had anything to do with the letters.” He wasn’t going into anything else. Pierre reminded himself that as far as Judge Crawford was concerned, he was here to look into that incident and make sure the court and the judge remained secure, and that was what he was going to stick to.

  “Then why was he here?” It seemed Crawford wasn’t buying his explanation.

  Pierre kept his cool. “He wanted to see how the court worked. Personally, I think he was tired and looking for a place to sit out of the rain for a while.” Mother Nature had conveniently provided that explanation, as water ran down the windows of the judge’s office. “I have his contact information in my notes, and we’ll look further, of course.”

  “Sounds like a pat answer.” Crawford placed his hands on his hips, robes fluttering.

  “We want to find out who sent the letters, and chasing down rabbit holes isn’t going to get us any closer.” Nor was pinning the situation on just anyone who might fit the bill. “I have some leads to follow up after you leave court.” That was the truth. “Are you going to be in your office for a while?”

  “No. I’ve already called for my car, and they’ll be out front in ten minutes.” Crawford unsnapped his robe and hung it up. Then Pierre escorted him down and out of the building. He’d really like to be able to speak with his private security people, but he doubted he was going to be able to get access to them. It would be interesting to know the judge’s movements once he left court.

  Pierre returned to where Jordan was working and flopped into a chair. “I need to run down the leads from the list you sent me. I’ll call you tonight once I get home, but it might be late.”

  “As long as you call.” Jordan flashed him a warm smile that faded when a woman came into the office. She was haggard and looked as though she hadn’t slept in a while. “May I help you?” Jordan asked her as patiently and gently as if he were speaking to Jeremiah.

  Pierre moved away and listened, not wanting to interfere.

  “I don’t know who I’m supposed to speak with…. My son… he passed away a few days ago.” She pulled a tissue out of her purse and blew her nose. “He was supposed to appear in two days, but he obviously won’t be able to. What do I need to do?” Her hands shook, and Pierre felt so sorry for her.

  “All you need to do is go down the hall to the clerk of court’s office. It’s two doors down. They’ll need paperwork, but I’m sure they can help you.” Jordan stood and offered his arm. “I’ll walk you down if you want.”

  “Thank you.” She took Jordan’s arm, and he left the office with her.

  Pierre sat down, shaking his head. How anyone could possibly want to make trouble for Jordan was beyond him. He helped people he didn’t know because they were hurting. Pierre gripped the arm of the chair, wondering how heartless Judge Crawford could possibly be.

  Jordan returned, and Pierre kissed him as soon as he closed the door. “You never cease to amaze me.” Jordan seemed confused, so he added, “You don’t even realize you’re doing it, do you?”

  “What?” Jordan looked at him like Pierre was a little crazy or something.

  “Taking care of people.” He pulled him into a hug, determined to help Jordan and keep him safe. Each day he spent with him, Pierre lost another piece of his heart to Jordan. “I’ll call tonight, and you be careful. I’ll have my cell with me. Just call if you need anything.” After spending last evening and night together, Pierre felt weird about leaving him. Being with Jordan was natural and brought comfort to his usually haggard, lonely life.

  Pierre headed out to his car. Once he got there, he opened the trunk and pulled out the list of people who might have a particular grudge against the judge. Now he had to try to track them down. The other deputies had noted any information that could be found, including most recent addresses, and Pierre started with the ones he thought might be the easiest.

  THREE STOPS later, he’d made no progress. One of the people, Lydia Hansen, no longer lived at the address he had for her and apparently had left town three months earlier for Phoenix, according to the tenants in the house now. Another had been out of town visiting his mother in Sacramento for the last month. Those he was fairly safe in crossing off his list for now, and the details would be easy enough to verify.

  Yet another answered the door with his right arm in a cast and the left in a sort of sling. Carter Levitt had been in an accident and was just regaining the use of his arms and hands. Pierre also reminded himself that the letters were mailed from all over, and by the look of the house, the man hadn’t been out in weeks. Pierre left that house and checked his watch. He needed to get moving if he was going to make it to one more house before it got too late.

