Red Hatchet Falls

by Susan Clayton-Goldner

  When Radhauser finished posting the warning, he headed to Ashland Holding Jail. He wanted to have another go-around with Sherman Parsons now that he'd had time to sober up—and hopefully had no access to the ‘hair of the dog’.

  Before meeting with Parsons, Radhauser put in a call to Heron. “Got anything new for me on the Parsons case?”

  "I do," he replied. "Your victim died of exsanguination from the severing of her hand. My examination concurs with my early estimate that she died between ten and midnight on Friday night. And I'm one hundred percent certain the hatchet you found at the scene was the murder weapon. The blade had been washed, but there were traces of blood that seeped into the wood underneath. I ran it through our lab and it was a match for our victim. The only fingerprints we found on the handle belonged to a Sherman Parsons, in the system for DUI. I'm assuming he's the husband."

  “He is. I already have him in custody.”

  "Oh, I almost forgot. The apron we found in the hamper at the Parsons’ house had both bovine and human blood on it. The human was another match for our victim. And there's one other thing. The hatchet blade has a small chip that matched the cut in the piano stool. That's why I have no doubt in my mind it's your murder weapon."

  “That’s great, Heron. The man works as a butcher, so I’m not surprised about the cow blood on the apron. The victim’s being there as well is a stroke of luck.”

  "Looks like this one is a slam dunk. I wish they were all this easy."

  Radhauser took in Heron’s words. This one had been easy, all right. Maybe a little too easy. He wasn’t one who believed in luck.

  Seconds after Radhauser hung up, a guard led Parsons into the room. “He’s all yours.”

  The room was as sparse as the interrogation rooms at the police station—just cinderblock walls and a small, rectangular table with three chairs. These spaces were primarily used for attorneys consulting with their imprisoned clients.

  It was pretty obvious Parsons had showered. Clean-shaven, his hair neatly combed and missing the cowlicks, Parsons was a handsome man. And he smelled a whole lot better than the last time Radhauser saw him. He wore a prison jumpsuit and a pair of flip flops on his bare feet. "Are my twenty-four hours up? I want to get out of this hell hole and find my kids."

  Radhauser nodded toward the chair. “How are you feeling?”

  Parsons sat, placed his hands on the tabletop, a pinched expression on his face. "How the hell do you think I'm feeling? I'm hungover. My wife's dead. Some terrorist wack job hacked off her hand and the police are wasting their time questioning me. My kids are God knows where. Besides that, I'll be out of a job if I don't show up for work tomorrow. Other than that, I feel like I just won the 32-million-dollar lottery."

  Radhauser shifted his gaze to Parsons’ right hand. Despite his shower, the paint was still visible. “How did you get that red paint on your index finger and under your thumbnail?”

  Parsons speared his hands through his dark hair, making it stand on end. “I don’t know. I guess it happened when I was touching up Junior’s little red wagon.”

  “Really? I thought you hadn’t been home since you left for work on Friday morning. How about you cut the crap and tell me the truth?”

  "That stuff stains. Won't wash off with soap. I guess I'll need to use turpentine."

  “Someone painted a bunch of racist graffiti on the Azamis’ apartment door. They used red and black spray paint.”

  “I suppose you think that someone was me. Well, so what if I did? Someone needs to get them Muzzie suicide bombers back where they belong.”

  “Defacing someone else’s property is vandalism. And that’s a crime.”

  “I already spent the night in the slammer. Can we call it even?”

  “I’m going to do you a favor, Mr. Parsons, and start the interview process over now that you’re sober.”

  “I’m forever in your debt.” Parsons gave Radhauser an exaggerated eye roll, then put his elbows on the table, cupped his hands under his chin and waited.

  Radhauser removed the tape recorder from his backpack and set it on the table between them. "This is Detective Winston Radhauser from the Ashland Police Department. It's Sunday, May fifth, 2002. I'm in one of the attorney rooms at the Ashland Holding Jail interviewing Sherman Parsons in connection with the May third death of his wife, Marsha."

