Code 61 (41 page)

“And?” I asked.

“Peale was busted here back in ninety-three,” he said. “Didn't you get our fuckin' reply to your inquiry?”

“Oh, yeah! Yeah, okay. Consensual blood ingestion, wasn't that it? And some involvement with a juvie, too.”

“You got it. Want to guess who the fuckin' juvie was?”

“Hutha Mann,” said Hester. “Hutha Mann, a/k/a Tatiana Ostransky, right?”

“You got it.” He laughed.

“The plot thickens,” I said. “So, what did he do to her?”

“Probably a statutory sex thing, I bet. The reporting officer says that she was not a complainant in the matter. She was seventeen at the time, so she could have legally consented, but this Peale dude provided her with booze, and since she was not able to consent to drinking, and she was intoxicated at the time she was discovered, he was in problems.”

“Ouch.” I grinned. “Bad choices, there.”

“Yeah. He didn't get shit out of it, with the plea bargain and everything.” Harry shrugged. “She had a fresh cut on her lip, but she claimed that was an accident.”

“I'll just bet she did,” said Hester.

“Now, here's the good part,” said Harry. “The guy who was in charge of that bust retires next week, but he was in, and he said that Jessica Hunley was involved in the edges of the case. She wasn't at the cabin at the time they made the arrests, but the Hunleys' attorney came to the cop shop and made everybody's bail. And this Hutha Mann, a/k/a Tatiana, gave her address as a place that turned out to be Jessica Hunley's fuckin' dance studio.”

“No shit?” I said. “So they go way back as a group, then.” “Apparently so,” he said, looking very satisfied with himself.

We walked over for lunch at a great place called Popeyes. Multiple levels, it had a maritime décor and a great menu. Well, a cop would think so.

“It must be great,” I said, “to work in a town that has restaurants like this.” There was a faint, multi-tone sound, and Hester pulled her cell phone from her pocket. She answered it, and then held it out to me. “For you. Your office.”

I took the phone. “Yeah?”

“Carl, Lamar. Nothin' major, but the attorney we got to talk to to get in the old mine won't be in until tomorrow sometime. Is this a problem?”

“No, I don't think so.” I didn't think we'd be back there until then, anyway. “I'd appreciate it if you'd look for some sign, down at the highway level, where somebody might have gone over the fence, or something. Stack of crates? Rocks? We think there's a really good chance our buddy might have made it down there pretty fast that night.”

“Borman and Knockle are already up there, and everything is okay, as far as they can tell. Most of the kids up there are at work, I guess.” He paused. “I'll have 'em check the mine area. Do you want 'em wandering around up on the hill, looking for an entrance?”

I did not. No point giving the game away before we were ready.

“You do know that it runs for about three miles or better?” asked Lamar. “Inside the hill, mostly north and south, but it does go back in under the bluffs for a good five hundred feet, too?”

“Okay…. ”

“I just asked because, if you want to do a search or something, it could take a real long time. The chambers are big enough to be easy to search, you know, but they cover a lot of territory.”

“I sure hope not,” I said. “I hate caves.”

He chuckled. “The troops been getting really curious why I'm telling 'em to do all this stuff. I ain't told where you are, and they're thinkin' that I'm on the case.”

“Hey, we brought in the best.”

“Uh, Carl, while I got you on the phone … did you have some sort of confrontation with Borman about that warning shot business?”

“Not really,” I said. “Why?”

“Well, he says you jumped in his shit in front of witnesses. Embarrassed him, or something. Gave him a lecture, I believe he said. Here in the office. You know anything about that?”

“Sure. He flagged me down on my way through Dispatch, and wanted to know why I told on him. Just like a little kid.”

“Yeah. Well, Carl, he's filed a grievance with the union. Alleges harassment on your part. Wants you disciplined.”

“Bullshit.”

“Yeah, but that's what he says.”

