Bored, I saw an ad to study photography with master photographer and teacher Jules Antoine and remembered how important taking pictures had been for me in high school. I scraped together my waitressing tips and enrolled in one of Jules’ one-on-one classes. That was when my picture taking took on a new dimension and photography became a passion. I prowled the streets of New York taking black and white photos with an old-fashioned Rolleiflex 6 x 6 that I’d picked up cheap in a secondhand store. Although I’d moved up to more high-tech cameras, I still relied on my old Rollei to get special black and white effects.
Jules was a master photographer of people. He made amazing art out of men and women going about their daily business, translating his emotions into visual form. He taught that a curious, caring approach allows one to open up to the camera. I applied his principles, not only in my “artsy” photographs, but in my wedding ones as well. I’d always wanted to turn Jules loose at one of my Minnesota weddings, to see how he would turn trite, posed pictures into interesting, alive art. The fact that my wedding business increased every year, while featuring unstaged pictures, suggested I’d been reasonably successful. At any rate, some of my more incautious actions had put me on a pretty good track. If I hadn’t acted on impulse, I’d probably still be waiting tables.
Photoshop was teasing me as insistently as Strothers’ SUV had tempted me in the driveway of the farmhouse. I couldn’t hope for perfection, given the circumstances, but maybe I’d find something I could use. Photo #2 was dark, as expected. I manipulated it as much as I could, pulling out every trick for brightness, contrast, and balance. No luck. I couldn’t bring up any image at all. When I added brightness to the third photo, however, a few lines began to take shape. Unable to figure out what I was seeing, I added some contrast, zooming in as far as I could go without losing the focus. A series of lines emerged, but I couldn’t tell if the lines were scratches or something else. I printed the enlarged image to get a better look. Taking the paper off the printer, I pinned it to the wall and stepped back. I was looking at vertical lines that could or could not be scratches.
Great. I had risked life and limb, and this was all I had to show for it. So much for my midnight caper. My detective skills had a long way to go. Better not quit your day job, Cassandra, I thought, while toting my empty coffee cup back into the kitchen.
It was only 8:20 a.m., but I set about spending the next hour industriously dusting and pushing the vacuum over the floors and carpeting. Whoever my parents were, they hadn’t passed down a cleaning gene to their daughter. I cranked up the CD player, hoping to drown out depressing thoughts with music from the Chicago soundtrack, stuffed another load into the washer, and plodded over to the closet for my meager housecleaning supplies. I worked in tempo to “When You’re Good to Mama,” and, at least temporarily, shelved images of myself decked out in prison orange.
As I transferred my first load of wash to the dryer and threw my jeans into the washer, something clinked against the bottom of the washer. I felt around for the errant quarter or dime I must have missed when going through the pockets. It wasn’t a coin or even a big button. To my utter surprise, it was a hundred-dollar CF memory card from my digital camera. I stared at it, bringing the palm of my hand closer to my face. What was on the chip? I couldn’t remember misplacing any wedding pictures. I stuffed the card into the pocket of my shirt and packed the rest of my jeans into the washer. Then, curiosity outstripping my need to do any more cleaning, I took the card to my office.
Once I had fired up my Mac, I fed the errant card into the card reader. I punched “Import Photos” on my computer and dozens of thumbnail images filled the screen. Pictures of buckskin- and calico-clad characters emerged. Ah, a card I’d shot up at the Rendezvous. I vaguely remembered slipping it into the watch pocket of my jeans and replacing it with a new one when I returned to my vehicle while waiting for the tomahawk competition to start. I’d taken so many photos at the Rendezvous, I hadn’t missed the shots on this wayward card.
The photos made me smile despite the Rendezvous turn of events. Hundreds of local citizens had earnestly tried to turn back the clock for one weekend out of their busy twenty-first century lives. I went to work creating files for separate categories. Trades-people—silversmiths, leather workers, blacksmiths—went into one file. The tomahawk-throwing competition got its own. Children went into another. I created files for women, gear, campsites, and goods.
