Fruits of the Poisonous Tree

19

I sat in my darkened apartment, surrounded by the familiar, tangible milestones of my life-books, framed photographs, odds and ends of sentimental value-all barely visible in the gloom, all so anchored in my brain I didn’t need to see them to feel their presence.

But despite them, I felt I was in a rowboat adrift offshore, watching impotently as a loved and comforting landscape slipped slowly away to the horizon. It was an estrangement made all the more unsettling because it was intentional and self-motivated. I was willfully pulling away from the status quo I’d worked so hard to create, distancing myself from the people I worked with and the woman I loved, potentially for the sake of a convicted rapist who’d tried to kill me.

I had to wonder why. It wasn’t to save a possibly innocent man-at least I didn’t think it was. Gail was right about Vogel-he was a bastard, and probably deserved the worst he could get.

But maybe not for this particular crime.

That was the gist of it-regardless of what James Dunn might believe, and a jury decree, I had to know Vogel’s guilt or innocence for myself. His history in the courts had already highlighted the system’s vagaries, so in this most important investigation of my career, I had to have more than a merely legal conclusion. I had to have the truth.

It was the only way I knew of regaining the shore, my life, and Gail.

The phone by my chair rang in the predawn darkness. I’d fallen asleep, and my startled reaction sent an electric bolt of pain through my stomach. Gail’s voice was sharp, on edge, wavering between anger and concern. “Joe, what are you doing here? I just got a call from Leo. You left the hospital without checking out.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I meant to call as soon as I got home, but I got sidetracked, and then I just forgot. I nodded off.”

“What’s wrong?”

I remembered how we’d parted and wished I had something more concrete to tell her, something that would cool the rage I’d felt then. But I didn’t have that yet, and perhaps I never would. “I know you don’t want to hear this, but I came back to answer some questions for myself-things I wasn’t able to do after I was stabbed.”

“The trial’s already begun, Joe.” Her voice was almost pleading.

“I know that, and I’m not saying it shouldn’t be happening. I just never got a chance to finish my job, and I need to do that.”

“You don’t think he raped me?” She was trying to be more matter-of-fact, forcing her intellect to rule her emotions.

“The evidence says he did. I need to know it’s right.”

“And if it’s not?”

“Then we go from there.”

“Damn you,” she shouted, “don’t you know what that means?”

I started to answer, but then stopped. I only knew what it meant to me. “Tell me,” I said instead.

“That whoever it was is still out there-that it’s all been a waste of time.”

I remembered her sensitivity to sudden noises, her constant checking of locked doors, her insomnia, her apprehension of the outdoors or of being left alone. It was true that much of it had been born from the turbulence surrounding the trauma and would eventually subside. But what I’d somehow ignored was plain, old-fashioned fear-that what had happened might happen again, especially if we’d caught the wrong guy.

Still, I persisted. “Gail, if he is still out there, then that’s what we need to know, right? You don’t necessarily want Bob Vogel hung out to dry-you want the guy who raped you.”

I could hear her breathing hard, almost panting, trying to harness her agitation. “And you’re saying they’re not one and the same.”

“I’m saying I don’t know. Right now, Bob Vogel fits the bill.” I rubbed my forehead, wishing I had something else to offer. “I can’t tell you more than that, Gail. I’m sorry. I would’ve liked to have settled all this without troubling you, but I’ve got to do it-for your sake, too. It won’t work any other way.”

I paused, waiting, finally wondering if she was still on the line, and then I heard her sobbing-something she’d almost never done in all the years I’d known her. I gripped the receiver tighter, riled by my inability to reach out and lend her comfort.

“I’m not in control of anything anymore,” she said after a long pause. “My emotions are all over the place, I’m scared of everything, I can’t focus on my work. I tried to turn this into a way to help other women, but I couldn’t get over my own fears. I tried taking care of you, but you healed and I felt abandoned. I was hoping to use the trial as a way to get better, and now you tell me you’re not sure he’s the right man. And in the news, I’m an ‘alleged’ victim, as if even that might be taken away. I worry sometimes that I’m just spinning away-that I’ll just disappear.”

“Can Susan help?” I asked softly.

Gail took a deep, shuddering breath. “She is. She’s trying. I’m seeing a therapist again. I’ve got good support. It’s what I should’ve done from the start. I just thought I could get a handle on it sooner.”

“Knowing that must help a little. Would you like me to come over?”

“No-I’m all right. How ’bout you?” she asked, surprising me.

“I’m fine. A little sore. I’m not doing anything strenuous.”

There was a moment of silence, during which we contemplated everything we hadn’t addressed. “You’re pretty sure he didn’t do it, aren’t you?” she finally asked.

“I honestly don’t know. I chased down two ideas last night, and neither one of them proved anything. All I’ve got are a bunch of little bells ringing in my head, telling me not to let this one go.”

