Читать книгу White River Burning - John Verdon - Страница 22

Kline and Gurney left the building together, saying nothing until they reached their cars. Kline glanced around like a man wary of being overheard.

“I want to clarify something, David. I don’t want you thinking I’m being less than totally honest with you. In the meeting you explained that you couldn’t ask Kim Steele for the phone because at that point you had no official standing in the case. Well, that’s exactly why I couldn’t tell you she’d come to me. You can understand the sensitivity of the thing.”

“The same sensitivity that kept you from telling Beckert about it?”

“I was delaying slightly on that—mainly out of respect for Kim’s concerns. But one thing leads to another. The best of intentions can create problems.”

“What problems?”

“Well, the simple fact of any delay at all. If that came to light, it could create the impression that I shared Kim’s mistrust of the department. That’s why I chose to handle it the way I did—not out of any desire to mislead you. By the way, how you handled the phone business in the meeting—that was ideal.”

“It was the truth.”

“Of course. And the truth can be very useful. The more truth, within reason, the better.” There were beads of sweat on Kline’s forehead.

From their first meeting back at the start of the Mellery case, Gurney was aware that there were two distinct layers in Kline’s construction: the veneer of a confident politician with his eye on the gold ring and, beneath it, a frightened little man. What struck Gurney now was the increasing visibility of the fear.

Kline looked around the lot again and checked his watch. “You see or hear anything in that meeting that surprised you?”

“The possible involvement of a third person was interesting.”

“What do you make of it?”

“Too soon to say.”

“What’s your next step?”

“I’d like more information.”

“Like what?”

“You want me to email you a list?”

“Easier this way.” He took out his phone and tapped a couple of icons. “It’s recording.”

“I’d like to see the incident report; crime-scene photos; copies of the video we just saw; ballistics report; victim bio; Jordan’s and Tooker’s criminal records; anything you can pry out of Beckert regarding his informants; and I’d like to know what’s behind his obvious hatred for Jordan and Tooker.”

Kline shut off the Record function of his phone. “That last one I can answer right now. Beckert’s strengths as a law enforcer come with a passion for maintaining order. He sees Jordan, Tooker, the whole BDA organization as agents of anarchy. Dell Beckert and the BDA are like matter and antimatter—a huge explosion waiting to happen.”

As he began his drive home, Gurney had two things on his mind. The first was Kline’s obvious anxiety. It suggested that he mistrusted the handling of the case by the department or by Beckert himself. He wondered if the source of that mistrust ran deeper than the phone text. The second was the motorcycle that had been maintaining a consistent position about a hundred yards behind the Outback since he’d left White River.

He slowed from seventy to sixty and noted that the motorcycle did the same.

He increased his speed from sixty to seventy-five with a similar result.

A few minutes later, as he passed a sign indicating a rest stop one mile ahead, the motorcycle accelerated into the left lane, rapidly coming abreast of the Outback. The rider, unidentifiable in a helmet with a face shield, extended his hand—holding a gold detective’s shield—and gestured toward the upcoming exit ramp.

The rest area turned out to be nothing more than a row of parking spaces in front of a small brick building that housed a pair of restrooms. The area was isolated from the highway by a line of overgrown shrubbery. As the motorcycle pulled in and stopped a couple of spaces away, the loneliness of the place prompted Gurney to move his Beretta handgun from his glove compartment to his jacket pocket.

When the rider stepped off the machine and removed his helmet, Gurney was surprised to see that it was Mark Torres.

“Sorry if you thought I was following you. I live out this way, my wife and I, in Larvaton. The next exit.”

“And?”

“I wanted to talk to you. I’m not sure whether it’s okay to be speaking to you directly, I mean privately like this. I don’t like going outside channels—with everything supposed to be going through Deputy Chief Turlock—but then I decided it would be sort of okay, since we’ve met before.”

“We have?”

“You probably wouldn’t remember, but I attended a seminar you gave at the academy a couple of years ago on investigative procedures. It was really amazing.”

“I’m glad you enjoyed it, but . . .”

“I should get to the point.” He looked like the idea was causing him physical pain. “The thing is . . . I kind of feel in this case like I’m in a little over my head.”

Gurney waited as a series of heavy trucks roared by on the far side of the bushes. “In what way?”

“I just got promoted from patrol to the detective bureau six months ago. To be put in this position on a case like this, with so much at stake . . .” He shook his head. “To be honest, I’m a little uncomfortable.” The hint of an accent was creeping into his voice.

“With the responsibility? Or something else?”