With most of the photos categorized, I looked more closely at the dozen left over. I had snapped several to simply fill up the disc on the way to the parking lot for new batteries. I zoomed in on them, one by one, to see if they would fit into one of the other categories, or if they even deserved to be saved. Pictures of vehicles in a parking lot left me cold, creatively speaking.
After reviewing a half dozen mind-numbing photos, I was ready to tuck the rest, unviewed, into a catchall category, when a few marks on a pickup door caught my eye. Zooming in on the vehicle’s door, I saw why they seemed familiar. They were the same lines I had photographed in the farmyard! In this photo, however, the lines were clearly part of a company logo . . . Bridgewater Land Development Company.
My heart was playing a drum solo as a startling thought reached my consciousness. A Bridgewater truck in the Rendezvous parking lot could place Strothers at the event! The photo might be enough to convince Shaw of the value in investigating him and dropping his focus on me. My hand trembled as I reached for the phone and punched in Jack’s number. No one answered at the stables. I punched in his cell phone number. He answered on the first ring. “Jack, where are you?” I practically shouted into the phone. “I tried calling you at the stables.”
“I’m just coming in from the pasture,” he said, audibly breathless. “I’m about to ride out to look for Jim Tuttle, Frank Kyopa’s nephew.”
“What do you mean?”
“He’s been missing for several days.”
“Is . . . is that unusual?”
“He’s sometimes gone for a couple of days to tend a trap line, but he didn’t show up for his job as county dispatcher and that’s not like him. I’m worried.”
“I have something I need to talk to you about, Jack. If you saddle Midnight for me, I’ll ride with you. Please wait for me.” A half hour later, I was seated on Midnight’s back. I suggested we search in a direction where I hadn’t ridden before.
“It’s kind of wild in there, Cass,” Jack said, eying the heavy brush. “I don’t think we should . . . .”
But Midnight had committed himself. We followed the faint trace of a path that led to somewhere in the middle of the island. Sometimes the trail was so narrow, branches threatened to pull me out of the saddle. I filled Jack in on finding Strothers’ truck in the photos.
“That’s intriguing, Cass, but merely because you see his company truck doesn’t mean he was there himself. An employee could have been using the vehicle. You’ll need a photo of Strothers at the event.” Jack pushed a branch from his face.
“I’ve got tons of photos to go through,” I said. “I’ll keep looking.”
Jack was feeling apprehensive and wanted to get off the trail. “I can’t believe Jim would be out here, Cass. Let’s turn around.”
“Even if we wanted to, we couldn’t,” I said, moving forward. “There’s no room to maneuver. Midnight is skitterish enough. I can see the glimmer of a pond up ahead. Let’s at least go there, let the horses refresh themselves, and then turn back.”
“I don’t think that’s wise,” Jack insisted. “We’ll get bogged down in the muck.” He had no more than said that than the trail opened to an expanse of tall, reedy green plants. A narrow shelf of ground looked as if it would allow us to skirt the area. “See . . . I told you, Cass. We can’t get through that mess. Don’t even try.” He reined his horse around.
“Okay,” I conceded. “I’ll just ride along the edge a couple feet and find a better place to turn.” As Midnight stepped into the clearing, I saw an old oak tree dominating th
e tiny patch of land on a slight knoll. “We’re not the only ones who have been here, Jack,” I said, pointing to a ring of rocks. ”Someone has built a fire out here.” Midnight kicked a muddy Budweiser can out of the way. “Drinking, I might add.”
Jack drew abreast of me and we listened to the sounds of swamp insects and the occasional croak of a frog, while peering more closely around us. “Whatever they were cooking out here doesn’t smell very appetizing,” Jack said, wrinkling his nose.
“It smells more like something died.” I covered my nose with my hand. “Maybe a coyote brought down a deer. Come on, Midnight, let’s go home.” I lay the reins on his neck and was about to turn him around when something caught my eye. “Jack, look over there. What’s that?” I pointed. “Over there by the tree.”
Both of us inched forward. When we were about ten yards from the tree, Jack stopped. “Oh, shit!” he said. He put out his hand to stop my progress.. “Cass, go for help. I’ll wait here.”
