Inherit the Bones

Chapter Twenty-eight

While Finn’s charms may have worked on Lisey, they had no effect on Tilly Jane Krinkle. I introduced the two of them and she paid about as much attention to him as a cat would to a saucer of sour milk. The librarian led us down into the basement archives, and as she stroked the stuffed parrot and cooed to it, I saw Finn’s mouth open.

I quickly elbowed him and shook my head. The last thing we needed was to piss off Tilly.

She said, “All right, kiddos, the space is all yours. Now, there are a couple of rules and yes, I know you are police officers but I don’t give a god dang rat’s butt, you follow the same guidelines as everyone else. And I ain’t asking, I’m telling.”

Tilly waited until we nodded our heads and then continued.

“There will be absolutely, positively, no marking, drawing, or otherwise writing on these materials. There’s a copy machine around the corner. If you remove something from a box, place it back in the same god dang spot. Don’t shelve or return anything yourselves; you’ll put it in wrong and then we’ll never see it again.”

Tilly cocked her head and closed her eyes and then jerked to the side with a violent spasm. Finn and I jumped at the sudden movement.

“Petey says go deep or go home,” she said. “She says you’ll know what that means.”

With that, she left us in the basement.

As before, the space was dark save for our small corner. In the stillness, I smelled Finn’s cologne, and old paper, and a musty odor, like the air inside a summer cabin that’s been closed up all winter.

Finn pulled a second chair over from another study carrel. He removed his wallet and cell phone and keys and placed them to the side and then sat down and took a stack of newspaper clippings from the top of the messy pile.

“What did she mean by that? Who’s Petey?”

“Petey is the parrot,” I said. “And I have no idea.”

I joined Finn and reached for one of the heavy, gray three-ring binders on the table. When I opened it, a dead black spider, its desiccated corpse as light as air, fell into my lap. I brushed the bug away and it struck me that the last person who had touched this stuff was Nicky.

Had he really found something here, in these old articles and photos and scraps of a forgotten time, something the rest of us had missed?

The binder was stuffed with newspaper clippings from the spring and summer of 1985. A few of them covered the sad story of Rose Noonan, the young woman whose strangled body was found tangled in the reeds on the banks of the river in August. Her murder, like the Woodsman murders, remained unsolved. The police always figured her killer was a drifter, a highwayman. Rose had lived in town only a few months, and judging from these clippings, her death, while shocking to Cedar Valley, didn’t light a candle to the disappearance earlier in the summer of the two local boys.

I held up a black-and-white Xerox copy of Rose Noonan’s driver’s license. She was pretty, with dark curly hair and laughing eyes. She wore a necklace with a dangling charm, and earrings that kissed her jawbone. “Remember her?”

Finn nodded. “The forgotten one.”

I looked at him. After a moment, he spoke again. “You know what I mean. She’s the forgotten one. When you think of 1985 and Cedar Valley, you think of the McKenzie boys. But there were three victims that summer. Four if you count the mayor’s death. I always figured the stress from everything that happened brought on his heart attack.”

“You think it was the same guy?”

Finn laughed at my expression. “Now hang on, that’s not what I meant. Different M.O. She was assaulted and strangled and thrown in the river like a piece of trash, a month after the boys disappeared. The kids weren’t touched that way. They were kept somewhere, killed, and then buried, properly, in the woods. I just meant that no one ever talks about her. You know they couldn’t even determine a date of death for her? Her body had been in the water too long.”

He was right; no one did talk about the woman.

“Do you think it would have made a difference three years ago, if you and Moriarty had gone through all this stuff?”

Finn shrugged. “I don’t know. Bottom line is that Nicky was gone. I suppose it would have been interesting to know about, but really, the only reason we’re down here now is because Nicky was murdered. Back then ‘all this’ would have been just a quirky footnote to Nicky’s life and tragic accidental death.”

I nodded and again thought he was probably right. Finn stood and leaned over the table and went through a few more of the piles.

“Why do you think he came back?” I asked.

“Who, Nicky?”

“No, Frank Sinatra. Yeah, Nicky. Sounds like they’ve got people drop in and out of the circus all the time. He had to have known what the next stop was-Cedar Valley. Why would he return? He could have checked out for a week or two and joined back up with the circus in Idaho,” I said. “What’s different now?”

Finn sat down and hugged a stack of files and folders against his chest. He played along. “You abandon your family-your parents, your sister, your grandfather, your friends-and run away for three years. You change your appearance. You’re running, or hiding, from someone. What is the one thing that could bring you back?”

