Five Minutes Alone (36 page)

CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

Schroder is sitting on the couch that he finds himself really beginning to like. It’s comfortable, it was cheap, there are no holes in it. It’s the best couch in the world. Warren is back too.

The radio is on and he’s listening to the news, and the newsman tells him about the body found last night and there is nothing new there. Then the newsreader says something Schroder isn’t expecting, and perhaps the newsreader wasn’t expecting it either. But they are going to cross to a live press conference at the police department.

Schroder turns off the radio. Then he turns on the TV. It takes him five seconds to find the right channel. It’s leading news. The conference looks like it has just started. Superintendent Stevens is talking. Stevens used to be his boss. The man was a pain in the ass, but he was fair, and that was what was most important. It was Stevens that fired him after he shot that old woman to save the young girl, and it was Stevens who helped cover that crime. At the time he was angry at losing his job, but grateful because it could have been worse. Now he wonders if they are kindred spirits.

He can’t see Tate, so maybe . . . but then the camera angle changes. Tate is sitting to Stevens’s left, and then to the left of Tate is Rebecca Kent, and the Old Him had a crush on Kent back when he knew how to have a crush. He guesses the Old Him had a crush on the Old Her. Stevens is talking. He confirms their belief that the killings on Saturday night are related to the killing last night. Peter Crowley, Stevens believes, is what the Five Minute Man would call collateral damage.

“Fuck you.” He looks up at Warren. “Can you believe he said that?”

Warren doesn’t answer.

“Fuck you too, Warren,” he says.

A reporter asks if the cases are related to Dwight Smith, and Stevens says there will be time for questions at the end. Then he goes on to say that they are following several leads, and he holds up the sketch of the bald man that doesn’t look like Schroder and, if anything, looks more like the dentist he used to have. Stevens tells the public this guy is a family member or a friend or a neighbor, and Schroder figures he is two of those, and perhaps still even all three as long as Warren can forgive him for swearing at him.

Stevens then asks for help from the public. They are looking for a dark blue Honda Accord, somewhere around ten years old, then holds up a generic photograph of the same make and model that Schroder is driving. He asks for calls from members of the public who saw this car near any of the crime scenes. The car could be a problem, right up there with the DNA found in the dog’s mouth at the fire.

“We’re dealing with a seriously dangerous individual,” Stevens says. “Ballistics have proven the same gun was used in the deaths that occurred at Grover Hills as well as the death of Ron McDonald. The man who is using this gun is responsible for the death of Peter Crowley, and we also believe he was involved in the death of Dwight Smith. Do not approach this man. He believes he’s on some kind of mission, and that means it’s possible he will hurt anybody who stands in his way.”

“So that’s what this is? A mission?” somebody asks, a male voice coming from the crowd. “Does that mean he hasn’t finished?”

“We will stop him,” Stevens says, which doesn’t answer the question. “Now, the man leading the investigation and who will answer your questions is Detective Inspector Theodore Tate. I’m sure many of you remember him, and I want to remind you to keep your questions relevant.”

“Who’s first?” Tate asks, and then most of the people in the room all seem to figure they are first, and questions come from every direction. “One at a time,” Tate says, and then points into the crowd. The camera angle doesn’t change, it stays on Tate as he listens to the question. His facial expression doesn’t change.

“What would you say to the family members of the victims to ensure them all is being done that can be done?”

“I would tell them we are doing everything remotely possible, and everything by the book. We will—”

But then the reporter interrupts him. “But you were in a coma just a few months ago,” he says. “And before that you were in jail. Seems to me the police force isn’t doing the best it can, but loading the deck in the Five Minute Man’s favor.”

Before Tate can answer, Stevens goes back to the microphone. “Like I said, people, relevant questions. Not stupid ones.”

“But—”

“You,” he says, cutting off the same reporter and pointing to another one in the crowed, this time a woman. “I trust you’ll stay on point?”

