Читать книгу The Tanglewood Murders - David Weedmark - Страница 9

TWO

Taylor was becoming restless. This was taking far too long. Looking at his watch, he realized that only fifteen minutes had passed since he had sent Juan to call for the police, but it seemed to be twice as long.

Still sitting beneath the apple tree, he pulled a cigarette from its pack and slipped it between his lips. His stomach turned as soon as he lit the paper, and he forced the smoke from his mouth with disgust. He squeezed out the smouldering ember between his fingers, letting it drop into the grass next to his knee. He stared at the small brown shreds of tobacco jutting from the end of the broken paper. Even from this distance, he would catch an occasional smell of smoke and charred flesh.

Taylor was watching where the sunlight fell in splinters on the leaves when the sound of muted rock music began to waft towards him along with the sound of an engine and the sound of tires rolling across packed gravel. A gleaming white Ford Dakota pickup rounded the corner at the edge of the orchard, approached the pump-house and idled to a halt beside Taylor.

Michael Voracci opened the driver’s door and stepped onto dried earth and gravel. Looking around, Voracci slid his cell phone into his back pocket, hoisted his pants up, then pulled a slightly crushed pack of Marlboros from the front pocket of his red golf shirt. As his eyes locked onto the pump-house a few yards away, his shoulders drooped, and he began to rock from his heels to his toes. A gold bracelet flashed as he lit his cigarette with a blue disposable lighter, the flame invisible in the bright sunlight. He leaned against the white hood of his truck with a hand as fleshy and soft as a toddler’s. He smoked his cigarette and occasionally looked at his watch with distraction as he surveyed the burnt pump-house.

“Taylor!” he called finally and took a step forward. “You in there?”

“Here.” Taylor came from behind the truck.

Michael Voracci patted Taylor’s shoulder. “You okay, pal? You look pale.”

“Better than she is.”

“What the hell happened?” Voracci asked.

“Looks like someone cut her throat then tried to cover it up by setting fire to the place. Too much rain, or too little gasoline, I’m not sure. But it didn’t work.”

Voracci nodded. “Juan told me, but he wasn’t very clear. He was pretty panicked. You sure it’s her?”

“Yes. Are the police on the way?”

“Of course. I called them right away. I was just getting into my truck when I saw the kid coming up the road on the tractor like his hair was on fire.” Voracci shook his head. “It’s an awful thing.” He took the last drag from his cigarette, threw it down and ground it into the gravel. “I suppose I should see for myself.”

“That’s for the police, isn’t it, Michael?”

As good-natured as he usually was with his employees, Michael Voracci was not accustomed to being addressed by his first name, let alone being told his place. He tilted his head and squinted thoughtfully at Taylor before replying.

“She was a family friend,” he said. “Her father is my employee and my friend.”

Taylor listened without expression, standing close enough to him that Voracci had to look up to address him. “And it’s a crime scene,” he said.

“And it’s my property.” Voracci’s voice was soft. “I appreciate your loyalty to her. I’m not going to touch a thing. But I am going to look.

And you aren’t going to stop me, Mr. Taylor. In fact, I think it’s time you went back to work now. I’ll wait here for the police myself.”

Taylor froze for a moment then stepped back. He did not have a badge, so he had no right to stop Voracci. However, there was no way Taylor was going to leave the crime scene to anyone until the police arrived.

Where the hell were the police, anyway?

Michael Voracci, the owner of Tanglewood Vineyards, was the eldest son of Senator Anthony Voracci, former cabinet minister and a one-time hopeful for the leadership of the Liberal Party and the office of Prime Minister. Michael Voracci had been something of a celebrity himself in the late Eighties, known for his nightclub exploits and his outspoken conservative views on politics, which contrasted sharply with his father’s liberal stance. Now in his late forties, the boyish good looks the young Michael Voracci had exhibited in his youth seemed to have been stretched and exaggerated with age, making him a caricature of his younger image. With thick thighs, rounded shoulders and a belly that had taken on the shape and texture of bread dough, he was in the midst of a fast, hard slide through middle age.

“Just don’t touch anything,” said Taylor as he watched Voracci approach the doorway. “The police will want to look for fingerprints.”

“I know that.”

Voracci stepped into the shadows of the pump-house, emerging a few moments later, pale and visibly shaken. A gold fly clung to the collar of his red golf shirt.

“Horrible,” he said. “Just fucking horrible.”

Taylor nodded.

Voracci’s nod mirrored Taylor’s. He began to rock on the balls of his feet. “We should cover her up.”

“That’s a nice sentiment,” Taylor replied. “But tampering with evidence won’t help her at all.”