Torres hesitated. “Well, it’s sort of like I’m the case CIO and sort of not. Chief Beckert seems to be running it. Like this thing of staying focused on Jordan and Tooker, like he’s positive they’re guilty. But I don’t see enough evidence to be that positive about it myself. Is this a big mistake, talking to you directly about this?”

“That depends on what you want from me.”

“Maybe just your phone number? I’d love to be able to bounce things off you. Unless that’s a problem.”

Gurney saw no reason to refuse, regardless of how rigid Beckert might be about the flow of information. He shrugged and gave the young detective his cell number.

Torres thanked him, and then was gone—leaving Gurney to muse over the encounter. Like everything else in the case, it felt not quite right. He wondered if the secrecy surrounding the request was the product of Torres’s insecurity, the White River police culture, or something nastier altogether.

His musings were interrupted by the passing shadows of a pair of vultures circling over the weedy field adjacent to the restrooms. It was interesting, he thought, that vultures, nurturing themselves only from the bodies of dead animals, harming no living thing, had become in popular parlance predators devouring the defenseless. More evidence that the popular mind was rarely distracted by the truth.

These musings were interrupted in turn by the ringing of his phone.

It was Hardwick.

“Gurney here.”

“Damn! That text you sent me from Steele’s phone? Could be a legit warning. Or something pretending to be a legit warning. Or some other fucking thing entirely. You know where the call came from?”

“We can pursue that when we get possession of the phone from Steele’s wife. But I’m sure the pursuit will dead-end at an anonymous prepaid cell. You have anything on Beckert or Turlock?”

“A bit more than before. I called in a favor from a guy at NYSP headquarters with access to old recruitment archives—the original forms with the CV data provided by applicants. Beckert’s and Turlock’s applications reveal a very early connection. They both attended the same military prep school in Butris County, Virginia. Beckert was a year ahead of Turlock, but it was a small school, and they would have trained together.”

“Interesting.”

“Also interesting is a notation on Turlock’s application indicating that he had legal problems back at that school. ‘Juvenile court hearing, proceedings sealed. Applicant explanation, supported by Butris County sheriff’s affidavit, deemed adequate for application to proceed at this time.’ That’s all the notation says.”

The vulture shadows passed again across the pavement and out across the scraggly field. “Hmm. Did Beckert have any problems there?”

“If so, nobody noticed. Top of his class every year. Clean as Butris County spring water.”

“Be nice to know what Turlock got banged up for.”

“We’d need a hell of a good cause to persuade a Virginia judge to open the sealed juvie file of a deputy police chief. And as of now we have no cause at all.”

“Be nice to find one.”

“For a guy who’s not sure he wants to get involved, you sound pretty damn involved.”

Gurney waited for another noisy convoy of trucks to pass. “One little peculiarity seems to lead to another, that’s all.”

“Like what?”

“Like the relationship Kline has with Beckert. Kline describes him as a law-and-order god. Even told me in a worshipful tone that Beckert is married to the governor’s cousin.”

“So?”

“So why doesn’t he trust this paragon of justice?”

“You don’t think he does?”

“I think something about Beckert’s approach to this homicide has Kline running scared.”

“The fuck you think is going on?”

“I don’t know. Something to do with Beckert’s plan to run for attorney general?”

Hardwick let out a braying laugh.

“What’s so funny?”

“Something I just heard. Latest rumor is that the former AG’s passing on to his heavenly reward in a Vegas hotel was more colorful than first revealed. Seems there was a hooker trapped under the fat fucker’s three-hundred-pound corpse.”

“This has some relevance to Beckert?”

“It dumps the former AG’s character into the shitter, which is a plus for Mr. Law-and-Order. Clean new broom to sweep out the nasty crap.”

Gurney thought about this for a moment. “You told me the other day that Beckert’s first wife died of a drug overdose. You have anything more on that?”

“There was no legal case, so no case records. The fuck would that have to do with anything anyway?”

“No idea. I’m just asking questions.”

When Gurney arrived home he found Geraldine Mirkle’s yellow Beetle parked by the asparagus patch. He was led by the sound of female laughter to the patio.

Geraldine and Madeleine were doubled over. Finally Madeleine got hold of herself and said, “Welcome home, sweetheart. Gerry was just describing an encounter with a client.”

“Sounds like fun.”

