Misery Bay

CHAPTER TWENTY

When I got back on the road, I picked up my cell phone and called Agent Long. All those times I’d been tempted to call her, this sure as hell wasn’t the conversation I had in mind.

“Listen carefully,” I said. “Did an agent talk to Sean Wiley this morning?”

“Alex, what’s going on?”

“Just tell me. Did an agent talk to Sean Wiley?”

“That’s the grandson. Yes.”

“Did he say anything about his cousin?”

There was a moment of silence on the line.

“Alex, what cousin?” she said.

“God damn it.”

“What are you talking about? What cousin?”

“Clyde C. Wiley has another grandson,” I said. “From his daughter Corina. His name is Bobby Bergman, and apparently he’s going to school at Michigan Tech.”

“Where are you?”

“I’m on the road, just outside of Bad Axe. Did you hear what I said?”

“Yes. So let me get this information before I kill you. Bobby Bergman. Michigan Tech. How did you find this out?”

“Connie told me.”

“Connie? What are you doing talking to him? I swear to God, Alex…”

“Just listen. Bobby’s father’s name was Darryl Bergman. When Wiley was arrested ten years ago? It all started with an attack on Darryl.”

“I remember that part, yes. But I don’t remember anything about a son…”

“You had no reason to look for that,” I said, “but now you’ll probably want to go dig up the full arrest record.”

“I’ll look into it. So you’re on your way back home now, right?”

“That’s one option.”

“Alex-”

“I think Sean’s headed up to Houghton,” I said. “If you can find out where Bobby Bergman lives, you’d better send somebody out there right away. In fact, you know what, I talked to the Houghton County undersheriff when I was up there. You should give him a call and have him go find Bergman before something else happens.”

“Okay, wait. If he’s really at Michigan Tech-”

“That would be a hell of a coincidence, wouldn’t you say?”

“Because one of our victims went to school there.”

“Exactly. Plus there’s a good chance Bergman has the right kind of camera to make that film.”

Another silence.

“Tell me what you’re really saying here, Alex. Are you saying this kid is the one we’re looking for?”

“That’s what we need to find out.”

“If he did all of this… and filmed it… how did the film end up with Wiley?”

“He had the editing equipment, remember? So a little trip down to Grandpa’s house. He knows how to find the place. I’m sure he knows where the key is.”

“Then Wiley finds it and watches it…”

“And boom.”

“Heart attack,” she said. “He wasn’t working on the film at all. He just watched it. One time.”

“Yeah, I watched it one time and I’m surprised I didn’t have a heart attack myself. Oh, and you know what else? You remember the fire?”

“In the film? One of the first few scenes? Yeah, we haven’t been able to figure that one out yet, but-”

“Bobby Bergman’s house burned down four years ago. It killed his father.”

Another silence.

“We’ve been working through a long list of suspects,” she said. “We would have come back to the family eventually. We would have found this connection.”

“I know that. I’m not blaming you.”

“And yet I feel like I’m defending myself whenever I talk to you,” she said. “It’s like you’re always two steps ahead of me.”

“Blind luck,” I said. “Never mind. How’s Maven’s daughter?”

“No word yet.”

“I’ll have my cell phone here. Call me back as soon as you can.”

“Alex, you’re not going to Houghton, okay? Just go back home.”

“I can’t do that,” I said. “Not now. Call me back. Please.”

I hung up the phone and kept driving.

I stopped just north of Bay City to fill the tank and grab some food. It was about three o’clock in the afternoon now, on a cold but clear day. A great day for driving all over the state. I was three and a half hours from home. Or seven hours from Houghton.

It all goes back to that first death, I thought as I got back in the truck. It has to, right? Charlie Razniewski Jr. hanging from that tree in the middle of the night… it was the first death, and if you think about it, it was the one death that probably took a lot more planning than all of the others. With a clean getaway we still haven’t figured out.