“No, no. I suppose that’s true.” Voracci kicked a stone. “Had you seen anyone around here?”

“Not a soul.”

Voracci rested his back against the front fender of his Dakota.

Reaching into the front pocket of his shirt, he pulled out his cigarettes. After lighting one, he offered the pack to Taylor.

Taylor shook his head. “No, thanks.”

“If she’d been alive, I’d have happily paid you the reward, you know. All five thousand. Every penny.” He exhaled a plume of smoke high into the air as he shook his head.

“I wasn’t worried about that,” Taylor said.

“The reward I posted was for finding her safe, remember?”

“I remember.”

Taylor turned away and clenched his teeth against the smell of the smoke. He fought to stay focused, fought to keep Anna’s face from appearing in front of his eyes again.

Voracci turned towards the front fender of his vehicle and unceremoniously unzipped his pants.

“My grandfather built that shed himself, you know,” he said, looking over his shoulder. A thin stream of urine splashed against the tire.

“He was a good man,” Taylor said, keeping his eyes from his employer. “I liked him a lot.”

“That’s right,” Voracci from over his shoulder. “I forgot. You used to work here in the old days.”

“When I was in school. For the summers.”

“Then you would remember him.” Voracci rolled his shoulders as the stream of urine slowed before zipping up his pants and turning around. “He started all this with a ten-acre potato field. Worked until his body was beaten. And he taught my father everything there was to know about wine and growing vines. But my father’s talent was business. He turned the farm into an empire. And now it’s my turn...”

Taylor let the words mingle with the scent of urine. He did not care to hear Michael Voracci’s self-advertisements. He had heard the speech before. It had been well-rehearsed, with much of it taken, nearly word for word, from the marketing pamphlets that were shipped with each case of Tanglewood wine. The family farm and wine operations had been successfully marketed as a longstanding family operation for the last thirty years.

Voracci’s grandfather, Antonio, a potato farmer, had started the winery as a hobby to keep himself busy in the fall and winter months.

His skill with the vines and his love for wine had made him successful.

Voracci’s father, Anthony, had replaced the potatoes with tobacco, planted more vines and turned the modest family business into a small empire that owned leasing properties, a chain of travel agencies, a trucking company and a wholesale distribution company.

When Anthony had retired fifteen years ago, he’d divided his businesses into parcels, giving most of the shares to his two sons, Vic and Michael, and keeping a small portion for himself. The farm was divided down the centre, the orchards and fields going to Vic, the vineyard and winery going to Michael.

The brothers soon began investing their family fortune into several technology companies and a host of other ventures that had very little to do with wine or farm produce, the pillars of the family’s original business. These investments had not fared well when the dot-com bubble of the Nineties had burst, and the brothers had returned their business interests to the family roots. Vic, with the help of some solid federal financing, had begin covering the fields with plastic, and venturing into hydroponic greenhouse tomatoes. This had not been the gold mine he had anticipated, due to increased competition from California, but it had been steadily profitable over the years. The winery thrived as well, Michael Voracci leveraging the family name through intensive advertising and wine competitions in both Canada and the United States. While they were extremely competitive with each other, the brothers operated both the greenhouses and the vineyard under a single joint holding company, through which they shared their equipment, trucks, water, power and warehouse facilities. Even the employees were hired under this holding company, Ben Taylor included, so they could be used each day wherever they were needed most, at the discretion of Randy Caines.

While Michael and Vic enjoyed the glow of their success, Taylor had some inside information few of the other workers would ever suspect—that most of the family fortune had been squandered. While Michael Voracci and his wife still lived on the farm, he spent more time on the golf course and travelling from one wine event to another than he did on the vineyard. Vic had bought a house a few miles away in Andover but spent most of his time in Toronto, enjoying a condo on the waterfront while managing a series of ever-shifting companies few on the farm knew much about. Abe Wagner, whose daughter Anna now lay less than twenty yards away, had once told Taylor it was a typical path of three generations. The first generation starts the business. The second generation builds the business. The third generation squanders the business. However, Abe Wagner had been quick to point out that this was not a hard and set rule. The aging wine master was hopeful this would not be the fate of the Voracci family business. His own livelihood, after all, depended on it.

Shortly after Voracci had finished his speech, Taylor realized this was already the longest conversation he had ever had with his employer. The few times Voracci was in the warehouse, or touring the vineyards with potential clients, he did not interact very often with his employees. He would wink as he passed, or give a thumb up, and call out with a grin, “Keep smiling!” before disappearing into his office. Taylor could not help but clench his teeth each time he saw Voracci smile.

