Deep Winter (12 page)

T
rooper Taggart had finished his call to dispatch a few minutes ago—made the request for a detective and the coroner's office to report to the scene down here—but he kept the radio mike clenched in his hand and pressed it to his lips. He knew that the sheriff was watching. Waiting to talk to him again. He needed a minute to think. Needed a minute to have another drink.

After he'd gotten the order to head down to Wyalusing, he had grabbed his flasks from his locker. He called them Starsky and Hutch. It was a long trek down here to the sticks, and he thought another drink or two would make the drive a little more bearable. He didn't usually start drinking until the end of his shift, but he figured why the hell not? He was supposed to be home right now. Not out here in the middle of nowhere.

Who are you kidding, Bill? You always manage to find an excuse to drink. Any excuse is a good excuse.

He kept the flasks hidden in his locker or the trunk of his cruiser. He could fit a fifth into both flasks real nicely. He'd rather have too much than not enough.
Be prepared
was always his motto. What a great God-fearing Boy Scout he turned out to be.

Taggart looked down at his hands. A wedding band was wedged over the knuckle of his fat left ring finger. Both hands trembled. He wasn't sure if it was because he had just shot and killed an innocent man or if he needed a drink. Probably both. He pulled one of the oft-used flasks from his bag, Starsky this time, and topped off his cold coffee. Mixed it with his finger and took a long drink.

The hayseed sheriff wouldn't give him space. He gazed out the windshield at Lester, who paced the driveway, staring at Taggart the whole time. Taggart pressed the mike to his lips and pretended to say something official to buy him some more time from the sheriff.

“Give me one stinking minute here, Sheriff. Christ,” he muttered into the mike instead.

He poured another shot into his coffee and drank it down. He told himself the drinks were calming his nerves and helping clear his head. Why should he feel any regrets about firing his service revolver? The hell with that. Another law-enforcement officer stood at the receiving end of an armed suspect at the scene of the crime. Textbook stuff. If he couldn't trust his instincts, then it was high time to turn in his badge. He didn't give a damn if he had a little buzz or not. He would have done the same thing if he were stone-cold sober. He finished his coffee cocktail and put his hat back on. Shook a few Tic Tacs into his mouth, took a breath, and stepped out of the patrol car.

L
ester was waiting anxiously. Taggart stepped in front of him, towering over him by a good eight inches.

“All right, Sheriff, they're going to send the coroner down straightaway. Detectives should be here in a few hours as well.”

Lester shook his head. “What a goddamned mess. Sweet Christ.”

“Yeah. It is what it is,” Taggart replied coolly. He looked over to Johnny Knolls's fallen body in the trailer doorway. “The father of the victim, did you know him well?”

“Yeah. Hell, everybody knows everybody around here.”

Taggart nodded. “He always carry a firearm?”

“Son, everybody around here always carries a firearm. Got one in our truck and a half dozen others back home. Way of life.”

Taggart grunted. “That may be, but this man's dead because of it.” Taggart's tone was flat and matter-of-fact. The way he intended it.

Lester let this roll off him. He needed help, and there was no good that could come from getting defensive.

“So you said you got the suspect in custody?” Taggart wasn't wearing a jacket. If he was cold, he wasn't letting on about it.

“Yep. Local boy. Big fella. Always thought he was more of a gentle giant,” Lester offered.

“Seems like that's always the case.”

Lester played with the stubble on his head. “Yeah. Danny Bedford. Might be big as an ox, but he's a few cards short of a full deck.”

Taggart gave him a look. “How so?”

Lester didn't keep his gaze. Something about the trooper made him uneasy. “Had him an accident on a frozen pond when he was a boy. Five or six, if I remember correctly. The winter of '49. The damn kid was underwater for near ten minutes. Suffered pretty severe brain damage as a result of it.”

“Guess he should have stayed off the ice or learned how to swim.”

