The Big Thaw

8

Art was pissed off, and Lamar was simply frustrated. Fred's bond had been set at $13,000.00, a so-called "scheduled" bond, that was used when a magistrate wasn't immediately available to set one. Lawyer Priller found one, though, and he convinced him to agree on a 10 percent posting. Fred had left us for the princely sum of $1,300.00.

"Don't worry about it," said Davies. "I'm just glad you didn't do something dumb, like charge him with murder."

As it turned out, that's exactly what Art had wanted to do, and had been dissuaded by Lamar, who had maintained that there was insufficient evidence to smack him with a murder charge.

"Let's put it this way," said Davies. "You lay a murder charge on him, I've got forty-five days to make the entire case, unless he waives his right to a speedy trial." He shook his head. "You know about backlogs at the lab. No guarantee everything will be done in forty-five days. I have other trials scheduled, in the next forty-five days. You charge him now, he demands speedy trial, he walks, free. Period."

He looked at Art. "What's the hurry? He ain't goin' nowhere." He grinned. "I assume, at least, that you told him not to leave town?"

"Absolutely." Art seemed a bit mollified.

I'd been checking the VINs I'd gotten from the snowmobiles against the list Sally had given me. Two were from Cletus Borglan. I announced that.

"Is this, like, significant?" asked Art.

"Beats me," I said. "Just an error in memory, maybe." Cletus had said that he gave Grossman one and junked the rest.

"I prefer to go to trial with a ninety-five percent chance of winning," said Davies, ignoring the Art and Carl show. "The five percent being the whim of the jury. I'll be happy with seventy-five percent, and I've gone in with about a sixty percent chance, but I really don't like to do that. Right now, this one would be about fifty-fifty. Maybe less. With a circumstantial case, and a local jury, I don't think we could pull it off."

"What if the lab doesn't give us anything linking Fred to the scene?" I asked. "Then what do we do?"

"If that happens," said Davies, "you do lots and lots of interviews, of lots and lots of people. And if we still come down with Fred being the only possibility, then…" He paused. "Then we go the grand jury route, get an indictment, and see if we can convince him to cop a plea."

"Nothing personal," said Art, "but that's not much of a plan."

"You are so right," said Davies. "And that's just the best possible scenario if the lab doesn't link him. The very best."

"So," I said, "where's that leave us?"

"The no-link bit, you mean?"

"Yep."

"That leaves us with very little," said Davies. "Or, to use a legal term, up Shit Creek without a paddle."

"Don't worry," said Art. "He did it, and the lab will find a link."

Davies looked at him. "You must have taken a confidence-building course recently."

"I just don't accept defeat," said Art, "when I know I'm right."

I was glad for him. He was just full of admirable traits.

After much discussion, it was left at this: Absent any other viable suspect, it appeared that Fred was the only person who could have done the deed. Period. We took a short poll, and it was decided that we would diligently seek other suspects. And, in the meantime, we would do all we could to link Fred to the scene.

"We don't have much pressure today," said Davies. "Tomorrow, there'll be more. And each day we go without an arrest, the pressure increases. So long as you understand that."

"Just like always," I said.

The dispatch desk called, and said there were several members of the press in the outer office. Art and Davies took the job of talking to them. Lamar went out the unused back way. And I mean, unused. We never opened that door, and never shoveled the snow outside it. I last saw him slogging through two-foot snow drifts, going around behind the building. He really hates the press.

I was tired when I got home around 8:30. Sue had laid in a supply of frozen, microwaveable food. Murder rations, so to speak. Although I couldn't discuss details, I let her know that things were going slowly.

"How about Madison this weekend?" she asked.

Ooh. We'd been planning to do that since Christmas, and this weekend was the one per month I was scheduled off.

"Not sure. Let me see how it goes tomorrow…" Damn. Another delay would put us into March. Too long. It was going to be difficult, though, getting things arranged for a weekend off. If stuff happened fast, then we would be able to go in March. If it continued at this pace, we'd be going in August if we didn't go now.

"I know you're really into this case, but if we don't go now…"

"I know. Now or six months from now."

"I got lots of frozen vegetables today. Be sure to eat some." She smiled. "You need to be healthy, either way."

I put the frozen vegetables into my microwaved couscous, added a can of mushrooms, sliced a low-fat sausage, and topped the whole thing with fat-free grated cheese. Eleven minutes from opening the first package to a complete, satisfying, and sort of tasty meal.

"I don't know how you can eat that…"

"Oh," I said, "thanks. I forgot the Thai sauce…"

"God." She shook her head. "Your stomach won't last till spring. If you want to eat at a good restaurant in Madison, you better go soon."

That was about as close to a clincher as you could get. I popped the top of a can of Diet Cherry Coke, and silently drank a toast to Madison. Hitting directly on top of the Thai sauce, it produced an instant reaction, and I belched.

