Breaking Point (20 page)

             
As I'd walked, the gully had become increasingly wider, so that by the time I neared the bottom of the woods, I was standing in a dry creek bed that went underground at the end of the trees and continued under the highway. The highway itself was barely visible through the blowing snow and seemed about two hundred feet away from the edge of the forest. Farther down the road, I could make out the haze of red and white flashing lights on several emergency vehicles. The snow had piled up during my walk and now several inches lay along the side of the road. If my inner compass was right, the lights were located right about where we'd turned off the highway onto Upper Bridal Road. Stepping onto the berm of the highway, I limped off toward the lights.

             
As I got closer, I heard the sound of a vehicle coming down out of the woods on Upper Bridal Road. If it was Woody, he'd learned to hot wire a car somewhere, which wasn't totally out of the realm of possibilities. It sounded more like a truck, though. The driver must have seen the flashing lights, because the truck stopped and with a grinding of gears, sounded like it was now backing up the dirt road. The whine of the reverse gear was shrill in the cold night air. Closer now, I heard men's voices shouting and doors slamming. Two cars sped up the dirt road, wheels spinning as they hit the icy surface and snow covered leaves. One of the cars had a sheriff's logo on the passenger door, while the second car racing after the truck bore the three oak tree emblem of the Oak Grove Police Department.

             
The third official car had pulled closer to the entrance of Upper Bridal Road and was parked there, blocking the way. Two state troopers stood behind the open doors of the vehicle. The last car, parked closer to the highway, looked suspiciously like the one that Melanie Goodwin had driven to my house from the airport. She was standing beside it, arms folded, watching the action. I walked over and tapped her on the arm.

             
She jumped. "You scared the hell out of me. Where's Woody?"

             
"He must be still up there with my car, probably waiting for me." I grabbed her elbow and turned her to face me. "How did you get here?"

             
"I was listening to the scanner and I heard a cop from Oak Grove call for assistance and he mentioned a detective and another guy and I knew it was you and Woody." She couldn't seem to get the words out fast enough. "Is it true? Is my uncle a drug dealer? Oh, my God, I can't believe this."

             
Before I could answer the obvious, three gunshots cracked in the night. We both turned, and in an instant, Melanie was running toward the state police car, screaming. "Oh my God, Woody, Woody." One of the troopers grabbed her arm and swung her around. I hobbled over and introduced myself to them. They hadn't seen me come out of the woods, so I filled them in on what had happened at the cabin and what I'd seen. Melanie seemed to be in shock and the officer sat her in the back seat of the cruiser.

             
In a moment, the radio came on in the car and we heard that they'd captured all three men. Two had been pinned down in the truck by Bill and his posse, and the one who'd gotten out and tried to scramble back up the road had been tackled and dragged down by Woody. He soon appeared, none the worse for wear, but Melanie jumped out of the cruiser and clung to him like he'd been lost in an avalanche. The gray bearded man I'd seen through the cabin window was being walked toward us, his hands cuffed behind him. One of the sheriff's deputies had a grip on one elbow and stopped him near the trooper's cruiser. While the deputy opened the back door, Frank turned to look at our little group. His eyes seemed to linger on Melanie's for a split second, and she stared back, but neither spoke a word. Turning to me he leaned and spat on the snow at my feet. "You looked better," he said, "with your face on the ground and my boot in your ribs."

             
I smiled. "You look pretty snappy yourself, Frank" I nodded toward his wrists, "Nice bracelets. You smell good, too. What's that cologne, Litter Box Magic?" Turning my back, I hobbled away as the deputy helped him into the back of the state police car.

             
It was after eight o'clock before we'd cleared up most of the loose ends. Bill said we could stop in at the station on Saturday and fill in the rest of the blanks. My back needed some cold treatment, which was now plentiful in the form of snow. Melanie filled a couple of plastic evidence bags that Bill gave her with scoops of snow, and I sat in my car with the bags pressed against the small of my back. She and Woody talked awhile in her car before he came over and slid under the steering wheel.

             
"You OK, buddy?" he asked when we were turned around and headed north once more.

             
"Yeah, or at least I will be, with this snow pack. So what happened there, Wood? You called Bill, I take it?"

             
"Yep. On my own little cellular phone from inside the gas station. I copied his number from that paper in your wallet. Hope you didn't mind. I thought we might be biting off a big chunk here, just for the sake of a little pride."

             
I told him I didn't mind at all, and thanked him for saving both our butts. I guess I'd been a little touchy about that pride thing, especially after my emasculation at the hands of a small Catholic nun. I didn't mention that, though, and neither did Wood. It's one of the reasons I like him.

Chapter 22

              After a couple of anti-inflammatory pills and two muscle relaxants, I slept like a baby, straight through the night. Woody wakened me at ten on Saturday morning.