* * *
Friday Evening
The corpse was that of Frank Kyopa’s nephew, Jim Tuttle. He had been hanging from the century-old oak tree for three days. His hands were bound behind him with a length of the same rope found around his neck—a hand-braided rawhide rope. Jim was thirty years old and left a wife and two young children.
Law enforcement was not amused that I had turned up at the scene of the third body to be found in Clayton County in less than two weeks. By now, the sheriff’s interrogation was so familiar that, with Lawton Sanders by my side, I anticipated most of the questions and answered them automatically. As I left the station and headed for home, I was surprised to see the sun still shining. For too long, I had felt I was walking under a dark cloud and that cloud had stubbornly followed me since I’d found Eric Hartfield’s body. Even my “Cassandra” mantra had failed to drive it away.
I’d always reveled in my name, telling myself I was special and destined to be more than ordinary. If not, wouldn’t my mother have given me a common name? Mary, maybe, but surely not Cassandra. Since childhood, I’ve chanted it to myself over and over whenever I was feeling stressed, like an affirmation that I’d get through my predicament. “Ca-SAN-dra, Ca-SAN-dra, Ca-SAN-dra,” I’d chant, to the rhythm of my bike tires. The mantra usually relaxed me, but, today, it taunted me. After finding three bodies, I was beginning to think the Greeks had the more correct interpretation of my name. Cassandra: prophet of doom.
The seemingly senseless killing of Jim Tuttle didn’t sit well with the citizens of Colton Mills. While Randy’s murder had finally driven them to lock their doors, stock up on ammunition, and stay inside, this third murder seemed to drive them into pressuring law enforcement to work harder. At least the press was indicating this change in attitude. It was clear to anyone with half a brain that a serial killer was in their midst. As I listened to updates of the murder on TV, it appeared the police didn’t have a clue or motive for any of the three murders. Thankfully, few citizens knew that I was on Shaw’s list of suspects. Otherwise, they’d probably be pounding on my door.
The only way to keep from dwelling on that fact was to concentrate on what I could do to help myself. My mind drifted to the paltry evidence I had that put Strothers near the scene of the Rendezvous murder. I had found a digital photo of his vehicle on a CF card the sheriff didn’t know I had. I was reluctant to turn it over to him. Two weeks had passed between the time of Eric’s murder and my discovering the photo card in my pants pocket. Shaw would surely make something of it, like charging me with withholding evidence . . . or something worse.
It probably wasn’t the smartest decision I’d ever made, but I hadn’t even mentioned finding the digital photos to my attorney. Fearing what Shaw would do with the information outweighed the fact that I should share it with Sanders, even though I’d had the opportunity to do so at the station. I hated the feeling that, along with everything else this case was doing to me, I was growing mistrustful of almost everyone.
I was determined not to become a powerless victim, though. No one cared more about clearing my name than I did. But . . . I was a professional photographer and not a detective. I was a long way from being a candidate for the Detective Hall of Fame. Instead of digging myself out of a hole, my lame detection attempts had proven fruitless. I was digging a deeper hole. I’d stepped out of character, photographing car doors in the middle of the night. And what did I have to show for it? Nada. Not only had I failed to acquire any overpowering evidence, I had left evidence behind. Feeling somewhat encouraged that I hadn’t received a visit or call from Strothers about the shirt, I found myself wanting to believe I had lucked out. Perhaps he couldn’t link it to me, because he had never paid enough attention to me to know I was usually dressed in red.
As I parked my Jeep in the garage of the carriage house, I wondered for the hundredth time what evidence Shaw had on me, or if he was only bluffing, as Sanders seemed to think. When would the other shoe drop and when would I become an official suspect in Randy and Jim’s murders?