“Ask Sally,” I said. “She was there. She was there for the whole thing.”

“Okay,” said Lamar. “But don't you talk with her about this. She's a witness, let the process take its course.”

“I want that little moron off this case,” I said. “Can't do that, Carl. You know the rules, here. Just watch your step.” “Watch my step, hell,” I said. “I'm gonna strangle the little shit.”

“Right. Oh, before I forget, that Huck girl called for you guys a few minutes ago. Dispatch didn't tell me 'cause it went in your 'to do' box, but I was readin' the log.”

Quite a gear change, as Lamar intended. “When did she call?”

“About an hour ago. No message, just said she needed to talk to you before you came back.” He stopped, surprised. “Let me check that note…. ”

“Back? How did she know we were gone?”

“Okay, Jesus, I didn't think. Yep, here it is. The note says ' … before they come back … ' You didn't tell her you were leavin'?”

“No. I didn't … just a sec.” I covered the phone. “Hey, did you tell Huck we were leaving the area?”

“No,” said Hester. “No, I didn't.”

“Me, neither,” said Harry, just to make me happy.

“She called for us, and left a message saying that she'd talk to us before we got back.” I was getting concerned.

“Hey, Lamar? No, Hester didn't say anything, either.” I pulled a pen from my pocket. “Give me the call-back number on the note, will you?”

He did. I knew it wasn't the Mansion, but it sounded familiar.

“You know what number that is?” If it was familiar to me, it would probably be familiar to Lamar, as well.

“Yeah, it's the main administrative number for the casino boat.”

“I'll give her a call,” I said.

I handed the phone back to Hester. “Gotta get one of those.”

“The whole state would appreciate it,” she said.

“Huck had to talk to either Jessica or Tatiana right after we left the dance studio,” I said. “She called our office a few minutes ago. I think she's on the 06:00 to

14:00 shift, which means that she was at work when shecalled our office, and would have been when we left the studio, too.”

“So they called her at work, then?” Hester and I were both figuring that a long-distance call from work was something Huck probably wouldn't be doing.

“Probably. I better call her.”

Hester just handed me her phone.

The gaming boat hated to interrupt dealers, understandably, and told me to call back in fifteen minutes. That gave me time to gripe to Hester and Harry about Borman and his grievance.

Hester just shook her head. Harry related a similar incident between him and a rookie that ended with the rookie working in a discount store. “They just seem to hate constructive fuckin' criticism, these days, you know?”

“Yeah,” I said, ruefully. “What my boy doesn't know is how restrained I was.”

Our food arrived just as Hester's phone rang again. She answered, grinned, and handed it to me. “Lamar,” she said.

“Yeah?”

“Your friend Huck just called back,” said Lamar. “She gave this number, and said you're to call it right away.”

I got my pen back out, and wrote it down. “Thanks.”

“You bet. Let me know what's going on…. ”

“Okay.”

I broke the connection, and dialed the number he'd given me. Of course, since he hadn't had to use the area code, I hadn't copied it down. Being in a hurry, when I dialed, I left it out. There was the familiar oscillating tone.

“Area code,” said Hester, her spoon between the soup bowl and her mouth. I noticed the spoon didn't even slow.

“Right.” I redialed.

“Hello,” said a muted voice. It was Huck, and she was half whispering. “Houseman. You wanted me to call?” “Yeah. That was fast. So, how you like Lake Geneva?” Still whispered.

“Great, so far.”

“You get around. Look, Tat called, she had some stuff to tell me, and I told her she could trust you. She can, can't she?” “Sure.” Tat? It sounded like she knew Tatiana better than I had thought.

“Okay, look, she wants to meet you in about a half hour. Jessica's got stuff to do, and Tat wants to talk with somebody. She's getting scared,” said Huck.

Well. “Okay, fine. Where at?”

There was a pause. “Before I tell you, you gotta know that Tat's in love with Jessica, all right? I mean, really in love with her.”

