Strike Dog (39 page)

“Don't be doin' that shit!” Tree said frantically. “Grady!”

Service put both of his hands back on the wound, wondered how far away EMS was, and knew it was not going to end well.

Tree pressed his fingers to her carotid and sat back. “She's gone, man.”

Service kept pressing against the wound.

Tree touched his friend's shoulder. “It's over, bro.”

Service let himself slump backward.

He heard sirens coming, but knew the old two-track in was tough, almost impassable.

Treebone looked at the dead woman. “You know her?”

“Feeb.”

Service felt for a pulse again, found none. How she had kept from bleeding out sooner he didn't know.

She had looked left. Now he looked that way and shone his light.

It was a plastic pocket protector. Was this all she had been pointing at? He looked in the direction her hand had pointed and started walking slowly.

There was a blood trail. She had been hit about thirty feet from where he'd found her, somehow staggered and crawled all that way. The attack had come in the rocks. Lots of blood, no prints. He went back to the body. Monica had still been trying to do her job to the very end. The thought choked him.

“She part of this?” Tree asked.

Grady Service didn't know.

Del Olmo led the ambulance in and stayed after they took Tatie Monica.

Just before 0630, Service called Eddie Waco. “Bring yours up to us. Tree's coming back to help.”

A half-hour later Eddie Waco and Tree arrived with a man in cuffs. He was thirtyish, with a hawk nose and an earring. He glanced at all the blood on the ground and looked puzzled. Service had never seen him before.

Eddie Waco took off his pack, opened it, and pulled out a small stainless-steel hatchet and a surgical kit, folded in a gray leather pouch. He looked at Service. “No ID.”

“Any trouble?”

“He was good, real quiet and sneaky. I got lucky.”

Service asked Waco, “You see a light flash?”

“Nope. You'n?”

“I thought I saw something.” He turned to Waco's prisoner. “You got a name?”

The man grinned, looked away.

“What have we got?” Waco asked.

Service took a cigarette, held out the pack to his partners. “I'll be damned if I know.”

Elza Grinda drove in to join del Olmo, and the two of them took the prisoner out to Iron County deputies on Deerfoot Lodge Road, who transported him to the county jail in Crystal Falls. Service, Tree, and Eddie Waco dumped their gear in the Tahoe and spent some time examining the area where Service thought he'd seen the flash of light. In such rocky terrain, footprints were out of the question. “Bring a dawg in?” Waco asked.

“I don't know. Did your guy act like he knew what he was doing?”

“Yessir. This case sure hain't bin easy,” Eddie Waco said.

Grady Service agreed. He stared at the pocket protector. It looked the same as the one Bonaparte carried. Had Bonaparte and Tatie Monica come out here together, and if so, where was Bonaparte now? There had to be an explanation, and in the back of his mind, where unthinkable thoughts lived, he had an almost overpowering feeling that something else had happened last night, something he had missed. Again.

53

CRYSTAL FALLS, MICHIGAN
AUGUST 8, 2004

Service drove them back to Crystal Falls in silence, feeling anxious and not wanting to talk. Had they solved the case or not? Waco's prisoner had the killing tools that fit, but something else had gone down. Special Agent Tatie Monica was dead, and there was no explanation yet for anything that had happened last night.

Wink Rector greeted them in the parking lot behind the jail. “I saw the prisoner they brought in. Have you seen Monica? I told her yesterday she was acting stupidly, but she wouldn't listen to me.”

Service was surprised. “You
knew
she was coming after us?”

“She had your AVL,” Rector said. “She wouldn't listen to reason.”

“Our AVL,” Grady Service repeated. He'd been right about that. Sort of. Why did Tatie Monica have the AVL, and what did it mean?

Service looked at Wink Rector. “Special Agent Monica is dead, Wink.”

Del Olmo showed up, handed Service a fax of the photo from the captain. It could be the guy Waco got, but the quality of the fax was poor.