Yes, it was definitely the biggest and boldest death of them all. What better place to do that than a carefully chosen spot just down the road from where you live?

I checked my cell phone. I was still in the Lower Peninsula, so I still had good reception. Just call me, I thought. Tell me you sent somebody over there and picked up Bergman. He’s behind bars as we speak. And Sean Wiley is safely on his way back home.

Call me and tell me that right now.

The phone stayed silent. I kept driving.

I was getting close to the Mackinac Bridge when my phone finally rang. It was just before six o’clock.

“What do you have?” I said.

“Where are you?”

“Just below the bridge. How’s Maven’s daughter now?”

“They’re cautiously optimistic right now.”

“Good,” I said, letting out a breath. “That’s good to hear.”

“We’re on our way up right now,” she said. “We’re about three hours behind you. So I think you should just stop and let us catch up to you.”

“Did you find Bobby Bergman?”

“Not really, no.”

“What do you mean, ‘not really’?”

“Well, you were right about the Michigan Tech connection. He was definitely going to school there.”

“He was going to school there?”

“He dropped out at the end of last year.”

“Where is he now?”

“Unknown, Alex. I’ve got nothing on him at all since the end of the last school year.”

“It’s April now, so that’s like a full year ago. Where the hell could he be?”

“He’s not at Tech anymore. That’s all I can tell you.”

“Damn,” I said. “So how do we find him?”

“Well, he did grow up in Houghton. He may still be in town, but we don’t have an address for him. It’s like he just disappeared off the face of the earth.”

I let out another breath, feeling dead tired now. After so many miles today, and now I had no idea where I was going.

“Alex, are you still there?”

“I’m here.”

“We confirmed what you said about the father. He died in that fire, four years ago.”

“A house fire that was captured on film.”

“Apparently so. It gets better. I went back and took a closer look at the daily logs. That day Wiley attacked his son-in-law, you know what else Steele and Haggerty did, besides making that arrest?”

“Tell me.”

“They drove Bobby Bergman and his mother back home to Houghton, right after their shift ended.”

“What? Why, were they in the car with Wiley?”

“No, that would have shown up in the arrest record. Apparently, the two of them ended up at the St. Ignace station somehow, and those two officers drove them home.”

“That makes no sense.”

“No, it doesn’t. If you look at Darryl’s sheet here, by the way, it’s mostly minor stuff-possession, simple assault, general misdemeanors. But there were a few domestics, too. If Wiley came all the way out from California, he must have been trying to help them get away, right? Why would they end up going back home?”

“We’ll just have to ask Bergman when we find him,” I said. “But you really don’t have an address? Is that what you’re telling me?”

“No, we don’t.”

“Do you have any prior addresses?”

I heard muffled voices on the other end of the line.

“Janet, are you there? Is that Fleury?”

“We’re on our way out there,” she said. “Please just let us handle this, okay?”

“Just give me his last known address, then. I’m closer than you are.”

“I can’t do that, Alex.”

I let a few seconds pass. I drove and I listened to the distant hum of static on the line.

“Hey,” I said, “how come you didn’t correct me this time?”

“What are you talking about?”

“I called you Janet and you let it slide.”

“Alex, I’m serious. You need to stop right now.”

“I’ll see you in Houghton,” I said. “Drive carefully.” I ended the call.

My signal was starting to fade as I crossed the bridge. Before it disappeared completely, I went to my saved numbers and looked up Leon’s cell phone. It rang twice and then he picked up.

“Leon,” I said. “Are you at work?”

“No, I’m home. I actually have a night off for once.”

“I’m sorry to bother you, but I just need you to look up an address for me if you can.”

“Sure thing, just tell me what I’m looking for.”

“The name is Bobby Bergman and the address is Houghton. The problem is, this address might be a little old. He hasn’t lived there since last year.”

I heard the clicking of keys, and then in the background I heard Eleanor’s voice, asking Leon who was on the phone. I wasn’t sure what the exact trouble threshold would be in that household, if just talking to me on the phone would get things going again.

