… Did I tell you the camera loves the snow? I believe I did. Even at night! All this hard work, it pays off. Keep going.
… Door left open, right on cue. Well done.
… Good to see you again, Sergeant Haggerty.
… Or should I say, Lieutenant Haggerty?
… Either way, time for your close-up.
… How do you like this thing? Pretty realistic, eh? I made it myself.
… Damn, that worked perfectly.
And cut.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
After I had answered all of their questions as well as I could, I sat in the waiting room of the Bad Axe post. Hours had gone by, a large part of the day, and as I finally sat there by myself, I went over it again in my head. I knew I’d be doing that for a long time to come.
Connie was still in the building somewhere, still talking to somebody. He had proven himself to be a complete jackass to me, in every possible way-right up until that exact moment when I had found him in that basement. Now I just felt sorry for him. For his son Sean, as well. I didn’t know how they’d ever be able to deal with this.
A trooper came by and gave me a cup of coffee. He asked me if I wouldn’t mind hanging around a little while longer. I told him I had no problem with that. I sat there with the coffee cup in both hands and watched the rest of the day go by.
I knew it was four hours from Sault Ste. Marie to Bad Axe. Another hour or two to get the full story. Maybe even see the filmstrip if you were properly prepared for the experience. Another few minutes to catch your breath. Maybe six hours total, and that’s just about when Agent Long came through one of the inner doors and sat down beside me. I was glad to see her.
She didn’t say anything for a while. Then she turned to me.
“Why didn’t you tell us you were coming down here?” she said.
“I probably should have.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
“What would you have told me if I had? You’d already eliminated him as a suspect.”
“I would have listened, Alex.”
“I don’t blame you guys for missing him. Not only was he seventy-two years old, he was a good enough actor to make people think he was on his last legs.”
“So then it’s kind of ironic,” she said. “He may have fooled us into thinking he was too weak to do this, but then his heart gave out.”
“Is that what happened? Cardiac arrest?”
“Yes. Before he had the chance to finish his masterpiece.”
I shook my head. “Did you see it yet?”
“I just did, yes. You know, I’m not going to beat you up on this now, but what the hell were you thinking? You should have called somebody right away. What if you had accidentally erased the film or something?”
“It wasn’t my idea,” I said. “But once it started…”
“I get it. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything. I probably would have done the same thing.”
“No, you’re right. It was a stupid thing to do, but that’s not unusual for me. Just ask Chief Maven.”
She smiled at that. We sat there for a few more minutes. Then we got up and she walked me to my truck. The state police had brought it back down from Wiley’s lake house. It was parked on the street.
“So what’s next?” I said. “Are you guys coming back up to the Soo?”
“I’m not sure. We may be all done up there now. We checked out of the hotel.”
“Already?”
“That’s one thing they teach you, an agent needs to be ready to move out at a moment’s notice.”
“That’s too bad,” I said. “I was going to buy you a drink at the Glasgow.”
“I’ll take a rain check. Next time I’m in the UP.”
“You’ve got my number.” I stood there for a moment, not quite sure what to do next. She put out her hand for me to shake. I took it in mine. Then I got in my truck.
I was about to drive off, but she motioned for me to roll down my window.
“How did you know?” she said.
“About Wiley? Just a gut feeling.”
She shook her head. “That’s a load of crap. There was something you saw that we didn’t.”
“Come up to Paradise and have that drink with me. I’ll tell you all about it.”
She smiled at me again. That slow, careful smile that was really starting to grow on me. I could only wonder if I’d ever see her again.
“Take care of yourself,” I said. Then I rolled up my window. I watched her in the rearview mirror as I drove away.
A drink at the Glasgow, I thought. That’s exactly what I need right now.
I pointed the truck due north and gunned it.
They closed the book on the murders of Charles Razniewski and his son Charlie, Donald Steele and his son Brandon, along with Donna Krimer, and Dean Haggerty and his daughter Dina. When they tried to write the very last page of that book, they cited the connection between Steele and Haggerty and the arrest of Clyde C. Wiley, ten years ago. They failed to find any concrete link to Razniewski, apart from the notebook I had found on Wiley’s kitchen counter. They were beginning to suspect that no link would ever be found in the official records. However Wiley came to know Razniewski, it could have been nothing more than a chance encounter on a completely different day, either on the job during those few times when Razniewski was working on his own, or even off the job. A few harsh words spoken to a man who already had his own reasons to hate Michigan State Troopers, or who would soon come to have such a hatred… it might have been enough. They’d never know for sure because Wiley was probably the only man who could tell them.
The fact that Roy Maven’s name did not appear in that notebook, along with the fact that Maven himself had no recollection of ever meeting Wiley-a meeting he would probably remember simply because of Wiley’s celebrity-made it look less and less likely that Maven had ever been a target to begin with. Apparently, Wiley had done all the killing he was going to do. He just died before he could finish his film.
Maven’s wife and daughter flew home from Amsterdam. As soon as they touched the ground, Maven’s wife called him and told him that she would not sleep one single night in that house in Sault Ste. Marie. Not after what had happened on her kitchen floor. Maven put up a brief fight. He had ripped up the floor, cleaned everything in the house within an inch of its life, and so on. But I think even he knew it was a fight he’d never win. So he went outside with a sledgehammer and pounded a FOR SALE sign into the still-frozen ground.
His daughter was home safe and his wife was staying with her in Lansing, and Chief Maven went off his administrative leave and reclaimed his job as chief of police. He moved back into his windowless concrete office in the City-County Building, with no pictures or any other distractions of any kind on the walls. His spot on the lower end of the totem pole in Sault Ste. Marie was once again secure.
It was late April now. There was a false sense of spring while everything started to thaw for three days straight. Jackie was actually observed smiling. Then we got ten more inches of snow. I had drinks with Leon after his shift at the Cineplex one night and told him everything that had happened. When I finally dragged him home well after midnight, his wife was not happy. I don’t know which one of us got in more trouble that night. I didn’t regret it for a second, but Leon might have felt differently when he woke up the next morning.
I thought about calling Agent Long a few times, but whenever I picked up the phone I thought about how many miles there were between us. I wanted to see her again, but I knew it wouldn’t be an easy arrangement for either of us.
The sun came back. The thermometer actually hit fifty for one brief day. Vinnie helped me do some of the remaining exterior trim work on the last cabin. Then it snowed another eight inches.
Things felt almost normal again, and I thought I might finally be ready to face that first cabin. Just go in, clean it out, reclaim it, banish all the bad memories of what had happened there. You do that and only the good memories will remain. At least that’s what I was telling myself. I set a date and I promised myself that was the day I was going to do it.