“Federal forces are en route,” Rector said in a thin voice. “If you're going to talk to the prisoner alone, you'd better use what little time you've got.”

Service met him in a small interview room with cream-colored walls. “Rud Hud?”

The man shrugged.

Service understood that this was very likely the man who was responsible for the deaths of Walter and Nantz. He was overwhelmed by the temptation to grab the man's throat and choke him to death on the spot, but he heard Nantz's voice telling him to keep his temper in check. He felt that he ­couldn't breathe and went back outside to Wink Rector.

“She had our AVL?”

“Yep, told me about it yesterday.”

“How'd she get it?”

“She didn't say.”

“Did you see an agent named Bonaparte in Marquette recently?”

“Yeah, the BAU guy. He was here yesterday. He and Tatie met in my office.”

“With you?”

“Just the two of them.”

“What about Pappas?”

“Haven't seen her.”

“You know where Bonaparte is now?”

Rector shook his head.

Del Olmo approached. “Her vehicle was out near the Deerfoot.”

“She walked all the way in there on her own, and without NVDs?” She
had
been desperate, and now she was dead, and he felt empty and deflated.

54

MARQUETTE, MICHIGAN
AUGUST 14, 2004

The events on the island in the Fence River had taken place a week ago.

Alona Pappas had cornered him at the jail in Marquette and ripped on him for five minutes, accusing him of everything from blowing the case to causing Tatie Monica's death. He found it interesting that Bonaparte had been in Marquette the day before it all went down, and had not been seen since.

Wink Rector came into Service's office. “You hear Bonaparte's missing?”

“Missing?”

“No contact with anyone since before the island deal went down.”

“What's the Bureau's take on it?”

“A BOLO will be issued today in conjunction with a press conference this morning in Washington.”

The captain and Fern LeBlanc joined them in the office conference room to watch the press conference on CNN. The FBI director was not at the conference and an assistant director officiated. The conference was short. No media questions were answered though the reporters waved their hands and pens and created a ruckus. The basic news was that the acting assistant director of the Behavioral Analysis Unit had been missing for a week. Bonaparte's photograph was shown. The assistant director profiled Bonaparte's career, called him a “founding father” of profiling, and concluded by saying that Bonaparte had been actively pursuing an investigation when he disappeared.

Service looked at his captain. “Why'd they do that?”

Captain Grant waved a hand in the air. “When you can't score on substance, you go for style points,” Grant said. “You ought to be aware that the Bureau is making noise about the unauthorized use of animal tranquilizers in the apprehension.”

“They ought to be focused on identifying the asshole we got, not how.”

So far the man remained unidentified and uncooperative. He had not said a dozen words since his arrest. He had not requested a lawyer, but one had been appointed, and he promptly resigned after time with his client. A second lawyer was now on the case and claimed he wasn't getting anything out of the man either and had no idea how to mount a defense.
Tough shit,
Service thought. Waco arrested him with the packet of tools. The guy was part of it, but not all of it. How did Bonaparte's pocket protector get on the scene? Had he walked in with Monica? Had he followed her or had she followed him? Service had given the pocket protector to Pappas as evidence, to pull fingerprints, and she had not said anything about it since then. Service knew in his gut there was more. The DNR's only source of information was from Wink Rector. Pappas and other FBI personnel had nothing to say. The fingerprints of the man in custody didn't come up in databases anywhere in the world. Neither had his DNA. He was about as close to a nonperson as Service had ever experienced.

Eddie Waco had gone back to Missouri with the plumed headdress Fiannula Spargo had given Service. Taking it back to her was a task Service wanted no part of.

Tree was still around, staying with him at the cabin.

The captain came to his office and seemed hesitant. “I don't know what the outcome of this case will be, but you, Tree, and Agent Waco did a fine job, Grady.”

As soon as he got into his truck, Service jimmied his false teeth loose and put them in a plastic container. He'd clean them when he got home. It felt good to have them out.

