Stateline

by Dave Stanton

  “You see, for a right-handed man this is a motion that can generate a lot of power, especially if the man was taller than the victim.”

  We headed back inside, and the bartender brought out our dinner. Myers stuck a fork in his entree, which was kidney pie. “It’s the coroner’s special,” he said with a dry laugh. Then his face went serious. “I think you’re looking for a man who knows how to kill, and kill brutally, with a knife. He very well could be ex-military.”

  “Maybe two people were involved,” I said. “Someone could have been holding his arms from behind when he was stabbed. Did you notice any bruises on his arms?”

  “No, but he looked like he had been in a pretty good scuffle. You saw the marks on his face and knuckles?”

  “Yeah. Did it look like he had sex before he died?” I asked.

  “He did indeed, shortly before. He died a happy man.”

  A group of about a dozen men came through the front door, loud and ruddy-faced. Some still wore ski pants or had lift tickets attached to their jackets. They crowded up to the bar, yelling in thick English accents for schnapps and buckets of piss.

  “You like living up here, Jack?”

  “I’m not a big fan of the cold, if that’s what you’re getting at. But my daughter and her husband moved here, and I like to be near my grandkids. Here,” Myers said, pulling pictures from his wallet. Four little devils grinned back at me.

  “Still married?” I asked.

  “Divorced years ago.”

  I ate about half my meal and pushed it away. It was an old habit, not wanting to fill up on food when I was more interested in drinking. I had the bartender bring me a whiskey.

  “Did you find any evidence of drug use?”

  “No outward indication, but we’ll have to wait a couple days for the toxicology results.”

  The two men who had been at the bar since we came in asked us to roll dice for drinks. We played liars and boss dice for a few quick rounds. I felt a numbing euphoria as the whiskey loosened the band of tightness that had been cranked around my skull. I opened my eyes wide and felt the tension in my brow recede. The details of the case became blurred and unimportant. We began playing darts, then Myers ran the pool table against the gang of Brits, who actually were from Australia. They started up a game of quarters, bouncing coins off their table into beer mugs, and every time someone made it everybody drank. The night became a rowdy, boozy party, we were all drunken friends, and they started calling me “Yank.” At one point I thanked Myers for being supportive and told him I wouldn’t mention his name if I ever met Conrad Pace.

  “Fuck him. What’s he gonna do, fire me? I don’t need his money,” he said, and I shot the rail, buying a round for the house to celebrate his attitude.

  Somewhere in the night I vaguely wandered out to the Nissan and carefully locked my wallet with the $50,000-check in the glove box. Then I went back into the bar and turned it up a notch, hitting the whiskey and keg beer like an alcoholic fraternity brother. Around midnight Myers stumbled out to take a cab home, a couple of the Australians were puking in the bathroom, and I went out into the cold and started walking to the Lakeside. I staggered about twenty yards down the street before returning to my car. I drove slowly, carefully in my lane, one eye closed so I wouldn’t see two of everything.

  CHAPTER 11

  Even though my father was sitting ten feet across from me, I could feel his hand on my shoulder. He was telling me about the case he was trying as district attorney. I started to ask him a question, but it didn’t seem he could hear me. I walked toward him, but I was moving in slow motion, and with every step I took he seemed to move back an equal distance. Somehow we both understood he was dead, and our conversation was temporary and unreal, but I didn’t want that to be. I strained and searched for some logic that would reverse his death.

  The dream faded, and my transition from drunken slumber to consciousness was slow and confused. When I finally came to, I was aware the knocking on my door had been going on for some time. I was fully clothed except for my shoes, and I had slept on top of the bedspread. My eyelids creaked open, feeling like rusty hinges on a saloon door, and the ceiling moved in a wavy pattern. As I rolled off the bed, it occurred to me the reason I didn’t feel so bad was because I was still drunk.

  I put the chain on the door and opened it two inches. A stocky man holding a badge peered in at me. I saw a uniformed deputy from the sheriff’s department behind him.

  “Dan Reno?”

  “Reno,” I croaked.