I wasn't exactly thunderstruck, but I was surprised. “Oh?”

She sighed. “You gotta know that so what she says makes sense.”

“Okay.”

“She wants to meet you at the observatory. You know where that is?”

“Yep. If you mean the big one? The Yerkes Observatory.” Oh, yeah.

“Yes. She'll be at the rear steps, I'll call her right now, gotta go, thanks, be good to her.” Dial tone.

“So?” asked Hester.

“Jessica and Tatiana did call her,” I said. “She wanted to make sure they were telling her the truth, for one thing.”

“She wonders about that, too?” asked Harry.

“Huck says that Ostransky, Tatiana, wants to meet us at Yerkes Observatory.”

Hester put down her soupspoon, got a map out of her purse, and said, “Looks like we take fifty west to sixty-seven, then sixty-seven south into Williams Bay. Follow it on West Geneva Street. Piece of cake.”

THIRTY

Wednesday, October 11, 2000
15:12

Yerkes Observatory is run by the University of Chicago. It's an incredible building, sort of dumbbell shaped, with a long hall connecting two observation areas. The building itself is an architectural delight. Built in 1895, it's a golden sandstone, ornately carved, complete with gargoyles, griffons and other mythological critters, as well as astronomical and astrological signs, cherubs, and just about anything else that would lend a Victorian Gothic air to the place. The domes themselves are very ornate, with pillared arches running around the lower levels, and making them look a lot like the exterior of the Leaning Tower of Pisa. The whole place has a Jules Verne atmosphere, and you can almost see the famous astronomers Hale, Barnard, and Burnham out of the corner of your eye.

We all got into Hester's car, and followed the map. As we turned in the long drive, Hester got a good look at the place, and said, “Wow.”

“Cool, no?” I gave her the basic details I'd gotten years back when I took the tour. “Some momentous stuff happened here, but in a quiet way.”

“It is quiet,” said Harry.

We parked right in front of the main entrance. There were only three or four cars there, and space for about twice that many.

The mirror image of the main entrance was on the other side of the building, so we walked on the lawn around the main dome, and approached the deserted rear of the building.

Sure enough, Tatiana was sitting on the stone steps, about fifty yards from us. She'd apparently pulled a pair of black slacks on over her dancing tights, and had on a pair of ankle-high, laced walking boots. She was in bright afternoon sunlight, and her hair shone like neon. She held her hand to her forehead to shade her eyes as we approached, and stood.

“Hi,” I said.

“What can we do for you?” asked Hester.

Tatiana didn't appear at all nervous, just in a hurry.

“Okay, look, I don't have a lot of time, and there's a couple of things you should know about what's going on.”

“You've got our complete attention,” I said.

“Let's take a little walk,” suggested Tatiana. We did, she and I walking together down a winding walk that crossed the big lawn, Hester and Harry following about a step behind. “Okay, first … well, you should know that we picked up Dan Peale on our way home, and gave him a ride.”

“You and Jessica? When you left Freiberg?” Always make sure.

“Yes.”

“Where did he spend the night?” asked Hester.

“Here,” said Tatiana. “In Lake Geneva.”

We stayed on the sidewalk, and meandered through a stand of trees.

“Wait just a second,” I said. “Your attorney told us that you two left early that morning. How could he have spent the night here, and then you gave him a ride?”

Tatiana snickered. “Early that morning? You might say that, I guess, and still be truthful. We left about ten after midnight.”

Ah. Attorneys. Always the most deceptive when they tell the truth.

“And where did you pick Dan up?”

“Right at the mine entrance, where we knew he'd be,” she said. “Just pulled over, and Jessica honked the horn. He came over the fence in a few minutes, and we were on our way.”

“How did you know that?” I asked. “Where to find him, I mean?”

“Cell phones,” said Tatiana, with eyebrows raised and an unspoken “duh” dangling from the end of the sentence.

