He thanked her and ended the call.
As he was about to close down his laptop, a document title in the Recent Activity window caught his eye—“Materials List for Alpaca Shed”—reminding him that there were other areas of his life that needed his attention.
He decided to make a start on the project.
48
The following morning was the Platonic ideal of spring in the Catskills. The early sunlight slanting across the hillsides illuminated countless shades of green. The low pasture was dotted with patches of purple clover. The sun was warm, the breeze was cool, and the scent of lilacs sweetened the air.
He was sitting with Madeleine at the patio table, sharing a breakfast of blueberry pancakes. Every once in a while Madeleine glanced with a smile at the start he’d made the previous afternoon on the shed. The necessary lumber was piled neatly next to the chicken coop. The holes for the corner posts had been dug—no small achievement in the rocky soil—and two of the posts had been set and braced.
“I can help with the next steps,” she said happily. “We can work on it together this weekend.”
Oddly, it was at times like this—when he’d acted like a real husband instead of like a detective who was sharing the house—that he felt his marital shortcomings most acutely.
She was gazing at him as though she were reading his mind. She got up from the table, came around behind him, and kissed him on the back of the neck.
At exactly ten o’clock that morning, he received the first of the phone calls he’d been hoping for.
“Good morning, Detective. This is Greta Vickerz. I have the information for you. You want me to give you first the number of pounds force required, or the method of testing?”
“Good morning, Dr. Vickerz. In whatever order you wish.”
“Method first is more logical, followed by results. First, we reinstalled the metal latch in an undamaged area of the wood. Second, we drilled a small hole in the casket lid and inserted a narrow cable with a bracket on the inside of the lid to hold it in place. Third, we closed the lid and engaged the latch. Fourth, we attached the cable to the laboratory’s spring scale and ratcheted it up until breaking force was achieved, providing force measurement in pounds. You understand?”
“I think so.”
“Then we repeated the procedure, again reinstalling the latch in a second undamaged area. This was to provide a second reading. There was less than ten percent variance in the necessary breaking force, so the results have a good confidence level. You want numbers now?”
“Please.”
“First test, breaking force one hundred fourteen pounds. Second test, one hundred six pounds. Average one hundred ten pounds.”
“So, you’re saying that the original breaking force exerted on the inside of that lid in the mortuary would have been in that neighborhood?”
“I would say with ninety percent confidence that the force would have been between ninety and one hundred thirty pounds.”
“This is helpful. Thank you.”
“All very interesting. If you want, I can investigate further an oddity.”
“Sorry?”
“For testing, we removed the lining from the casket. In the bottom, we observed a hole, seven millimeters in diameter.”
“Part of the original structure of the casket?”
“Drilled later.”
“Any obvious function?”
“No.”
“Too small for an air hole, I would think.”
“Too small, wrong place. Also an air hole in a casket would be . . . hard to understand.”
Like everything else in this case, thought Gurney.
He asked if she could imagine any possible purpose for it. She said no, but she could develop a technical study proposal with a cost estimate. That struck him as a process more likely to raise red flags than produce useful results. The little hole was intriguing, but its relevance was questionable. He thanked her again and ended the call.
He spent some time thinking about the force that Tate had to apply to break open the casket. Considering his damaged physical condition, even the lower end of the range seemed challenging. But his constricted position, an apparent limitation, could have been an advantage, since it was similar to a weight lifter’s bench-press posture. Bottom line, Vickerz’s testing was instructive without resolving anything.
Gurney couldn’t help wondering about that seven-millimeter hole in the bottom of the casket, but his wondering was truncated by another phone call—this one from Hardwick.
“Hey, Sherlock, definitely some odd shit connected to that BMW. I found an outfit down in Montville—calls itself Eleganza Luxury Rentals—specializing in everything from Beemers and Audis up to Bentleys and Lamborghinis. Funny thing happened. I called them last night and told the guy who answered that I was looking to rent a 5 Series BMW, preferably a 530e. He said I was in luck. They had that exact car in dark blue—just returned yesterday after being out for three or four days.”
“That has to be the one. Were you able to get the renter’s name?”
“Good news and bad news. The guy I spoke to was the service manager, not the agent who rented the car. They were just closing, and the agent was gone for the day. So I called back this morning. Got the agent. Totally different story. Very vague. And get this. He claims there was a glitch in the system, and the information on the renter was accidentally deleted. And naturally the agent’s description of him is useless. Normal height, normal weight, ordinary voice, wore a hat, wore sunglasses. Could even have been a woman.”
“Interesting.”
“So, the bad news is we don’t know who rented the car. The good news is the slimebag agent was apparently motivated to fuck up the record system, which suggests that the renter bribed him to hide his identity, which suggests you may be right about the car being used for a shady purpose.”
“Nice to discover I’m moving in the right direction.”
“So the evidence would suggest. But be careful where you step, Davey boy. Pride goeth before the fall. And I’d hate to see you trip into a pile of shit.”
“I’ll be in touch.”
As soon as he ended the call he placed one to Slovak.
“Brad, I need a favor. Remember those three churches over in Bastenburg that had the Dark Angel message scrawled on their doors?”
“Absolutely. We had the uniforms out canvassing for anyone who might’ve seen Tate’s orange Jeep in the neighborhood.”
“We need to go back and ask about a dark blue BMW—and whether anyone can recall anything about the driver. I know these things get hazy fast, but it’s worth a try.”
“This is ringing a bell. Hold on a second, let me bring up the interview reports on the computer.”
A minute or two later, Slovak was back. “I knew it sounded familiar. The manager of an all-night laundromat down the block from one of the churches said there was, quote, ‘one of them fancy BMWs’ in his parking lot the night in question. He noticed it because, ‘Ain’t nobody in Bastenburg got the spare cash for a ride like that.’ We didn’t follow up because we were just looking for people who saw Tate’s Jeep.”
“I need you to pay him a visit and find out if he saw the driver. But keep that between you and me for now.”
“Will do.”
Gurney gave his next call some thought before placing it. He was reluctant to disturb Morgan, but even more reluctant to withhold information that could upend the case conclusion presented to the public.
Morgan picked up on the fourth ring.
“Yeah?” His voice sounded dull as lead.
“Mike? This is Dave Gurney.”