On top of the pier, Calvin waved to the people still standing at the beginning of the dock. “Hey, over here! I’ve got Stanley here. We need blankets and something hot to drink!”
Marc Gagne walked up, wrapped in a blanket, shivering and smiling. He took off his blanket and draped it around Stanley’s scrawny shoulders. “So, Stanley, congratulations on rescuing Calvin,” he said cheerfully. “I don’t know what we would have done without you.”
Stanley looked abashed. “I didn’t really rescue him none.”
Gagne clapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t be modest, Stanley. I think you were great.” He looked at Calvin, laughed and shook his head. “It’s a great day, Stanley.”
Stanley smiled and looked sheepish. “Aw, Calvin’s my friend. I’d do anything to help him.”
The three of them walked slowly back to the entrance to the pier, Gagne and Calvin still trying to warm up. “Stanley,” Calvin asked quietly. “Who was it who threw Big Moose into the water?”
A hard look came into Stanley’s face, all the more disconcerting because it was so out of character. His chin trembled. “Little Guy LeBlanc. I never did nothin’ to him, but he picked up Big Moose and threw him in the water. Big Moose can’t swim; he just sank. I had to save him, Calvin, so I jumped in, but I couldn’t find him and then the water pushed me under the pier and I found the ladder.”
Stanley looked up, grief stricken. “I’ve got to save him, Calvin. He’s down there, all alone, and he hates cold water.”
“We’ll get him, Stanley, don’t worry,” Calvin reassured the man-child. “Once I warm up, I’ll get my swim gear and we’ll find him and clean him up.”
Then the Fire and Rescue Squad reached them with warm blankets and hot, sweetened coffee thickened with condensed milk. Emergency medical technicians sat all three of them down and listened to their hearts and checked their body temperatures. One of them checking Calvin also gave him a piece of his mind.
“What the hell did you think you were doing?” he fumed. “This is Maine for Christ’s sake. Fifteen minutes in that water, twenty max, and you will be unconscious and drown. You can’t just go jumping into water this cold without a wetsuit. Christ, Calvin, you know that, what were you thinking?”
“Stanley could have died,” Calvin protested.
“All three of you could have died,” the EMT snapped. “Could have died really easily. Happens all the time. You’ve got to think before you act, dammit.”
That’s when Calvin saw Little Guy LeBlanc and Paul LaPierre standing at the entrance to the dock, enthralled by the mayhem they had caused. Calvin stood up abruptly, dropping his blanket. “Excuse me,” he told the startled EMT, then strode to where Little Guy stood smirking.
“Hey, the hero of the day!” Little Guy crowed as Calvin approached. But LaPierre, seeing the look on Calvin’s face, backed away several steps.
Calvin hit Little Guy square in the nose and felt the cartilage crunch under his fist. Little Guy collapsed to the dock, clutching his nose and screaming, blood seeping between his fingers.
“You sonofabitch!” Calvin screamed at him. “You almost killed Stanley!”
“You broke my nose!” Little Guy wailed. “Again!”
Calvin grabbed him by the shirt, getting ready to hit him again when the Fire Rescue guys swarmed over him. “Whoa! Whoa!” one of them hollered, pulling Calvin back. “Calm down!”
“He threw Stanley’s bike into the water!” Calvin said loudly, struggling to get free and take another swing at Little Guy. “Stanley jumped in to try to save it. Stanley almost died in there!”
The burly fireman effortlessly picked Calvin up off his feet and held him suspended in midair. “If you don’t settle down, I’m going to throw you in the harbor just to cool you off! Now cut it out!” the fireman told him.
“He also sent his cousin to beat up my girlfriend,” Calvin said hotly. “Isn’t that right, you little weasel?” he shouted at Little Guy.
“Ah, the plot thickens,” the fireman said in resignation. “First things first, kid. We gotta finish checking you out and get a fix on your body temperature, and we really need to get Stanley to the hospital. He’s built like a toothpick and for sure he’s hypothermic. So all this drama will have to wait.” He put Calvin on the ground, but firmly held onto his arm.” Then he turned to Little Guy.
