Authors: Michael Koryta
"Dude
can shred a guitar," the kid behind the counter informed us from behind
his protective layer of piercings. "I mean just melt the amp, really. But
he won't play with anybody else now. Only solo. Calls himself El Caballo
Loco."
He
paused, waiting for a reaction, and then said, "It means the crazy horse.
Badass, right—"
Badass,
we agreed. Now where can we find him—
"He's
a stone carver, man. Works with a guy named Ben down on Forty-eighth. Does all
sorts of cool shit. You should see some of the gravestones."
"Gravestones—"
"Yeah,
awesome, right— Like I said, he's pretty badass."
He
didn't have an address for the carving shop, but he gave us a close enough
description. Ken and I didn't speak until we were back in my truck.
"So
he carves the gravestones," Ken said, "and Harrison keeps them clean—
That's the idea— A pair of murderers making a living in the cemetery business—
"Steady
work," I said. "They're never going to run out of clients. Hell,
they've helped produce some."
The
carving shop—Strawn Stoneworks—occupied the bottom floor of a three-story brick
building near the old stockyard district. Nobody answered our knock, but there
were lights on in the back, and the door was unlocked. We went in.
The
front of the room was scattered with samples of carvings laid out on old wooden
tables—a fireplace mantel, a small gargoyle, and a handful of headstones. There
was a narrow corridor separating this room from the next, and at the opposite
end fluorescent lights glowed and a steady tapping sound could be heard. Metal
on stone.
I led
the way down the hall, and we came out in a workshop that smelled of sweat and
dust. There were pieces of stone on the floor and on heavy-duty steel shelves,
and tools littered the rest of the space—grinders and hammers and racks of
chisels, an air compressor with hoses draped around it. A man was working with
his back to us, chipping away at a piece of marble with a hammer and chisel. I
was just opening my mouth to speak when he turned and said, "The hell you
think you're doing—"
He
was of average height, wiry in a hard way, with gray hair and a goatee. He wore
an earring, and there were thin lines of sweat snaking down his forehead.
"Hey,
sorry, there wasn't anybody out front," I said.
"Strawn
left for a while. Said he was getting lunch, but he's probably buying comic
books. That's what he does at lunch." He wiped sweat away with the back of
his hand. "Anyhow, he's the owner; he's the one you talk to. Not me. And
nobody comes back into the workshop."
"We're
not looking for Strawn," I said. "We're looking for Mark
Ruzity."
He
didn't answer.
"Are
you—" I began, but then he cut me off.
"Maybe
I wasn't clear. Nobody comes into the workshop." He cocked his head and
stared us down, first me, then Ken. "Lot of tools back here. People wander
in, they could get hurt."
It
didn't feel like a public safety announcement.
"Mark,"
I said, "wouldn't it be easier to answer five minutes of questions—"
"Would
be
easiest
to throw your asses out. Nobody—"
"Comes
into the workshop. We get it. But if you throw us out now, we'll just have to
go back to your place on Denison and wait around. What's the point—"
His
eyes flickered and went dark when I said that. Didn't like it that we knew
where he lived.
"Okay,"
he said. "I can tell you what I've told every other cop: I'm clean.
Haven't killed anyone in a while. If you're asking about something that went
down in the neighborhood, you're asking the wrong man. I'm not involved, and I
don't drop dimes."
"It's
not about the neighborhood," Ken said. "It's about Alexandra and
Joshua Cantrell."
Ruzity
seemed to draw in air without taking a breath. Just absorbed it, sucked it
right out of the dust-filled room until the walls felt tight around us. He
didn't speak, but he looked at Ken in a way that made me wish I were wearing a
gun. There were pneumatic hammers on a table beside him, but he was using hand
tools, a hammer in his right and a carbide chisel in his left. He turned the
chisel in his fingers now. It looked natural in his hand. Familiar.
"I
suspect the time has come," he said, "for us to share some names. You
already know mine. What are yours—"
We
told him. Names and occupation. He kept rotating the chisel. It had a flared
point, ridged with small, sharp teeth. Sweat had slipped behind his glasses and
found his eyes, and he blinked it away without dropping his stare.
"Private
investigators," he said. "Then police didn't send you. So who did—
Dunbar—"
I
could feel Ken's
who's Dunbar—
question on the way, could also feel the
price of it if he let it escape his lips, and rushed out my own response first.
"What's your problem with Dunbar—"
Mark
Ruzity switched his eyes to me. "My problem— The son of a bitch has spent
twelve years
harassing me and sending cops my way. You ask what my
problem
is—"
I shrugged,
and he narrowed his gaze. "Dunbar does his own hassling, though. FBI guys
don't hire anybody else to do it for them. So who the hell you working
for—"
"If
you don't mind," Ken said, "maybe you could answer a question or two
and then we will. You know, fair trade."
"Fair
trade—" He took a step closer and drew himself up to his full height, and
the muscles in his forearms stood out tight around the chisel and the hammer.
Then he paused, as if something had interrupted his forthcoming words, and
frowned at Ken.
"Merriman,"
he said. "That's your name—"
"Yes."
"You
came around a long time ago," he said. "Back at the start."
"You
wouldn't agree to see me," Ken said.
"No.
