The Poet

9

I ended up with four pages of notes which I then synthesized after an hour of study and thought to six lines of shorthand questions I had to find the answers to. I had found that if I looked at the facts of the case from the opposite perspective, believing Sean had been murdered and had not taken his own life, I saw something the cops had possibly missed. Their mistake had been their predisposition to believe and therefore accept that Sean had killed himself. They knew Sean and knew he was burdened by the Theresa Lofton case. Or maybe it was something every cop could believe about every other cop. Maybe they'd all seen too many corpses and the only surprise was that most didn't kill themselves. But when I sifted through the facts with a disbeliever's eye, I saw what they did not see.

I studied the list I had written on a page in my notebook.

Pena: his hands? after-how long?

Wexler/Scalari: the car? heater? lock?

Riley: gloves?

I realized I could handle Riley by phone. I dialed and was about to hang up after six rings when she picked up.

"Riley? It's Jack. You okay? This a bad time?"

"When's a good time?"

It sounded like she had been drinking.

"You want me to come out, Riley? I'm coming out."

"No, don't, Jack. I'm okay. Just, you know, one of those blue days. I keep thinking about him, you know?"

"Yes. I think about him, too."

"Then how come you hadn't been around for so long before he went and… I'm sorry, I shouldn't bring things up…"

I was quiet a moment.

"I don't know, Riles. We sorta had a fight about something. I said some things I shouldn't have. He did, too, I guess. I think we were kind of in a cooling-off period… He did it before I could get back with him."

I realized I hadn't called her Riles in a long time. I wondered if she had noticed.

"What was the fight about, the girl that got cut in two?"

"Why do you say that? Did he tell you about it?"

"No. I just guessed. She had him wrapped around her finger, why not you? That's all I was thinking."

"Riley, you've got-Look, this isn't good for you to be dwelling on. Try to think about the good things."

I almost broke down and told her what I was pursuing. I would have liked to give her something to ease her pain. But it was too early.

"It's hard to do that."

"I know, Riley. I'm sorry. I don't know what to tell you."

There was a long silence on the line between us. I heard nothing in the background. No music. No TV. I wondered what she was doing in the house alone.

"Mom called me today. You told her what I was doing."

"Yes. I thought she should know."

I didn't say anything.

"What did you want, Jack?" she finally asked.

"Just a question. It's kind of out of left field but here it is. Did the cops show you or give you back Sean's gloves?"

"His gloves?"

"The ones he was wearing that day."

"No. I haven't gotten them. Nobody asked me about them."

"Well, then, what kind of gloves did Sean have?"

"Leather. Why?"

"Just something I'm playing with. I'll tell you about it later if it amounts to anything. What about the color, black?"

"Yes, black leather. I think they were fur-lined."

Her description matched the gloves I had seen in the crime scene photographs. It didn't really mean anything one way or the other. Just a point to check, one duck put in the row.

We talked for a few minutes more and I asked if she wanted to have dinner that night because I was coming out to Boulder, but she said no. After that we hung up. I was worried about her and hoped the conversation-just the human contact-would raise her spirits. I contemplated dropping by her place anyway, after I was done with everything else.

As I passed through Boulder I could see snow clouds forming along the tops of the Flatirons. I knew from growing up out there how fast it could come down once the clouds moved in. I hoped the company Tempo I was driving had chains in the trunk but knew it was unlikely.

At Bear Lake I found Pena standing outside the ranger shack talking with a group of cross-country skiers who were passing through. While I waited I walked out to the lake. I saw a few spots where people had cleared away the snow down to the ice. I tentatively walked out on the frozen lake and looked down into one of these blue-black portals and imagined the depths below. I felt a slight tremor at my center. Twenty years earlier my sister had slipped through the ice and died in this lake. Now my brother had died in his car not fifty yards away. Looking down at the black ice I remembered hearing somewhere that some of the lake fish get frozen in the winter but when the thaw comes in spring they wake up and just snap out of it. I wondered if it was true and thought it was too bad people weren't the same way.

"It's you again."

I turned around and saw Pena.

"Yes, I'm sorry to bother you. I have just a few more questions."

"No bother. I wish I could have done something before, you know? Maybe had seen him before, when he first pulled in, seen if he needed help. I don't know."