“Guy, if half the things he says are true, you are in deep shit. I suggest you get your ass to the hospital so they can pack your nose and tape it.” He shifted to Paul LaPierre. “And you, I’ve known your family for years. You should know better than to follow this idiot. I don’t know what the hell you guys thought you were doing, but Stanley could have died. If he had, you both would be in a world of hurt. Now get going.”
He turned and dragged Calvin back to the ambulance. “And you, numbskull, you’re supposed to be some sort of smart kid or something. Start acting like one.” They reached the ambulance, where the EMT was loading Stanley and Marc Gagne into the back.
“Here, take this one, too. I’m sure he’s got a touch of hypothermia because he was acting erratically and I had to restrain him.”
The EMT’s eyes shifted uncertainly back and forth between the fireman and Calvin.
The fireman sighed. “Just take him, okay? He needs to stay out of trouble for the next hour or so, and he should be checked out given how long he was in the water.”
The fireman watched the ambulance pull away, lights flashing.
“God save me from teenagers,” he breathed.
Chapter 36
Monday Night – Lowell, Massachusetts
The thing about Monday nights, the truly blessed thing about Monday nights, was that nothing ever happened. People stayed home. They didn’t go to bars and get into trouble, they weren’t out late and getting into accidents. They stayed home and recuperated from whatever the hell they did over the weekend.
Officer Rob Cantarella loved it.
In fifteen years on the Lowell police, he’d seen it all. Stabbings, gunshots, people run down with cars, one beheading – one was more than enough – even one poor bastard garroted with a pink tutu – that one was sort of weird. Missing persons, domestics, a zillion or more drug busts, car accidents, missing children, children killed by their own parents – those were the worst, he decided – and more drunks than he would have thought possible.
But not much on Monday nights. Officer Cantarella loved Monday nights. Drive around, sip some coffee, listen to some Sixties Rock on his radio. Tranquil. Until…
“Unit 14, Dispatch. Report of suspicious activity near a dumpster behind Spinnato’s Pizza on Elm Street.”
Cantarella groaned and thumbed his mic. “Dispatch, Unit 14, any details on the ‘suspicious activity’?”
“Unit 14, Dispatch. Patron reports blood near the dumpster.”
Officer Cantarella sighed. His peaceful Monday night was slipping away. “Dispatch, Unit 14, on my way. Arrive in five minutes.”
When he arrived, there was an adult and two teens standing several feet away from the dumpster. Cantarella swung out of the car and looked at them over the roof. “You the guys who called in something suspicious?”
The older man nodded. He seemed pale, though perhaps it was only the light. “My boy was throwin’ an empty box into the dumpster, Officer, but the lid was stuck. He climbed up and opened it and…” He paused and took a breadth. “Well, he’s pretty sure he saw a foot.”
Aw, fuck, Cantarella thought wearily. A body? On a Monday night?
“I did see it!” the younger boy said hotly, and it was clear there had been some discussion as to whether he had really seen anything. “I can show it to you!” The boy had an unruly mop of black hair and sported a pair of thick glasses that made him look like a very young professor.
Cantarella nodded slowly. Something about this kid; he didn’t look like the type to see things that weren’t there. He touched his radio mic. “Dispatch, Unit 14. Request one backup unit to Spinnato’s Pizza to as
sist in a search. Ask them to bring a good flashlight.”
A moment later his radio gurgled: “Unit 14, Dispatch. Unit 6 is two minutes away.”
He turned to the kid, who looked like he might be twelve or thirteen. “Okay, young sir, what’s your name?”
The boy glanced at his father, then back to him. “Billy, Billy Shaw.”
Cantarella smiled reassuringly. “Okay, Billy Shaw. Maybe you saw something, maybe you didn’t, but you did the right thing calling the police. Can you show me where you think you saw the foot?”
Without a word, Billy walked to the edge of the dumpster, which was almost a foot taller than he was. He climbed up the edge, stepping first on a flange and then on the lip of the dumpster. Bending over, he pulled up the green lid and let it crash backwards.
He pointed inside. “See? It’s right there.”