She sighed again, and I added, “You’re still at Susan’s, right?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll have Tony send someone over today to install some dead bolts and window locks. Maybe they’ll help you feel a little more secure.”

“Mary Wallis gave me a gun-a nine millimeter.”

I didn’t like that, but I knew now wasn’t the time to say so. “You know how to use it?”

She let out a small, humorless laugh. “Secrets of my hidden past. My dad taught me when I was little. We used to shoot at cans and light bulbs at my aunt’s farm in Connecticut. I got pretty good at it.”

“Well, be careful. You want those locks?”

“Thank you… Joe?”

“What’s up?”

“You’re still digging into this because of what you said, right? It’s not something else-something you’re not telling me?”

How well she knew me. “I just want to make sure the job’s been done right.”

I sat in my car across from Bob Vogel’s derelict trailer, staring in disbelief at what the passage of a few weeks had wrought. The door and several windows were missing; clothing, soiled sheets, magazines, plates, even a few pieces of broken furniture littered the frozen ground. A stained, broken-back sofa lay on the sagging wooden steps leading to the gaping front door, as if it had been shot trying to escape.

I crossed the yard gingerly, noticing the shredded remnants of the plastic yellow “police line” tape we routinely use to seal off a property-obviously to great effect. The vandals, as usual, had been inordinately capricious in their choices, breaking some items of limited value, stealing others that made no sense. Going through the trailer, I worked both from memory and from a copy of one of Ron’s files that listed the place’s entire contents, complete with “general scene” photographs. Tony Brandt’s box was proving to be a gift from heaven.

Nevertheless, I couldn’t find the one item I was after.

I stopped short of the doorway before leaving the trailer twenty minutes later and peered surreptitiously across the yard to the neighboring trailer-the one housing the consumptive scarecrow who’d directed me to the Barrelhead when I’d first visited the neighborhood. A curtain moved slightly as soon as I stepped into the anemic sunlight.

I walked over and pounded on the rattly metal door.

“Who is it?” The voice was as I remembered it-raspy, wet, and ruined.

“You know damn well who it is. Open up.”

The door swung back with a rusty complaint, and Vogel’s bedraggled, bearded, reed-thin neighbor glared out at me with bloodshot eyes, a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. I showed him my badge.

He coughed, as if under attack by the fresh air. “What do you want?”

“Talk. Can I come in?”

He stepped aside, and I entered a virtual wall of stench, thick enough to make my eyes water.

“What about?”

I glanced around quickly and pointed to a mildewed dish rack by his sink. “That, for one thing.”

He stared at it in astonishment. I pointed at a cracked oval mirror leaning against the wall near an armchair with three legs. “And that, too.”

He swiveled his head like a spectator at a tennis match. “What about ’em?”

“They belong to Bob Vogel. You stole them.” I showed him the photographs, placing my finger on each item.

He swallowed hard and glanced at the door, as if contemplating flight. Then he looked at me defiantly. “I didn’t start it. I just got what the others left behind.”

I didn’t believe that for a moment. “I’m sure that’s true. So I’ll let you off the hook. But I want a favor. I want to see the alarm clock he had by his bed.”

He hesitated, weighing whether or not I was setting him up. “Wait a minute.”

He disappeared into the gloom to the rear of the trailer and reemerged moments later with a cracked plastic Baby Ben clock-an old wind-up model dating back thirty years.

I turned it over, pulled the alarm tab up, and moved the hour hand until it touched the alarm sweep. Nothing happened-just as I’d suspected. “Was this broken when you got it?”

“Yeah-piece of shit. Should’ve known.”

“That makes two of us.”

I found J.P. Tyler squirreled away in his compact forensics lab. His eyebrows arched when he saw who’d opened the door. “Joe. How’re you doing? I didn’t know you were back.”

“I’m not officially, so don’t tell anyone.” I handed him the broken clock. “Do me a favor. Find out why the alarm doesn’t work in this thing.”

He took it from me and smiled. “Sure. You ought to look into buying a new one, though. These aren’t too accurate.”

“It’s not mine. It’s part of a case, and it’s red-hot priority.”

The smile widened. “And you’re not back officially.”

“Right. Let me know as soon as you can. I’ll be in the property room.”

The property room was across the hall from Tyler’s closet, and about three times larger. A high-security area, it was where we held evidence until it was needed for trial, and therefore was packed to the ceiling with tagged and labeled bags and containers. What I was after, however, was right in the middle of the floor, readily accessible for the case being heard across the street at this very moment. I sat down among the boxes and began sorting through the envelopes within them, being careful not to break any evidence seals.