I ran through the last few years, looking for some change, some difference, something new. The People magazine article on the Bellingtons from a month or so back came to mind. It was a two-page spread on the Bellingtons that touched on the tragic loss of their only son; Ellen’s former career as an actress; and Terry’s struggle with cancer. “His dad. Nicky came back because of his dad.”

“The cancer?” Finn asked. He thought about it. “I think you might be right. If I thought my dad was dying, that would be enough to bring me home.”

I nodded. “Something to think about. It’s been splashed all over the news, maybe Nicky saw it in an article somewhere.”

Finn was into the files and folders now. “It seems like there’s a good mix here of reporting from ’85 and from 2011.”

He handed me a photocopy, this one the front page of the Valley Voice dated two days after I found the skull. There was a photograph of Chief Angel Chavez and me. Under the image was a headline that read “Missing No More-McKenzie Boys Found in Local Woods.”

I scanned the first paragraph.

In a stunning discovery early this week, the remains of Tommy and Andrew McKenzie were found in shallow graves in the woods a few miles off Highway 50 by backcountry skiers Gemma Monroe and Brody Sutherland. Monroe, an officer with the Cedar Valley Police Department, declined to comment for this article, but Chief Chavez issued a statement, calling the discovery “an opportunity for closure for the families, and for the town.” The disappearance of the two children in 1985 will be reopened as a murder investigation. In town, a new title has already been bestowed upon the case: The Woodsman Murders.

I stopped reading. The byline was Missy Matherson; at the time, she had been a bit reporter for the Voice and had not yet climbed the ranks to television anchor. Even then, she’d irritated the hell out of me and had been the main reason I’d declined to comment.

That, and what would I have said?

That already I felt finding the bodies had altered the course of my life?

That when I closed my eyes, I saw Andrew’s skull grin at me, his eye sockets wan and empty, his teeth even and white?

The dreams hadn’t yet started but they were sure as hell on their way.

Finn muttered, “Shit, these shouldn’t be here.”

He held up a stack of manila file folders, each stuffed with loose-leaf sheets of paper. He angled the cover of the folder on top and I saw the distinct blue-and-green stamp of the police department emblem.

“You’re kidding me,” I said. “Ours?”

He nodded. They were classified reports. How long they’d been down here, tucked among these public records, was anyone’s guess.

“What are the dates?”

Flipping the first few folders opened, Finn scanned the contents. “From 1985. They’re from the original missing persons investigation.”

“Well, at least it won’t be our butts that will be in the hot seat,” I said.

If case files from 2011 had been down here, free for any person off the street to find, there would have been hell. But most of the cops from ’85 were retired, dead, or had moved away.

“Uh-oh,” Finn said quietly.

He stopped reading the folder in his hands and put it on the bottom of the stack.

“What?”

He shook his head. “It’s nothing. I just remembered, I had an appointment this afternoon.”

“You’re many things, Finn, but a good liar you aren’t,” I said. “Give me the damn thing.”

“I really don’t want to,” he said, but he handed it to me anyway.

A sticker affixed inside the folder read September 18, 1985. Interview 245-A, Officers Dannon and Cleegmont. Subject Daniel David Moriarty. 4:15pm. Moriarty residence, 1763 Lantern Lane, Cedar Valley.

“Our Moriarty?”

Finn nodded reluctantly. “Danny was his son. He died a few years ago in a bar fight; he was stabbed to death. From what I’ve heard, the kid was always sort of a bad seed. In 1985, Danny would have been what? Sixteen? C’mon Gemma, the cops back then interviewed every male between the ages of thirteen and sixty-five. It doesn’t mean a thing.”

“That’s bull, Finn, and you know it. Moriarty’s a cop, a cop who happened to be a lead on the investigation into Nicky’s accident. And now come to find out his son was a suspect in the very murders Nicky was obsessed with? I don’t believe in coincidences.”

“Subject, Gemma. Not suspect,” he said, and leaned back with a sigh. “Well, go on, read it. Let’s see what it says. I know you’re not going to let this go until you do.”

They were only a few sheets of paper in the folder. On the first page, a tiny notation referenced a recording, and I assumed the transcript was word for word. With a deep breath, I began to read.

Moriarty, Daniel: Do I need a lawyer?

Dannon, Officer: You have the right to an attorney if we take you downtown. Right now, this is just a friendly conversation, son. Your dad does this sort of thing all the time with folks.

Moriarty, Louis: He’s right, Danny. Just answer the officers’ questions.

Cleegmont, Officer: Please, son, have a seat. As Officer Dannon said, this is just a nice friendly little conversation. We’re visiting everyone in town. Heck, we talked to your neighbors just a few minutes ago.