  Pierre ran through a Burger King drive-through and ate in a rush in the car before heading to the last location of the night, in Mechanicsburg. He pulled up to a well-maintained ranch house with clean paint and a spotless driveway. Everything about this house said that someone cared a great deal about where they lived. Every shrub was trimmed neatly, and the flower beds were weed-free. He parked at the curb and got out, looking over the near-perfect landscape, and then walked up the drive. A dark blue pickup truck sat outside the garage door. It wasn’t brand-new, but like the rest of the property, it was beautifully maintained. What captured his attention was the orange and blue FedEx bumper sticker on the back. He continued up to the front door and rang the bell.

  A woman answered the door, paling when she saw him. “Kyle isn’t here right now. He hasn’t done anything wrong.”

  “I haven’t said he did, but… I would like to speak with him.”

  “What about?” She kept the screen door closed.

  “Do you want to do this with a police officer standing on your front porch?” he asked. It was a way to get inside. She stepped back and he went inside, which was as neat as the outside. “Are you Kyle’s wife?”

  “Arlene Oistin,” she supplied. “What can I do for you?”

  “The truck in the driveway….”

  “That’s my truck. I drive it back and forth to work. Why?” Her eyes narrowed as she became suspicious.

  “Then you work for Federal Express,” Pierre stated, seeing the beginning of a possible outline.

  She nodded. “What’s that got to do with Kyle? He hasn’t been able to get a job in months, even though we were able to clear his name, eventually. No one wants to hire him or cares that he was innocent. I worked at FedEx part-time for five years, and when a full-time position opened up, I took it.”

  Pierre nodded. He understood that. It sounded a lot like the story Norman had told him earlier in the day about his brother. What the fuck was going on?

  “What is your husband doing now?” Pierre asked.

  “He’s been doing landscaping work. He did our yard, and some of the neighbors and friends have asked him to work on theirs, but it’s hard for him after having had a steady job.” She leaned forward. “Why do you want to know? What is it you’re after?”

  “I’m following up cases handled by Judge Crawford. He’s been receiving threatening notes, and we’re trying to discover the source.” He watched her closely as her eyes darkened. He’d hit on something, especially as she watched him and realization dawned. “What do you know?” He had to press it.

  “Nothing…,” she answered quickly.

  “Mrs. Oistin…,” he said, using a cautionary tone. “The letters have come in from all over the area. Did your husband give you letters to mail?”

  “He said he had to send things to the court and….” She turned away.

  Pierre gentled his tone. “Tell me what you know. When did he start sending things to the court?”

  She grew nervous. “Two, three weeks ago. He gave me the letters, and I dropped them in boxes while I was out making deliveries. I didn’t know what was in them. I thought it was offici
al business and….” Her shoulders slumped. “He gave me one today, but I forgot about it and left it in the truck.”

  She stood and Pierre did the same. He followed her out, and she unlocked the truck door and opened the glove compartment, then handed him a sealed envelope. It certainly looked like the other ones, with the address typed and no return address.

  “Didn’t you think it strange that there was no return address?” He pointed to the corner.

  “I didn’t notice.” She was clearly rattled, so Pierre didn’t push it. He wasn’t here to give her any trouble. Arlene was acting as her husband’s courier and doing her best to provide for the family.

  “All right.” Pierre opened the envelope and carefully pulled out the page inside. It took seconds for him to know he’d identified the letter writer. “Can we go back inside? I’d like you to call your husband and find out where he is. Don’t say anything about my visit.”

  “How much trouble is he in?”

  “Threatening a judge is a serious crime, ma’am.” Pierre sighed. “But cooperation can make things easier.”

  She nodded, and they went back inside. Arlene called her husband, and from what Pierre heard, it sounded like Kyle was on his way home.