Lester finally gave him a look. This state trooper fella seemed to be a bull in a china shop. Like a lot of city cops and state law officials, men like Taggart elbowed their way around life. “Lost both his folks in the same accident. Helluva thing.”

“You got him in lockup?” Taggart asked, ignoring Lester's last statement.

“He's laid up at the doc's office right now.” Lester stopped himself. Thought about what he would say next. Wanted to be real careful. “Danny suffered a broken jaw when we brought him down.”

Taggart almost smiled. “I'm sure he did.”

Lester didn't let the other man bait him. He continued on, also matter-of-fact. “Like I said, he's the size of two of me, so it took all that my deputy and I could do to restrain him.” Lester hated lying,
but he figured it was better not to raise any eyebrows when it came to Sokowski's actions.

“I take it your deputy is with the suspect now? Has him under careful watch?”

Lester nodded and took out a pack of cigarettes. Tucked one in the corner of his mouth and cupped the match from the wind. He only had one cigarette left now. The state trooper looked at the pack, and even though Lester didn't want to, he offered the man the last smoke. Common decency had it that you never took a man's last cigarette.

Taggart accepted the smoke.

“Deputy Sokowski is there with him now. Just waiting to turn him over to the state. He's in good hands.”

“I would hope so.” Taggart took Lester's pack of matches and lit up. He gazed around the countryside. It was pitch-black, and beyond the trees there wasn't much to see for miles. “You born and raised around here?”

“Yep. This has always been home. Never seen a reason to leave.”

Taggart looked at all the trees and rolling countryside around him with a bemused expression. “Never cared for the country myself. Too damn quiet. I'm a city boy. Would drive me nuts living out here with nothing to do.”

Lester kept smoking. “Guess it's not for everybody.”

“Living out here would be a prison sentence for someone like me.” Taggart laughed at the thought.

“Suppose that's true for some.” Lester was going to stop there but couldn't help himself. “Then again, I think life in the city tends to suck a man dry of what's important.”

Taggart gave the sheriff a look. “And how's that?”

Lester knew he shouldn't go on, but he did anyway. Something
about Trooper Taggart provoked Lester and didn't bring out the wisest part of himself. “Seems like city folks are always so busy rushing around with places to go and things to do that they forget what it's like to take one day at a time and enjoy the small things in life.”

“That right? You sound like a Hallmark card.”

Lester shrugged. “Used to get bent out of shape when city dwellers rolled into town looking down their noses and laughing at our ways, all the while wondering how anyone would actually choose this life, but now I just feel sorry for them.”

Taggart seemed to consider the sheriff's words for a moment. “I see what you're saying. And I hope I'm not coming off that way. Not my intention.” The man exhaled, shook his head. “Guess you're right, though. City life can be a grind, but it's all I've ever known. For better or worse.”

Lester finally grinned at the man—part of the state trooper's wall came down just a bit. “Life here grows on you. Hell, you spend another few hours out here in the fresh air, you might just be coming back for more.”

Taggart grinned a little himself. “Don't know about that.” He flicked his cigarette to the snow and gazed over at Lester. “What I do know is that we'll be needing another pack of cigarettes.”

Lester flicked his cigarette to the ground as well. “Hell. Ain't that the truth.”

A
ll the fucked-up shit that had happened in the last few hours had sobered him up but left him as jittery as hell. He sure could use a drink or a hit from a joint. Or both would be even better. He needed to get a buzz.

The front door opened, and a blast of cold night air rushed inside, carrying with it a wave of powdery snow. Carl looked up at Sokowski, whose face was flushed red, and his hard eyes were even more bloodshot than the last time Carl had seen him.

“Where's Doc Pete at?”

Carl shrugged. “In his office, I suppose.”

Sokowski glanced over at the office door, then turned back toward Carl. “You didn't say nothing, did you?”

“Naw. Didn't say nothing.”

Sokowski was all tensed up. A bundle of nerves. His shoulders
were tight around his neck, and his fists clenched and unclenched at his side. “Where'd they put Danny?”

