“It’s a five or a six I think,” Riles said, also squinting.
Mac took a closer look at the upper right-hand corner of the picture. Along the top of the license plate, above the letters, was what looked like a grainy circle with a house or, wait, the angling of the roof? Mac pointed to it, “Riles, what you make of this?”
Riles looked, moving his head closer and squinting at the screen, “Those ain’t pine trees.”
“Yeah, looks like a barn and a farm scene,” Mac replied, and added, “and the letters are on the right side.”
“What in the hell are you guys talking about?” Jupe asked.
Riles and Mac smiled at each other and then looked at Jupe, uttering in unison, “Wisconsin.”
Chapter Eighteen
Riley called in the partial plate number while Mac drove well over the speed limit back to the station, his flasher and siren parting traffic like the Red Sea. Jupe had come through big time. They finally had a break. Mac could hear the excitement in Riles’s voice as he called into Rockford. Mac also heard the obligatory, “You gotta be shitin’ me,” rejoinder shouted through the phone.
“God, I hope that plate matches up,” Riles said when he hung up. “Rock’s already starting a computer search.”
Mac and Riles walked into the conference room with Rock and the rest of the detail waiting with an extra bounce in their manner. They had a break, and everyone was ready to go. They practically wanted to reach through the computer monitors to grab the information. The printer was spitting out reams of paper.
“Rock, what’ve you got going here?” Riles asked.
“Report, Wisconsin Econoline vans with F-M-G and a five or six,” Rock replied, “We’ll make copies and start working through them.”
The printer burped out the last piece of paper. A detail guy grabbed the paper out of the printer and sprinted out of the room. He was back within five minutes with a stack of reports.
They got started working through the reports, and Lich chuckled out loud.
“What?” asked Rockford.
“Mac.”
“What about him?”
“He’s got a horseshoe up his ass.”
“Thank God,” Riles added.
Mac cringed. “We haven’t found anything yet, boys.”
“It’s there. I can feel it,” Riles replied.
“Cases are like anything else. Sometimes you get hot,” Mac mused. It was pure luck that he’d looked up at the video camera and noticed it pointed out at the street. It was pure luck that the camera was pointed at the perfect angle. It was pure luck Jupiter could get a partial plate. “I’m seriously considering getting on a plane to Vegas.”
“You should at least go out to Mystic Lake Casino,” Rockford added. Mystic Lake Casino was an Indian casino in Prior Lake, a southwest suburb of the Twin Cities.
Mac started working through his report. Rock had printed all records for vehicles with F-M-G and either a five or six and Ford Econoline vans. That brought them fifty-three records, which everyone started reading through. Each record contained information such as date of birth, height, weight, eye color, address, occupation, income and employer among other things.
The reading was tedious. There were a couple of possibilities yelled out, with everyone turning to the specific record. One was an address in Prescott, and another in Grantsburg, both in western Wisconsin. The vans were both lighter colored. One was registered to a woman. They were close enough that they were put into the possible pile.
One of the guys ran across the street to Wang’s for take out. Gut bomb Chinese food-nothing better. They emptied out the pop machine to wash it all down. The conference table was full of empty white boxes and soda cans. The coffee machine was started, and a few scattered white Styrofoam cups littered the table. It was not a good diet mix. Everyone was belching, and more than one person asked about Tums.
Then they had a real hit.
Riles shouted, “Forty-six looks interesting.”
Everyone started flipping pages. Mac was on record forty-four at the time, turned the page and read out loud, “Forty-six. Dirk Knapp. Age twenty-nine. Resides in Hudson, Wisconsin. Has a 1997 Ford Econoline Van registered in his name.”
“What’s he do?” someone yelled, not yet to the page.
Mac scrolled down the page with his index finger. Bingo. “He’s employed as a driver by Quick Cleaners on University Avenue,” Mac answered. He grinned.
That got everyone’s attention. Quick Cleaners was a large dry cleaning shop and did a huge volume of clothing and uniform dry cleaning. It would not be uncommon to see a Q Cleaner van anywhere in St. Paul and especially on University. In fact their main location was on University.
There was a buzz in the room. This was a good possibility. Everyone broke into conversation, people fighting to speak over one another. Mac sat back and took it all in. It was the sound of guys who, after working a case for a couple of months with no success, finally saw a ray of light. They had a lead, and excitement simply took over. Any semblance of order was momentarily lost.
Finally, Riles jumped in, “Hey, shut the fuck up. We have some others to go through here, so let’s settle down,” then to Mac, “Anything else?”
“Was in the Marines, medically discharged in 2000. No criminal record.”
“Medical discharge? Anything on that in the record?” someone asked.
“Not that I see,” Mac replied, shaking his head.
“Okay, make a note of that,” Riley ordered. “If we need to, we’ll see if we can get those records. How many more do we have to go through?”
“Seven.”
“Okay. Let’s get through them. Then we’ll get back to Knapp.”
Of the seven remaining records, there was one other mildly interesting candidate from Elk Mound, but nothing as close to what they thought they should be looking for as Knapp. Consequently everyone in the room was keyed up to take a closer look at Dirk Knapp. It was 7:45 p.m., and everyone felt like it was 7:45 a.m. with a full night’s rest under their belt.
Rockford said what was on everyone’s mind, “Road trip to Hudson anyone?”
Hudson, twenty miles east of St. Paul just across the St. Croix River and into Wisconsin. The Wisconsin counterpart to Stillwater, Hudson, was a quaint town, with a main street and old brick-front stores and shops. In the summer, the private marinas filled with river pleasure boats. The shoreline was dotted with numerous restaurants and bars with docks so that people could stop in while boating and have dinner and drinks. Now that it was November, the river, docks and restaurants were quiet. Knapp’s address put his home just north of Hudson, resting along Wisconsin State Highway 35.
They made a convoy to Hudson. All that was missing was, “This is the Rubber Duck and a 10-4, good buddy.” Eight detectives made the trek out. More had wanted to come, but Riles held them off, wanting to get a look at Knapp’s place before half the St. Paul Police Department camped outside his front door. At 9:30 p.m., they all stopped in the parking lot of an Italian restaurant on the north side of town. A call ahead to Hudson was made and the police chief met them in the parking lot. “Whatever you boys need, let me know. We’re glad to help.” He gave them a rundown of the road ahead and where Knapp’s place was.
Riles, Mac, Lich, and Rockford left the others at the restaurant and cruised Knapp’s place, which was another half mile up the road on 35.
Knapp’s house sat on the west side, one hundred yards back from the road. There was a bright yard light that illuminated an old white, two-story, clapboard farmhouse, two out buildings and a large red barn. A faint light peered through the front picture window. In addition to the van, Knapp also had a 1999 Grand Am registered in his name. They saw neither vehicle. It looked as if nobody was home.