“Eleanor says hello,” Leon said, still working away at his keyboard. “She also says you need to stop by and have dinner some time.”

“So she can kill me, right? Look, I don’t want to get you in hot water again. I wouldn’t be calling if this wasn’t important.”

“It’s okay. It’s just a phone call, and besides, we came to an agreement. She knows I can’t help myself, so whenever you drag me into this stuff, it’s all your fault, not mine. I’m just a helpless pawn in your wicked game.”

“I really owe you, Leon. Yet again.”

“Not a problem. As a matter of fact, I’m seeing three different addresses here.”

“Three? What are you talking about?”

“I’m going back in time, Alex. On the Internet. I can go back about ten years and see everywhere he lived.”

“You can really do that?”

“You really need to get a computer. Can we set you up with one, please?”

“Then I’d have no excuse to call you,” I said. “But seriously, can you tell me those addresses? And while you’re at it, maybe help me find where they are?”

I pulled over for a minute and wrote everything down. When he was done, I thanked him, told him to kiss Eleanor for me, then thanked him again. I don’t know how much of it he heard, because that’s about when the signal cut out for good. I put the phone down and got back on the road, taking that first exit past the bridge, to that thin lonely U.S. Highway 2 that runs along the shores of Lake Michigan, straight west into the setting sun, toward Houghton.

It felt strange to be back in Copper Country, where everything had begun. Winter wasn’t gone for good quite yet, but now it seemed to be fighting a losing battle. Where the snow had melted away there was dead ground and what deciduous trees there were looked like they’d never carry leaves again. I knew it would all come and it would come quickly, but tonight as my headlights swept across the empty road, the springtime felt like a fairy tale.

It was just after ten o’clock at night when I finally hit Houghton. There were lights now, and people driving around in their cars, but that empty feeling of foreboding I had brought with me didn’t go away. Maybe I was just too tired now, but I’d spent so many hours on the road and I knew there was a good chance I’d find something horrible here, just as Sean’s girlfriend had predicted.

As I went down the main street in Houghton, past the college buildings and the fraternities and everything else, I saw a lot more kids outside than I would have expected. They were walking up and down the sidewalks, some of them carrying beer bottles and most of them underdressed for the weather. I guess if you go to school in Houghton, an April night with the temperature just above freezing must feel like Bermuda.

I found the first address Leon had given me on the east side of town, not far from the college. This was the most recent address, I thought. This is where the trail will be warmest. I parked the truck on the street and sat there for a moment, still feeling the road and hearing the hum of the engine after so many hours of driving.

It was an old house, subdivided into several small apartments. I rang the doorbell. A young woman answered and told me that nobody named Bobby Bergman lived there anymore. It was all women now, as a matter of fact, and no, she had no idea where Bergman may have moved to. They pick up these rentals on a yearly basis, after all, and whoever lived there in previous years was nothing more than a foreign name to them. I thanked her and left.

The next address was right on campus. It was one of the main dormitories. I knew that would be even more of a dead end than the apartment.

The last address was over on the west side of town, away from the college. I wasn’t sure what I’d be able to find out there, but what the hell. So I drove all the way through town, past the bridge, and made my way through the side streets until I found Waterworks Drive. I started tracking the house numbers. They were going up, so I was heading in the right direction. An even number, I thought, so definitely on this side of the street. Getting closer now. One more house.

Boom, here it is.

Nothing.

There was no house there at all, just an empty lot with a low mound of dirt where the house should have been. I rechecked the addresses on either side of the lot. This was it.

I parked the truck, got out, and then stood there looking at the empty lot.

This is the neighborhood, I thought, looking up and down the street. That first scene in the film, it was taken right here. Meaning that this empty lot was-

I sensed a movement to my right. I looked over at the house next door, saw a woman’s face peering out at me from between the front window curtains.