Moriarty, L: That’s right. And I talked to a bunch of your friends, and their parents, last week.

Moriarty, D: Okay, Pop, I get it. What do you guys want to know?

Dannon: Okay, Danny. Says here you’re a junior at the high school? Is that right? On the football team?

Moriarty, D: Yes, sir, a junior. No, sir, baseball’s my game, sir.

Dannon: Baseball? Now that’s a real American sport, isn’t it? You pitch?

Moriarty, D: Yes, sir.

Cleegmont: You know, I played a little ball in my day. I can see by your arms you’ve probably got a real nice throw, son.

Moriarty, D: I do okay.

Dannon: You lift?

Moriarty, D: Coach has us do weights in the afternoons in the gymnasium, sir.

Cleegmont: Would you call yourself a strong young man, then?

Moriarty, D: I suppose so. Strong enough.

Dannon: Now, I heard from one of the families down the road that you and Tommy had a beef awhile back. Can you tell us about that?

Moriarty, Elsa: Oh, that old nonsense? That boy was bothering Danny, following him around. He got in the way all the time. He wanted to be just like Danny.

Dannon: Now, what do you mean, he got in the way?

Moriarty, Elsa: Well, he-

Moriarty, D: Ma, let me handle this. It was nothing. We just had a scuffle last spring. It wasn’t a big deal.

Cleegmont: Was this before or after you stole lunch money from Andrew McKenzie on the bus?

Moriarty, D: Someone has been lying to you guys. Andrew’s poor as dirt. I never stole anything from that kid.

Dannon: You think this is funny? He’s eleven. His birthday was two days before he disappeared. And I have more than one person who can testify you were giving him a hard time a few months back.

Moriarty, L: Okay, fellows, I think you made your point. Danny’s a good boy and he sure didn’t have anything to do with the missing boys. I think this interview is about done.

Dannon: Lou, you know better than anyone that we’ve got to talk to everyone. We got two kids missing, and according to our records, your son has, at various points within the last year, had “issues” with each of them. We also know your son’s got a file an inch thick at the school. Now, we can go about this the easy way or the hard way. What’s it going to be?

“Is that it?” Finn asked.

I nodded. “The page ends there. Seems like there should be more to the report, but…”

“Wow. I mean, wow. Moriarty. What do you want to do?”

What I wanted to do was to sink my teeth into a big steaming slice of cheese pizza with olives and mushrooms, and forget I’d ever opened the folder.

I shrugged. “Let’s keep this between us for now. Like you said, they would have interviewed everyone. There weren’t that many kids in town; they were all bound to know one another, at least peripherally. But, it does make me wonder. A father’s loyalty to his son is something to consider, especially if the kid had a reputation. The cops would have been all over that.”

Finn said, “What are you saying, Gemma? That Danny Moriarty was the Woodsman? And his dad covered up the crime? No way. No, I know the guy too well. Lou Moriarty didn’t cover up the murder of two boys and then spend the next thirty years in the same damn town, all the while knowing the bodies were rotting a few miles away.”

He stood and pulled at his hair, something I had never seen him do before. He paced the aisle to our right, stopping at the edge of the dark void and then coming back. “And then what? Sixteen-year-old Nicky discovers this and Moriarty kills him, too? That is complete and utter bullshit.”

I thought a moment, recalling Finn’s words. “You said it yourself. Moriarty was insistent on searching Nicky’s room. What if Nicky had approached him, and threatened to expose him, or his son? Maybe Moriarty was looking for something Nicky had, some piece of evidence or proof?”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. Something. When you searched the room, did you have a pack with you, something to collect evidence?”

Finn nodded. “Yes, but I carried it. Moriarty couldn’t have taken anything without me seeing. I remember that day, we met at the Bellingtons’-their old place-and we looked like the freaking Bobbsey twins, both of us in khakis and maroon polo shirts. Moriarty didn’t have anything else with him, no briefcase, no bag, no nothing.”

“But if it was something small… something he could have slipped in his pocket?”

Finn stopped pacing and stared at me and then started pacing again. “What the hell. Sure, I suppose.”

I thought about Louis Moriarty. In 1985, he would have been in his mid-forties, smack dab in the middle of a distinguished career with the Cedar Valley Police Department. From the police transcript, it sounded as though he was still married at that point, living with a teenage son with a history of getting into trouble with the other kids.

Lou was big and strong; I had to imagine his son Danny had been as well. How much easier for a kid, known from the neighborhood, to get close to the two young boys than it would have been for a stranger? Maybe there was something there.

