My mouth had gone suddenly dry; I couldn’t have spit if I’d wanted to.
The stream seemed very loud here. The noise it made, slipping around rocks, plunging softly over ledges, was like a crowd of people whispering: a chorus of hushed words I couldn’t quite catch.
After a moment, I blew all the air out of my lungs and then refilled them. I took long, purposeful steps straight toward the driver’s door. I had no weapon, nothing to protect myself, but I had a hunch that I wouldn’t need one. That presentiment proved correct.
The window was misted over from the inside, but the splatter of red on the glass told me all there was to tell.
I pulled my left hand back into my sweater sleeve like a turtle pulling its head back into its shell. I didn’t want to contaminate the handle with my own fingerprints.
As I expected, the door was open. And as I expected, Hans Westergaard was inside.
He sat upright behind the steering wheel, his face chalk white, his eyes open but frosted. Ruth Libby was correct that he was a handsome man. He had a strong jaw, a Roman nose, and a head of silver hair I recognized from his portrait on the Harvard Business School’s Web page. He wore a chambray shirt and chinos, but no shoes or socks. Like the Rover’s leather upholstery, all of his clothes were now stained a deep, indelible red.
On the seat beside him was the kitchen knife someone had used to cut his throat.
29
“What the hell brought you here?” asked Danica Marshall.
“It was a hunch,” I said.
She was dressed in an electric blue down jacket, making her eyes that much more vivid, black denim pants that flattered her legs, and shiny black boots. She had a skier’s golden tan-new since the last time I’d seen her.
We were standing around my Jeep-Danica, Menario, Baker, and me.
Somewhere in the darkening woods, the state police evidence-recovery techs were performing their painstaking work while the medical examiner inspected the corpse. Under the Maine attorney general’s Death Protocol, the body couldn’t be touched or moved until Dr. Kitteridge had made his preliminary assessment. I was willing to predict the ME would attribute death to a severing of the carotid artery, but I was less certain about the timing. The Range Rover had certainly been mired in place since before the ice storm.
“We know you came here straight from the prison,” said Menario.
I’d taken a Vicodin after I called in my grisly discovery and now felt a mellow self-confidence. “News travels fast.”
“A guard called to tell me there was an off-duty game warden speaking with Erland Jefferts,” said Danica. “I didn’t need to be Perry Mason to figure out who it might be.”
“What were you doing with that asshole Bell?” asked Menario.
I noticed that Sheriff Baker had slid his hands into his parka pockets and kept gazing dreamily off into the trees. He needn’t have worried. I had no intention of squealing on him.
I cocked my head. “Which question am I supposed to answer first? What brought me here? Or why was I at the Maine State Prison with Oswald Bell?”
“Don’t be a joker,” said Menario.
“We know you spoke with Jill Westergaard, too.” Danica tried to stare me down, to no effect.
“Is that a third question?”
“Are you on something, Bowditch?” asked the detective, looking into my undersized pupils with suspicion.
This was the first question that actually provoked a nervous reaction in me. I had no idea how impaired I was by the Vicodin in my system. I was fortunate that Kathy Frost had been summoned that morning to Aroostook County to help look for a lost girl. The only warden on the scene was Ruth’s cousin, Mark Libby. At the moment, he was off in the woods with the CID techs.
“I went to meet Erland Jefferts at Ozzie Bell’s request,” I said.
Danica opened her mouth and shook her head in disbelief. “Didn’t I warn you about Jefferts?”
I looked over at the sheriff, who was doing his best imitation of an invisible man. “I’m not joining the J-Team, in case you wondered,” I said. “I know Erland is guilty, but I wanted to meet him. You wouldn’t understand.”
“You’re right there,” she said. “What is with you anyway? Do you have some kind of career death wish?”
I rested my body against the cold hood of my Jeep. “I was curious about Jefferts. I wondered why seemingly sane people flock to his defense.”
The detective and the prosecutor waited. They were expecting me to drop a pearl of wisdom on them.
“Go on,” said Menario finally.
“He’s a con man,” I said.
Sheriff Baker coughed into his fist. When he had arrived on the scene, I knew from his glare that Bell must have told him how abusive I’d been to the J-Team’s beloved convict.
“That’s an amazing insight,” said Danica Marshall.
I let the sarcasm roll off my back. “After I spoke with Jefferts, I started thinking about the similarities between the two homicides. He said something about an old tree the kids carve their initials in. I figured this place might be another point of connection to the Nikki Donnatelli killing. Being the district game warden, I decided to investigate. I recognized the tire tracks, found the vehicle, and called you in.”
Menario gave me one of his patented eye rolls. “The district game warden? You’re on sick leave!”
“But this is still my district.”
“Not for long,” said Menario.
I was unimpressed by his bluster. “What are you going to do, punish me for finding the most wanted fugitive north of Boston?”
“I’m having a hard time understanding your personal obsession with this case,” said Danica without animosity. She was genuinely perplexed, and I couldn’t blame her.
I was still formulating a response when a state police evidence tech came running down the trail. “Detective!”
“Don’t go anywhere,” said Menario, stalking off toward the crime scene.
After a moment of indecision, Sheriff Baker hurried along behind. As a clandestine supporter of the J-Team, he wanted to overhear every possible conversation.
I thought maybe Danica Marshall would follow the two men, but evidently she didn’t want to let me out of her sight. She reached into her ski jacket for something. It turned out to be lip balm, which she applied overgenerously to her wide mouth. “I don’t get you at all,” she said. “How long have you been a game warden? Two years?”
“Less than that.”
“I have no idea what to make of you. On the one hand, you have the highest conviction rate of any warden in the service, according to your lieutenant. On the other hand, your colonel is taking bets in Augusta on when you’ll quit or be fired. You strike me as a world-class fuckup, and yet you keep doing Menario’s job for him.”
“Does it really matter what you make of me?” I asked.
“Not anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
“I was worried before about putting you on the stand. Now it doesn’t matter whether you’re an unreliable witness.”
I understood what she was hinting at. “There’s not going to be a trial.”
“Not if it’s a murder-suicide.”
“But Westergaard didn’t kill himself,” I said. “Someone else did.”
She inspected the painted nails on her left hand, pretending I hadn’t offered an objection. “What did Bell tell you about me anyway?” she asked casually.
“I’m assuming you’ve read Bell’s dossier,” I said. “He thinks that you suborned perjury by Detective Winchenback and suppressed evidence at the Jefferts trial.”
“The attorney general and a three-judge panel say I didn’t. You know the J-Team has been shot down on every appeal.”
“Maybe that’s why Bell calls you ‘the Black Widow.’”
When she smiled, I could see that her teeth had been professionally whitened. “The Black Widow. I like that.”