The camera angle doesn’t show who asks the question, but this time it’s a woman. “There are some people who think what the Five Minute Man is doing is a good thing. It’s been a hot topic that the justice system in this country isn’t hard enough, and the public voting the death penalty back in is proof of that. What would you say to those people?”

Tate glances at Stevens to make sure his boss isn’t going to answer it, and Stevens straightens up, putting distance between him and the mic.

“I would remind them that half the country is against it,” Tate says, “and I’d like everybody to think about where this would lead if we allowed people to run around playing judge and executioner. I know people out there have these Hollywood notions of a good man doing what he thinks is right, but—”

“And you, Detective? Where do you stand on that issue?”

“Innocent people are being hurt or killed, like Peter Crowley and Ron McDonald,” Tate says. “I’m going to stop whoever is doing this.”

There’s a murmur in the crowd, then somebody asks the question that Schroder is thinking, and he knows Tate has said it deliberately. But what does it mean? “Are you saying Ron McDonald is an innocent man?”

“Of course that’s what I’m saying,” Tate says. “If he were a guilty man we would have prosecuted him seven years ago.”

“You know that’s not the general impression,” the same reporter asks.

“I can’t help what general impressions are, but the fact remains Ron McDonald was never charged with a crime, and therefore that makes him an innocent man.”

“Are you saying he’s just as innocent as he was seven years ago? Or have you found something to make him seem more innocent?”

“It’s like I said,” Tate says, “Ron McDonald was never charged. What I can tell you is that several interviews and a search conducted today have brought to light new evidence in the killing of Hailey McDonald.”

“Does that mean you have a new primary suspect?” another reporter asks.

“What I’m saying is new evidence has come to light.”

“Simplify it for us, Detective,” another reporter asks. “In your opinion, did Ron McDonald kill his wife?”

“Ask me again tomorrow,” Tate says, “because by then we’ll know for sure.”

There are more questions, some of them stupid, some of them to the point, and Tate answers some and brushes others aside, and Schroder sits through it all listening, listening, listening, but really what he is doing is thinking, thinking, thinking.

The conference carries on. Tate says the bald man may have been given a lift on Friday night, sometime after one o’clock in the
morning, from the location of the train tracks. He says the bald man may have hitchhiked, and if somebody did pick him up, then he is to get in touch with the police. Kent doesn’t talk, but Stevens takes over again and thanks the reporters for coming, promises they’ll have more information for them tomorrow, then talks about Detective Inspector Wilson Hutton, whose loss will greatly affect the department, before reminding everybody just how dangerous the Five Minute Man is.

The conference ends.

Schroder switches off the TV.

He gets out his cell phone.

He calls Tate, imagining him still walking out of the room, imagining him reaching into his pocket while reporters are still trying to ask him questions.

“Detective Tate,” he says, answering his phone.

“It’s not going to work,” Schroder says.

“What’s not going to work?”

“You’re trying to bait me. You’re trying to make me think I killed an innocent man.”

“Hang on a second,” Tate says, and then there is a rustling sound and Schroder can picture the phone being dropped into a pocket, more voices, more footsteps, and then a closing door and silence. “I’m not trying to make you think anything.”

“Bullshit.”

“It’s true. And the other thing that’s true is Ron McDonald is an innocent man. You killed a good guy, Carl. You killed somebody who never harmed anybody, and tonight I’m going to prove it.”

“You’re lying.”

“I’m not.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“You will. This time tomorrow you will.”

Tate hangs up. Schroder is left staring at his phone. His hand is shaking. He feels . . . emotional. He slips the phone into his pocket then looks up at Warren. “He’s lying to me.”

Maybe you’re lying to yourself.

“Goddamn you, Warren,” he says, and he takes his shoe off, reaches up, and splatters Warren into the shape of a fur ball. “Goddamn you for never being on my side,” he says, and he hits him again, then again, and then again for good measure. Then he turns and throws his shoe at the couch. “Goddamn all of you.”

CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

I get off the phone. It feels good to have rattled Schroder. I get back out into the corridor. Reporters are still making their way to the stairwell and to the elevators. I find Kent in the task-force room on the fourth floor. A three-foot-square whiteboard has been put up in the corner and a grid drawn over it. In each square is a number.

“It’s a pool,” Kent says, “for tonight. I have twelve thirty.” I realize then that the numbers are times, and that they are spaced ten minutes apart. Like she said, Kent has written her name in the twelve thirty slot. “It’s for when Chris Watkins is going to show up tonight.”

Most of the spaces are still free, meaning the grid has just been drawn, and what names are up there are between eleven and one.

“How much?” I ask.

“Ten bucks,” she says, and points towards a container.

“And if he doesn’t show up?”

“Then it’s refunds all around.”

I drop ten bucks into the container, then pick up the felt by the whiteboard and write my name in the two o’clock slot.

“You really think it’ll be that late?” she asks.

“I have no idea, but two a.m. is as good a guess as any.”

“I’ve heard phone calls are already coming in about the car. Lots of people seem to have seen it, or know somebody who owns one. We’re probably going to be inundated with calls. The psychics are starting to call too.”

I look at my watch. “It’s only been ten minutes,” I tell her.

“Yeah, but the psychics have known for fifteen.”

“How we getting on with the guys canvassing the tire stores?”

“It’s going to be a big job,” she says. “It’s not just tire shops—plenty of service stations change them too. Could take a week.”

The tires are a worry. Could be later today they find a tire-store operator who remembers the car and the bald guy. Could be later today or tomorrow or next week, but it will happen. Could be they have surveillance, or that Schroder paid by credit card. Then what? Well then we have to bring him in for questioning. Then he tells us what he’s been up to, and what I’ve been up to too. Then it’s holding cells, prison cells, court, more prison cells, and the hangman’s noose. Or lethal injection. Or whatever in the hell it’s going to be—maybe that’ll be decided by referendum too.

I can feel the net tightening around me.

“Are you okay, Theo?”

“Yeah. Just thinking.”

“About?”

“About how good it’s going to feel when we arrest Chris Watkins tonight.”

“And until then? What’s the plan?”

Well, the plan is to solve nothing. The plan is to keep pushing the investigation in a different direction, only that’s impossible now. I can’t stop the police from going from tire shop to tire shop. I can’t say I’ll help out and go from tire shop to tire shop too in the hope that I’ll find the right one and can cover it up. I can’t stop the list of Honda Accords being cross-referenced and, in a few days’ time—or a week, or however long it takes to run through thousands of names—stop Schroder’s name from coming up.

“Let’s go check in with the medical examiner,” I tell her.

We drive to the hospital together, and like always Kent drives. It’s getting close to the middle of the afternoon and the sun is peaking and the temperature is peaking and I can’t imagine having to wear a jacket again until next year. We park in the same spot as Saturday and sign in with the same security guard and take the same elevator down into the basement where the same shiny tools are lined up and a different selection of dead bodies are lined up
too. Quite a few dead bodies. Including Wilson Hutton, who has a sheet covering his body right up to his neck. We walk over to him just as Tracey is coming out of her office.

“I’m really sorry for your loss,” she says. “Hutton was a good man.”

“What was wrong with him?” I ask.

“I don’t know all the answers yet,” she says, “but combining diet pills with way too much exercise when you were as big as him, well, it’s not a good combination. I think his heart just gave out. Would you like a minute with him?”

“Sure.”

She walks over to some blackened people that don’t even look like people, but look like something that crash-landed from Mars and was thrown on the barbecue. We stay with Hutton for two more minutes, and Hutton reminds us how life can be so fickle, and we remind Hutton that we’re going to miss him, and then we promise him we’ll look after his city. My phone vibrates a few times and I keep ignoring it, hoping that it’s not Schroder telling me he’s chosen his next victim.

Then Tracey goes over her findings with us.