“Oh, you have no idea!” said Geraldine, her round face a picture of glee. “I’ve got to be going now. Buford gets a little crazy if he doesn’t get his dinner on time.” She stood up, surprisingly nimble for a rotund woman, and hurried off to her Beetle. As she was fitting herself into the driver’s seat she called back, “Thanks for the tea, my dear.” With a burst of giggles she drove off.

Madeleine responded to Gurney’s quizzical expression with a dismissive little wave of her hand. “Just a bit of dark clinic humor. Hard to explain. You had to be there.” She wiped her face again and cleared her throat. “I thought we’d have dinner out here this evening. The air is pure heaven.”

He shrugged. “Fine with me.”

She went into the house and came back ten minutes later with place mats, silverware, and two large bowls brimming with her favorite salad of cold shrimp, avocado, diced tomatoes, red-leaf lettuce, and crumbled blue cheese.

They were both hungry and hardly spoke until they were finished. The four chickens were pursuing their own daylong meal, pecking in the grass around the edges of the patio.

“Buford is her cat,” said Madeleine, putting down her fork.

“I thought it was her husband.”

“Hasn’t got a husband. Seems happy enough without one.”

After a pause Gurney launched into a summary of all that had transpired that day, including his meeting with Kline in the parking lot.

“The more he tells me how open and honest he’s being with me, the less I believe it. So I guess I need to make a decision.”

Madeleine said nothing, just cocked her head and eyed him incredulously.

“You think my involvement is a bad idea?” he asked.

“A bad idea? Is it a bad idea to let yourself be used in a murder investigation by a man you think is lying to you? To put your life in the hands of a man you don’t trust? My God, David, on what planet would that be considered a good idea?”

Putting his life in Kline’s hands might be an overly dramatic way of looking at it, but she had a point. “I’ll sleep on it.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

In his own mind he was inclined to continue his investigation, at least for a while. What he intended to ‘sleep on’ was his relationship with Kline.

She gazed at him for a long moment. Then she gathered up their salad bowls and forks and carried them into the house.

He took out his phone and looked up the number Kim Steele had given him. The call went to her voicemail. He left a message saying it would be helpful for him to have her husband’s phone with whatever digital information might be stored in it. He avoided using language that sounded peremptory. He knew his best chance of getting her agreement lay in giving her the option of refusing.

Then he sat back in his chair, closed his eyes, and tried to put the jumble of the day behind him. But his mind kept going back to the unusual power dynamic of the White River meeting—Beckert clearly being the man in charge, despite being outranked by the three elected officials at the table—the mayor, the district attorney, and the blind sheriff.

He was still sitting there on the patio half an hour later, trying to relax in the sweetly scented spring breezes, when he heard Madeleine stepping back onto the patio. He opened his eyes and saw that she was fresh from a shower . . . hair still damp, barefoot, wearing only panties and a tee shirt.

She smiled. “I thought we should probably get to bed early.”

It proved to be a wonderful solution to his focus problem.

The next morning he awoke with a start. He’d been dreaming that he was lying in the bottom of his excavation, shackled by a black-iron chain to the foundation wall. A blind man in dark glasses was standing at the edge of the excavation, brandishing a long white cane. He slashed the cane viciously back and forth, each slash creating a high-pitched scream.

As Gurney came to his senses in the bed next to Madeleine, the screaming became the ringing of the phone on the nightstand. He picked it up, blinking his eyes to clear his vision. He saw on the screen that the caller was Sheridan Kline.

He cleared his throat and pressed Talk.

“Gurney here.”

Kline’s voice was shrill. “About time you picked up.”

Gurney glanced at the clock on the night table. It was 7:34 AM. “Is there a problem?”

“An hour ago Dell Beckert got a call from the pastor of White River’s largest Episcopal church. He was concerned about Beckert’s statement on RAM News.”

“Meaning what?”

“It sounded to him like Beckert was saying that Jordan and Tooker were cop killers.”

“The pastor was upset by that?”

“Furious.”

“Because?”

“Because Marcel Jordan and Virgil Tooker just happened to have been meeting with him in the parish house at the time Steele was shot. Discussing ways to end the violence. Jesus! That’s why they left the demonstration early. Meaning they have what is known as a rock-solid alibi. They didn’t do it. Couldn’t have done it. Not unless we want to believe the most popular white pastor in White River is in the pocket of the BDA.”

“Okay. So they didn’t do it. They have an alibi. So what?”

“So what? So what? So they were just found. That’s so what.”

“Found?”

“Found. Dead.”

“What?”

“Stripped naked, tied to the jungle gym in the Willard Park playground, apparently beaten to death. In the goddamn playground!”