The trademark grin was far away at the moment as Voracci ran his fingers through his stiff black hair and looked over the damage to the pump-house. “I was going to bulldoze it a couple years ago,” he said, “but never got around to it. We could have planted six more trees there.”

“Or some more vines,” Taylor offered without interest, looking down the orchard for signs of the police.

“No, no,” said Voracci, crossing his arms. “I want to keep all the grapes on that side of the lane. Keep this for the fruit trees. Of course, it was all trees in this part when you used to work here, wasn’t it?”

Taylor nodded.

“I remember you,” Voracci said. “You were just a kid. It’s awful strange to see you back here, Taylor. It’s nice, of course. Just strange.”

“You too,” said Taylor. “I’d have expected you to be living in Toronto or New York. Back then you were going to law school, weren’t you?”

“Yeah, but life got in the way. You don’t understand family business, Taylor. Not just our family. Any family business. You just don’t walk away. It keeps you here, tied to the ground.” Voracci forced a smile. “I’ll tell you, it’s a damn good thing I love this land.”

Taylor nodded impatiently through Voracci’s monologue as he watched a white police cruiser quickly make its way up the gravel laneway, approaching slowly. Rising dust formed a small trail behind it. The cruiser stopped behind Voracci’s Dakota. Tom McGrath, the Andover Police Chief, was in the passenger seat. Pat Patterson, one of his six constables, and McGrath’s son-in-law, was driving. Taylor knew them all by sight.

McGrath was sixty-four and looking towards the retirement his body desperately needed and his ego could not face. The Chief closed his door, lifted both arms in the air and yawned loudly. Watching the grimace on the Chief ’s face as he stepped from the car, Taylor understood the yawn was to mask the back pains that came from too many hours behind the wheel of a cruiser, too much weight on his aging spine.

Patterson was in his mid-forties, about the right age to have gone to school with Voracci, Taylor realized, if he had grown up in Andover. Taylor watched the way Patterson would not make eye contact with Voracci or even shake his hand the way McGrath now did, and decided he must know Voracci quite well to warrant such a slight in etiquette. Both officers stood with their hands on their hips, looking over the scene from behind dark sunglasses.

McGrath squinted into a smile behind his glasses, dentures white in the sun. “What’s going on, Mikey?” he asked in an amiable, grandfatherly manner. The tone was well practiced and came easily to the Chief after years of pulling over drunk drivers and moving teenagers from the sidewalk in front of the pool hall.

“We found the girl,” Voracci answered, looking to the ground. He pointed behind him with a thumb. “She’s in there. Anna Wagner.”

McGrath drew a long loud breath. “Hell of a thing. Thanks, Mike. You’d better stay over by the vehicles now. We’ll take it from here.” He did not seem to notice Taylor.

“Of course,” said Voracci.

Patterson looked sideways at Taylor as Chief McGrath disappeared inside the pump-house. The constable did not seem to give Taylor much importance either. He was just another farm worker to them, another set of eyes ogling the scene of a crime.

McGrath stepped out into the sunlight. He pulled a blue linen handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face and neck. The Chief seemed more annoyed with the additional workload than upset for the girl’s fate. Taylor found himself wishing he had covered her body after all.

The Chief nodded at Patterson. “It’s her, all right. Not very pretty. It’s a damn shame.”

Patterson opened the trunk of his cruiser and began rooting around with his equipment. Taylor stepped forward.

“It’s a damn shame,” McGrath said to Voracci. “You have to think he kept the poor girl in there all this time we were looking for her.

Right under our noses. Had anyone looked for her here?”

“I don’t think so,” said Voracci.

“Wasn’t that your job?” Taylor interrupted, glaring at the police chief.

McGrath turned and looked Taylor up and down, as if he had not seen him until this very moment.

“Who’s this, Mikey?” McGrath asked. “One of your workers?”

“Yes. This is Taylor. Er...”

“Ben Taylor,” said Taylor.

“Yes. Taylor. He was one of the workers to find her.”

“And what were you doing out here this morning?” McGrath asked.

“We were going to tear this shed down,” Taylor replied. “We were told it had been struck by lightning two nights ago, and we were told to tear it down.”

“Did you touch anything inside?”

“Just some pipes that were against the wall. The door was locked.

We broke the locks. It’s there beside the door.”

McGrath nodded, satisfied, but far from pleased.

“But you should know,” Taylor added, “that a few of us searched all around here last week. A couple days after she disappeared, but we didn’t see or hear anything to make us think she was in here.”

“No one uses this shed,” Voracci added. “I was just saying I should have had the thing bulldozed years ago.”

“Well, it’s a damn shame. She was a beautiful girl. But you can’t blame yourself, Mikey.” McGrath turned to his constable. “Piss poor time for this to happen, Pat. I’m glad we invested that training in you.

