So sure of death (28 page)

“Did you meet his sister, too?

“Yeah. He introduced me once. A pause. “She was a cheerleader, traveled with the team.

“Pretty?

“Yeah.

The 737 touched down just inside the markers in a runway paint job, the engines roaring immediately into reverse so they wouldn't miss the first taxiway. Hot dog, Wy thought. Definitely the sound of someone not flying their own plane.

“Liam says they're dead. He looked at her.

Wy finished with the rag and turned to pitch it, accurately, in the wastebasket just inside the door of the shed. “Yeah. She turned back. “When did you talk to Liam?

“This morning. I went over to the post. When you left to take the mail to Manokotak.

Bless the U.S. Postal Service, Wy thought automatically. A mail contract was the difference between red and black on the bottom line to a Bush air taxi. “Oh.

“You didn't say I couldn't.

“No, she agreed. Did he ask about me? she wanted to say, but managed to refrain from anything that sophomoric.

“So they're dead, he repeated.

“Yeah. Her hand settled on his shoulder and squeezed, as the 737 popped its hatch and let down its rear air stair.

“It'sit'sitstinks, he said, and his eyes when he raised them were dark and wounded.

“It stinks to high heaven, Wy agreed. “Tim. Did you ever meet the rest of Mike's family? His mom? His dad?

Tim shook his head. “No. Just Mike. He hesitated.

“What?

He colored, and looked at his shoes. “One time, it was like the first time we played the Wolverines, I remember Mike got benched for fighting.

“What about?

His color deepened and he wouldn't look up. “Somebody'd said something about his mother.

“What?

He said gruffly, “Said she slept around on Mike's dad. Called her a whore. So Mike beat him up, and the coach benched him. He added wistfully, “That was the only time all year we beat them.

“Who said that? Who did Mike beat up?

“Arne. Arne Swensen. He plays guard, too. He's a senior this year, so he'll probably start even if he doesn't deserve to. He looked up. “That stinks, too.

Wy smiled and ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah.

He pulled back and anxiously patted his glossy black locks back into their previous perfect order. The last person off the 737 was a big, bulky man wearing a parka and mukluks. In July. “Tourist, he said.

“And how.

“Mom?

He'd called her Mom from the first day she brought him home from the hospital, a direct and determined repudiation of his birth mother. Now that he felt more secure, he used Mom and Wy interchangeably. She did notice that when he was particularly bothered about something, he usually called her Mom. She steeled herself. “What?

He fidgeted. “They weren'tthey didn'tKerry and Mike . . . nobody, well, hurt them, did they?

It only took Wy a second to understand. Tim had grown up among a succession of people who had regarded his body as their personal punching bag. “No, Wy said.

“Are you sure?

“Yes, Wy said. “I'm sure.

She wasn't, of course, she knew nothing about the condition in which the bodies had been found, but she was willing to lie herself blue in the face before she contributed one more scene to Tim's recurring nightmares. Imagining how Mike, a boy he'd admired, and Kerry, a girl he might have had a secret crush on, had been tortured before being killed was not going to lessen their frequency or ease their intensity.

The 737 started loading passengers for the return trip to Anchorage. First on board was a skinny little blond kid in a blue nylon jacket, jeans and sneakers, clutching a silver briefcase almost as big as he was. He looked purposeful, on a mission. Wy wondered what was in the suitcase.

A shout distracted her attention, and she looked around to see Professor Desmond X. McLynn bearing down on them. “I'm outta here, Tim muttered, and he grabbed his bike and shot off. Wy didn't blame him.

“What can I do for you, Mr. McLynn? Wy said as the professor came trotting up.

“Do? You can fly me out to my dig, is what you can do. Where have you been all day? I was here at nine o'clock and you were gone! You've contracted to be my air support for the summer, and then you disappear when I need to fly! Give me one good reason why I shouldn't hire another pilot!

Wy, one of the more reliable pilots on the Bay, bit back an invitationfor Professor Desmond X. McLynn to do just that, didn't say that she'd contracted to fly him in and out once a week, not twice, and plastered a smile on her face. “I do have other contracts to fulfill besides yours, Professor McLynn, butshe overrode his protest“I'm here now. We can be in the air in ten minutes.