A mile from Slippery Creek, he saw a familiar truck parked on the side of the road. Limpy Allerdyce was sitting on the gate, swinging his legs like a kid. Service pulled up behind the old poacher and got out.

Allerdyce shoved a satchel off the gate. It plopped on the ground, raising dust. “Mutt brung dat stuff home, sonny.”

Service unzipped the bag and opened it. There was a stainless-steel hatchet and surgical kit inside, identical to the tools taken from the man on the island. There was also an FBI badge, ID card, and a night vision device. The photograph on the ID was that of Cranbrook P. Bonaparte.

Service looked up at Allerdyce. “The FBI is looking for this man.”

“Zat so?”

“Your dog found these things, all in a bag like this?”

“Just da way dey is right dere on da ground.”

“Must be one helluva strong dog to carry a bag like that.”

“Crazy mutt,” Allerdyce said.

Service groped for words, but Limpy spoke first. “We take care of our own, sonny.”

What the hell was Allerdyce saying?

“Your dog found this stuff?”

Allerdyce shrugged. “I jes noticed it and brung it, eh?'

“You're on damn thin ice,” Service said.

“Been out dere plenty times,” Allerdyce cackled.

“The FBI will want to talk to you.”

The old man winked. “I jes know what da mutt brung home.”

Service wanted to ask questions, but couldn't find a starting point. He found a stick, picked up the bag, started back to his truck, and stopped. “Your dog didn't happen to bring home a powerful light of some kind?”

“Youse make a mistake with light at night and youse can blind yoreseff wid one-a dem, eh?” Allerdyce said.

Service stared at the man, groping for what to say.

“Close yore mout', sonny, and put yore teets in whin youse're out in publics. Don't want ta scare da peoples, eh.”

55

MARQUETTE, MICHIGAN
AUGUST 23, 2004

The interview was being held at the federal offices on the second floor of the Republic Bank on US 41. Wink Rector invited Service to observe from behind one-way glass. Two days after giving Service the bag and implements, Limpy Allerdyce had surrendered without resistance, told only that the U.S. Attorney wanted to talk to him. Alona Pappas and an unnamed assistant director were with Rector.

Allerdyce sat in the interview room with his insipid grin and a twinkle in his eyes.

“They offer him a lawyer?” Service asked Rector.

“Repeatedly. Says he's not interested.”

Talia Rilling, assistant U.S. attorney for the Western District of Michigan, was less than two years on the job in the Marquette office, and being touted as a rising star. She wore oversize glasses that made her look both bland and studious, but Service saw that she was a handsome woman, small in stature. Her size made her look less than intimidating, but she moved with grace and confidence in the room. He wondered how she would handle Allerdyce.

The interview began, and Service found himself mesmerized by the exchanges. From the start it was clear that Rilling had never fenced verbally with the likes of Limpy before, and he knew from experience that there was nothing more difficult than dealing with someone with a steel-trap mind who acted like a fool and talked like a dolt.

 

rilling:
Mr. Allerdyce, you have been informed of the reasons for this interview. Let the record show that you have come in willingly, and further, that you also have refused legal representation.

allerdyce
:
Why I wanta lawyer? Youse want to talk about what dat mutt drug home, eh.

rilling:
Can you describe the circumstances under which your pet brought home the satchel?

allerdyce:
Ain't no pet! Just a mutt hangs around camp.

rilling:
The dog brought home a satchel.

allerdyce:
Name's Satchmutt, on account he gotta big black nose and howls like dat colored horn player died awhile back. Dat “Hello Molly” guy. I like dat music, eh.

rilling:
He's not a pet, but you named him Satchmutt?

allerdyce:
Youse
ain't nobody's pet, but youse got name, eh?

rilling:
Let's start again. The dog brought home a satchel.

allerdyce:
Dat's why we here, eh?

rilling:
What time of day did the dog bring home the satchel?

allerdyce:
I was asleep.

rilling:
So . . . this event transpired during the night.

allerdyce:
I go ta bed late, sleep late.

