Darkness First (19 page)

5:14
P.M.
, Sunday, August 23, 2009

Machias, Maine

M
aggie had called Luke Haskell's number half a dozen times, but her calls kept going directly to message. While Haskell might have been on the water, outside of cell range, on a Sunday morning, it didn't seem real likely he'd still be out there at five in the afternoon. Most lobstermen started early. Finished early. Maybe Haskell didn't take calls from ‘unknown callers'. Or maybe Pike Stoddard had warned him not to.

She also tried Stoddard's phone a couple of times. But Pike wasn't answering either. She was about to call Frank Boucher to see if he'd be willing to run Haskell down for her when the doorbell rang.

Sean Carroll was on the doorstep, Emmett Ganzer stood behind him, sporting a black eye and a bandaged nose. More bandages around his right wrist. A pair of state police cruisers in front of the house, light bars flashing, made it clear this was an official visit.

‘Jesus, Emmett,' she said, ‘what the hell happened to you?'

‘Where's your brother?' Ganzer asked.

‘Which one?'

‘Don't play cute with me, Savage. You know damned well which one.'

‘If you're talking about Harlan, I have no idea where he is,' she said. ‘He the one who beat you up?'

Ganzer pushed his way past her into the small center hall.

‘He's not here, Emmett,' said Maggie. ‘You can take my word on that.'

‘Yeah? Then you won't mind if we look around.' Ganzer was already poking his head left and right into the dining and living rooms.

‘As a matter of fact I do. If I tell you Harlan's not here, he's not here. If you don't believe me, find yourself a judge and get a warrant.'

‘Do you know where he is, Maggie?' asked Carroll. He spoke softly but he wasn't smiling.

‘No, I don't, Sean. If he's not at his place up in Whiting, you might try the Musty Moose. He hangs out there a lot. Though usually not this early.'

‘He's not in either place. We also checked room twelve at the Bluebird Motel. But he's not there either and Francie Joplin checked out at eleven this morning.'

‘It might help if you told me what's going on.'

Carroll nodded. ‘Fair enough. May I come in?'

Maggie led both detectives into the living room. Ganzer chose the couch. Maggie and Carroll sat in the twin wing chairs on either side. Polly Four plopped herself on Maggie's foot.

‘We have a warrant for his arrest,' said Ganzer.

‘Assaulting an officer?'

‘Yes. For one thing.'

‘I'm surprised you let him get the drop on you, Emmett. Of course, he is trained in hand-to-hand combat. Pretty good at it, I guess.'

‘Unfortunately,' said Carroll, ‘that's exactly what happened. After you told me about Harlan's relationship with Tiff Stoddard, I asked Emmett to go out to his place and either interview your brother there or, if Harlan was willing, bring him back to Machias and talk to him at your father's office.'

‘So what happened?'

‘Harlan didn't want to cooperate. He attacked Emmett instead.'

‘Really?' Harlan had a quick temper but she didn't think he'd be that stupid. ‘What did you do to provoke him, Emmett? Wave a gun in his face and threaten to shoot him if he didn't come peacefully?'

‘It was the other way around,' said Ganzer. ‘Soon as I get there your brother charges out of that shithole he's living in. Points a rifle at me, tells me to get off his property. When I tell him I just want to talk to him about Tiff Stoddard, he goes berserk and slams me in the face with the butt of the gun.'

PTSD or no PTSD, Maggie didn't think Harlan would just flip out like that. Not without provocation. Not with a police officer.

‘There's been an ATL out for your brother since 2:30 this afternoon. I've got every available unit out looking for his truck now. So does your father. We're also looking for the Joplin woman's car in case they took off together. We've also alerted the Warden Service in case he decides to try to head into the woods and live off the land. Since he took his rifle with him as well as Emmett's back-up piece we've told all units to consider him armed and dangerous.'

‘What do you want from me? I already told you I don't know where he is.'

‘You're his sister,' said Carroll. ‘This morning you said you knew Harlan as well as anybody. I hoped you might have an idea where he'd go if he was running from the law.'