McLynn blustered for a few moments before giving in. They were in the air in the promised ten minutes. It was their fastest flight to the dig yet. “Are we back on a normal schedule? Wy said, when she had him and his gear on the ground.

“What? Yes, yes, pick me up Friday evening.

“Certainly, sir, Wy said to his retreating back. She was in the air before he reached the work tent. She left his gear where it was.

Some jobs didn't pay enough. Some jobs wouldn't pay enough if you were making a thousand dollars an hour. Still, a job was a job, a paycheck was a paycheck and a lawyer's fee was most definitely a lawyer's fee. Wy brought the Cub around and headed back to Newenham.

Liam went back to the post to find Prince had left a note, saying she'd gone to lunch and that she'd be back in time to sit in on the interrogations. So they were interrogating suspects this afternoon, were they? Liam picked up the phone and dialed his father's number in Florida. It rang five times and he was just about to give up when someone picked up. It was a woman's voice, very young and breathy, which made “Hurlburt Field Strategic Operations School sound like phone sex. “Hi, I'm Liam Campbell, Colonel Campbell's son, he said. “Is my father in?

There was a brief silence, and the voice said brightly, “I'm sorry, Mr. Campbell, but Colonel Campbell has been reassigned.

Has he indeed? Liam thought. “Could you tell me where?

“I'm sorry, sir, I'm not allowed to give out that information.

“Oh. Liam waited for a moment, letting the silence gather. “I really need to talk to him about some family businesswhat was your name again? Valerie? That's a pretty name. Are you single, Valerie?

Valerie giggled. “You're not very subtle, are you, Mr. Campbell?

“I don't play hard to get, he purred, shamelessly dropping his voice down into its best lower register, sexy-guy-picking-you-upina-bar accents.

She giggled again, sounding very young. “I don't know . . .

“I'm his only son, Valerie, and it really is important that I reach him soon. Kind of a family emergency. Just a phone number. I won't even say I got it from you.

He hung up a minute or two later. Definitely a threat to national security there, he thought, dialing the number he'd scribbled on his desk calendar. This time he was unlucky; an answering machine picked up. The message on it was illuminating, though.

At three o'clock he was back at the jail. He showed Mamie the warrants Bill had sworn out, and she copied them and filed them away. “There's an interview room in the back, she told them.

There was: four walls, a barred window, a table and four chairs, so tiny there was barely enough room to inhale. Liam reached through the bars and opened the window. A raven's croak was the first sound he heard, and he craned his head for a look. Nothing. Big black bastard ought to mind his own business.

He caught himself. There was a word for that, anthropomorphizing, the assigning of human feelings to plants, animals and inanimate objects. Like giving your car a name and begging it not to stall out at a red light in February. Like telling the Chugach Mountains they looked beautiful all dressed up in alpenglow. Like talking back to a raven.

Newenham wasn't just hard on his uniforms, it was hard on his sanity. There was a reason the inhabitants referred to it as Disneyham, strictly among themselves, of course.

He turned and sat at the table, Prince on his right with a lined pad and a pencil, Frank Petla across from him. Frank was sucking on a Dr Pepper. “Can't you guys get me a cigarette, man? I mean, one lousy smoke?

“Secondary smoke, it's a killer, Frank, Liam said, and started the handheld recorder. He gave the date, the time, said who was in the room and then set the recorder to one side. Frank Petla looked at it with the eyes of a rabbit caught in the headlights of an oncoming car. “You've waived your right to an attorney, Frank, is that right?

Frank nodded.

“Say so for the recorder, please.

“Yeah.

“You're sure about this? Yesterday afternoon you said you wanted a lawyer.

“I'm sure. Don't need no damn lawyer.

“All right. You want to tell us what happened out at the dig yesterday?