rilling:
What time did you discover the satchel?

allerdyce:
Was when I wokened up. Couldn't find it when I was asleep, eh.

rilling:
What time was that?

allerdyce:
I don't watch no clocks.

rilling:
Before noon, after noon?

allerdyce:
Yes.

rilling:
Yes to what—before or after?

allerdyce:
I said I don't watch no clocks.

rilling:
But you will agree it was around midday.

allerdyce:
Tink I said dat, din't I?

rilling:
All right, the dog brought the satchel to you around midday.

allerdyce:
No, I said I found it den; I don't know when da mutt brung it, and he din't bring it me. Just brung it, okay?

rilling:
Did you see the dog when you went to bed?

allerdyce:
Din't look for 'im.

rilling:
All right, please describe the circumstances under which you discovered the satchel.

allerdyce:
Joycie ridin' me, see, and she says, “Dat your bag over dere in da corner?”

rilling:
Joycie?

allerdyce:
She's up top, red in face, all discombobolinked, and she says, “Dat your bag over dere in da corner?”

rilling:
All right, Mr. Allerdyce. What did you do when
Joycie
pointed out the satchel?

allerdyce:
Holy Wah, I lay right dere till she got done. I'm a gentleman wit wimmens.

rilling:
And after she got . . . after that?

allerdyce:
Told her ta fetch cuppa coffee.

rilling:
What about the bag?

allerdyce:
Still sittin' where she seen it.

rilling:
Eventually you looked in the bag.

allerdyce:
Yeah, I looked.

rilling:
What was in it?

allerdyce:
Same was in it when I give it ta sonny-boy.

rilling:
That would be Department of Natural Resources Detective Grady Service?

allerdyce:
Yeah, sonny-boy.

rilling:
Did you see the dog bring the satchel in?

allerdyce:
Nope.

rilling:
So you don't
know
it was the dog that brought it in.

allerdyce:
Was him. Does dat sorta ting alla bloody time.

rilling:
But you didn't actually
see
the dog with the bag?

allerdyce:
I seen where da mutt chewed it.

rilling:
Yes or no—you saw the dog bring the bag in?

allerdyce:
No.

rilling:
Okay, thank you. Let's change directions. What did you think of what you found in the bag?

allerdyce:
I t'ought somebody be bloody pissed ta lose stuff like dat.

rilling:
Did you have any idea who might have owned the bag?

allerdyce:
Was ID inside.

rilling:
You assumed the person who owned the badge and ID owned the bag?

allerdyce:
You tink different?

rilling:
I'm interested in what
you
thought.

allerdyce:
I already said: I t'ought somebody be bloody pissed.

rilling:
Let's take a brief break. Would you like something to drink, Mr. Allerdyce?

allerdyce:
Tanks, I'm good—but youse go ahead. Youse look kinda sweaty, dere, girlie.

Rilling came out of the room, looked at Wink Rector, rolled her eyes, went to get a cup of water, talked briefly to Alona Pappas, and came back. “Service?”

“Yep.”

“You know Allerdyce pretty well?”

“Dealt with him a lot. Nobody
knows
him.”

“You see anything different in his demeanor today?”

“He's being more direct than normal.”

Rilling blinked. “You buy his story that a dog brought the bag home?”

“No,” Grady Service said.

“You know,” she said, “the way this looks, the bag was Bonaparte's, which leads us to speculate that he was one of the killers. Do you think Allerdyce did something to Bonaparte?”

“Absolutely.”

“Any reason why?”

“You'll have to ask him.”

“You want to join me inside?”

“Nope.”

“I insist,” she said, holding open the door.

Grady Service walked into the room and Allerdyce started chuckling. “Dey bringin' in a relief pitcher already?”