‘I don't. I also don't believe Harlan killed Stoddard. Or rammed into Emily.'

‘Look, Maggie, I'm sure you love your brother. But please remember, like your father, you're a police officer. It's your sworn duty to uphold the law. You've had a pretty distinguished career up till now. I'd hate to see you blow it. If you have any idea where he is you ought to tell us. You know as well as I do he's just getting himself in deeper by running.'

Maggie sighed. ‘Did he take a vehicle?'

‘Drove off in his truck. He knows we're after him so he might have ditched it for another vehicle. Or he might have dumped it and fled on foot.'

‘Any stolen vehicle reports?'

‘Not yet.'

Harlan had plenty of buddies in the area who might lend him a car or truck. And maybe honor a request not to tell the law. On the other hand Harlan didn't need a vehicle. If anyone was capable of disappearing into the wilderness without a trace it was Harlan.

‘He could be anywhere,' she said.

Carroll's phone rang. He checked caller ID, got up and walked outside to the porch.

Maggie studied the injuries to Ganzer's face. They were unsightly but none looked in any way life-threatening. ‘I take it you think Harlan killed Tiff Stoddard,' she said.

‘That's what I think.'

‘So, how come he didn't kill you?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘Well, he beat you up pretty bad.'

Carroll returned from the porch but didn't interrupt. Just stood by the front door, listening to Maggie.

‘If Harlan's the killer, I'm wondering why he didn't kill you while you were down. Chop you up into little pieces and toss you into a dumpster like Blakemore. Or cut your throat like you think he did Tiff Stoddard. Or maybe just weighted you down with a bunch of stones and dumped you into the ocean. But he didn't do any of those things. Why not?'

‘What's your point?' asked Carroll.

‘Just seems like Tiff Stoddard's killer is not someone who shows a pattern of leaving survivors behind to identify him. If Harlan is Conor Riordan, how come Emmett's still alive?'

‘Maybe he was smart enough to know killing a police officer …' Carroll said.

Maggie interrupted. ‘Your wife was a police officer, Sean. I'm sorry to bring up a painful memory, but Conor Riordan, assuming it was Conor Riordan, had no problem killing her.'

‘Maybe he was in a hurry to get away,' said Carroll. ‘Didn't want to take the time.'

‘Bullets travel pretty fast. Wouldn't take hardly any time at all to blow poor Emmett here all to bits.'

Ganzer's big body squirmed in the corner of the couch, not pleased with the direction the conversation was taking.

‘And I can assure you, even before he became a marine, when Harlan shot at something he pretty much never missed.'

‘Well,' said Carroll, ‘it's an interesting question, Maggie. But, at this point, it's a little academic.'

‘Really? Why is that?'

‘That was Heinrich on the phone. His people found a bunch of interesting things up at your brother's place. He wants to show us what he's got before he sends it down to Augusta for analysis. Since you're so sure Harlan's innocent, why don't you come along and see for yourself?'

O
n a Sunday afternoon in late August most of the traffic on Route 1 was going the other way. Vacationers and weekenders returning to their real lives in Portland or Boston or New York.

Carroll drove the unmarked MSP Impala. Ganzer rode shotgun. Neither spoke. Not to each other and not to Maggie, who sat silently in the back seat, strumming her fingers against one leg and looking out the window.

After they passed through East Machias and into Whiting, the commercial buildings and eventually the houses became more scattered. The woods on either side of the road denser. Whiting's 450 year-round residents were thinly spread over a mostly empty fifty square miles. Carroll turned left on Camp Road, followed it a mile or two and then turned right on a narrow, unmarked dirt track. He seemed to know where he was going.

They bumped a couple of hundred yards down the track before it opened into a narrow clearing. Harlan's small, dilapidated mobile home sat in the middle. The techs had strung yellow crime-scene tape around the entire place, which seemed kind of superfluous since nobody except a cop was likely to wander this far off the beaten track. A pair of state police cruisers was parked. So was an ERT van.

Heinrich approached Carroll's car as the three detectives exited.