We had started walking back toward the shack.

"I don't know what anybody could have done," I said, just to be saying something.

"So, what are your questions?"

I took out my notebook.

"Uh, first off, when you ran to the car, did you see his hands? Like where they were?"

He walked without speaking. I think he was envisioning the incident in his mind.

"You know," he finally said, "I think I did look at his hands. Because when I ran up and saw it was just him, I immediately figured he had shot himself. So I'm pretty sure I looked at his hands to see if he was holding the gun."

"Was he?"

"No. I saw it on the seat next to him. It fell on the seat."

"Do you remember if he was wearing gloves when you looked in?"

"Gloves… gloves," he said, as if he was trying to prompt an answer from his memory banks. After another long pause he said, "I don't know. I'm not getting a picture in my mind. What do the police say?"

"Well, I'm just trying to see if you remember."

"Well, I'm not getting anything, sorry."

"If the police wanted to, would you let them hypnotize you? To see if they could bring it out that way?"

"Hypnotize me? They do that sort of stuff?"

"Sometimes. If it's important."

"Well, if it was important, I guess I'd do it."

We were standing in front of the shack now. I was looking at the Tempo parked in the same place my brother had parked.

"The other thing I wanted to ask about was the timing. The police reports say that you had the car in sight within five seconds of hearing the shot. And with only five seconds there is no way anybody could make it from the car and into the woods without being seen."

"Right. No way. Would've seen 'em."

"Okay, then what about after?"

"After what?"

"After you ran to the car and saw the man was shot. You told me the other day you ran back to the shack here and made two calls. That right?"

"Yes, nine one one and my supe."

"So you were inside the shack here and couldn't see the car, right?"

"Right."

"How long?"

Pena nodded, seeing what I was getting at.

"But that doesn't matter because he was alone in the car."

"I know but humor me. How long?"

He shrugged his shoulders as if to say what the hell and fell silent again. He walked into the shack and made a motion with his hand like lifting up the phone.

"I got through on nine one one right away. That was pretty quick. They took my name and stuff and that took some time. Then I called in and asked for Doug Paquin, that's my boss. I said it was an emergency and they put me through right away. He got on and I told him what happened and he told me to go out and watch the vehicle until the police came. That was it. I went back out."

I considered all of that and figured that he had probably been out of sight of the Caprice for at least thirty seconds.

"On the car, when you first ran out, did you check all the doors to see if any were unlocked?"

"Just on the driver's side. But they were all locked."

"How do you know?"

"When the cops got out here they tried them all and they were locked. They had to use one of those slim jim things to pop the lock."

I nodded and said, "What about the backseat? You said yesterday that the windows were fogged. Did you put your face up to the glass and look directly into the backseat? Down at the floor?"

Pena understood now what I was asking about. He thought for a moment and shook his head in the negative.

"No, I didn't look directly into the back. I just thought it was the one guy, is all."

"Did the cops ask you these questions?"

"No, not really. I see what you're driving at, though."

I nodded.

"One last thing. When you called it in, did you say it was a suicide or just that it was a shooting?"

"I… Yeah, I said somebody up here went and shot hisself. Just like that. They got a tape, I 'spect."

"Probably. Thanks a lot."

I started back to my car as the first flurries started floating down. Pena called after me.

"What about the hypnotizing?"

"They'll call if they want to do it."

Before getting in the car I checked the trunk. There were no chains.

On my way back through Boulder I stopped at a bookstore called, appropriately enough, The Rue Morgue and picked up a thick volume containing the complete stories and poems of Edgar Allan Poe. My intention was to start reading it that night. As I drove back to Denver I worked on trying to put Pena's answers into the theory I was working on. And no matter how I moved his answers around, there was nothing that derailed my new belief.

When I got to the DPD, I was told up in the SIU office that Scalari was out of the building, so I went to homicide and found Wexler behind his desk. I didn't see St. Louis around.

"Shit," Wexler said. "You here to bust my chops again?"

"No," I said. "You going to bust mine?"

"Depends on what you're going to ask me."

"Where's my brother's car? It back in service yet?"

"What is this, Jack? Can't you even conceive of the possibility that we know how to run an investigation?"