  He had Parsons state his full name and spell the last, his address, and his place of employment, then read him his Miranda rights again. "Do you agree to talk with me without an attorney present?"

  “I’ll do anything if it’ll get me the hell out of here.”

  “I need a yes or no.”

  “Yes.”

  “Please state your relationship with the deceased.”

  “Jesus, Radhauser. She was my wife. The mother of my two children. You know that.”

  “This is for the official record. How long have you been married?”

  “Seven years.” He laughed. “Long enough to get the seven-year itch.”

  “Where were you between the hours of ten and midnight on Friday, May third, 2002?”

  “Damnit, man. You know I was at the Nut House Bar and then the Siskiyou Motel. But for your damn record, I went to the bar after work. I knocked down a few. Then, because I was drunk and my wife hates it when I get drunk and doesn’t hesitate to remind me, I checked into the motel to sober up.”

  “Can anyone verify your presence?”

  “What’s the matter with you? You senile or something? You talked to both the bartender and the clerk at the motel. You know I was there.”

  "I know you checked in around nine o'clock. The clerk verified that, but he has no idea what you did or where you went afterward."

  “I never left the motel. I was too drunk to go anywhere. Besides, you said I was there with some woman.”

  “What I said was the clerk told me you checked in with a woman with dark hair, a lot of makeup and wearing red high heels. He saw her leave less than thirty minutes later. Between nine-fifteen and nine-thirty.”

  “Okay then, so why the hell am I here?”

  “You’re here on suspicion of murder.”

  “How many times do I have to say it? I didn’t kill my wife.”

  “Why don’t you tell me about the woman you were with?”

  “I don’t remember her.” Something in the way his gaze shifted down and to the left told Radhauser Parsons was still lying. Was the woman married? Was he trying to protect her reputation?

  “Why don’t I believe you?”

  “Because you’re a cop, and all you want to do is arrest someone for my wife’s murder. It’s always the husband, right?”

  “You might help yourself out a bit if you gave me the name of the woman who checked into the Siskiyou Motel with you on Friday night.”

  “Are you deaf in addition to dumb? I don’t even remember checking into the motel on Friday. You can’t expect me to remember the name of some broad I’ve never met before.”

  “I have an eyewitness who puts you in the bar with this woman on several occasions during the past year. Funny you don’t remember any of those times. Are you in love with her?”

  He laughed. “I see a pretty woman, I buy her a drink. No big deal.”

  "Did your wife know about these pretty women?"

  “Marsha was always accusing me of something.”

  “Was she aware you were having an affair?”

  "You need to see one of them ear doctors and get yourself a hearing aid. I wasn't having any affair."

  Radhauser decided to humor him and move forward even though he knew Parsons was lying. He’d given himself away with his comment about the itch. “Did Marsha have any enemies that you’re aware of?”

  “No, but I do. Why don’t you check out that diaper head, bin Laden lookalike who works with me? Ahmed Azami was far from happy about his wife hanging around with Marsha.”

  Adrenaline rushed through Radhauser. And he fought his urge to punch this racist in t
he mouth. He waited a moment, decided not to give Parsons the courtesy of a response. “Is your home walking distance from the Siskiyou Motel?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long a walk is it?”

  “Maybe a mile.”

  “So, you could walk home in say, twenty minutes? Thirty if you were staggering?”

  “That’s about right.” He gave Radhauser an outraged look. “I know where you’re going with this. I could, but I didn’t.”

  "Would it surprise you to learn the ME has established, with one-hundred percent certainty, that the hatchet we found hanging on the pegboard in your garage was the weapon used to kill your wife?"

  Parsons leaned back in his chair. “How can he know that? If you’ve seen one hatchet, you’ve seen them all.”

  Again, Radhauser wanted to slap that smug look off Parsons’ face. “Forensics evidence doesn’t lie. This one had Marsha’s blood under the blade. And a little chip that matched the indentation in the piano stool.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The killer used the piano stool as a chopping block.”