The interview resumed.

rilling:
You know Detective Service?

allerdyce:
Holy Wah, long time—his daddy too. Sonny dere busted me, sent me up seven year.

rilling:
Were you angry with him?

allerdyce:
Was me shot 'im—on accident. He'd be the one pissed.

service:
Can we get back to the satchel?

allerdyce:
Why I come in—ta help youse.

service:
Why'd you bring the bag to me?

allerdyce:
Youse're closest law ta camp, eh.

service:
When you gave me the bag, did you not say, “We take care of our own?”

allerdyce:
Dat's right, sonny.

service:
What did you mean by that?

allerdyce:
Youse find somepin' don't belong, youse take it to da law. Got a record like me, gotta be careful. Youse always saying, sonny, I screw up, you gonna send me back inside. I din't mess wit yer old man—I ain't messin' wit you.

service:
How do you account for your dog finding the bag?

allerdyce:
He got da dandy sniffer, eh.

service:
But you have no idea where he found it?

allerdyce:
Bloody mutt runs all over da place. Once found him down Iron County.

service:
Did the dog go down into Iron County often?

allerdyce:
He don't leave one of dem whatchacallits.

service:
Itineraries?

allerdyce:
Yeah.

service:
Have you been in Iron County recently?

allerdyce:
I move around, eh.

service:
Yes or no?

allerdyce:
Mebbe. I don't pay no attention ta county lines.

service:
Did you ever meet the man whose ID was in the satchel?

allerdyce:
No.

service:
How do you think someone could lose a bag with such valuable contents?

allerdyce:
You know peoples lose stuff alla time in woods.

service:
Do you think your dog could take you back to where it found the bag?

allerdyce:
Dat sorry mutt? He ain't 'roun' no more.

service:
The dog ran off again?

allerdyce:
Nipped one-a da grankittles, had to shoot 'im. Can't have no nippin' dog roun' my grankittles.

service:
The dog is dead, and you're saying we'll never find the place where the bag was found?

allerdyce:
I won't say never.

rilling:
Would you willingly take a lie detector test, Mr. Allerdyce?

allerdyce:
Youse ast me, I'll take 'er.

Grady Service nudged the U.S. attorney, who followed him into the hall.

“You're wasting your time, and mine,” he said.

“Wouldn't hurt to give him the test,” Rilling said.

“He'll pass.”

“Then we'll know he's telling the truth.”

“If you hook him up to the machine and ask him if Mother Teresa gave him a blow job last night, he'll say yes, and the machine will indicate he's telling the truth.”

“Sociopath?” she countered.

“Total.”

“Do you think he has something to do with Bonaparte's disappearance?”

“What I think and what I can prove are two different things.”

“Why do you think he brought you the bag?”

“To let me know Bonaparte had been taken care of.”

“Why?”

“He's a strange old bird with his own twisted sense of justice.”

“I'm going to call this off,” Rilling said.

When Allerdyce came out of the room, Service walked downstairs with the old poacher and followed him. “Between us, do you know what happened to Bonaparte?”

“Sounds like he lost 'is bag, den himseff.”

“That's all you have to say?”

“Youse know what da wolfie haters say?”

“Shoot, shovel, and shut up.”

“Dat's all I got ta say ta youse, sonny. I'm real sorry about yer gal and yer kittle.”

Service wasn't finished, and followed the old man to his truck. “Between us and off the record.”

Allerdyce stopped and turned to face him. “Listenin', sonny boy.”

“You were out there.”

Allerdyce gave a single nod. “Heard your truck was up dat way.”

“Bullshit. Heard from who?”

“Youse know I got my ways.”

“You were out there.”

“Seen your fire on da island. Real good fishin', dat spot.”

“That's all you saw.”

“Seen da woman come. Walked in dere, and she look scared shitless, eh.”

“And?”

“She start downriver.”

“She didn't make it.”

“Fella wit a mask like black hornet slash't her t'roat.”

“That's when you stepped in. You shined a flashlight into his goggles.”

“Ain't sayin', but he had one-a dem funny computers in his jeep. Youse know, like youse use.”

“His jeep?”

“Parked up Sumac Camp.”

The camp was two miles west, isolated, difficult to get into.