He angrily threw the pen he was holding into a trash can in the corner of the room. He then realized what he had done and went and picked it out.

"Look, I'm not trying to show you up or cause you any problems," I said in an even tone. "I'm just trying to settle all my questions and the more I try the more questions I have."

"Like what?"

I told him about my visit with Pena and I could see him getting angry. Blood rushed into his face and there was a slight tremor along his left jawline.

"Look, you guys closed the case," I said. "There is nothing wrong with me talking to Pena. Besides, you or Scalari or somebody missed something. The car was out of his sight for more than half a minute while he was calling it in."

"So fucking what?"

"You guys were only concerned with the time prior to his seeing the car. Five seconds, so nobody could've run away. Case closed, suicide. But Pena told me the windows were fogged. They had to have been for someone to have written the note. Pena didn't look in the back, onto the floor. Then he leaves for at least thirty seconds. Somebody could've been lying down in the back, got out while he was making the calls and run into the woods. It could have happened easily."

"Are you fucked in the head? What about the note? What about the OSR on the glove?"

"Anybody could have written on the windshield. And the glove with the residue could have been worn by the killer. Then he took it off and put it on Sean. Thirty seconds is a long time. It might've been longer. It probably was longer. He made two calls, Wex."

"It's too iffy. The killer would be relying too much on Pena taking that much time."

"Maybe not. Maybe he figured he'd either have enough time or he'd just take out Pena. The way you guys handled this thing, you would have just said Sean killed him and then himself."

"That's bullshit, Jack. I loved your brother like he was my own fucking brother. You think I want to believe he swallowed the goddamn bullet?"

"Let me ask you something. Where were you when you found out about Sean?"

"Right here at the desk. Why?"

"Who told you? You get a call?"

"Yeah, I got a call. It was the captain. Parks called the watch captain. He called our captain."

"What did he tell you? His exact words."

Wexler hesitated a moment as he remembered.

"I don't remember. He just said that Mac was dead."

"He said it like that or did he say Mac had killed himself?"

"I don't know what he said. He might've. What's the point?"

"The ranger out there who called it in said Sean shot himself. That started the whole thing rolling. You all went out there expecting a suicide and that's what you found. The parts of the puzzle fit into the picture you brought with you. Everybody around here knew what the Lofton case was doing to him. You see what I'm saying? You were all predisposed to believe it. You even got me believing it on the ride out to Boulder that night."

"That's all bullshit, Jack. And I don't have the time. There's no proof of what you're saying and I don't have time for theories from somebody who can't face the facts."

I was silent a moment, letting him cool down.

"Then where's the car, Wex? If you're so sure, show me the car. I know how I can prove it to you."

Wexler paused himself. I guessed he was contemplating whether he should get involved. If he showed me the car, he was admitting that I had at least put a small doubt in his own mind.

"It's still in the yard," he finally said. "I see it every goddamn day when I come in."

"Is it still in the same condition as the day it was found?"

"Yeah, yeah, still the same. It's sealed. Every day I come in I get to see his blood all over the window."

"Let's go look at it, Wex. I think there's a way to convince you. One way or the other."

The snow flurries had made it over from Boulder. In the police yard Wexler got the key from the fleet manager. He also checked an inventory list to see if anyone had taken the keys or been inside the car other than the investigators. No one had. The car would be in the same condition as it was when it was towed in.

"They've been waiting for a requisition from the chief's office to clean it up. They have to send it out. You know there are companies that specialize in cleaning houses and cars and stuff after somebody's been killed in them? Some fuckin' job."

I think Wexler was talking so much because he was nervous now. We approached the car and stood there looking at it. The snow was swirling around us in a current. The blood sprayed on the inside back window had dried to a dark brown.

"It's going to stink when we open it," Wexler said. "Christ, I can't believe I'm doing this. This is going no further until you tell me what is going on."

I nodded.

"Okay. There are two things I want to look at. I want to see if the heat switch is on high and if the security lock on the rear doors is on or off."

"What for?"

"The windows were fogged and it was cold but it wasn't that cold. I saw in the pictures that Sean was dressed warmly. He had his jacket on. He wouldn't need the heat on high. How else do windows get fogged when you're parked with the engine off?"