‘Looks like this is our guy, Sean,' said Heinrich. ‘Took no time at all to find stuff that confirms Savage had an ongoing relationship with Stoddard. Other stuff that ties him to the murder.'

Heinrich handed out latex gloves and everyone put them on. ‘May as well look at the good stuff first. Follow me.' They walked around to the back of the mobile home to a couple of green plastic trash bins. ‘Found these inside a sealed garbage bag in here.' Heinrich held up a plastic bag containing a pair of latex gloves not unlike the ones they were all wearing. Except these had what looked like blood spatter all over them. He passed the bag to Carroll, who looked closely then passed it to Maggie. She gave it to Ganzer, who peered at the gloves, shined his penlight on the bag to light them up.

‘You're sure that's blood on there?' asked Carroll.

‘I'm sure. I'll send the gloves down to the lab tonight. I'm willing to bet it'll turn out to be Stoddard's. We found this in the same garbage bag as the gloves.' Heinrich pulled a black, long-sleeved shirt out of another evidence bag and held it up for viewing. It was almost totally covered with dried blood.

‘Given the difference in height between Stoddard and Savage,' said Heinrich, ‘the blood pumping from Stoddard's severed arteries would likely have concentrated just about here.' Heinrich pointed to a place midway down the shirt where the blood seemed the thickest.

Jesus Christ
, thought Maggie,
why couldn't Harlan have gotten rid of this stuff somewhere a little less obvious than his own damned trash can? He was smarter than that, wasn't he?

‘What else?' asked Carroll.

‘Follow me.'

They went around to the front of the trailer. ‘It's all right to come in. We've finished going over everything. Still, I'd like you to wear these inside.'

He handed them each some booties. The detectives slipped them on and followed Heinrich up three steps into a narrow rectangular space divided railroad style into three small rooms. The front door in the middle brought them directly into the living room. The kitchen was off to the right, a single bedroom to the left. An open door next to the bedroom led into the tiny bathroom with a toilet, sink and a cheap metal stall shower the manufacturer had just managed to cram in. All the walls were covered in fake wood paneling. The furniture seemed mostly to be third-hand Salvation Army junk plus a few decent pieces Maggie recognized from home. She wondered if Joanne had given them to Harlan when he got back from Bethesda or if Savage had made a donation of things Anya didn't want once she moved in.

Maggie paused to look at three framed photos hanging in a row on the wall. She recognized the first. A formal portrait of Harlan, nineteen years old, in marine dress blues. The picture, or one just like it, used to hang in her parents' bedroom at home. The look of earnest expectation Harlan wore on his face pulled at Maggie's heart. This was her handsome younger brother the way she remembered him. Or maybe, she supposed, the way she
wanted
to remember him.

The middle shot was more disturbing. Harlan with four other marines. All dressed in desert camo with body armor and combat gear. All grinning at the camera. One of them, not Harlan, was standing with his right foot planted on the chest of a dead insurgent like an old-time hunter showing off the big game he'd bagged. In the picture black
x
s were magic-markered over two of the marines' faces. Comrades, she supposed, who never made it home. Finally there was a shot of the Savage family, all five of them, with Maggie and her father both dressed in uniform. She couldn't remember who'd taken it. Or when. There was no black
x
over her mother's face.

‘Are you with us, Savage?' Ganzer's voice.

Maggie pulled away and joined the others in the kitchen, where Heinrich was showing off two more evidence bags. Each held a folded knife. One had a red handle. The other black. ‘We found these in a utility drawer here in the kitchen.'

Ganzer took both bags from Heinrich and peered through the plastic at the knives. A nasty smile made Maggie wish Harlan had broken more than his nose.

‘Both knives have blades we think fit the wounds we saw Friday. We'll know better when we get the autopsy report. On this one …' – he pointed at the knife with the red handle – ‘… we also found what appears to be a black pubic hair stuck in the cavity the blade folds into.'

Carroll looked even closer. ‘Is it still there?'

