“Nope.” Hamilton checked a sheet of paper lying beside him, presumably an agenda. “What about the identities of the deceased?” “Ah. There, Sarris is being more helpful, but that’s Mike’s territory.” We all looked at Mike Churchill, who hadn’t said a word so far, no surprise with a partner as voluble as Apple. He cleared his throat.
“Yes. We-I mean, I-showed him photographs and he identified everyone including the burned guy. I pushed him a little there, since the guy’s such a mess, and at first he seemed to hesitate a little. But then he said definitely there was no doubt the burned guy was Fox. His real name was Ed Sylvester, by the way. Sarris said he’d known him for years; he’d been one of his trusted advisors and one of the original members of the Order. Plus, he said, Fox-or Sylvester hadn’t turned up, and the burned house was where he’d lived. Gave me addresses of next of kin for everybody, too. I’m still working on it, but so far, they’re checking out. It’ll take a few days for it all to get back to us.” “Did he get those from a file or something?” “What?” Churchill seemed startled at a question from me. “The names and addresses.” “Oh. Yes. A filing cabinet.” “He keeps pretty substantial records, I think,”
Hamilton clarified.
“About six months ago, they had an accidental death over there a small child fell off a bridge into a dry stream bed. Sarris gave us all the information we needed.” “Were you able to look into his files?” “No. He wasn’t that cooperative, but what he gave us checked out.” Hamilton smiled ruefully. “I can’t deny I would have liked a look, but he made it clear we’d have to get a warrant, and we had no grounds.” “How old a child was it?” I asked, my curiosity piqued. Hamilton paused a moment, thinking. “He was a little guy-had just learned to walk-fourteen months comes to mind, but I’d have to check the case file.” “And he was walking across a bridge?” The other man’s brow furrowed at my persistence. “He wasn’t e.
There was a group of them, supervised by a couple of adults. The dren were all holding hands when this one either broke away or was 0 and ran to the rail. He was over in a flash. Nothing they could As far as we could tell, it was a straightforward accident; tragic, unavoidable.”
Hamilton picked up the agenda before him and referred to it. “I ss that’s about it. So our primary thrust right now is to see if rchill and Appleby can establish a willful and malicious fire.” “What about Julie Wingate?” Hamilton stared at me for an instant.
“Has anyone talked to her?” “I’d like to,” Apple admitted.
“I asked about her,” Churchill added, “but got nowhere with is.” “I didn’t either,” I told them.
“Nor will any of us,” Hamilton said, “unless we prove she did ething to warrant getting a court order.” “How did Wingate do on the lie detector?” I asked. “Inconclusive; and his wife refused to take one.
Ron Potter spoke up again. “Is there any feeling he might have ted that fire?” Apple answered. “Too early to tell, but I agree with Dick. Someg stinks here, and I think old Brucie’s right in the middle of it.” “I agree,” I said. “His reaction following the fire was odd, and he ainly had motive and opportunity. I take it he has no real alibi for whereabouts that night?” Apple smiled. “They were in bed together all night-supposedly.” “Did you go with them to take the lie detector test?”
“Yeah, up to Derby. That’s what bothers me. I know those maes are supposed to be pretty good, but they can be beat. To me, an nclusive result might just mean we were asking the wrong ques,s. I mean, I know in my gut Wingate ain’t playing straight.” “Where’re they from, by the way?” I asked. “Natick, Mass. He’s a bank manager; she’s a legal secretary. eaky clean on the outside.” Hamilton held up his hand at that. “One word of caution. This stigation is just beginning. We have some leads; we have a lot of ork to do. Let’s not jump to conclusions and go after the wrong pIe. We don’t have an arson here-we have an accidental fire. And don’t have a homicide. Right now, it’s an unexplained death, quite sibly also accidental. The press is going to have a good time with this, so let’s keep them as bored as possible.” He looked at Potter and me. “I want to thank you two gentlemen for coming today. We will, of course, keep you up to date on everything we find out.” “In other words,” Apple laughed, “bye-bye; we have private stuff to talk about.” This time, Hamilton showed his anger. “That’s enough.”
Potter got to his feet. “No-absolutely. Thank you one and all. We appreciate the invite. I’d like Joe here to be a part of all this, and we’ll let you know what he digs up, too.” “So, what do you think?”
Potter asked me as we stepped outside the building and headed toward our cars. His voice was falsely jaunty, as if he were whistling past the graveyard.
“Like I said in there, I agree with LeMay and Apple; the whole thing stinks to high heaven.” His obvious reluctance to acknowledge the more suspicious aspects of the case made me sound harsher than I intended. “I also wish I could get hold of Julie Wingate and ask her where she was when the house burned down.
“You think she had something to do with it?” “I don’t know. But it’s quite a coincidence the house went up in flames only hours after Wingate broke in fighting mad looking for his daughter.” “Shit. You know goddamn well this whole thing’s going to blow up in our faces. The news guys are going to have a ball. I mean, look at this mess: a cult, five deaths, possible arson, a flunked lie detector test.” “Enough to drive you out of politics, huh?” I couldn’t resist needling him. This was, after all, his big chance to act out his grand ambitions.
“Enough to get me evicted from politics-damn straight.” “Relax.
Island Pond was a big deal because people fucked up.
You’re just doing your job.” He shook his head and got into his car.
We both drove to his office-the first time I’d been there since my arrival-and he introduced me to his secretary, Florence Ginty. She and I made up his entire staff. For the rest of the day, I set up shop, establishing a filing system to absorb the mountain of paperwork I knew the State Police would soon produce on this case, and getting Flo used to me. Potter stayed in his office most of that time, and then later disappeared “to court,” a catchall phrase I’ve always envied.
Flo left at about six, having thoroughly impressed me with her organizational wizardry. An investigator can either translate police reports and files into something usable for his boss’ day in court, or he have others do most of that for him while he hits the street to fill he blanks. In the best of worlds, he does a little of both. I hate the erwork, so my particular joy was discovering that Flo was my ect counterpart. She had no interest in the war stories of how rmation was gathered; her delight was in seeing it all properly filed, otated, and thereby transformed into legal data. She would be the ect bridge between me and Potter, and I promised her that whatextra help she might need down the road, she would get-guaranLater, however, sitting in my corner of the office alone, writing and timetables of things done and things to do, a feeling of dread an to take over. I sat back and looked out the window onto the street w.
Tony Brandt had asked me back in Brattleboro why I didn’t just on vacation, instead of taking a leave of absence. I’d told him I ded a change of pace, not a vacation. The truth was I hadn’t taken cation since Ellen had died. I didn’t know what to do on a vacation. dn’t hunt, didn’t fish, didn’t collect butterflies or slides of exotic es. I ate, slept, read, watched TV, worked, and-these past few rs spent time with Gail.
That, of course, was the nub of it. If I had gone on vacation, it rally would have been with Gail. But that hadn’t been an option time, not with the chill that had descended on that friendship. I reached out and turned off the desk lamp, allowing the lights the cars below to filter through the misty window panes and er across the ceiling in silence. I was truly between a rock and a d place. Instead of staying put in Brattleboro and tearing down the ive, half-seen barriers that had grown in silence between Gail and I was now arm wrestling with the ghosts of my childhood memowhile being sucked into a case that threatened the very serenity been seeking.