"I don't-"

"Think about surveillances, Wex. What causes fogging? My brother once told me about the stakeout you two blew 'cause the windows fogged up and you missed the guy coming out of his house."

"Talking. It was the week after the Super Bowl and we were talking about the fucking Broncos losing again and the hot air fogged everything up."

"Yeah. And last I knew, my brother didn't talk to himself. So if the heat is on low and the windows are fogged enough to write on them, I think it means there was someone with him. They were talking."

"That's a long shot that doesn't prove anything either way. What about the lock?"

I gave him the theory: "Somebody is with Sean. Somehow he gets Sean's gun. Maybe he comes with his own gun and disarms Sean. He also tells him to hand over his gloves. Sean does. The guy puts the gloves on and then kills Sean with his own gun. He then jumps over the seat into the back where he hides down on the floor. He waits until Pena comes and goes, then he leans back over the seat, writes the note on the windshield and puts the gloves back on Sean's hands-now you've got the GSR on Sean. Then the doer gets out the back door, locks it and splits into the cover of the trees. No footprints, 'cause the lot's been plowed. He's gone by the time Pena comes back out to watch the car like he's told to do by his supervisor."

Wexler was silent a long time while catching up.

"Okay, it's a theory," he finally said. "Now prove it."

"You know my brother. You worked with him. What was the routine with the security lock? Always keep it on. Right? That way no mistakes with prisoners. No slip-ups. If you take a nonprisoner you can always disengage it for them. Like you did on the night you came for me. When I got sick, the lock was on. Remember? You had to switch it off so I could open the door to puke."

Wexler said nothing but in his face I saw that I'd struck home. If the security lock was off in the Caprice it wouldn't be rock-solid proof of anything. But he would know in the way he knew my brother that Sean hadn't been alone in the car.

He finally said, "You can't tell by looking at it. It's just a button. Somebody will have to get in the back and see if they can get out."

"Open it. I'll get in."

Wexler unlocked the door, flipped the electric locks and I opened the rear passenger side door. The sickly sweet smell of dried blood hit me. I stepped into the car and closed the door.

For a long moment I didn't move. I had seen the photos but they didn't prepare me for being in the car. The sickly smell, the dried blood sprayed over the window, the roof and the driver's headrest. My brother's blood. I felt the cloying grip of nausea in my throat. I quickly looked over the seat to the dashboard and the heater control panel. Then, through the right window, I looked out at Wexler. For a moment our eyes met and I wondered if I really wanted the security lock to be off. The thought occurred to me that it might be easier to just let it go, but I quickly ran it from my mind. I knew if I let this go I would be haunted for the rest of my life.

I reached over and hit the passenger lock switch for my door. I pulled the door handle and the door swung open. I stepped out and looked at Wexler. Snow was starting to stick to his hair and shoulders.

"And the heater's off. It couldn't have fogged the windows. I think Sean had somebody in the car with him. They were talking, Then whoever the bastard was killed him."

Wexler looked as if he had seen a ghost. It was all clicking in his mind. It was more than just a theory now and he knew it. It looked as though he might start to cry.

"Goddamnit," he said.

"Look, we all missed it."

"No, it's different. A cop never lets his partner down like that. What good are we if we can't watch out for our own? A fucking reporter…"

He didn't finish but I think I knew what he was feeling. He felt as though he had somehow betrayed Sean. I knew that was how he felt because it was the same for me.

"It's not done with yet," I said. "We can still make up for believing the wrong thing."

He still looked forlorn. I wasn't the one who could comfort him. That would have to come from within.

"All that's lost is a little time, Wex," I said anyway. "Let's go back inside. It's getting cold out here."

My brother's house was dark when I went there to tell Riley. I paused before knocking, wondering at how absurd it was that I believed the news I was bringing might in some way cheer her. Good news, Riley, Sean didn't kill himself like we all thought, he was murdered by some nut who has probably done it before and probably will again.

I knocked anyway. It wasn't late. I imagined that she was sitting in there in the dark, or maybe in one of the back bedrooms which emitted no light. The lantern light came on above me and she opened up before I had to knock a second time.

"Jack."