  Parsons cringed. “Well, I sure as hell didn’t use no piano stool for anything. Maybe Marsha used it for one of her home-improvement projects.”

  “The hatchet had your fingerprints on the handle. There were no others. Not to mention, the butcher apron we found in the hamper had your wife’s blood on it, too.”

  Parsons dropped his chair back onto all four legs. His face paled and his mouth dropped open.

  Tough guy Sherman Parsons was scared.

  “You can’t believe I killed her like that.”

  “Why can’t I, Mr. Parsons?”

  “She was my wife. The mother of my kids. I...I loved her once...” He crumpled back in his chair, hung his head and breathed deeply, as if trying to compose himself. When he raised his gaze to meet Radhauser, his eyes were wet.

  “And you were drunk and in a motel with another woman. Is that supposed to prove to me how much you loved her?”

  Parsons looked away. “You don’t know one damn thing about me. What’s going to happen to my kids?”

  “That’s something you should have thought of before now,” Radhauser said. “The state will take care of them. I suspect, better than you did.”

  Parsons pushed his chair away from the table, his face as red as the paint beneath his thumbnail. “Who the hell do you think you are to judge me? Do your damn job and find out who’s framing me.”

  “Do you keep the outside door into your garage locked?”

  "No. Anyone could raise the garage door," he said, a trace of hope in his voice. "The side door is rarely locked."

  “Keep that in mind. I suspect a good criminal defense attorney might be able to use that to try to establish reasonable doubt.”

  Parsons shot him a look that held a bullet. His face had grown ruddy and the veins in his neck stuck out like cables. “Despite what you might think, I love those kids. Maybe more than Marsha did.”

  “At this point, all the solid evidence we have in your wife’s murder case points directly to you.”

  "You need to find some other evidence. I swear to God, I may be a lousy husband, but I didn't kill Marsha." Parsons slammed his hand against the tabletop. It vibrated for several seconds after the impact. "This interview is over. I want a damn lawyer."

  "That's a very good idea, Mr. Parsons. You'll need one." Radhauser clicked off the tape, then stepped out into the hallway to place a call to Captain Murphy. He explained the situation to his boss.

  “You got a motive?” Murphy asked.

  “I’m pretty sure he’s having an affair.” He told Murphy about Parsons leaving the bar with a woman and how she was with him when he checked into the motel.

  “I thought you said he didn’t have an alibi.”

  “She was seen leaving the motel very shortly after they checked in. The suspect claims he doesn’t know her name, but his body language says otherwise.”

  Murphy let out a long sigh. “What are you waiting for? Arrest the son of a bitch.”

  "I don't know, sir. My gut tells me I should postpone an arrest for another couple of days. We can hold him for another twenty-four hours. That will give me time to find and question the other woman."

  “Screw your gut, Radhauser. Every mistake I’ve ever seen a cop make came from relying on his gut. People are afraid to take their kids to the park. You’ve got your man. Let’s keep him off the streets.”

  Radhauser reviewed what he had, more for himself than for Murphy. "We've got both the murder weapon and his butcher apron with the victim's blood on them. His prints are the only ones on the weapon’s handle. He was drunk on Friday night and claims he was sleeping it off at the Siskiyou Motel, but no one can substantiate his alibi. McBride has a neighbor who'll testify that she heard Parsons threaten to murder his wife early in the afternoon of the night it happened."

  “That all sounds good, so get rid of that doubt I hear in your voice, Radhauser.”

  A bead of sweat dripped from Radhauser's upper lip. He swallowed hard, his heart rate accelerating. Murphy was right. Radhauser could connect Parsons with a means and an opportunity. But he couldn't establish a motive until he'd at least spoken with the other woman. Maybe he needed to dig a little deeper.

  “It’s the motive, sir. Somehow, I can’t figure out why he’d cut off her hand.”