  “Please meet him with me and ask him to talk to me.” He was taking a chance, but Pierre was hoping to get some more information out of the letter writer than just the fact that he had sent the letters.

  She agreed and Pierre went outside. An older tan Ford sedan pulled near the house, and Pierre watched the driver, in his early forties like Arlene, pause. He caught his eye and the car pulled into the driveway.

  “Kyle, what have you done?” Arlene demanded as soon as he got out of the car. “I saw the letter you asked me to send. What were you thinking?” Anger rolled off her. “After all we did to prove your innocence and to try to rebuild our lives, you do this….” Pierre thought she was going to hit him.

  Kyle folded like a house of cards right there in front of her. His head bent forward, and Pierre felt sorry for him.

  “Why don’t you come with me to the station and we can talk?” Pierre had seen men fight like panthers when they were cornered. He’d seen them try to bully or plead when they had been caught dead to rights and were being taken to the station. Kyle was none of those. He seemed like a man whose legs had been completely knocked out from under him and who was too tired and beaten down to fight.

  Pierre opened the back door of the cruiser, and Kyle got in. Then he closed it and walked around to the driver’s side of the car.

  “What should I do?” Arlene asked.

  “Come to the station in about an hour,” he said gently before he got in and pulled away from the house, heading back to the station. He called ahead to let them know he was bringing in someone for questioning and was told that an interview room would be ready and waiting.

  Pierre parked and walked an extremely docile Kyle Oistin into the building. He hadn’t arrested him yet because he wanted to know more about what he’d done, and he figured that would only aggravate him. Pierre went right to the interview room and made sure Kyle was reasonably comfortable before leaving him to go speak to his boss.

  “I hear we have our letter writer in the conference room,” Sheriff Hunter said as he approached the office.

  “Yeah,” Pierre said.

  “You don’t sound excited.”

  “I am and I’m not.” Pierre went in and closed the door. “I feel sorry for the guy. I know I’m not supposed to, but I do. He’s like a puppy that’s been kicked and kicked until it wants to roll over and die.” He told the sheriff about Norman from court earlier, and what Arlene had told him. “Those stories are so similar, it’s scary. How many other lives has Crawford screwed over?”

  “We don’t know anything for sure, and we need to keep the broader implications to ourselves for now. We’ll tell the judge that we’ve found the letter writer and explain the situation.” Sheriff Hunter grinned. “Let me think about how you should explain things to the judge. In the meantime, find out what you can from your suspect about why he was sending the letters.”

  “I will.” Pierre left and returned to the interview room with two cans of soda. He handed one to Kyle and sat down across from him, popping his open. “Why don’t you tell me why you sent the notes?” He figured it was best to get to the heart of the matter.

  “He ruined my life,” Kyle said softly, all fight gone, not that he had any to begin with. He seemed almost fragile, like he was going to fall apart any second. “I was at the Gingerbread House in Mechanicsburg. I had been passed over for promotion at work and was feeling pretty bad, so I had more than I should have had to drink. I know that now, and I wasn’t thinking clearly. Some guys I knew were there with me. I probably would have called them friends then, but I know better now. We got loud and boisterous, so they stopped serving us and started herding us out the door. One of the other guys, Mason, looks sort of like me—same build and hair color, I guess. I never noticed then. He stumbled out of the bar and bumped into another guy. They started fighting, and the guy I was with pulled out a knife and stabbed him. He cut the guy pretty bad, at least that’s what they said in court.” Kyle lowered his head, his shoulders shaking. Pierre knew he was crying, and it wasn’t hard for him to imagine the heartache he was going through.

  “What happened after that?” he asked softly, not wanting to stop his flow, but needing him to move forward.

  “The guy who was stabbed fingered me. I was there and he must have seen me and thought I was the stabber. I was so drunk and out of it, I wasn’t sure what had happened. They threw me in jail, and we had to get a lawyer. They had the victim as a witness against me, but eventually my mind cleared enough for me to remember bits and pieces. This Mason guy split town, and I was left holding the bag. No one else remembered that there was anyone else there, and I was blamed.”