Somebody’s definitely awake next door, I thought, and she likes to know what’s going on in her neighborhood. Maybe she likes to talk about it, too.

I went up her walkway and knocked on her front door. After a few seconds, I heard the deadbolt sliding and then the door opened up just a crack, with the little security chain rattling on its latch, making sure the door wouldn’t open any farther. The same woman I had seen in the window was now looking at me. She was in her late sixties maybe, and she was wearing a pink robe and pink slippers. I could see a cat rubbing itself against the backs of her legs.

“I’m sorry to bother you, ma’am. Can I just ask you a couple of questions?”

“Who are you?”

“I’m a private investigator, ma’am.” At that moment, I wished I had one of those stupid cards Leon had made for us, once upon a time. “Can I come inside for a moment?”

“I’d rather talk to you from here, if you don’t mind.”

“Fair enough.” I wasn’t about to point out to her that her little chain wouldn’t have stopped any able-bodied person, if that person really wanted to come inside her house. “Can you tell me, did the house next door burn down?”

“It sure did.”

“About four years ago, right?”

“Yep. Burned right to the ground. They had to come out with a bulldozer and clean it all out. Then they filled the foundation with dirt. It was two weeks of unholy racket, I’ll tell you that much.”

“The family who lived there,” I said. “Those were the Bergmans, right?”

“The Bergmans, yes. The father’s the one who died in the fire.”

“Did you know them well?”

“I lived next door to that family for a long time, mister, but I think Darryl Bergman might have said three words to me the whole time. That man was as mean as a snake. I never meant to pry, but I couldn’t help noticing what was going on over there. Police cars coming by, his wife with the bruises on her face, young Bobby always looking like he was afraid of his own shadow.”

“There was a man named Clyde C. Wiley,” I said. “An actor. He came out here one time, about ten years ago…”

“I sure remember that day, yes. He came over and beat up on Darryl, then the wife and kid went tearing down the street in Darryl’s old truck. That was a hell of a day, I tell you. I’ve never heard such language.”

“You saw it happen?”

“Sure did. I thought they were running away from the scary-looking biker guy, but then it turned out he was the father, just trying to help them get away. The wife and Bobby came right back, though, so I guess it didn’t work. Things got even worse after that, let me tell you.”

“So you were also here when Mrs. Bergman committed suicide?”

“Yes, sir. That was another heck of a day right there. The police came out and I thought they were just gonna talk to Darryl again, but then the ambulance showed up and they wheeled her out on a stretcher with a sheet over her head. I saw some of the blood seeping through the sheet, from where she cut her own wrists.”

“That was about nine years ago, right? About a year after that other incident?”

“Has it been nine years already? I guess it has.”

“You’re being very helpful, ma’am. I appreciate you taking the time to talk to me.”

“I know it’s not a Christian thing to say, but I didn’t mind it all that much when that house burned down with Darryl inside it. I truly didn’t.”

“I understand. I only have one more question for you. Do you have any idea where Bobby Bergman may be right now?”

“Haven’t seen him since the fire,” she said, shaking her head. “Poor kid. Some people shouldn’t have to go through that much misery in their life, you know what I mean? I think that old camera of his was his only friend.”

“An old movie camera?”

“An ancient thing, yes. He was always horsing around with it. He took a movie of me one day. I think I might have given him a funny look about it.”

Of course, I thought. That was you. You were in that one scene, looking over the fence.

“Then I felt bad afterwards,” she said. “I should have been a better neighbor to the boy.”

“No, I’m sure you were just fine. Thanks again for talking to me. You have a good night.”

She said something to her cat as she closed the door. As I left, I heard the deadbolt sliding back into place. After everything that had happened next door, I couldn’t blame her for being a little scared, even if the house itself was nothing more than a memory now.

“Where are you now, Bobby Bergman?” I said, taking one last look at the empty lot. “And wherever you are, is your cousin with you?”

I got back in the truck. As long as I was here in town, there was one more place to go.