             
"Hey, Rude, wake up," he shook the covers over my right foot. "Look at the newspaper." He was holding a folded Iowa City Press Citizen and pushing it toward me. I rolled over and sat on the edge of the bed, noting only a minor complaint from my back and leg.

             
"Holy shit!" I whispered. "Iris Wilson's house was burned to the ground? What the hell's going on?" I read the entire article, but there wasn't a lot more to it. Late Friday night, the fire had been reported by a neighbor who had awakened to the smell of smoke. The small structure was already engulfed in flames by the time the firemen had arrived on the scene. No one had been home at the time of the blaze and it was under investigation by the state Fire Marshall. Earlier in the week, two men had been chased by a neighbor when they were seen near the house after dark. That was about it.

             
"It has to be the negatives,” I said. "Somebody broke in here looking for something after I took the case and started asking questions. The only other thing I've found was that meth, and unless Frank Goodwin was looking for those two crystals for some reason, it has to be the negatives that somebody wants, or wants destroyed. I really need to show the reprint to someone who can identify the people and see what the hell is so important about it."

             
When I was dressed, I had a couple of mugs of Woody's special coffee. It wasn't a particular blend of his, just the fact that he used double the amount of coffee that a mere mortal would. I'd always thought of it as more of a coffee concentrate. You could probably add a spoonful to a cup of hot water and arrive at regular strength coffee. After the two muscle relaxants I'd downed the night before, though, I needed a jump start, and the two mugs perked me right up.

             
Iris called while I was eating a second batch of the French toast that Wood had cooked. I forked a couple more sausages onto my plate and tried to chew quietly as I listened. The police hadn't known where she was, so she hadn't been notified about the fire. She and Gary had driven right up to it an hour or so ago and she was still bordering on hysteria. They were at the Iowa City Police Station. I couldn't tell her that the prowlers had been Woody and me, so I tried to assure her that the two incidents were probably just a coincidence and that the fire was most likely an accident. I didn't sound convincing to myself and Woody was across the table shaking his head, but it was the best I could do.

             
"I don't have a house or any of my furniture, my insurance papers or anything," she sobbed. "The only clothes I have are what I took with me over Thanksgiving. I just don't know what I'm going to do." She gave me Gary's phone number, then, and said she'd be staying with him for a while. I tried to calm her down as best I could and before she hung up, I told her I'd found the eight-by-ten photo that was missing from her in-laws' album. I described it to her and asked if she thought she could identify any of the five people in the picture with Charlie.

             
"No. I don't think I've ever seen any of the pictures in those old albums. Charlie was looking at them last Christmas, but that's the first time I ever saw him do that. I really wasn't very interested, I'm afraid. We were already having problems again by then and things were kind of tense between us."

             
"OK, then," I said. I must have sounded disappointed because she suddenly remembered what she'd told me a few days earlier.

             
"Rudy, I still want you just to drop the case. Please. I don't care what Charlie did behind my back or who else is in that stupid picture. I really want to put it all to rest. I'll get some money together and pay you as soon as I have it."

             
I said that would be fine and that she could just call me later. I hung up and finished my meal in silence.

             
"Doom and gloom, Rudy?"

             
"Well, Iris Wilson wants me to drop the case and she says she doesn't know or care who the people are in that photograph." I tossed my plate into the sink and ran some hot water over it. "Damn it. Wilson's parents never called me back. Now I'm going to have to fly out to California and go to their house." I stalked into the living room and slumped down on the couch, where Woody soon joined me.

             
"Hey, Rudy. You'll figure it out. Take it easy."

             
I took a deep breath and tried to relax. He was right. I always got pissed off when I didn't know what was going on and who all the players were. Probably being a private investigator wasn't the most relaxing career for me, where the whole point was that the detective had to figure things out. I said as much to him, but Woody was always positive in his take on things, including my career choice.

             
"Bullshit, Rude. You love it. I think Ira put some kind of a spell on you or something. I don't think you could quit if you wanted to." I didn't have any witty retort so Woody got the last word in that discussion.

             
The phone rang again. It was Tucker this time. I didn't recognize his voice, but I have only one nephew and he did call me Uncle Rudy.

             
"Hey, Tucker, what's up?"

             
"Well, I was wondering," he started and stopped. "I mean, I was thinking maybe I should talk to somebody and well..." His voice trailed off.

             
"Sure," I said, as I leaned back and put my feet up on the footlocker. "What's on your mind?"

             
He took a breath and blurted it out. "I was wondering if I could talk to Woody." Oh. I raised my eyebrows and told him to hold on. With a shrug, I handed the receiver over to Wood. I decided this would be a good time to go install a new wall switch in my office The old one didn't have any crispness left in the mechanism and I had a couple of new ones in the workshop. And I certainly wasn't needed here.