  Kyle raised his head. “I eventually came before Judge Crawford, and he threw the book at me. We brought witnesses who said that there were other people, and I even testified because I had to tell my story. They tried to refute me, but I stuck to my story and told the court about Mason and described him. At least I tried. The defense kept harping on the fact that I was drunk, and Judge Crawford disallowed parts of my testimony or something. He fucking agreed with them that I was unreliable, and said as much. I was done and I knew it, and sure enough, I went to prison for something I didn’t do. Arlene, bless her heart, she believed me and stuck with me, getting a job and a new lawyer, who appealed. He found new witnesses and tracked down Mason, who was in jail in Pittsburgh. Got him to confess. All the charges were dropped, and I was declared innocent and got to go home.” He started crying again, and dammit, Pierre could feel his own emotions rising. “I thought I’d be able to go back to my own life, but I couldn’t. No one would hire me, so I do yard work and whatever I can do. I… I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to make sure he knew what he did. The bastard doesn’t care who he hurts, whose life he ruins.” Finally Kyle showed some fight, and it was good to see.

  “Can you tell me anything more about this Mason?” Pierre asked. Something smelled funny for him there, but he couldn’t put a finger on it.

  “His name is Mason Deringer, or something like that. He’s a relative of the former mayor of Mechanicsburg, Vernon Dipple. Arlene said Dipple didn’t run for reelection and decided to retire to Florida.”

  Pierre excused himself and left the interview room. He called the sheriff and waited for him to come down.

  “What do you have?”

  “It’s pretty bad. It seems that the judge was doing some favors, at least ones he thought he could get away with, for friends of his. Kyle Oistin is our letter writer. He couldn’t take the judge getting away with what he was doing. I think he wanted to scare him, and it worked. I need to verify his story, but I can do that easily enough.” Pierre recapped what Kyle told him quickly.

  “You’re right. Verification will take minutes. Give me the names, an
d we’ll get on it.”

  Pierre wrote them down, along with an overview of what Kyle had said. “It seems the guilty party, who skipped the state, is a relative of the former mayor of Mechanicsburg, and I saw the judge having dinner with the mayor of Carlisle and the head of borough council.” He still needed to speak with Judge Fortier, and mentally put that on his list of things to do in the morning. “I need to dig deeper, but we may have influence peddling on a huge scale.”

  Sheriff Hunter groaned. “Shit, just what we all need. The press will have a field day with this.” His expression hardened. “You need to get on this fast, damn fast, because as soon as anyone gets wind of this, they’re going to be doing their own investigations and guilty parties are going to slip out of our jurisdiction.” He stepped closer. “We will clean up our own mess, and we aren’t going to have the state get involved. I will not have another Harrisburg mess.” Or have something that could be used against him at reelection. If the sheriff’s department got to the bottom of this, it would be a win in the people’s minds, but if someone else did, then they’d get part of the blame.

  “I’m on it.”

  “I’ll get people checking out the story.” The sheriff turned away, and Pierre went back inside and sat down.

  “I need you to help me write a statement of what happened at your trial. We’re going to pull the records, but I need to know all of the facts from you. I will do my best to keep you out of the press and spotlight, but we need your help.”

  “Wh… wh… what about the letters?” Kyle asked.

  “I think we’re going to hold you here until tomorrow. I need to talk to the judge and see if he really wants to press charges.” An idea was forming in Pierre’s mind that just might get Kyle off the hook for that without alerting Crawford. It was going to take him walking a tightrope, but it was possible.

  PIERRE TOOK care of the paperwork and then brought Kyle to a private holding cell, with a request that he wasn’t to be with any other detainees. He met with Arlene and explained what was happening to him and that so far he was only being held pending the judge’s decision to press charges.