The Lions Of Lucerne

23

Back in the helicopter, Scot accepted Vance and Nick’s excuse for letting so much slack on the safety line escape. He also decided not to punch both of their lights out.

As Vance explained it to Scot while he lay exhausted yet safely supine back upon the ridge, Scot’s slam into the face of Squaw Peak had caused what they all feared, a secondary avalanche. It was small and came to a stop well before it could cause harm to anyone below in the valley, but Scot had acted like a magnet for the falling snow and ice, which piled on top of him and exponentially increased his weight upon the rope.

Pitons were popping left and right, and both Vance and Nick thought for sure they would be yanked over the edge. Neither of them ever even considered letting go; that just simply wasn’t an option. They were able to finally dig in and get control of Scot’s fall at the very last minute. The burn marks in their gloves attested to their courage and Scot’s extremely good fortune. He wanted to kiss the guys, but before he could, a voice from the Deer Valley helipad came over the headset. It instructed the pilot to return to the pad to shuttle an FBI team to a crime scene in nearby Midway.

“Midway?” Scot leaned forward and said while tapping Vance on the shoulder. “That’s just the other side of the mountain, isn’t it? What do you suppose is going on over there?”

Vance was reading Scot’s mind. He radioed back to Deer Valley asking where the FBI team was to be taken. As the information was relayed across the headsets, the pilot nodded that he knew where it was, and Vance pointed for the pilot to go in that direction.

“Lemme guess. You’re going to take responsibility for this one too?” queried Nick.

Scot only smiled and asked the pilot if there was a pass or anything like that connecting the area around Death Chute to the farm they were headed toward in Midway.

“There are a couple, but only one that could be considered a pass in the sense that it can be completely traversed,” replied the pilot.

“Do me a favor and follow it,” said Scot.

Vance turned in the copilot’s seat and asked, “What are you thinking?”

“Just a hunch.”

“Great,” said Nick, leaning his head against the window of the chopper and staring up at the ceiling, “another hunch. Let’s see if we can get fired on this hunch, or better yet, maybe we can actually get killed this time.”

“Not a chance,” said Scot as he placed a thankful and reassuring hand on Nick’s shoulder. “When the helicopter touches down, I’m getting out and you’re going back to Deer Valley.”

“Too bad,” said Vance, turning back around in his seat to look out the front. “This was just starting to get interesting.”

Before jumping out of the helicopter, Harvath thanked his friends and asked the pilot to do him a favor and make sure the FBI got to enjoy some of the Wasatch Mountains’ scenic beauty on their way over. The pilot laughed and gave him the thumbs-up.

Scot straightened up once he was sure he had cleared the rotor blades and walked over toward the three Wasatch County Sheriff’s Department Suburbans parked in front of the Madduxes’ farmhouse.

“FBI?” said a deputy sheriff as Harvath approached, digging his credentials from his pocket.

“Secret Service. I’m Agent Harvath, head of-”

“The president’s advance team. I remember reading your name on the memo that came around about the visit. I’m Ben MacIntyre, deputy sheriff. You working with the FBI on this?”

“Yeah. Whenever the president is involved or we think there may be some sort of connection, we tackle these things together,” lied Harvath right through his teeth. “Why don’t you fill me in on what you’ve got.”

Deputy MacIntyre removed a small notebook from the breast pocket of his coat and started reading: “About seven-thirty this morning we got a call from the daughter of the old couple that lives here, Joseph and Mary Maddux. Apparently, after church yesterday, they passed up on the normal Sunday dinner at the daughter’s house because the father wasn’t feeling well. The daughter tried to check in with them a couple of times last night and couldn’t get ahold of anyone. She thought maybe they’d turned in early and, being older folks, just didn’t hear the phone.

“So, this morning she tries again, several times, and there’s still no answer. Worried that they might have been in an accident or something, she called our office and asked if we’d swing by.”

“Your office?” asked Harvath. “Why didn’t she come herself?”

“She lives down in Orem,” said the deputy, referring back to his notes. “It’s a pretty long drive up here, especially with the weather. Plus she works and didn’t think the boss would let her. A couple of our guys know, or I should say knew, the Madduxes, so they didn’t mind coming out.”

“Knew? They’re dead?”