  “I’m Don Raneswich, detective, Lake Tahoe Police. We need to speak with you.”

  I opened the door. Raneswich was not a tall man, but his shoulders were wide, as were his waist and hips. He looked like a short refrigerator.

  “Make yourself comfortable, men. You woke me up,” I said thickly, and went into the bathroom. I splashed water on my face and hair, brushed my teeth, and drank three glasses of water out of the little plastic cup next to the sink. Through the fog in my head, a basic conclusion emerged: they had found out I was investigating the Bascom murder and wanted to speak to me about it. I came out, and they were sitting in the two chairs in the room, so I sat on the bed and leaned against the headboard.

  “Where were you last night?” Raneswich said.

  I laughed. “Actually, Detective, I spent the entire evening at the King’s Head.”

  “I believe it. Your room smells like a freaking distillery,” said the deputy, whose name I would later learn was Louis Perdie. Raneswich shot him a look.

  “You can check it out. I was there the whole night.”

  “We will, you can count on it,” Raneswich said.

  “Why, what happened last night?” I said.

  “The guy you got in a fight with yesterday afternoon, Sven Osterlund? We fished him out of Emerald Bay this morning. Someone put three bullets in him.”

  ******

  Osterlund, dead? I had to tell myself to close my mouth, and my eyes felt as round and dumb as a bloodshot Saint Bernard’s. The prime suspect, or at least the most likely witness, found floating in the waters of Lake Tahoe. I imagined him lying on the surface of the cold, blue-green water, face down and half submerged, like a snorkeler scanning the bottom. Except when they turned him over, his face would be white and bloated, his lifeless eyes locked forever on their final vision. I wondered if in his last moments he regretted what he’d done with his life. Somehow, I doubted it.

  I stared out the window past the cops into the dark, overcast morning. Raneswich wanted to check out my gun, so I put my boots on, and we went out to the parking lot. I opened my trunk and let him inspect the Beretta.

  “It hasn’t been fired since the last time I went to the range, about a month ago,” I said.

  “What was your fight with Osterlund about?”

  “Uh, it’s a long story. Meet me in the diner in fifteen minutes, and I’ll tell you about it.”

  “Good, I’m hungry,” said Louis Perdie, who was taller and skinnier than Raneswich, except for his midsection, which hung over his belt like a sack of flour.

  “All right, don’t make us wait,” Raneswich said. We walked back into the Lakeside, and they went toward the restaurant.

  I would have loved to sleep until noon, but I put my brain on autopilot, ordered a double Bloody Mary from room service, and was brushing my teeth again when the drink arrived. I drank it straight down, in a hurry to keep my buzz going and postpone what I knew would be a grueling hangover. I gobbled four aspirin and sat down heavily. In my surly state, the same thought kept running through my mind: Osterlund went and got himself killed before I had a chance to kick his ass. I sat there with my head hanging, my chin on my chest, saying it over and over to myself until I started laughing like a madman. Then I lit a cigarette and went downstairs.

  Raneswich and Perdie stared at me as I walked through the tables toward them. It seemed rude, but I didn’t care—I was toxic. I slowed at the coffee shop’s aquarium, and I swear the fis
h started turning belly up.

  “Enjoying your breakfast, gentlemen?” I said, sitting at their table. Raneswich only had a cup of coffee, but Perdie was eating from a plate stacked with pancakes, scrambled eggs, bacon, and sausage links. The waitress handed me a menu, and I asked her to bring me a Bloody Mary, a coffee, and the same thing Perdie was having.

  “How did you know Osterlund?” Raneswich said. He put his mug down and opened a notebook.

  “We went to the same high school.”

  “Okay. Tell me about the fight you got in with him.”

  “Detective,” I said. “Can I call you Don?” I felt the alcohol coursing through my veins. I was shaky but happy. I wasn’t quite sure what I was going to say, but I felt confident. He nodded, and I smiled.

  “It was basically over a woman. He came after me, and we threw a couple blows. That was about it.”

  “Do you have any idea why someone might want to kill him?”