"You may have to go by yourself…"

I was just scraping off my plate, and opening the dishwasher, when the phone rang. It was Deputy John Willis, our newest officer. He was coming along nicely, and excelled at the snoopy kind of patrol work that would make him an excellent officer.

"Hate to bother you at home…"

"Sure you do." I picked up a notepad and pen. "Whatta ya got?"

"Well, you know, I got to thinking about Fred, and the Borglan place, and all that stuff. You remember last year, oh, maybe July, when we had that humongous fight in Dogpatch?"

Dogpatch was our name for Jasonville, a very tiny town in the west of the county, population about 100, and one very busy tavern. "Yeah," I said. "The one where we called everybody but the National Guard?"

We'd arrested over 50 people that night, which isn't bad for either a town of 100, or a department of 10. Most of the arrestees had been from out of town…

"We arrested Fred and his two cousins that night. Remember?"

I did now.

"Yep. I did the interviews of all three of 'em."

"Okay…" I said.

"I got the notes right here… Fred got into it with some grubby dudes from Dubuque, remember. And both his cousins jumped in to rescue him. And I got statements from the three of them. And all three say that they… just a sec… that they will 'give my life' for the other two. In each of the three statements, same thing."

"Exactly?" I asked. Strange.

"Exactly the same phrase."

"Damn…" I jotted the phrase down. "You remember how close together they were when they wrote the statements?"

"Well, they were in the same room…"

"Did they communicate with each other?"

"Well, yeah, they did…" He sounded disappointed.

"Great!"

"What?"

"That's at least as good, I think," I said. "Chummy, even talk it over and decide they will stick together through and through kind of stuff. Remember if they were sober?"

"I've got the PBT stuff here," he said. A PBT was a preliminary breath test, designed for use on the highway as a precursor to arresting for DWI and doing a real test on an Intoxilyzer. The PBT wasn't admissible in court, but was used a lot to give the officer a ballpark idea of the state of the subject. "All three of them were over point one oh, but not by too much."

"Fine."

"Fred's girlfriend bailed all three of 'em out, that night."

"Cool. You remember anything else they might of said?"

"No, sorry, I was kinda busy." He was apologetic, like he should have known that they were going to end up in a murder case or something. New officers are like that. Well, the good ones are, anyway.

"That's all right," I said. "No problem. This is good." I was having a bit of trouble getting the ballpoint pen to write, and grabbed a pencil. "What was the girlfriend's name?"

"Just a sec," he said, and I could hear paper being shuffled in the background. "Ah… Donna Sue Rahll."

"Get a DL on her, will you?"

"Will do."

"Thanks. This is good."

I normally hated to be called at home, but I loved it when it was something I could use. I didn't know Donna Sue Rahll, but the last name rang a very faint bell.

I joined Sue in the living room.

"Did I hear you say Rahll?" she asked.

"Yeah. Know anybody by that name?"

"Well, John Rahll is the man who runs the Maitland Economic Development Center."

"Oh, sure… tall man?"

"Yes."

"Any kids?" One of the many benefits to being married to a teacher.

"Oh, a girl who graduated a while ago. Becky, maybe," said Sue, absently, as she shuffled through some tests she'd brought home to grade.

"Or, how about Donna?"

"That's right, Donna."

So. Tomorrow's schedule was shaping up.

"You know where Donna might be, these days?"

She looked up. I usually didn't pursue her information so far. It was an agreement we had. You don't have to tell me about school stuff, I don't have to tell you about cop stuff.

"Last I knew, she was working at the Maitland Library. She had a year of school, dropped out. Came home. I think she might live with her parents."

"Okay. Thanks. That's plenty."

"So, now I get to ask a question?"

"Uh, maybe." I grinned.

"They said in school that you were flying in helicopters today, looking for another body. True?"

"Yes, I was in a helicopter today. It was really, really cool. But, no, we aren't looking for any more bodies."

"Thanks," she said, and went back to her papers.

Rumors can plague an investigation. Especially in a town like Maitland and a county like Nation. One of the seldom appreciated effects is that it retards the flow of information. Somebody has a truly important bit, but they hear through the grapevine that something else entirely is really important. They dismiss what they know, and begin to rely on what they hear. Consequently, they don't tell you their information, because it doesn't seem important. In our case, for example, the third body bit might convince someone that a snowmobile sighting they had on the night in question might not be significant. Because we weren't looking for snowmobile sightings, after all, we were looking for a third body. So that's where that triple homicide nonsense came from with the media.

"We were looking at snowmobile tracks," I said, hinting. "Not for a third body. If anybody asks…"

"Oh," said Sue, absently. "All right."

You do what you can. I went to bed. But before I did, I turned off the police scanner.