“Yup, Mr. Maddux was shot close range to the head, and Mrs. Maddux suffered multiple gunshot wounds.”

“Have you contacted your sheriff?”

“Yes, sir. He’s been over with your people in Deer Valley working that avalanche, but now he’s on his way back here with the FBI. We also have our medical examiner on the way as well as a homicide team coming up from Salt Lake County. The highway patrol and the state park rangers are buttoning down all the roads around here.”

“Well done, Deputy. You did everything by the book. As I was already in the air, I was routed here first. Has anyone touched anything inside?”

“Nope, the first officer on the scene had his winter gloves on and only took them off to check for a pulse on each of the victims. He tracked a little snow inside, but we’ve laid down some plastic, so that ought to lessen contamination of the scene.”

“Good job. I trust your sheriff told you no one else was to be allowed in until he arrived with the FBI?”

“He certainly did.”

“Good. Make sure you send them in to me when they get here.”

“Sir, my orders are that no one gets in until the sheriff and the FBI get here.”

“Deputy, when do you think the sheriff called me?”

“He called you, sir?”

“When do you think he called me? Before he talked to you or after?”

“He didn’t know about anything till I called him, so it would have to be after.”

“Exactly, so when the sheriff told you to keep the scene secure until he got here, that was before he knew I was already airborne and could get here faster.”

“Uh, huh.”

“Deputy, I don’t need to draw you a picture. You’re a smart man. By now you’ve figured out that if the sheriff is coming all the way over with the FBI and the head of the president’s advance team is already here, this is some pretty serious stuff.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Listen, I’ve done a lot of advance work in some very out-of-the-way places. Most of the county sheriffs we work with would make Gomer Pyle look like an astrophysicist. I’m not blowing smoke up your ass. Your department does a damn good job. I don’t want you to get in any hot water with your boss, but I have my own boss to think about, and he’s the president of the United States. Now, if you’ll cut me a little slack, I can get started and have a preliminary report for the FBI guys when they get here. What do you say?”

“I guess so. We were told to cooperate with the Secret Service with anything they needed.”

“Good man. Where are the victims?”

“Master bedroom. Second floor, down the hall on the left. Do me a favor and wear these. We want to keep the crime scene as uncontaminated as possible,” said the deputy, pulling out a pair of paper surgical booties from a box in the backseat of his truck.

“Thanks,” said Scot, accepting the paper booties and a pair of latex surgical gloves while walking up the steps of the house. “I meant what I said. You guys are pretty impressive.”

A piece of plastic had been laid in front of the storm door, and Scot stood on it while he took his Timberlands off and slipped on the booties. Snapping on the rubber gloves, he opened the double doors.

As a nonsmoker, Scot immediately detected the lingering odors of cigarette smoke. The smell grew stronger as Scot neared the family room. He quickly turned and walked back to the front door.

Catching the attention of one of the Wasatch County officers, he asked, “Officer, do you know if Mr. and Mrs. Maddux are Mormon-” Scot noticed a slight change in the face of the officer and, catching his faux pas, switched to the more politically correct term preferred these days by the Mormons. “I’m sorry. I mean were they members of the LDS church?”

Pleased that an outsider would show such respect for their faith, the officer responded, “Yes, sir. Mr. Maddux had been our bishop for a long time. He retired a ways back, but we still saw him at church and all the functions.”

“I see,” replied Scot. “I take it by your answer that you are a member of the Church as well?”

“Yes, I am.”

“And you abide by all of the Church’s covenants?”

“I certainly do.”

“So you don’t smoke?”

“No, sir. Never.”

“How about Mr. and Mrs. Maddux. Did either of them smoke?”

“No, sir. I can tell you as sure as I am standing here that they were perfect examples of what members of the Church of Latter Day Saints should be.”

Harvath turned his attention back to Deputy MacIntyre. “Ben, could there have been any of your guys smoking in here?”

“No way. Why?”

“How about near the front door at all?”

“Not a one. What are you getting at?”

Without answering, Harvath turned back inside, closing both doors behind him.

He needed to see the bodies. How they were killed and how they were placed would hopefully tell him something about the killers. The scenic route Scot had asked the Deer Valley helicopter pilot to take would delay the FBI for only so long. With his eyes wide open and all of his senses operating at their peak, he climbed the creaking stairs to the second floor.