  “Hell, yeah. He was an asshole. By the way, Don, who did you get my name from?”

  “I’ll ask the questions here.”

  “Okay, fine,” I said with a shrug. “I’m on your side, man.”

  Raneswich blew his breath through his teeth and rolled his eyes.

  “Did you talk to Brad and Whitey?”

  He didn’t say a word, and the waitress brought me a coffee. “How about the Bloody?” I asked her.

  Raneswich sat still as a potted plant, staring at me with bland eyes. I looked back at him, and when he didn’t respond I said, “What is this, a stare down?” He didn’t answer, so I turned to the other cop. “How’s the grub, Deputy?”

  “Good,” Perdie said around a mouthful of food.

  “We can do this here or down at the station,” Raneswich finally said.

  “Sure, why not? I was there the other day, talking to Marcus Grier and some dipshit of a cop who looked like he was still wearing diapers.”

  Perdie started laughing and blew some eggs out the corner of his mouth. “I know who you’re talking about,” he said, wiping his lips.

  Raneswich shook his head slowly, almost imperceptibly, and stared at the spoon in his hand. He tapped it twice on the table.

  “Again, why would somebody want to kill him? Come on, give me your expert opinion.”

  “From what I gather,” I said, trying to pick my words carefully, “Osterlund was a guy who went through life looking for trouble. He could have had any number of enemies.”

  I could see him weighing the issues as he watched the waitress serve me my Bloody Mary.

  “All right,” he said, once she left. “Let’s make sure we’re clear on this. I know you’re investigating Sylvester Bascom’s murder. We believe Osterlund did it, and now he’s dead. So there’s really nothing left for you to investigate.”

  I sipped my cocktail and studied Raneswich, as his real agenda slowly dawned on me.

  “No kidding, huh? Do you have any solid evidence that Osterlund killed Bascom?”

  “That’s police business, not yours.”

  “So I should just pack my bags and leave town?”

  “That’s right,” he said.

  “Here’s my point of view on this, Detective,” I said, trying for a businesslike tone. “If the South Lake Tahoe PD formally concludes Osterlund stabbed Bascom to death, and John Bascom agrees with your findings, I suppose there’s no reason for me to hang around. But until then, I’m willing to work with you and cooperate. Hopefully my involvement can be of some help. Keep in mind I’ll be working full time on this case. Consider me a resource.”

  Raneswich’s face betrayed no opinion, but I was pleased with how I phrased it. Not bad, considering my disheveled state. It was bullshit, of course, but I thought it sounded very diplomatic.

  “Consider you a resource?” he retorted. “I consider you a liability. If you do anything to impede or otherwise get in the way of a formal police investigation, it’s a major problem.”

  “And what if you run into dead ends, and the case stalls? What then?”

  “You know, I love you PIs. You’re mostly drunks, one step up from a minimum-wage security guard, but you love to treat the police like we’re a bunch of bumbling bureaucrats. I want to make sure we’re clear on this. If you create problems for me, you’ll cool your jets in our jail. So don’t put a target on your back. I could have you arrested for drunk in public right now, but I’ll give you a break. But get my meaning.”

  I almost snapped back at Raneswich, but I kept my mouth shut and tried to think calmly. The synapses in my brain felt like they were short-circuited, snapping and sizzling like downed power lines on wet pavement. I suddenly became very thirsty and guzzled my ice water in one long pull.

  “I’m sorry you feel that way,” I said slowly. “But I’m not a criminal, and I resent being treated like one. I’m a licensed investigator, employed by a legitimate company, and I have a job to do.” I paused, and his fleshy face turned a deeper color. I noticed he had a big mole under his eye and some smaller ones on his cheek.

  “Now, I’ve offered nothing but a respectful attitude and the willingness to cooperate,” I continued, telling myself to shut up but getting on a roll, giving in to the drunken tendency to babble. “And you give me this hard-ass stuff. How do you expect me to respond to that? You think I’m just gonna go away? That ain’t gonna happen.”