Cantarella hoisted himself up and shined the flashlight on the cavernous interior. “Yep, that certainly is a foot.” It was only a couple of feet away, lying on what was almost certainly a slice of pepperoni and mushroom pizza.
Billy was looking around the dumpster. “But where’s the rest of the body?”
Cantarella slowly shined his light around the interior. It was a jumble of discarded pizza boxes, half-eaten pizzas and soda cans. Flies buzzed about industriously.
“There!” Billy shouted excitedly. “See it, near the box that’s upside down!” He didn’t sound horrified at all, just thrilled to be looking for body parts in a pizza dumpster.
Cantarella swung the light over to where the kid was pointing. Sure enough, there, sticking up between two sauce-smeared boxes, was an arm. A whole arm, severed messily above the elbow. He glanced at the kid to make sure he was okay.
Billy Shaw was beaming.
Cantarella shook his head. This kid was going to grow up to be either a cop or a serial killer, maybe both. “C’mon down, Billy. Good job, but now we’ve got to preserve the crime scene.”
“Cool! Can I help?” Billy asked.
“Sure, why not?” Cantarella smiled. He fetched some crime scene tape from his car and gave one end to the boy. “See that tree by the building? I want you to walk this end over there and tie it around the tree, maybe four feet off the ground. Okay?”
While Billy Shaw was living out his fantasy of being a policeman, Unit 6 drove in, lights on, but no siren. Andy McGuire got out. “I’m here for the take-out pizza? Did you add the extra onions and mushrooms?”
Cantarella shook his head in dismay. “Cute, very cute. But I’d suggest you eat it first, because we’ve got a body in pieces in the dumpster. Gonna be a long night.”
“Ah, Christ,” McGuire muttered. “On a Monday?”
More radio calls. Soon a forensic team had assembled, all dressed in plastic overalls, gloves and biohazard helmets. Two of the forensic team climbed into the dumpster, now lit by four towering LED lights bright enough to guide small aircraft through a storm. Hundreds of pictures were taken. Then, slowly, meticulously, the pizza boxes and soda cans and everything else in the top layer were removed one by one and bagged and tagged. Including the foot. A man’s foot, from the size and condition of it.
Then the arm was photographed in place again and then placed gingerly into an evidence bag.
Then the process was repeated for the next layer.
It was slow work, exacting work, but the Lowell forensic squad was experienced and patient. And, of course, little treasures were found along the way.
“Got a leg here!” one called up, which triggered another flurry of activity.
And twenty minutes later: “Ah, yeah. Got a head. Severed head here.”
McGuire elbowed Cantarella in the ribs. “So, whatta you think? Drug gang killing or the guy refused to pay for his pizza?”
About two hundred photographs later, the head was safely bagged and they started on the next layer. The most important find came an hour after the head was discovered.
“Hey! Got a wallet here!” one of the techs called enthusiastically.
Heads were nice. Heads were sexy, but a wallet meant actual information. A wallet was gold.
More photographs, then the wallet was handed out in an evidence bag. The chief homicide detective on the scene carefully opened it. First, he glanced at the license and compared the picture to the face of the severed head. They matched, although the deceased had been smiling in the license photo. Not so much now.
Then he opened it to the smaller pockets where people normally kept credit cards and stuff.
And hit pay dirt.
He took out a slip of paper and saw a name and a phone number, then pursed his lips in a silent whistle. He took out his cell phone and dialed the number. After two rings it was answered.
“Honeycutt,” the voice said.
Mr. Honeycutt, this is Detective Samuel Peterson of the Lowell Police. Am I correct that you are an Assistant Director with the DEA?”
“That’s correct, Detective. What can I do for you?”
“Well, sir, I am standing by a dumpster in Lowell. We’ve just spent the past two hours removing the body of a man who was cut to pieces. Literally. We just found his wallet and there is a slip of paper in it with your name and number. I thought you might want to know about this in case the deceased is one of yours.
“Can you email me a picture of his license, Detective?”
“You bet. You’ll have it in two minutes. Please call me when you get it.”
“I will do that, Detective, thank you.”