Talk about a time warp, Scot thought as he looked down the hallway at the green shag carpeting. At what point in the aging process do people just give up and let time pass them by?

At the top of the stairs, he’d noticed a door ajar directly in front of him. Walking over to it, he pushed it the rest of the way open with his foot. It smelled of strongly perfumed soap, exactly the way a bathroom in a grandmother’s house should smell. Everything was neatly in place, except for a towel that appeared to have been hung hastily back on the rack next to its neatly folded twin.

Scot looked into the tub, which was perfectly dry. Next he checked the washbasin, and it too was dry except for a little pool of moisture around the drain. He noticed that the faucet had a very slow drip. Scot tightened the handle and the dripping stopped. Judging from the little bit he had already seen of the place, he knew the Madduxes kept one neat and clean house. Someone other than the Madduxes had used this sink recently and had been careless both with turning off the water and with hanging the towel.

Leaving the bathroom, Scot made his way down the hall toward where the deputy had said the master bedroom was. He passed rows and rows of photographs of family vacations, picnics, weddings, and posed Kmart shots of what must have been the grandchildren. The whole array was hung in chronological order. What he assumed were pictures of Mr. and Mrs. Maddux in their youth were at the beginning of the hall, and the display transitioned into their later years as one got closer to the master bedroom. Each night they would have actually relived their lives on the way to bed. It gave Scot an eerie chill to think that the final posing of the two would be at the very end of the hallway, where they lay in death.

And posing was a perfect word for it. Scot entered the room and saw the couple laid out on their bed. The killer hadn’t surprised them in bed, because they were both fully clothed and were lying on a white chenille bedspread now puddled with patches of rusty brown. There were also marks along the floor, undoubtedly caused when one of them had fallen and been dragged and then slung onto the bed.

The damage to Mr. Maddux was consistent with a professional hit: concise, cold, and accurate. Mrs. Maddux’s injuries were anything but. With half her nose blown away and additional gunshot wounds to her neck, chest, head, and face, it looked as if someone had lost control or was in a complete and total rage. The gruesome scene was going to keep the police, the sheriff, and the FBI busy for a while.

As Scot had been flown from Deer Valley to Midway, a theory had formed in his mind. One of the biggest questions he had, outside of how the kidnappers had been able to ambush and take out the president’s detail, was how they had got away. Everything he had seen so far served to reinforce that these people were absolute professionals. Each precise detail had been planned and probably practiced until it was perfect. Aside from assaulting a structure like the White House or Fort Knox, it was hard to think of a more daring, more dangerous, or more difficult undertaking than this. Yet, the kidnappers had succeeded.

The FBI would sweep the room for hair, fibers, and prints and would also look to see if the killer had left any other sort of clue, such as a note or a distinctive marking. Scot was positive they wouldn’t find any notes. Psychos who wanted to get caught left notes, taunting the police and Feds. While Scot couldn’t pass judgment on how psychotic this killer was, he knew one thing for sure-he was professional.

Scot tried to put the killings in context. If the FBI was on their way here, chances were pretty good that they were thinking the same thing he was. The kidnappers would have needed a base. The only way off Death Chute was by foot or helicopter. With the weather the way it had been yesterday, there was no way a chopper would have been able to get there. Plus, a helicopter would have made too much noise. The surrounding mountains acted as one big echo chamber. Only a craft with supersilent capabilities would have been quiet enough to get in there undetected.

Harvath thought about that for a second, not yet ready to rule it out. Flying low enough, a stealth helicopter could have evaded the radar monitored by the Secret Service agents who had been posted with the FAA in the Tower and Approach Control at Salt Lake International Airport and breached the protective “No Fly Zone” over Deer Valley. The sophistication of the jamming device Hollenbeck had found demonstrated loud and clear that the kidnappers had access to some very high-tech equipment. But the one element that didn’t fit was the human element-the pilots.