Carl pointed down the hall, then returned his fingers into his mouth. Tore off a piece of nail and spit it out. “Sheriff ask you anything? Doesn't suspect anything, does he?” Carl asked, and immediately recoiled from Sokowski's cold, dead expression.

“Nothing to suspect. Unless you went running your mouth.”

“I ain't stupid, Mike. Kept my mouth shut like you told me to.”

Sokowski muttered at him and strode down the hall toward the exam room, and Carl could tell by the way he walked that he'd been drinking again.

“What are you doing?” Carl asked.

Sokowski put his hand on the doorknob and gave him a look. “Gonna have a little talk with the retard, is what.” He swung open the exam-room door and stepped in.

It was cold inside the room. Felt like a walk-in cooler. The window on the back wall stood wide open, and snow was spitting inside. Most of the snow melted as soon as it hit the floor and left behind puddles of water covering the linoleum tiles. Sokowski looked around the empty room, eyes stopping on the paper covering the exam table that was dotted with dried blood.

Sokowski glanced back to Carl. “Fucker's gone.”

Carl walked behind him but didn't say anything. He just stood there, looking guilty as he continued picking at his fingers.

Sokowski walked to the back of the exam room, peered out the window, took off his hat, and ran his fingers through his hair. He was almost smiling.

“This is good. Hell yes. This is real good.”

“But Danny's gone.”

Sokowski glared at Carl like he had shit all over his face. “Think about it, Carl. Christ. A guilty man runs.”

“Shit. What do we do?” Carl asked.

“That, dumb-ass, is obvious. We go and tell the sheriff the truth. Prisoner got loose, and a killer is on the run. Danny did us a big fucking favor.”

Carl looked around the exam room. “Wasn't my fault. I don't want to get blamed for nothing.”

Sokowski glanced at Carl, and his eyes narrowed a bit as an idea took form. “You're right about that. It wasn't. You put up much of a fight?”

“Huh?”

“Danny outweighs you by a hundred or so pounds.” Sokowski took a yellowed handkerchief that got plenty of use from his back pocket and wrapped it around his knuckles. “You did all you could, but the son of a bitch was strong and scared out of his mind, and he put a hurting on anything in his path.”

Carl watched Sokowski tighten the handkerchief around his fist and hold it down at his side. Carl stopped picking at his fingers. “We really gotta do it like this?”

“Yeah, we really do. Gotta make this look believable.” Sokowski was really grinning now. “The sheriff didn't have Danny cuffed, so he sucker-punched you and escaped out the window. It was over before you knew it. When I got here, you were still scraping yourself off the floor. That's the story. Short and sweet. You got any questions?”

Carl shook his head that he didn't, eyes down on the floor, and waited for the punch that was coming. He didn't have to look at Sokowski to know that part of him was enjoying this.

F
iltered moonlight peeked through the dense cover of trees, coming down in soft shafts of light. The limbs of centuries-old maple, oak, and birch trees stopped most of the snow from falling to the frozen ground, but the flakes that did manage to get through floated slow and easy, creating an almost dreamlike setting.

Danny had given up running a few minutes ago. The jarring motion from the thudding of his boots on the hard ground was too much. Too painful.

His jaw hung open like a broken mailbox door—hurt too much to close it. And his tongue, thick and swollen now, filled his mouth like a bloated breakfast sausage. He felt a few teeth rattle around with each step he took. The wind still blew pretty hard in the woods, so his shoulders hunched forward as he plodded through the snow, frozen leaves and dried twigs snapping beneath his feet.

Finally he stopped walking altogether. It was all too much. His
head pounded and felt as if someone were kicking it every few seconds with a steel-toed boot—Sokowski's steel-toed boot. He couldn't feel his fingers or toes, and he didn't know where he was or where he was going. Everything was so dark around him, and Danny hated the darkness almost more than anything else.