What had happened out at the dig yesterday was that Frank Petla, a completely innocent man, had been out for a peaceful ride on his four-wheeler on a sunny summer day, when he had accidentally driven his four-wheeler into this hole in the ground. In the hole in the ground were a bunch of things that Frank, a completely innocent man and an Alaska Native, instantly recognized as family heirlooms. He had collected them in a bag, as any completely innocent man, Alaska Native and traditional tribal member would do, to return them to their rightful owners, his village elders.

“That's what you were going to do, Frank? Liam said. “ Return them to your village?

Frank had been, and he was indignant at the suggestion that he might have been going to sell them. He strenuously denied ever having been to the dig prior to yesterday, and when commanded to look at Prince and try to remember the last time he, Frank, had seen her, hazarded a guess that it might have been last October at AFN. “Didn't we dance at the Snow Ball? He hadn't hit anybody, he hadn't shot anybody and he most certainly hadn't stabbed anybody with anything, least of all with something that he, a completely innocent man, an Alaska Native, a traditional tribal member and a signatory to the AFN Sobriety Movement, recognized as a storyknife. “It's a girl thing, that storyknife, he said confidentially, as if it were a secret. “Only girls could play with them. They would take it down to the river-bank and draw pictures in the mud and tell stories to their brothers and sisters.

He was silent for a moment. Liam, watching him, saw a shadow pass over his face. “My sister storyknifed. He said a word in Yupik that sounded like yawning ruin. “That's Yupik for storyknife, did you know that?

“No, Liam said. “I didn't know that.

“She was beautiful, my sister, Frank Petla said, no bombast or bluster or wounded innocence now. “She had the longest hair that she would braid with beads. When she danced, she would toss it around like a cape. All the boys loved her.

“What happened to her?

“She died, Frank said, still in that quiet voice. “She drank too much, and she died.

There was a brief silence. In a gentle, unthreatening voice, Liam said, “Where were you this weekend, Frank?

It was a while before Frank came back from wherever he'd gone. “This weekend?

“The two days before yesterday, Prince said, and subsided when Liam touched her arm.

“Don Nelson was killed sometime between Friday night and Saturday night. If you didn't stab him, Liam said, the voice of sweet reason, “you obviously weren't at the dig. So where were you?

Frank stared at him in stupefied silence for a good minute and a half. “I don't . . . Fishing?

“Fishing where?

“On my boat.

“You have a boat?

“Yes. TheSarah P.

“Is it down at the harbor? Frank nodded. “What's the slip number? Frank told him. “Where were you fishing, Frank?

Frank thought. “On the river. Drifting. Off a creek.

The Nushagak River was hundreds of miles long, with on average one creek per ten feet. “Which creek?

“I dunno. Frank looked helpless.

“Was anyone fishing with you?

“No.

“Did you see any other boats?

“No. Frank's eyes slid sideways.

Aha, Liam thought. “Was this creek open to fishing, Frank?

Frank was indignant. “Of course! They could take my boat if I got caught fishing in a closed area!

They certainly could, Liam thought. He could ask Charlene which areas on the Nushagak had been open to fishing on Monday, but there might be an easier way. “Who did you deliver to, Frank?

“A fish buyer, Frank said promptly. “He was buying off the dock.

“Did you get a fish ticket?

Frank shook his head. “He bought with cash.

They left him in the interview room for a moment.

“Convenient how no one can confirm his story, Prince said, eyes bright. She smelled a conviction.

“Yeah, but he was drunk as a skunk when he ran into you.

“So?

“So, how did he pay for his booze?

“He bummed some off a friend, I don't know. Why do we care?

We don't, Liam thought, but Charlene will.

When they went back in, they found Frank trying to squeeze through the bars on the window. His head was too big, and he'd gotten stuck. They extricated him and returned him to his cell.

Walter Larsgaard was up next, and he was in the mood to talk. He sat down, folded his arms and waited until Liam started the recorder. He declined representation and said simply, “I killed them. I killed them all.

“You killed David Malone, Molly Malone, Jonathan Malone, Michael Malone, Kerry Malone, Jason Knudson and Wayne Cullen?

“Yes?

“How did you kill them?