Ah, again. I was going to have to buy one of those damned things, just so I wouldn't keep forgetting they existed.

“Where is he now?” I asked.

“I don't know. I think Jessica does, but I don't.”

“When did you last see him?” Hester asked.

“About seven-thirty this morning,” was the reply. “That's what I want to talk to you about. He's got one of Jessica's cars, and I'm afraid he's going to drag her down with him.”

She wasn't about to break down or anything, but she did seem to be getting toward an edge.

“Why do you say that?”

“He wants her to stay with him forever,” said Tatiana. “She's really mad at him right now, and that's good, but she let him have the car, and that's just because they spent last night together, and he's working on her emotions.” She took a deep breath. “Jessica's such a wonderful person, and he's going to get her in trouble because she cares.”

“How do you know she's mad at him?” I asked, leaving out any reference to them spending the night together. Their sleeping together really didn't strike me as an anger reaction. That, plus an image of a caring Jessica Hunley was hard to achieve.

“Oh,” said Tatiana, “you should have seen her when he got in the car down at the mine. She slapped him. Really. Three times, and called him an idiot and a fool.” Her eyes widened as she spoke. “I've never seen her mad like that. She was just furious.”

“And he didn't stop her?” asked Hester.

“He just sat there. Really. I was driving, and he got in the car, and there wasn't really room, and she just started slapping him, and he just sat there and let her.”

“Really?” Hester didn't look convinced.

“Really, I'm telling you. You'd have to see her that way. I'm not kidding. He just got this stony look on his face, and never even said a word.”

Interesting. She'd established Jessica as the dominant personality, without a doubt.

“Well, since she's already been harboring a felon,” said Hester, “how much more damage can he do to her?”

“He wants to go to London,” said Tatiana. “See?”

“No,” I said, “I guess I don't. Why London?”

“You know. He says that's where he's from, originally. Anyway, to go all that distance, he needs more energy,” said the dancer. “Lots of it.”

“Yes?” She was losing me, and fast.

“We're afraid he has to kill again, to gain energy, before he can go on such a long trip.”

“Wouldn't killing somebody like that just drain more energy?” I asked. Thinking to myself,
Jesus, what kind of nuts are these people?

“You know what he is. Huck said she told you what he is.”

“You mean a vampire?”

“Yes.”

“Yeah,” I said, “she and Toby and I guess everybody at least thought that's what he might be, to varying degrees.” I shrugged. “I don't think Huck believes that, really. Do you?”

“He is.” She said it very simply, and very convincingly. “He's a vampire. He gets energy from drinking blood. I know that.”

This was no time to bring up the subtle differences between actually being a vampire, and just being very delusional. She believed it, and that was going to have to do. The important thing was, if he really thought he was a vampire, there was a good chance he'd be tending to act as if he were. The downside was that if he was playing an elaborate game, he was only going into vampire mode to impress or frighten certain people. If that were the case, we were then dealing with somebody who was going to act normally outside their view. The latter scenario had my vote.

“So,” said Harry, “where do you think he's headed?”

Tatiana was silent for a second, organizing her response. She was genuinely worried, no doubt about that. She glanced at her watch. “Okay. Okay, look, Toby contacted us on e-mail, and said that he had some stuff to tell Dan. We just said to send it to us, and we'd try to find Dan.” She looked seriously at me. “Toby's not all that reliable, you know?”

“Yeah,” I said. “We know.” I made a mental note to obtain a search warrant for Toby's computer. I knew Harry was thinking the same about Jessica at this end.

“So Toby told us that Edie was talking to the cops. That'd be you, I suppose,” she said, almost as an afterthought. “So Dan called him, and told him to stop Edie by … by putting the stake in her heart, and other stuff.” Another deep breath. “So, you guys told us today that he really did that. Right?”