Even U.S. Night Stalker pilots, the best in the world, couldn’t have tackled that storm last night. In normal conditions, the downdrafts around the valley were amazingly tough to handle. As Scot thought further, assembling a mental picture of the area where the bodies of the president’s detail were found, he realized there wasn’t enough room to land any sort of helicopter. Scot ran down how it might have happened. What if the kidnappers were able to get their hands on a helicopter with stealth capabilities, and what if they could find a pilot crazy enough to tackle the downdrafts, and what if the pilot was good enough to do it in a raging snowstorm, and what if he could land in a heavily treed area that didn’t provide enough space? Would it have been possible? Absolutely not, thought Scot. That was too many “what-ifs.”

The kidnappers would have had to ski down the mountain along a route they were relatively confident would not allow for them to be spotted and then rendezvous with some sort of transport that would either facilitate their escape or be an intermediary step along the way.

When the Deer Valley helicopter had flown Scot over the only serviceable pass to Midway, the pilot had told him the other routes would be traversable only if you brought climbing gear, plus they switched back on themselves often and would take double, and in some cases triple, the time. When Scot had asked if a four-wheel-drive vehicle could make it through the pass, the pilot had said it was possible, but why would you use a jeep when a snowmobile would be so much faster?

Reaching the bottom landing again, his nose and the smell of cigarette smoke led Scot back into the family room. He stood for several moments with his eyes closed, trying to put himself in the mind of the killer. The Madduxes were not smokers, so it must have been the killer who had lit up, and more than once. That heavy smoke smell didn’t come from just one cigarette. So, he’d had time for more than one. Why?

Simple. He was waiting. Scot’s mind began to turn faster. Waiting for what? His colleagues, the kidnappers, to arrive with the president. He waited right in this room and smoked. What else did he do? Scot looked around the room; there were no books or magazines, but there was a television set. He walked over and turned it on. After a few moments, the set warmed up enough and its picture popped to life. Where would he have sat? Harvath looked behind him and spotted what must have been Mr. Maddux’s La-Z-Boy recliner. It had man of the house written all over it.

Knowing he was compromising the crime scene, but needing desperately to put the pieces of the puzzle together, Scot sat down in the chair and extended the tattered leg rest by pulling on the worn handle. The old La-Z-Boy lurched backward as the footrest sprang up, placing him in a very comfortable position. If the killer had been smoking, he would have needed an ashtray and a place to set it. He could have rested it all on his chest as he waited and watched TV, but if he had gone to this extent to make himself comfortable, why not use the end table immediately to his left?

Scot scanned the items that sat on the end table. There was a TV Guide with a ring on its cover where a glass had been placed, a few knitting needles that probably belonged to Mrs. Maddux, a pair of reading glasses, and a couple of coasters. Coasters? Why would there be a moisture ring on the TV Guide if there were coasters right on the end table? That didn’t seem to jibe with the fastidiousness that reigned throughout this house.

Scot mimicked smoking, imagining the killer had used a pop can or something similar for the ashes, and let his left hand trail back toward the table, where he believed the makeshift ashtray would have been. The movement was difficult. Not just because of his sore muscles, but because of the position of the end table. The killer would have needed to rotate his torso and actually look at what he was doing, or he would have missed his target. Scot thought the chances were pretty good that he had missed once or twice and jumped out of the chair to test his theory.

Examining the edges along the surface of the end table, he saw a grayish, powdery dust that could have been cigarette ash, but only a lab would have been able to tell at this point. Dropping to his knees, Scot searched along the bottom of the table and found what he was looking for. Resting in the fibers of the matted orange carpeting were indeed cigarette ashes. The killer had obviously missed.

Then something else caught his eye. The end table was between the La-Z-Boy and a long couch. Judging from the wear on the couch cushion closest to the end table, that was where Mrs. Maddux sat while Mr. Maddux occupied the La-Z-Boy and the two watched TV. Underneath the couch was something dark and square. Scot reached under and pulled it out.

He held it up to the light coming in through the window. It was a piece of chocolate, perfectly square, that had been broken off from a larger bar. It was stamped with a distinct N, which Scot recognized as being the monogram of Nestlé, and the almost imperceptible word Lieber across the N. Conscious of the heat in his fingers, Scot transferred the chocolate square into his palm and walked across the entry hall into the kitchen, hoping the Madduxes had some Ziploc bags. He placed the chocolate on the edge of the counter by the sink and started rummaging through the drawers underneath. In the fourth drawer he found what he was looking for.