I hadn’t completely closed the door-the stench of stale, confiscated marijuana being reminiscent of old, dirty clothes-but I had dropped the bar that stopped people from inadvertently stepping inside the sacrosanct room. When I heard a movement behind me a quarter of an hour later, therefore, I expected to see J.P. Tyler. Instead, I looked up to find Brandt staring down at me. He didn’t look pleased.

“What the fuck’re you doing?”

I stood up awkwardly, favoring my wounded gut, and smiled lamely. “I have to put this to rest, Tony. I got too many questions rattling around up here.” I touched my temple.

“I’m not so sure you’ve got anything up there. The hospital called this morning, madder than hell. They’d already contacted our insurance carrier, who in turn called the town manager, who’s just finished reaming my butt. I called Harriet and found out you’re not laid up at home, feeling sorry for yourself, you’re in here, fucking around with state’s evidence for the hottest ongoing trial we’ve had in a decade.” His voice had grown in volume and pitch throughout this monologue, but was cut short by Tyler appearing at his elbow. “What the hell do you want, J.P.?” he asked.

Tyler held up the clock between us. “The alarm mechanism’s been cut clean through-fresh marks, I’d say probably by a pair of wire cutters.”

“It couldn’t have just fallen off through wear and tear?”

“No way.”

Brandt looked at both of us and took the clock from Tyler. “What are you talking about?”

“Bob Vogel said he missed his meeting with Helen Boisvert the morning after Gail was raped because his alarm didn’t go off. It sounded pretty lame then, but lying on my back for three weeks got me wondering. The guy’s a total shit-we know he’s raped before, and he treats everyone he meets like scum-but he’s hanging onto his probation like a drowning man. Look at the effort he takes not to be caught driving that beater of his. Also, since he signed up with New England Wood Products, he’s never missed a day, never even been late. I wanted to find out if he’d lied about the alarm clock.”

Tony Brandt tugged at his ear, probably wishing he were on vacation. “You’re suggesting somebody cut the alarm to set him up?”

“Possibly. The other argument being that he cut it himself to give himself an alibi.”

I let Tony fill in the blank on that one. “For missing a meeting with Boisvert? Seems a little elaborate for someone who can barely string two sentences together.”

“Plus we didn’t find a wire cutter anywhere, in his car or the trailer,” J.P. added.

Tony mulled it over for a few moments. “Jesus,” he finally muttered, “we’re going to have to tell Dunn.”

“And he’s going to have to tell defense counsel,” I added.

I looked down at what I’d been holding when Brandt found me-the photos Vogel had taken of Gail walking around town. They were not sealed but were instead in a brown envelope, tied with a string. I opened the envelope, catching Brandt’s attention.

“What’s that?”

“Another of the things that bugged me. In that box of files you brought up, I found out we never did find a camera, and that the Green Mountains Lab people who processed the film had no files or recollections linking the film to Vogel.”

“And that got you thinking, too,” Tony finished morosely.

I didn’t answer. As I’d been speaking, I’d also been flipping through the eight pictures, not looking at Gail, as I had previously, but at the backgrounds to each scene. “Yeah, it did,” I murmured. “It struck me that since we found them in his trailer, we automatically assumed they were his, especially since we had so much other stuff against him. So we looked at them for who they showed us, and for what fingerprints might be on them, which, conveniently enough, were all smeared. What we never concentrated on was when they were taken.”

“Actually, I did,” Tyler said, trying not to sound offended. I was finding fault, after all, with his part of the investigation, not something he was used to. “But all I could get was that it was summer. I couldn’t find any calendars or clocks in the background store windows, or anything else that would give me a better fix.”

I held out one of the pictures to him, of Gail waiting to cross the street at a traffic light opposite the Photo 101 camera store. Next to her was a blue Toyota Corolla, its license plate easily readable. On its windshield, barely visible, was a small blob of color. “How about a parking ticket?”

J.P. took the picture from me. “Shit.” He quickly copied the plate number and headed off to a computer terminal. All our tickets were issued using a computerized, handheld system, which meant the time, date, parking-meter number, and details about the vehicle would all be in our files.

Brandt let out a sigh. “So what else have you been churning over in that hyperactive brain of yours?”

I told him about the logging-equipment yard near Jamaica, the oil slicks, and of my conversation with Fran Gallo. He absorbed it all quietly, having already adjusted himself to the inevitable meeting with Dunn.

He nodded once I’d finished. “All right. I don’t think the oil slicks or the red shirt’ll cause much trouble, but this other stuff might.” He checked his watch. “They’re probably about ready for a lunch break over there. I’ll talk to Dunn. You better come along.”

Tyler returned and handed him a slip of paper with a date on it. “It’s the only ticket that car’s had in the last two years. No possibility of confusion. And the owner paid it off personally, here in the building, one hour later, so the picture could only have been taken during about a forty-five-minute time span.”

Brandt looked at the slip of paper grimly. “Well, let’s hope Vogel doesn’t have an alibi.”