“Right. Or, at least, some of it. He did the stake thing,” I said, “but he couldn't do the other stuff.” She opened her mouth to talk, and I held up my hand. “Just so there's no misunderstanding, I really didn't say that Edie was actually talking to us. I indicated that her body could tell the pathologist things. Toby just put his own spin on it.”

“Oh.” She considered that, and I got the impression she didn't believe me. “Well, whatever. Anyway, Toby also said that Huck was talking to you, and that he thought Melissa was about ready to give up everything.”

“Well,” I said, “that's not been the case.”

“He thinks it is,” said Tatiana, “I can tell you that. Toby told him, and he's just furious.”

“So?”

“I'm afraid that he's going to go back to the Mansion and hurt somebody.”

“Why would he go back there? The cops know all about the Mansion,” Hester said.

“Because they've been
cultivated
by him, just for that,” said Tatiana. “They're his, well, his disciples, you know? And his livestock, kind of, at the same time.”

“Look,” I said, “why don't you come with us to some place where we can get all this down, and you can—”

“Jesus Christ, you guys! I gotta get back,” she said. “If Jessica finds out I'm gone … ” Her eyes darted to her watch, again. “Maybe later? Maybe tonight sometime? You do believe me, don't you? God, Huck said you were pretty real people.”

“I believe you about everything that counts, that's for sure,” I said. “I believe that Dan's pissed, and I believe Toby's an idiot. And I believe we better get some people to that house.”

She started walking away very fast, almost skipping as she turned back to us. “I'll call you,” she said. “Later,” and she was gone.

We decided that we'd better get word to the people at the Mansion, just in case he was really headed back there. I sort of doubted it, frankly. Delusional doesn't necessarily equate with dumb.

I called the Nation County Sheriff's Department on Hester's phone. I asked Sally to get a message to Borman.

“Just a sec, I'll let you talk to him.”

“What?” I didn't want to do that, not until I could reach him, anyway. But I had no choice. “He's right in the back room,” she said. “Writing his reports.”

Borman came on the line a second later. “Hi.”

“I thought you were up around the Mansion?”

“No, we went up there, and everything's fine. I thought I better come back down and get writing on these reports.”

I could see why he'd want to do that, but I wasn't all too happy about it. I thought he was trying to avoid working overtime, as opposed to being eiffcient.

“Look, go back up and talk to them again, will you? We have indications that Peale was in Lake Geneva this morning, early. He left. He's driving one of Jessica Hunley's cars, but we don't know which one for sure. There's a good chance he may be on his way back to the Mansion. Tell them that. All of them.” I really tried for a friendly voice. Well, a normal one, anyway. He didn't know that I was aware he'd filed a grievance, and he'd figure out Lamar had told me if I mentioned it.

“Oh, okay. Sure. So, like, you're over in Lake Geneva, then?”

Well, it was a good guess, and there really wasn't a reason to keep it secret anymore, since we'd already talked to Jessica.

“Yeah, we're in Lake Geneva. We got a few interviews to do yet, and should be on the way back tomorrow sometime.”

“Oh. Rank has its privileges, huh?”

I couldn't tell from his voice whether he was kidding or being sarcastic. “It sure does. You might want to remember that.” I took a breath, and lightened back up.

“Keep all this to yourself, though. Just you and Lamar. No point in the whole world knowing just yet.”

“Okay, I'll get right on it. Nothing much going on here, at all.” He sounded fairly earnest, and sincere.

“Okay. You might want to pick up some OT, and hang around up there this evening. Maybe a good idea to have a couple of reserves up there tonight, all right?”

“You got it.”

“Give me back to Sally, will you?”

“Yo!” Sally always managed to sound cheerful.

“Yeah, hey, keep me posted on anything that comes up, okay?”

“Always, Houseman. Hey,” she said, “I hear I'm a witness.”

“Ah, yeah, I guess. But I'm not allowed to talk about that with you.”

“Sure. I think it's a crock of shit, though. He's acting like a little brat.”