  “Louis, thanks, you can go back on patrol now,” Raneswich said to Perdie, who had seemingly ignored us while he ate his breakfast. He mopped up the last of his eggs with a crust of toast.

  “Good enough, Don. You ought to get some sleep, buddy,” Perdie said to me as he stood. Then he leaned down, put his hand on my shoulder, and his mouth near my ear. “Your eyes look like two piss holes in the snow.” I felt his hot breath on my neck, and he kept his head near mine for a long moment. I finally turned and looked up at him, and his face was blunt and cold. Then he tipped his cap, winked, and walked away.

  “Where’d you find that guy?” I said.

  “Don’t ask,” Raneswich said. He motioned at the waitress for the check, and I pulled out my wallet but couldn’t find my credit card. With a shock I realized I must have left it with the bartender at the King’s Head.

  “It’s good for me to know what to expect from you,” he said. He threw down some singles to cover his coffee and the deputy’s breakfast, then walked away without another word. As I watched him leave the restaurant, I tilted back my drink, but it was empty.

  “Nice going, that was well done,” I muttered. Goddammit, I should have played it more low key, humored Raneswich a little, been more agreeable. That’s what I tried to do, at first anyway, but clearly he wasn’t buying it. Fuck him, then. Still, the last thing I needed was some cop with an axe to grind on my back. But he dealt the play, not me. Could I have been more cooperative? Sure, if I was willing to quit the job, which would mean screwing John Bascom and foregoing the shot at another fifty thousand dollars.

  I stared at the remains of my Bloody Mary and wondered what was motivating Raneswich. As a general rule, most police departments understand and tolerate the rights of private investigators. Raneswich’s effort to make me back off was atypical. Maybe he sorely needed to solve the case to further his career and viewed my involvement as a threat. Or maybe he had some reason to not want Sylvester Bascom’s murderer caught.

  I pushed my plate away and started doodling on a cocktail napkin. In the center I wrote “Sylvester,” circled it, and beneath it I wrote “Osterlund” in smaller letters, then connected the two with a line. I started trying to write all the things I knew about them, their friends, backgrounds, hobbies, anything that came to mind, and the napkin was soon too messy to make sense of. “Fuck it,” I said, and balled it up and dropped it in Raneswich’s half-full coffee cup. Then I left a ten-dollar bill on the table, walked out to the Nissan, and drove out onto the highway, toward the Lazy 8.

  CHAPTER 12

  Unbeknownst to me at the time, as I was driving down 50, Deputy L
ouis Perdie was five miles further on the same road, heading to the county sheriff’s complex in Placerville. When he arrived forty-five minutes later, he eased himself out of the car, yawned and stretched, passed gas loudly, and hitched his pants up. A crooked smile creased one side of his face as he walked into the building.

  A tall, shirtless man with a scraggly blond beard was struggling with two deputies in the lobby. The deputies were red-faced and straining mightily to cuff the bigger man, whose eyes were dilated and wild with adrenaline. “Get your dirty hands off me, pigs,” he shouted, as the trio spun around the lobby area, banging against the walls, knocking a potted plant off a table. Two more uniformed cops jumped into the fray, and one was kicked hard in the knee and went down with a yelp of pain.

  Perdie removed his baton from its holder, waited for the right moment, then swung with a quick chopping motion across the blond man’s jaw. The man’s eyes rolled back, and he dropped to the floor, jerked momentarily, then lay still as a corpse. The deputies stood panting over him.

  “My god, Louis,” said one cop.

  “This man’s seriously injured,” said another. “That was unnecessary. He’s a paranoid schizophrenic. We would have restrained him in a minute.” The shirtless man lay in a pile, a pool of blood forming under his mouth, which looked oddly deformed.

  “Probably got a broken jaw,” Perdie said. “Teach him to mess with Placerville’s finest. Clean up the mess, boys.” Perdie smiled again and walked through a glass door into the interior of the building.

  Sheriff Conrad Pace sat at his desk, idly considering a local neighborhood petition for increased patrol at a park that had been overrun by truant teenagers. He tossed the paperwork aside when Perdie knocked and let himself in.