Two minutes later, Howard Honeycutt was staring at the license photo of his informant inside the Dominican gang in Lowell.
“Well, crap,” Honeycutt said.
And then he thought about the last report he had received from the informant just a few hours earlier. And his heart sank. Not that, he thought in despair. Please, not that.
Chapter 37
Tuesday Morning – Searching
LeBlanc sat in the pilot’s chair of the Celeste, moodily watching the water. The morning fog was finally starting to lift and he was tense, bored and antsy. It was only 6:30 a.m., but they had already been out for an hour, the Celeste, Samantha and Rosie’s Pride running north in a line 1,500 meters across, each pinging the surrounding waters every fifteen seconds.
Next to LeBlanc, Banderas sat at the acoustic transponder console, wearing a pair of Bose headphones and watching the display screen carefully. He hadn’t moved an inch since he sat down. LeBlanc had told his crews that Banderas was a researcher from the Maine Department of Fisheries, here on a project to map the bottom waters in the North Harbor and Stonington areas. Banderas even wore a fake ID badge on a lanyard around his neck, with a picture of him smiling at the camera.
Funny thing was, despite the ID and the fancy equipment, all the crew shied away from Banderas. They instinctively sensed danger. No matter how much Banderas might dress up, he looked like what he was, a killer.
LeBlanc’s brother, Jacques, kept staring at the transponder’s display screen. He leaned forward and tapped it. “If you’re using sonar, why doesn’t it show the bottom?”
Banderas shook his head in tired resignation. Surrounded by imbeciles. “It is not sonar, it is a transponder triggering a reply from a receiver. When the pulse from the transponder strikes the receiver, the receiver sends a tone, which we can hear.”
Jacques looked confused. “Oh.”
Jean-Philippe LeBlanc looked sourly at his brother. “It works the way it’s supposed to, okay?” Then to Banderas: “Anything?”
Banderas shook his head.
There was a small chime from the equipment console. LeBlanc looked at it for a moment, reading text as it scrolled down the screen. He frowned. “National Weather Service alert. A storm is coming in this afternoon. High winds and rain from the northeast, shifting to the north, then northwest through tomorrow. Seas will be six to ten feet.” He glanced at Banderas. “That will make a hash of this search. Lot of rocks in these waters. It will be noisy and dangerous. The r
eceiver could sing the Star Spangled Banner and we might not hear it, plus there’s a good chance we’ll end up on a rock.”
Banderas frowned. “Will other ships be out, or will everyone go to harbor?”
LeBlanc snorted. “Harbor for sure. Nobody risks his boat for a few more lobsters.” He shrugged. “Anyway, with high winds and waves, it’s damn hard to find your buoys, let alone haul them in. The decks will be rolling and the waves will be coming right over the rail. You just can’t work in weather like that.”
Banderas grimaced. The drug packages should be coming through the area sometime between Tuesday and Thursday. If they didn’t find them today and they wouldn’t be able to search Wednesday because of the storm, then everything depended on Thursday. And if they missed the packages Thursday… He ran a hand through his hair. By Friday the three bags could have passed through the cluster of islands off North Harbor and been swept out to the open ocean. Millions of dollars of drugs, just gone. And how would he explain that to his masters in Sinaloa?
“We search as much as we can today,” he told LeBlanc. “As long as the weather holds, we search.”
LeBlanc shrugged and turned back to the pilothouse. Banderas turned back to the transponder’s display screen.
It was going to be a long day.
______________
On the dock at North Harbor, Paul Dumas spied his nephew Jacob walking past with a brown grocery bag in his hands. Dumas’ brow wrinkled. “Hey, Jacob!”
Jacob turned and grinned at his uncle. “Oncle Paul!”
Dumas reached him and the two men exchanged a hug. “What’s this, a day off in the middle of the week?” he teased. “Why aren’t you out getting covered in lobster slime and salt water?”
Jacob’s grin broadened. “Actually, I do have the day off. Captain LeBlanc is out doing some sort of bottom mapping and doesn’t need his regular crew for the next couple of days.”
North Harbor Page 20