‘Yes. It's hard to see but it's there. The lab'll be able to tell us for sure if the hair is Stoddard's. We think it might have gotten stuck in there when he pulled out the knife and ran.'

Maggie took her turn and studied the knife with the red handle. When she held it up to the light coming through the window, she could just see the strand of hair through the plastic.
If the AG's office accepted all this stuff at face value
… Maggie didn't bother finishing the thought.

‘Did you find his stash of drugs?' asked Carroll. ‘Oxycontin 80s? Thousands of them.'

‘Yes and no. We didn't find
THOUSANDS
of them. But we did find this. Sitting under his underwear in a drawer in the bedroom.' Heinrich held up a plastic bag with several hundred small greenish ovals inside. ‘You want us to keep looking?'

‘Please do. Take this place apart. Though he probably took the main stash with him when he ran.'

‘You got it. Meantime there are a couple of smaller things you ought to see.' Heinrich led them back into the living room. Lying on a coffee table was a digital photo wrapped in a plastic sleeve.

‘Found this in a bedside table drawer.'

It was a picture of Tiff and Harlan taken at night. The two were standing in what looked like an outdoor concert venue. You could see a crowd of people milling around, some bleachers in the background. Both Tiff and Harlan wore broad smiles and black Killers t-shirts. Harlan had his arm around Tiff's waist. She hadn't seen her brother look that happy since he got back from the war.

‘The Killers played a concert in Bar Harbor last month,' said Ganzer. ‘It looks like they went down to catch the show.'

‘This doesn't prove anything,' said Maggie. ‘Except they had a relationship.'

‘Yeah. They had a relationship. Until last week, when she dumped him. Gives us what we need, Savage. Motive for murder. You know, the jilted lover? It's classic. Happens all the time.'

Maggie seethed at the smug certainty of Ganzer's words. The snarky little smile that darted across his face. Visions of sergeant's stripes no doubt dancing in his head like sugarplums on Christmas Eve.

‘We still don't know for sure it was Harlan who killed her,' she maintained stubbornly.

‘Give me a break, Savage. I know this guy's your brother but even you've got to recognize a slam-dunk conviction when you see one.'

‘Is that what you think too, Sean? That my brother not only killed Stoddard but also killed your wife? And Laura Blakemore?'

Carroll gave her a hard look before answering. ‘We don't know for sure about Liz or Blakemore yet. But if Harlan and Tiff were running the drug trade together it's entirely possible. You never did ask him where he was last January, did you?'

‘No.' Maggie answered in a small voice. ‘I never did.'

‘Maybe you should have. Anyway, as far as Stoddard goes, your brother's starting to look pretty damn solid.'

‘We've got more proof of the relationship,' said Heinrich, handing the photo to Carroll along with a magnifying glass. ‘Take a close look at the pendant she's got hanging around her neck.' Carroll peered through the glass at the photo then handed it to Ganzer, who did the same before giving it to Maggie. Using the magnifying glass, she could clearly make out the color and shape of the pendant. A gold starfish with what appeared to be a small diamond stud in the middle.

‘Okay,' said Carroll. ‘A starfish pendant. What about it?'

‘We found it in the drawer under the photo.' He held up another plastic bag that contained a piece of jewelry identical to the one Tiff was wearing in the photo.

‘If you turn it over you'll see a tiny inscription on the back that reads “To Tiff. We've only just begun. H.” '

Maggie's heart sank. H. had to be Harlan. By itself the pendant didn't prove his guilt. Any more than the t-shirts did. But what Maggie hadn't told Carroll or anyone else was something Emily had said in the hospital the day before. That Stoddard had been wearing a gold starfish pendant when she arrived at Em's office. That she still had it on when she left. Since they hadn't found it on her body or anywhere around the crime scene, the only logical conclusion was that the killer pulled it from her neck before cutting her throat. Taken it with him when he fled. And now here it was. The first seeds of doubt about Harlan's innocence began taking root in Maggie's brain. She tried pushing them away, but they refused to go. Maybe Iraq had changed Harlan more than she could ever have imagined.