  “You know what your problem is, Radhauser, you think too much. Murder isn’t always logical. You’ve got your man off the streets. Now the people in Ashland can breathe easy again. Officially charge him, then let it go.”

  But Radhauser couldn't let it go. He understood that part of being a detective was slicing back the beautiful façade of a town to expose its underside, the wounds festering beneath the surface. Detectives needed to know who were the pedophiles, the wife and child abusers, the drug addicts, and the ones who preyed on the town's most vulnerable.

  This homicide, however, was different from any he’d investigated before. There was something highly symbolic about Marsha Parsons’ murder. The severed hand. The line drawing of a mother and child. The fact that the hand was left near the Lithia Park playground. Radhauser’s gut told him that the murderer had reasons for those actions. And he wouldn’t be satisfied until he knew what they were.

  “I don’t think another day or two will hurt.”

  “Arrest him.” Murphy hung up without another word.

  Radhauser, with no choice but to obey a direct order from his superior, stepped back into the jail's attorney conference room. He called the guard and placed the recorder in his backpack. "Please stand and put your hands behind your back," Radhauser said to Parsons. "You're under arrest for the murder of Marsha Parsons."

  Chapter Twelve

  Once Parsons was taken away, Radhauser drove back to the station. He should have been elated. He’d arrested a viable suspect in a murder case. And the DA was confident he had enough evidence to convince the grand jury to bring the case to trial. But instead, Radhauser had a churning sensation in his gut. Sherman Parsons was an ass, a racist, a lousy husband and father, and a sometimes-drunk. No doubt about any of that. But was he a murderer?

  Why would he kill his wife by cutting off her hand? He was the one drinking and womanizing. Marsha Parsons was the wronged partner with motivation to kill a spouse, not Sherman. Still, maybe he was tired of being a husband, tired of her nagging him to quit drinking. Maybe he was in love with the woman he’d brought to the motel. If that were the case, moving on with his life would be much easier if Marsha disappeared. But why would he kill her in a way that made him appear so guilty?

  Radhauser opened the blinds behind his desk to let in some sunlight. He felt as heavy as a wet sandbag as he dropped onto the chair, but he sat there reading and rereading the notes he'd taken at the scene. To do everything by the book, he put in a call to Judge Wainwright to issue an arrest warrant for Sherman Parsons.

  Now, he needed to find the woman who’d
accompanied Parsons to the motel Friday night. She might be able to shed some light on his condition, his mood, what he might have said about his wife and kids.

  Despite Murphy’s insistence Parsons be arrested, Radhauser was the kind of man who paid attention to his reservations. If Parsons was passed out drunk in the room when the girlfriend left, what were the chances he’d awakened, gotten himself home, and had the presence of mind to wear a plastic raincoat, spread a tarp over the floor and install the lock on his kids’ bedroom door? Not to mention killing his wife, then transporting her hand to Lithia Park playground to bury it under a pile of leaves?

  Parsons may have been at the murder scene. His wife’s blood was on his butcher apron. But that didn’t mean Parsons was wearing it when it got there. No matter what Murphy said, Radhauser wouldn’t rest until he was certain he had the right man.

  When he heard the thump of footsteps coming down the hall, he looked up.

  Sully stood in his doorway, a copy of the Medford Sunday Tribune in his hands. “Did you see the story? We’re practically famous.” He wore a clean pair of denim overalls, with no patches on the knees, and a red plaid shirt. The scent of Old Spice filled the air around him. The old man must have taken his weekly bath, shaved and shampooed his hair and beard.

  Sully stepped into the office and stopped in front of the desk. He held the newspaper up and pointed to the colored photograph. “Ain’t that a good picture of me and Rodney? I couldn’t believe that reporter and a photographer come all the way out to the lake. That’s almost a two-hour trip. And all he wanted to do was take some pictures and talk to me.”

  The photograph showed Sully sitting on his dock, the lake behind him, and Rodney perched on his lap, looking straight at the camera.