             
From the office, I could hear Woody's side of the conversation. He was telling my nephew that his own father had left him and his mother all alone when he was a little kid. The man had never come back, and now Woody didn't know if he was even alive. It must have helped Tucker to get some perspective on the fallibility of adults, even those who happen to be parents, because soon Wood was laughing and telling his tired jokes. They were pretty old, but were probably new to a kid of Tucker's limited years and experience. I got the new switch installed and flipped the breaker back on in the workshop. When I tried the switch, it worked. One small step for me.

             
"I think it's a good idea," I heard Woody say into the telephone. "Listen, Tuck, counselors are nothin' but people who listen to you and help you sort things out. It isn't like a doctor or something." He listened for a few minutes, making noises of agreement, then took up his argument once again.

             
"No, that ain't right, kiddo. It's just somebody, like a friend almost, who's on your side and wants you to feel better about things." He nodded, his square chin obliterating the mouthpiece as his jaw bobbed up and down on top of it. "That's right, Tucker. Let your mom make the appointment and you just go see how it is. Then you can call me back and we'll talk about it, OK?"

             
When my friend was finally finished helping my nephew, he remembered that I still existed and was in the next room, where he found me methodically swinging my desk chair from side to side. He flopped his bulk into the only other uncluttered chair.

             
"Tucker needs somebody to talk to, Rude." Woody's face was serious. "You care if it's me?"

             
"Not at all," I answered, feeling like the bigger man for having said it, even if it wasn't entirely true. "Who's he going to see?"

             
"He doesn't know yet. There's a clinic near their place. It's a free one, he thinks, so he figures the people who run it are idiots." Woody chuckled. "You know kids. He thinks if it doesn't cost a bundle, it can't be any good. I told him he won't know 'til he tries."

             
I agreed and we proceeded to kick my brother-in-law around a little, figuratively. By noon, I was ready to pay a visit to the local police station. We plowed a path through the parking lot with our boots and walked the three blocks against a stiff northwest wind. Bill and Sue were both in the office having brown bag lunches at the desk.

             
"Too cold to go out for lunch?" I asked.

             
"Too lazy," Sue answered. "Besides, we didn't want to miss your visit. Want to fill us in?"

             
We did, including the drug paraphernalia I'd seen from the window, and which they'd already confiscated. They knew everything I did, except where I'd gotten the meth crystals and I wasn't ready to give that information out yet. Bill knew where it had probably come from, though, and intimated as much.

             
"I heard about Charlie Wilson's place burning down last night. Any connection there to your investigation into his death?"

             
"Darned if I know," I answered, looking puzzled. "As far as I can see, he probably did jump or fall into the drink. By the way, what did Goodwin say? Anything new there?"

             
He's clean on the Wilson death, if it turns out he was murdered. Goodwin was in a car accident near Moline the day before and was still in the hospital on April nineteenth. His story checks out on the meth, he's keeping quiet. We have the two bikers and plenty of evidence already so it's just a matter of time 'til we find out if anyone else was involved. He'll do some hard time on that one." We all agreed we'd keep in touch.

             
On the walk back from the station, we saw the city snowplow clearing the streets and spinning a mixture of salt and sand across the freshly scraped roadbed. The bulk of the snow from last night's blast of moisture seemed to be already on the ground, but a few lingering flakes blew around our faces as we walked. I always had difficulty determining whether the blowing stuff was coming down from above or was being carried back up from the ground by the powerful wind. When we got back to my parking lot, it had been cleared. Two piles of snow stood at the rear of the lot, where French was raising the plow attached to the front of his truck. I waved and called out to him as we trotted over. Opening the truck's window, he grinned down at us.

             
"That shoveling stuff is too much like work."

             
Woody and I agreed and I thanked him for his effort before making the introductions. We stood there shooting the breeze for a couple of minutes, comparing the Pennsylvania winters to the much windier ones here in Iowa. French said he'd heard the Cedar Rapids Airport was shut down from the storm.

             
"When do you have to fly back? he asked Woody

             
"Not until Friday. It should be clear by then."

             
"Should," said French. "Unless another one blows in." With a last wave, he backed out onto Cherry Street and turned onto Main, toward his store.

             
"Nice guy," Wood said.

             
"He plowed the whole street out after the other big snow this season. French really is a nice guy. Most of the folks out here are friendly like that, but a good neighbor with a snowplow is a really good neighbor," I said, laughing. "At least, it is in Iowa."

             
Once inside, I went to my office and tried the Wilson's number in California one more time. They still weren't there. I gave up and made another call, this time to the Eastern Iowa Airport. The reservation desk at the airport was open, although the runways were closed for the rest of the day. Gloria, who took my call, said they were planning to reopen in the morning when the swirling snow and wind had died down. The morning flights were already filled with the layover passengers who would be spending the night at either the airport or at the nearby Howard Johnson's Hotel. Gloria got me on an afternoon flight on Sunday that would get me into Los Angeles at four fifteen Pacific time. She transferred me to the rental car desk and I arranged for a car at the L.A. airport. It would be about a twenty mile drive to Everly from the airport. Oh boy, I thought, sunny California.