“It’s grisly stuff,” she says, then starts pointing to wounds that we can’t see because of the amount of flesh that’s burned away. The two bodies that were trapped under the car are in the best condition, but that’s a comparative statement, like choosing to eat a really rotten tomato because it’s in better condition than the one riddled with maggots.

Four victims. Bevin Collard. Taylor Collard. Matthew Roddick. Robin Walsh. All four men were shot in the head, but all four men were dead by that point anyway. Walsh had his Achilles tendon sliced open and was clubbed in the head before being shot. Roddick was shot in the throat, that bullet wasn’t recovered because it was a through and through. The bullet to the head was a different story, and was recovered. His leg was also gashed open. Taylor Collard had his face opened up and the skull beneath it cracked open by a roof tile. And his brother, Bevin, was shot in the chest and the
head, and had broken wrists, one broken arm, a broken collarbone, and a broken neck.

“Most likely from a fall,” Tracey says, “and most likely from upstairs to downstairs. Also, the brothers have nineteen broken ribs between them. My guess is they were used as a ramp to get the car up to the doorway. I don’t know what in the hell happened out there,” she says, “but it sure as hell wasn’t pretty. These men really pissed off the wrong person.”

“Any of them suffering from a dog bite?” Kent asks.

“Not that I’ve seen,” Tracey sees, “but it’s possible. The fire created a lot of damage, so there could be dog bites there, but I can’t see them because the flesh has burned away. I heard about the dog and the DNA that was found. I’ve sent DNA to the lab from our victims here, so you’ll know if there’s a match soon enough.”

“And Peter Crowley?” Kent asks. “What happened to him?”

“Peter died of blunt force trauma. Three blows to the head. I found green glass in the wound. I’ve sent it to forensics, but my guess is it’s from a beer bottle. The bottle stood up to the first two blows, but shattered on the third. The brain started to bleed, it swelled up, and he probably lived ten or fifteen minutes before dying. He probably wouldn’t even have been able to tell you his name at that point.”

“Are there any crime-scene photos here?” Kent asks.

“Some,” Tracey says.

“You get the ones we took of the position of his body?”

“They’re here.”

“Can I see them?”

Tracey disappears into her office.

“What are you thinking?” I ask.

“Peter wasn’t supposed to die, right?”

“Right.”

“Then you’ll see in a moment.”

Tracey comes back. She’s holding a folder with the photographs of each of the bodies as they were found before being removed, and
also the photos we took of Crowley. Kent twists the photographs of Crowley a little as if she can change the angle it was taken from. She looks at it for a good twenty seconds before handing it to me. “Look,” she says. “You notice what isn’t there?”

I take a look at the photograph, and the answer that pops into my mind is
Schroder,
but the answer I give is, “What?”

“Glass,” she says. “He was hit with the bottle elsewhere, and dragged there. My guess is Peter was killed inside, and was dragged outside.”

“Because the killer felt sorry about it,” I say. “He was trying to help Peter, and he didn’t want the guy getting all burned up.”

“Exactly,” Kent says.

“I know where you’re going with this,” Tracey says, “but between then and now he’s been moved and touched and autopsied, and do you know how hard it is to get fingerprints off skin anyway?”

“Really hard,” Kent says, “but sometimes it’s possible. If our killer picked him up, there may be something.”

“Or maybe he picked him up under the armpits and only touched his clothes,” I say.

“True, but look at this,” she says, then points at the photographs again. “Peter’s eyes are closed. Maybe our bald guy didn’t just drag him out before setting the building on fire, but maybe he used his fingers to close the dead man’s eyes. Seems maybe the kind of thing he would do, especially if he never intended Peter to be hurt. I say we fingerprint the body, and I say we start with the eyes.”

“I wish you’d thought of this yesterday,” Tracey says.

“So do I. But it’s possible, right?”

“Possible? Why don’t you ask your best fingerprinting guy what he thinks, and he’ll tell you that you’d be lucky to get even close to possible. Still, it’s worth a shot,” she says, and I feel the net tighten a little bit more.