The FBI office in Portland put together a complete set of Gene Anderson's fingerprints except for the left little finger, and these prints were duly entered in their files together with a photograph of the boy furnished by Chief Cooley.
Beach went out to talk to Alma Munk when she had had a day or two to pull herself together. He asked her where Jerry's revolver was, and she said she didn't know. Beach sent the serial number of the gun to the manufacturer, and eventually learned that it had been sold in 1939 to a sporting goods store in Laramie. Beach knew there was no point in trying to trace it through the store's records; the gun had probably had three or four owners since then.
The "Gazette" ran an unprecedented two-column front page story about the "Tree House Murder"; reporters from the Portland and Salem papers came out, and there was even a photographer from "Time," but his pictures never appeared in the magazine. Souvenir hunters climbed the tree and pulled off boards to take home. A psychic in Corvallis claimed to have seen in a vision that Gene Anderson was living in a mountain cabin, "in a Western state, near running water."
John and Mildred Anderson drove down from Chehalis as soon as they heard. They talked to Sheriff Beach, and he showed them the books, games, and papers he had taken from the tree house. There were letters from correspondents in Switzerland, France, and Italy. "How did he ever get to writing all those people?" Donald Anderson asked.
"Pen pals. They advertise in magazines for kids. I've written letters to all those addresses, asking them to let us know if they hear from Gene, but I'd guess he's too smart for that." There was also a letter to his parents, never mailed.
"He was afraid to let us know where he was because Tom Cooley might find out and kill him," Mildred said. "Is that what happened? Do you think he's dead?"
Beach shook his head. "No telling. If he's alive, maybe he'll turn up."
"Can't you find him? -- can't the police -- ?"
"Mrs. Anderson, I know how you feel, but there's thousands of missing kids every year. Runaways, mostly; they don't want to be found, and there's just too many of them. If he happens to get picked up and fingerprinted, then they'll identify him."
Beach would not give them their boy's belongings, but he allowed Mrs. Anderson to copy down the names and addresses of his correspondents, and when she got home she wrote them urgent letters. Eventually she got three replies; the writers all said that they would certainly let her know if Gene wrote to them again. After that there was nothing.
The coroner's jury met in late November; they listened to Cooley's account of the incident, and Sheriff Beach's report, and they heard Dr. Swanson testify that the victim's injuries were consistent with death caused by a .38 revolver bullet, fired at short range, and passing through the left ventricle of the heart. The jury brought in a verdict of murder by a person or persons unknown.
Cooley went up to the district attorney's office afterward. "What the hell do they mean, persons unknown, it was the damn kid!"
The district attorney, Quentin Hoagland, gave him a cold look over the tops of his gold-rimmed glasses. "Mr. Cooley, that was a responsible verdict in my opinion, and I'm a little surprised in fact, because this is a one-horse county. I'll tell you this, too, there are things about your testimony that I personally find hard to believe. I'm issuing a warrant for Gene Anderson as a material witness, in case you're interested. But there's something about this case that smells, and I don't mind telling you that if I had a little more evidence I'd be putting out two warrants, not one."
Early in March of the following year, word came back to Dog River that Mr. and Mrs. Donald Anderson had died in a house fire of undetermined origin in Chehalis, Washington. It had happened on a weekend when Chief Cooley had been away on one of his trips, and the rumor went around that the fire had been set by an arsonist.
Chief Cooley noticed during the following weeks that some people were avoiding him on the street; even old friends, when he sat down beside them at the Idle Hour or the Elk Tavern on route thirty-five, sometimes sat in embarrassed silence for a while and then got up to play a game of pinball or make a phone call.
Cooley was not surprised when Mayor Hilbert came to see him one Friday evening. "Hello, Gus. Come on in. You can throw those magazines off the chair."
Hilbert sat down. "Good Christ, Tom, this place is a damn pigsty."
"That what you came about?"
"No, Tom. It's about the Anderson business."
"Goddamn it, Gus, are you going to bring that up again? I was in Sacramento -- I showed you the motel receipt."
"I know it, Tom, but people talk anyway. And, you know, there's some bad feeling about what happened to Jerry. Well, maybe they're right or maybe they're wrong, but people are telling me things like that shouldn't happen in Dog River. You know what I'm telling you, Tom."
"Sure. You're not going to renew my contract."
"That's it. I'm sorry, Tom, that's the way it has to be."
"All right. Got anybody else in mind?"
Hilbert shifted uneasily in the chair. "Nothing definite. Walt Barrett has an uncle, a police sergeant in Portland, he's retiring next month -- he might be innarested."
"Contract isn't up till September, Gus."
"I know that. Nobody's rushing you, Tom."
"Want a beer?"
"No, thanks -- well, all right."
Cooley brought two bottles from the refrigerator and a glass for Hilbert. "Down the hatch," he said. "You know, Gus, I want to make this easy on you if I can."
Hilbert wiped the foam off his upper lip. "You do?"
"Sure, I do. Let's make a deal. Suppose I resign, whenever you say -- May first or whatever. I'll show the new guy the ropes, break him in and so forth. I been thinking of moving on, anyhow."
Hilbert looked thoughtful. "You said a deal, Tom?"
"All I want is two months' salary and a letter of recommendation. A good letter, Gus. And if anybody asks you for a reference, I want you to tell them I resigned to look for a better job, and I'm the best damn chief of police you ever saw."
"That letter you can have, no problem. About the two months, I'll have to talk to the town council."
"You do that. And, Gus -- "
"Yeah?"
"You tell them if I don't get it, I'm going to be the meanest son of a bitch north of Mexico."
Cooley sold his house, auctioned off the furniture, and put everything he had left into the trunk and back seat of the Buick. He closed his account at the bank, took a few hundred dollars in travelers' checks and cash, and got a cashier's check for the rest.
It was his belief now that the kid was alive, and he was still convinced that he had gone south. The only thing he had to go on, besides a hunch, was something Mrs. Anderson had said: "He likes to draw." Cooley got into the Buick early one morning in May and headed for Los Angeles. If he drew a blank there, it was his intention to work north again -- San Francisco, then up to Salem, then Portland, but he didn't think the kid would have stopped that close to home. He wouldn't feel safe until he was as far away as he could get without leaving the country. Los Angeles: that was where he'd find him.