I thought about something else, too. Lou was one of the men that used to play poker with my step-grandfather, Bull Weston, and Frank Bellington and a couple of other guys from town. Thirty years ago, they were all accomplished, middle-age men, running the town in various ways: lawyers, cops, businessmen, and politicians.

And then, about twenty years ago, there was a falling out. The group disbanded, the men went their separate ways. What could have been at the root of something like that?

The lights above us buzzed off for a second and came back on and then flickered again and then went completely out. I stood and waved my arms, hoping to trigger a sensor but nothing happened. The space was dark, so dark that when I lifted a hand in front of my eyes, I couldn’t see it. I couldn’t even make out the green glow of the emergency exit sign.

Maybe the entire building had experienced a power outage.

“Gemma?”

“I’m here, by the desk. Just stay where you are, I’ll see if I can find a switch,” I said. I groped blindly with my arms outstretched in front of me low, to protect my belly. I felt the edge of the table and ran my hands up the sides of the study carrel and then up and on to the wall.

Left or right?

Tilly had mentioned a copy machine around the corner and I headed that way, keeping a hand on the wall like a tether.

“Gemma? I’m going to come back to the desk,” Finn called. He sounded far away, much farther than if he had indeed stayed where he was when the lights went out.

Maybe it was a trick of the dark, causing our voices to ricochet and bounce around in space. My hand ran along the smooth flat surface of the wall until it hit an edge. I reached around and decided it was a corner and rounded it, careful to keep my other hand stretched out to fend off any tables or chairs.

I hit the copy machine with my foot and stopped and felt along the wall, but there was no button or switch… just more of the same smoothness that seemed to stretch on into infinity. With no idea what lay before me, and getting farther and farther from my partner, I was hesitant to keep going.

“Finn?”

I listened and heard nothing but the ticking from my Timex, and a low shifting noise as though the building itself was settling in for the day.

“Finn? Are you there?”

The darkness had a weight all its own, and the silence around me grew. It pressed against me and I took a deep breath and slowly exhaled, willing my nerves to settle.

A few feet away, a soft scuffling noise, like a sneaker catching on carpet, caused my heart to hiccup.

“Hello?” I called softly. “Tilly? Finn?”

Another scuffle and I backed up against the wall next to the copy machine. For the second time in one week, the feeling of being watched by someone unseen slipped over me and settled in my bowels like a shard of ice.

I held my breath and listened and almost screamed when I heard the low, steady inhalation and exhalation of someone else breathing. My heart felt like it was going to crawl up out of my throat and my hand went automatically to my belt, where I found… nothing.

I was in the summer dress I’d worn to the circus. My Glock was locked in the gun safe in the trunk of my car.

“Who’s there?” I called. “I can hear you breathing, damn it.”

A low laugh, followed by, “Yes, I’m here.”

The voice was too low to tell the age or sex of the speaker but there was a familiar quality to it, one that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. The words were enough to make me slide down the wall and land on my rear end. I wrapped my arms around my knees and shrank into myself and closed my eyes and tried not to breathe.

I heard another soft scuffle, this time closer.

The stranger was approaching me, one slow step at a time. He, or she, was just on the other side of the copy machine now.

“Gemma,” the voice whispered in a singsong voice. “Where are you?”

A low electrical hum began and the copy machine gave a shake and lit up with red and green buttons. In a far corner of the cavernous space, lights began flickering on. Then running footsteps and a door slamming and as the lights came on in my corner, dazzling and blinding, I stood and jogged down the corridor in the direction of the noise.

“Gemma?” Finn called.

“Down here!” I said. “Hurry.”

I reached the end of the corridor and saw a door to my right and one to my left.

Damn.

Which door, which door… I ran to the door on the right and pushed against it and then looked down and saw a rusty padlock gripped by an equally rusty chain.

Finn met me on my way to the door on the left. “What is it?”

“There’s someone else down here,” I panted. I hadn’t run this much in months.

Next to me, Finn bent down and removed a small snub-nosed revolver from an ankle strap.

“Nice,” I said as I pushed open the door.

“Like my American Express and condoms, I don’t leave home without it,” he replied.

Above us, a dark staircase loomed and I hurried up it as fast as I could, Finn behind me. We reached the top and I pushed open another door and we emerged into bright afternoon sun at the back of the library in an old parking lot.

It was empty, save for the tangled weeds and trash that lay in the cracks and holes of the cement. A tall chain-link fence lined the perimeter of the parking lot and I sighed as I saw a dozen different holes cut into the wire.

We spun around but there was no one in sight. From the looks of it, no one had been there for months.