Scot crossed to the refrigerator, took several ice cubes from the freezer, and dropped them into the larger of the two Ziploc bags. He then put the piece of chocolate into the smaller bag, zipped it, and placed it into the large bag to keep it cold. He slipped the package into his outside parka pocket and turned his attention to the garbage can under the sink.

There wasn’t much garbage and nothing that could have been used to ash a cigarette into. As Scot was closing the cabinet door that hid the trash can, he heard the telltale signs of an approaching helicopter. Leaning against the sink, Scot looked out the window above it to see if he could make out the approaching FBI team. Nothing yet, but they would be here very soon. As his mind raced through what else he should be looking for, Scot looked down at the dish rack to his left with its three upturned glasses. He upended them one by one, placing his nose inside and inhaling deeply. With the second one, his hunch was confirmed. After placing the glasses back in their original positions and running back to the family room to right the La-Z-Boy, Scot closed the front doors behind him and put the paper booties in his pocket as he laced up his Timberlands.

“Looks like the gang is on approach,” said Deputy MacIntyre as Scot finished tying his shoes and came down the front steps of the house toward the assorted police vehicles.

“It’s about time,” replied Scot.

“You learn anything while you were in there?”

“Naw, not really. Pretty much just as you called it. I know it’s been snowing a bit, but did you fellas find any tire tracks or anything out here on the perimeter?”

“Yeah, some pretty big mothers.”

“Really? How big?”

“Looks like maybe a big rig. Eighteen-wheeler. Came right up to the barn. There were some others like one of them big flatbed pickups that uses the doubled-up tires in back, but only singles in front. And some other single-tread tracks behind the barn, probably snowmobiles.”

“That sounds like a lot of activity, Deputy.”

“Well, in the winter, the farmers get a lot of snowmobilers across their property, so that might be where the ones across the back of the barn came from. The doubled-up tires could have come from any number of neighbors around here. That’s Mr. Maddux’s pickup over there and he’s got singles, so it wasn’t from him. Those eighteen-wheeler-looking tracks are a little more confusing. The way it was backed up to the barn makes me think there might have been a drop off or something.”

“Or a pickup. Did you or your men look inside the barn?”

“Nope. We were going to, but that’s about the time we made contact with the sheriff, and he told us to secure the area and hold off on anything further until he got here.”

“Yeah, he was probably right. My guess is,” said Scot, gesturing to the incoming helicopter, “that they’ll want to check out the victims first, then they’ll look over the house, and then they’ll start their search of the other buildings. I’m gonna get the outer search started. After they’ve searched the house, do me a favor and send ‘em over to the barn, will ya? Thanks.”

Scot finished with his most engaging smile and made his way to the barn. He was walking quickly, while trying not to attract any undue attention. The roar of the chopper could be heard from just overhead. Scot knew he’d been blessed with more time on this crime scene than he should ever have had.

Thankfully, the barn wasn’t locked, and he was able to slip inside and shut the door behind him just as the Deer Valley helicopter touched down outside. It took Scot’s eyes a minute to adjust to the diminished light, and while he waited, he filtered through the mess of tire tracks he had seen leading to the door.

The snow made it difficult to perfectly identify what had made them, but Scot had to give the deputy from Wasatch County another ten points. His interpretation of the tracks was probably right on the money. Casts would confirm things for sure, but what Scot was trying to do now was create the best picture he could of what happened.

His eyes adjusted, he walked around the edges of the large dirt floor, hugging what in Mr. Maddux’s younger days had probably been horse and pig stalls, trying not to trample on any evidence. The floor was a maze of all sorts of different tracks. Scot could see that the snowmobile tracks led from the back door of the barn, across the floor, and stopped at a deep horizontal groove in the dirt floor. The picture was becoming clearer now. Scot knew that if the falling snow hadn’t obscured them completely, he could probably open the back door of the barn and find that the tracks would lead all the way back through the pass, to a secluded spot somewhere adjacent to Death Chute.

Suddenly, the barn was awash with light. It fell across his shoulders and landed on the floor in front of him. That light, coupled with a cold wind on the back of his neck, told Scot the FBI had decided to take up their investigation of the barn more quickly than he’d thought they would. Without turning around, he knew exactly who was standing behind him.