And I won't now. You were working for his parents." His frown deepened.
"What in the hell brings you back all these years later—"
"The
case remains unsolved, Mark."
"No
shit. You been working it for the whole time—"
"No.
I'm back because they found his body. It… stimulated my interest."
Ruzity
pulled his head back, stared down at Ken with his eyes thoughtful and his mouth
open, as if Ken had just told him a riddle and Ruzity wanted to be damn sure he
got the right answer.
"His
body," Ruzity said at length, "doesn't mean shit to me. Okay— Unless
you want me to carve his headstone, it doesn't mean shit to me. It shouldn't to
you, either."
"No—
Like I said, the crime remains—"
"Unsolved,"
he said. "Yeah, I got it. Maybe it's better that way, too."
"Think
you can explain that remark—" I said, and he ignored me, still focused on
Ken.
"His
parents hired you again when the body turned up— That's what you're telling
me—"
"No.
I'm not working for them anymore."
"Bullshit.
Or, wait—give a shit. As in: I don't. Who sent you here is irrelevant. What's
relevant is that you haul your asses out the door and go back to your clients
and tell them to stay the hell away from Mark Ruzity."
"Odd
response," I said, "coming from someone the Cantrells helped. I'd
think you would care about seeing Joshua's death and his wife's disappearance
resolved."
His
head swiveled to me, and I felt a cold tightness along my spine.
"You
think you know something about what the Cantrells did for me—" he said.
"You think you know a
damn
thing about that— Let me tell you what
they did—showed me that I'm the sort of man who needs his space. Why— To keep
from losing a temper that I don't have real good control over. I've controlled
it for a while now. Some years, in fact. But it's a daily chore, and it only
works when I keep my space, and other people keep theirs."
He
lifted the chisel, put the tip to my forehead, and then gave it a gentle tap
with the hammer. The tiny teeth bit into my skin. Enough that I felt it, but
not enough to draw blood. Ken shifted toward us, but Ruzity appeared
unconcerned with him.
"Right
now—" he said. "You're in my space, brother."
He'd
lowered the hammer but was still holding the chisel against my forehead. Now he
leaned close, so close that his goatee brushed my jaw, and spoke into my ear.
"You
want to know what Alexandra Cantrell did for me—" he said. "She
taught me how to keep myself from putting that chisel through your brain."
He
popped the chisel free, and I could feel the imprint of the teeth lingering in
my skin.
"The
door is where you left it," he said. "Turn your asses around and find
it again."
Rehabilitated—"
Ken said as we walked to my truck. "Really—"
"Clean
since the day he stepped out of prison, is what you said."
"It's
the truth. But the man seems to have an edge, doesn't he—"
"An
edge," I said. "Yeah. That's the word."
"He's
the only guy Harrison singled out, the only person he told us not to talk to. I
wonder what he—"
"I'll
tell you what we need to be wondering about right now: Dunbar. That's the name.
You didn't mention him to me before. Have you heard the name—"
"No."
"Ruzity
said he was FBI."
"As
far as I know, the FBI had nothing to do with the case."
"They
shouldn't have," I said, "but evidently they did."
"Think
we should track him down—"
"Until
I hear otherwise from Graham, yeah. And guess what— Graham still hasn't
called."
John
Dunbar had retired from the Bureau four years earlier, but fortunately for us
he hadn't left the Cleveland area. He was living in Sheffield Lake, a small
town west of the city and directly on the shore of Lake Erie. I didn't know the
place well, but I'd been there several times, always to a bar called Risko's
Tavern. My father had been close with the guy who'd owned the place when I was
a kid, and he used to make the drive out there on the weekend to sip a few
beers, talk, and watch the water. Every now and then they'd have a clambake or
a cookout outside, and he'd take me along. All I remembered of the place from
those early visits was that they'd had a piranha tank inside and that my father
always seemed to be in a hell of a good mood when he was there. The bar had
changed hands since then, but I still stopped in occasionally to sit with a few
drinks and some memories.
The
waterfront property in the town had gone through a dramatic transformation in
recent years, rich people buying up the old cottages that had lined the shore
and tearing them down, building ostentatious temples of wealth in their place.
When we got out there and I realized from the addresses that Dunbar's property
would be on the north side of Lake Road, right on the water, my first thought
was one of suspicion—these places were going for several million, so how in the
hell did a retired FBI agent afford one— Cop on the take—
Then
we found his house and that suspicion faded. It was wedged between two brick
behemoths but didn't fit the mold. A simple home, white siding with blue trim,
it had just enough room across the front for a door and two square windows on
either side. To say the place was tiny didn't do it justice—beside those
sprawling homes, it looked like something made by Lionel.
What
the house lacked in size, it made up for in location, though. The perfectly
trimmed lawn ran all the way down to a stone retaining wall at the lakeshore's
edge, and beyond it the tossing, petulant gray water spread as far as you could
see. There were some beautiful trees in the front yard, with flowers planted
around their bases, but the backyard had been wisely kept free of visual
obstructions, letting the lake stand out in all its power. The house was as
well cared for as the lawn. When we pulled to a stop behind the carport—there
was a Honda Civic parked inside—I could see that all the blue trim was fresh,
and the roof looked new.