Chapter 19
Saturday—Week Two
My feet hadn’t touched the floor of my bedroom, before I was dreading what the day would bring. Should I spend it indoors poring over the Rendezvous pictures on the digital card? What I needed was to get out of the house and clear my head. The weather report on the late night news had predicted a sunny day in the low eighties. It would be a perfect day to try one of my favorite places—Tall Pines National Park, where an Orienteering meet was being held. I could get off the beaten track and do some hiking, and yet be in the midst of people having fun. I laced up my red Lands End hiking boots, looking forward to what I hoped would be a mind-clearing walk.
Despite my determination to enjoy the day, I spent almost as much time peering in my rear view mirror as I did driving down the county road to the park. No one seemed to be following me, so I focused, instead, on the towering trees lining the winding driveway up to the park’s main building. They soothed me. I found a spot in the crowded parking lot, slid out from under the wheel, and did a runner’s stretch against my car. I grabbed the camera on my car seat (I have to have at least one camera or I feel undressed), pulled the strap over my head, and started out by the trail signage arrow. It was a good ten degrees cooler under the majestic Big Woods canopy.
The trail I selected wound upward and circled through the woods. Between the trees, I caught glimpses of brightly clad orienteering participants jogging to one of the orange nylon control boxes that dangled from a branch. Their presence reassured me, and I trekked on resolutely, willing myself to forget the events of the past month.
A woman in a blue and orange skin-tight suit jogged by, topographical map in hand, and veered off into the woods, seeking the next box. I knew a little about orienteering. The participant who best combined reading the topographic map with compass reading, and worked out the shortest route through the woods from start to finish was the winner. Participants negotiated the route from “control” to “control,” punching their cards at each box. Finishers had their cards completely punched.
I liked the way the structure combined running with a kind of treasure hunt, and the fact that it had little to do with teamwork, a principle that seemed to challenge my compatibility. I decided I might join a local “O” club, as soon as the mess I was in blew over. The way my life was going now, however, I’d probably get lost in the woods and never find my way out. Picturing myself all suited up in a red and black jogging suit, it suddenly dawned on me that I no longer saw any orienteering runners. I had slogged beyond the boundaries of the course.
Damn. Better reverse. I turned to retrace my steps. That’s when I saw him. The man was coming—make that trudging—up the trail toward me. He was still too far away to identify his features, but I immediately spotted the farmer-style jeans and red suspenders. I stopped dead in my tracks. Where should I go? Did I have to stay on the path? Did he recognize me, too?
The man in question stopped to mop his brow. Then he plod
ded up the hill, head down. My eyes never left him and my imagination went wild. Hundreds of old men wore overalls and suspenders. At least dozens of them liked the color red. Maybe the suspenders had been a Christmas gift. Maybe the old gentleman was on a picnic with the family and simply getting away from the grandchildren for a few minutes.
At that moment, he lifted his head and saw me staring at him. He stopped with a jolt and stared back at me. He’s not just another hiker in the woods. He’s the man at the farmhouse with Strothers. I think. Isn’t he? He stood perfectly still, straddling the trail so I’d have to either walk through or around him to get past. Winded as he appeared to be, he didn’t look like he’d be much of an obstacle. Except for his size. He had a good hundred pounds on me. As we held eye contact, his right hand inched slowly toward his pocket.
Now, a man can reach for several things in his pocket—a hanky to wipe his brow, a stick of gum, a pack of cigarettes, a cell phone. But my already uneasy brain registered, “He’s going for a gun!” I reacted the only way I knew how to react in such a situation. I drew my own weapon. I lifted my Canon and adjusted the telescopic lens to bring him into focus. Just as I pressed the shutter, he abandoned the trip to his pocket and whirled, hiding his face behind his uplifted arm. In a flash that belied his age and physical condition, he stepped off the trail and lumbered into the woods. Happily, not quickly enough. I had a perfect photograph of the red suspenders holding up his dungarees.
Feeling full of myself for my quick thinking, I was tempted to keep going in his direction, but once again, common sense prevailed. I jogged the remaining four miles of the trail, confident that, unless he had a four-wheeler stashed somewhere, I was out of his reach. When I returned to the parking lot, I photographed the vehicles and their license plates, just in case he had left his vehicle in the public parking lot and I could match it to those in other photos.
A Rendezvous to Die For Page 14