"Riley. I was wondering if I could come in and talk to you."

I knew she didn't know yet. I had made a deal with Wexler. I would tell her in person. He didn't care. He was too busy reopening the investigation, drawing up lists of likely suspects, getting Sean's car inspected again for prints and other evidence. I hadn't told him anything about Chicago. I'd kept that to myself and I wasn't sure why. Was it the story? Did I want the story just for myself? That was the easy answer and I used it to soothe my uneasiness at not telling him everything. But in the deeper folds of my mind I believed it was something else. Something maybe I didn't want to bring out into the light to view.

"Come in," Riley said. "Is something wrong?"

"Not really."

I walked in behind her and she led the way to the kitchen, where she turned on the light over the table. She was wearing blue jeans, heavy wool socks and a Colorado Buffaloes sweatshirt.

"There's just been some new developments about Sean and I wanted to tell you. You know, instead of on the phone."

We both took chairs at the table. The circles under her eyes hadn't disappeared and she had done nothing with makeup to hide them. I felt her gloom descending on me and I looked away from her face. I thought I had escaped but it was impossible here. Her pain invaded every space in the house and was contagious.

"Were you asleep?"

"No, I was reading. What is it, Jack?"

I told her. But unlike Wexler, I told her everything. About Chicago, about the poems, about what I wanted to do now. She nodded occasionally during the story but showed nothing else. No tears, no questions. All of that would come when I was done.

"So that's the story," I said. "I came to tell you. I'm going to Chicago as soon as I can."

After a long silence she spoke.

"It's funny, I feel so guilty."

I could see tears in her eyes but they didn't fall. She probably didn't have enough left for that.

"Guilty? About what?"

"All of this time. I've been so angry at him. You know, for what he'd done. Like he had done it to me, not himself. I started hating him, hating his memory. Now, you… now this."

"We were all like that. It was the only way to live with it."

"Have you told Millie and Tom?"

My parents. She never felt comfortable addressing them any other way.

"Not yet. I will, though."

"Why didn't you tell Wexler about Chicago?"

"I don't know. I wanted a head start, I guess. They'll find out about it tomorrow."

"Jack, if what you're saying is true, they should know everything. I don't want whoever did this to get away just so you can pursue a story."

"Look, Riley," I said, trying to keep calm, "whoever did this had already gotten away until I came along. I just want to get to the cops in Chicago before Wexler. One day."

We were silent a moment before I spoke again.

"And make no mistake. I want the story, that's true. But it's about more than just the story. It's about me and Sean."

She nodded and I let the silence hang between us. I didn't know how to explain to her my motives. My skill in life was putting words together in a coherent and interesting narrative but inside I had no words for this. Not yet. I knew she needed to hear more from me and I tried to give her what she needed, an explanation I didn't quite understand myself.

"I remember when we graduated from high school we both pretty much knew what we wanted to do. I was going to write books and be famous or rich or both. Sean was going to be chief of detectives at DPD and solve all of the mysteries of the city… Neither of us quite made it. Sean was closest, though."

She tried a smile at my memory but it didn't quite go with the rest of her face and so she put it aside.

"Anyway," I continued, "at the end of that summer I was leaving for Paris to go write the great American novel. And he was waiting to go into the service. We made this deal when we said good-bye. It was pretty corny. The deal was that when I got rich I would buy him a Porsche with ski racks. Like Redford had in Downhill Racer. That's it. That's all he wanted. He'd get to choose the model. But I'd have to pay. I told him it was a bad deal for me because he had nothing to trade. But then he said he did. He said that if anything ever happened to me-you know, like I got killed or hurt or robbed or anything-he'd find out who did it. He'd make sure nobody got away with it. And, you know, even back then I believed it. I believed he could do it. And something about it was a comfort."

The story didn't seem to make much sense the way I had told it. I wasn't sure what the point was.

"But that was his promise, not yours," Riley said.

"Yes, I know." I was quiet for a few moments while she watched me. "It's just that… I don't know, I just can't sit back and watch and wait. I've got to be out there. I've got to…"

There were no words to explain it.

"Do something?"

"I guess. I don't know. I can't really talk about it, Riley. I just have to do it. I'm going to Chicago."