The OPP are all working on that big case in Sacketville. And I don’t know how long it will take to get the coroner out here today.” He looked up at the blue sky. “I don’t want the body baking in this heat, so we might have to take her out of here ourselves. We’ll have Doc Logan come out here just to be sure. But I want pictures of everything before we touch this body.”

Constable Patterson cocked his head. “But he’s retired…”

“No, no,” said McGrath. “He’s semi-retired. Just get him out here, okay?”

Patterson nodded wearily and began to unpack his camera and equipment from the trunk of the cruiser.

Taylor had heard enough. He took a step towards McGrath and positioned himself alongside the two men. He cleared his throat, staring into McGrath’s sunglasses.

“Have you notified the provincial police?” Taylor asked.

“All in due time,” said McGrath. “All in due time.”

“You can’t move her until you’ve notified the OPP.”

“Like I said, son, there’s no one available right now. Step aside.

This isn’t a TV show. Leave this to the professionals.”

Taylor took another step, putting his face within eighteen inches of McGrath’s. He spoke deeply, deadly serious, and intent on getting his point across. “That’s what I’m telling you. Leave this for the professionals. Do not touch that girl’s body until you’ve called the OPP.”

“Okay now! Calm down.” Voracci stepped up and came short of putting his hand on Taylor’s shoulder. “That’s enough, I think. Let the police do their job, Taylor. I’m sure they know what they’re doing.”

“I think I know what is and what is not within my jurisdiction, young man,” McGrath said, ignoring Voracci’s intervention. “Step away.”

Patterson closed the trunk of the car and held up his camera for Taylor to see. “That’s why we’re documenting everything before we remove the body. The rest of this area will not be disturbed.”

McGrath turned angrily to Voracci. “Everyone’s a goddammed authority these days. Doesn’t this man have something to do other than hang around here?”

“Yes,” Voracci replied. “Yes, he does. Taylor, thanks for your help here. You can go now.”

“This is a homicide, Mike,” McGrath continued. “Not just a runaway girl. I’m going to have to make this building off limits to everyone. You and your worker here included. And I’m going to want a list of every worker’s name. And I’m going to want to talk to everyone who had access to this building. That includes your family, the workers, this man here, your father, everyone else you can think of.”

“Of course,” said Voracci. “Taylor, I appreciate your concern, but I told you to go now. Give Scotty a hand setting up the line for this afternoon’s shift. And you better make sure Abe doesn’t come out here.”

“You’re too late,” said Taylor, pointing over Voracci’s shoulder.

Michael Voracci turned around. An electric golf cart was making its way towards them, a sixty-year old man in faded bib overalls behind the wheel. Abe Wagner. His face was ashen. His hand trembled as he pointed at the pump-house.

“Is she in there?” he shouted. “Is she there?” He stepped out of the cart, nearly falling as his foot got tangled in the pedals. “Let me see! Let me see my girl!”

Moving quickly, Constable Patterson set his camera on the hood of the police cruiser and was within arm’s reach of Abe Wagner by the time the man had begun to walk towards the pump-house.

Taylor, surprised by Patterson’s speed, was only a step or two behind him. It took a few minutes for them to gently persuade Wagner to get back in the golf cart and let Taylor take him home.

Taylor had just helped the trembling man sit down in the cart when a black pickup pulled up behind the police cruiser. Michael Voracci’s brother Vic and his famous father, Anthony Voracci, climbed out of the cab. Each carried a tray of coffee. Vic, a shorter, thinner version of his brother, balanced a box of doughnuts on the palm of his hand.

“Coffee and doughnuts?” Wagner said with tears running down his face. “Is this some sort of party?”

Taylor started the golf cart and put it in reverse to turn it around. “No,” Wagner said as he placed his hand on Taylor’s arm. He leaned forward in the passenger seat, watching intently at the action in front of him and at the pump-house. “No. It is all wrong. She wasn’t there.”

The Voraccis had settled against their vehicles as the two policemen continued their work. McGrath was securing the area around the shed with yellow tape. Patterson was testing the flash on the camera. “She wasn’t there last week.”

Taylor eased the golf cart into drive, and just before they rounded the corner at the end of the tree-lined road, he looked back.

The three Voraccis, coffee and doughnuts in hand, leaned against the side of the white Dakota and looked as though they had begun to swap stories. The police disappeared inside the burned pump-house that contained Anna’s body. Wagner, sitting beside Taylor, dropped his arms on his knees and buried his face in his hands. The last of the morning dew evaporated from the grape leaves under the brightening summer sun.