Shadow Men

CHAPTER
23

Wilson showed up with a squad car following him into the driveway. He greeted me coldly.

We stood in the shadow of the big oaks. Mayes deliberately avoided looking back at the open barn door, and the uniformed cops, one with sergeant stripes on his arm, seemed at a loss as to what to do with the bristle they carried into the place. The sheriff's face held a look of tight-lipped resolve.

"Hank, keep these two separated, please, until I can get their independent statements," he said, and then spun on his heel and headed for the barn. I went to sit in my truck while one of the deputies took Mayes to the squad car. The sergeant started over to me but when I looked up and met his eyes, he saw something in them that made him stop short, and he took up a position about fifteen feet away. I didn't say a word. After a time I watched Wilson step out of the barn door and head back our way. He bypassed us and went to the trunk of his Crown Victoria and popped the trunk. He came up with what I recognized as a fingerprint kit and I watched him return to the barn. He was gone several minutes more and then came out with the kit and again disappeared into the trunk of his car, concentrating on something there. When he was finished, he called me over and my guard came with me.

"I am not a man who likes to be wrong, Mr. Freeman, but my daddy taught me to at least admit it when you are." There was no question in the statement, so I did not feel compelled to say anything in return.

"I have taken enough latent print courses at the FBI to make a good guess that the fingerprints of the now-deceased Mr. Jefferson appear to match those on the.405 casing that we found at the first murder scene," he said. "We'll have to get them over to the expert in Orlando, but I'm guessing we've got some shaking out to do with all this, Mr. Freeman. So why don't you and I sit down and talk a bit."

Wilson used his cell phone to call the county medical examiner's office. When he was through he gave his deputies instructions on how he wanted the scene sealed off, and then turned to me.

"Come take a knee with me, sir."

He led me over into the shade of the oak, and when the sergeant started to follow, he waved him off.

"It's OK, Hank," the sheriff said.

"If you don't mind, Mr. Freeman, I'd like to leave your friend there in the car."

I looked over at Mayes, and when I turned back, the sheriff read the confusion in my face.

"Gotta do this one by the book, sir."

We settled under the tree and I told him how I had arrived at the church at 6:10 and found Mrs. Jefferson there. I described where and how I had found Mayes and how I had left the scene out back just as he found it, except for my adjustment of the front door.

He nodded, and then it was his turn.

"You must have left the church just before we got there, son. Mrs. Jefferson called Judy down to dispatch and told her she'd found her husband hanging dead in the barn when she got up. She said she didn't know what to do but to go to the church and pray."

She had known he was dead before I had arrived. I tried to rerun her words and wondered why I hadn't caught it.

Wilson then gave me a short version of his own ten-year investigation into the Highlands County murders. The facts weren't much different from those that Billy had come up with in his research, but from the lawman who had lived the cases and had obviously let them burn in his head for so many years, it was painful to see him try to accept the truth. The reverend had carried out the killings as some kind of warped retribution against evil. The twitch of violence in his bloodline had surfaced in a way he could somehow justify.

While we spoke a van from the medical examiner's office arrived with another county squad car. Wilson's sergeant spoke to the driver and he backed down the driveway to the front of the barn. The van emitted a piercing beep for as long as the transmission was in reverse. I cringed with each beat, and saw Mark Mayes squeeze his eyes closed.

"I have seen Reverand Jefferson two or three times a week for a decade. Attended many a prayer meeting at his church," Wilson said, looking off in the direction of the van. "I'm having a hard time with all this, Mr. Freeman. What possesses a man?"

I wasn't qualified to answer such a question, and when I remained silent, he stood and put his hand on my shoulder.

"I need to speak to Mr. Mayes, and then you two can go. I will eventually need that rifle that the reverend gave you."

"I'm sure the ballistics reports on the weapon will be extremely thorough, Sheriff."

While Mayes was being interviewed I called Billy's office and home before finally reaching him on his cell. The connection was bad.

"I'm down in Miami-Dade," he said. "The lawyers for PalmCo are trying to get an injunction to block any excavation of the site that we put in the probable cause filing. They're trying to use some angle about sacred Indian burial grounds through the name of some Miccosuki tribesman they dug up, excuse the expression."

"Christ," I said. "Lawyers."

"It's a stalling tactic," Billy replied. We've already got a Collier County sheriff's detail out there securing the site, and I've warned the PalmCo boys that if they play us on this, we'll be glad to get the media involved."

"We built Florida on the bones of our workers."

"Exactly," Billy said.

I told Billy about Reverend Jefferson's suicide and the sheriff's preliminary fingerprint analysis.

"Is Mayes all right?"

I looked over to the patrol car where Wilson was still talking with the kid. Mayes was nodding his head, being deferential and polite.

"The kid's got some faith," I said. "And finally some answers."

"And more to use it on than he bargained for," Billy said.

When the sheriff was done talking to Mayes he escorted him over to where I was standing and shook my hand.

"I'll have to have both of you come in later to make official statements. I hope that won't put you out much. I know you'll have some pressing engagements down south," he said.

Mayes climbed into his car just as another squad car was pulling in. I could see Mrs. Jefferson's profile through the backseat window.

"May we go back to the church for a few minutes, Mr. Freeman?" Mayes said, watching the car through his window. I nodded and he pulled out ahead of me without waiting.

When we pulled down onto the dirt drive to the church, a worn and rusted truck was parked in the grass. I stopped next to Mayes's sedan and got out.

"Can I suggest that you get a hold of Billy as soon as you can?" I said. "He's going to have some things to tell you. There's a forensics team working the spot in the Glades where we found your great-grandfather. Billy can probably arrange to have you taken out there if you want."

He waited a few seconds and then said, "I don't think I'm going to have to, Mr. Freeman." We were still standing next to my truck when a couple came out of the church. He was big and round- shouldered with thick, workingman's hands. The woman was small and angular and sagging at the shoulders with some invisible weight. The man opened the passenger-side door of the truck for her and then got in and drove away.

"I'm going to go inside for a minute if you'd like to join me," Mayes said, and turned away.

I watched him disappear through the church door and then sat back looking at the sun filter down through the leaves and onto my hood. I had been up for nearly forty-eight hours, and my head felt filled with cotton though I couldn't call it sleepiness. I was bone- tired, but my grinding had not stopped. I reached back behind the seats and found the bag I had stuffed there after hosing myself off at Dawkins's dock and took out an evidence bag.

Mayes was in the front pew when I joined him inside. His hands were folded in front of him, but instead of bowing his head he simply stared up at the cross behind the altar. I sat down beside him and tried to match his gaze but couldn't hold it for long. I took the gold watch out of the plastic and held it out in my palm beside his knee and he finally shifted his eyes down and reached out to take it. He held it with the tips of his fingers as though he was afraid of a brittleness that was not there.

"It still opens," I said.

He found the catch and flipped it open, then turned it so he might read the inscription. A single tear rolled down his face, leaving a shining streak. He looked back up at the cross.

"He was a good and pious man, wasn't he, Mr. Freeman?"

"I believe so."

"Then I should forgive him," he said. It was not a question, and I did not feel the need to answer.