Maybe it was his fault that Mindy was gone. Maybe if he had finished the bird carving in the morning like he planned, he would have gotten to her trailer earlier. Maybe he could have stopped the deputy and Carl from hurting her. Maybe she wouldn't be dead.

Danny dropped to his knees, crunching the snow under him, and began to cry. His wide shoulders shook and built to a violent shudder as he let it all out. He cried for the ache he was feeling in his jaw. Cried for Mindy being gone forever. Cried for being slow and dumb and different from everybody else. He didn't want to be here anymore. Not just here in Wyalusing but here in this world, where so many bad things happened. He wished he could be with his folks again. Up in heaven where it was supposed to be safe and happy, with all the other angels.

He lowered his head and let out a slow howl. Maybe he should talk to God, but he had never talked to him before and didn't know what he should say or what he should ask of him. If God were looking down on him right now, sitting on his throne with his white beard and robe, maybe he would see that Danny was in a pinch and could use some help.

The snap of a dry twig echoed softly through the woods somewhere around him. Danny looked up, peered around at all the trees, but didn't see anything. Another snap, followed by a rustling sound. He kept listening, and every few seconds there would be another soft crunch of snow.

“That you, Carl?”

The movement stopped at the sound of his voice.

Snow started to soak through Danny's trousers at the knees, and the cold began to numb the skin. He tried to stand back up on his feet when a dark shape slipped across the forest floor in front of him. Slow and careful.

Danny's cries hitched and caught in his chest as he watched the shadowy figure move behind a clump of brush.

Get up, Danny-Boy.

It was the voice again, but it sounded a little different now, and even though it seemed different, the voice itself was familiar.

Listen to me, Danny-Boy.

Danny's papa used to call him Danny-Boy
.
Danny wiped the tears from his eyes so that he could get a better look at whatever was out there.

Come on, Danny.

Danny stood up, and his knees cracked a bit. “Pop?”

The shape moved a little deeper into the woods, away from Danny.

“I'm scared.”

No time for that.

The voice—it kinda
did
sound like his papa's—made Danny cry again. Tears rolled down his cheeks and froze like tiny stones around the corners of his mouth.

“What am I supposed to do?” All this talking made his jaw feel even worse. A lot of his words were slurred and muffled, and this made him cry even harder.

Follow me.

The shape disappeared into a wall of darkness. Danny didn't want it to go away, so he put his right boot forward, and the other one followed. It was slow going, but at least he was moving.

“I'm cold.”

I know.

“I want to see you.”

Soon. Soon.

“Is Mama with you?”

The voice didn't answer. There were no more sounds of breaking twigs or crunching snow. The woods were quiet again except for the sound of wind rattling leaves on the tips of tree limbs. Danny forced himself to walk faster, hoping to catch up with whatever or whoever was leading him deeper into the forest.

He climbed over a fallen tree covered with a thick layer of ice and snow and kept walking. He squinted into the night air and tried real hard to hear any more sounds in the woods around him.

He started getting scared that he might be walking the wrong way—if there was a wrong way. He was tired. So tired. Just when he felt like stopping and lying down, he saw a flicker of movement ahead of him. Could have been a grouse or a clump of snow falling from the tree branches, but he kept moving.

Danny wasn't sure how long he walked. It sure felt like a long time. His legs burned, and his muscles screamed out for rest, but he kept his feet moving at a steady pace. The snow was up past his knees now.

The wind intensified and started whipping against his face. It felt like it was turning into sleet. The soft snowflakes had become hard and small and stung his cheeks as they pelted against his skin.

“How much further?”

We're almost there.

The voice didn't really sound like his papa's now. Truth be told, his papa had died so long ago that he couldn't say for sure what his voice sounded like. Maybe it wasn't his papa's, but even if it wasn't, Danny wanted to think it was somehow.

The wind started really howling, like someone had flipped a switch. His pants flapped hard against his legs, making his skin tingle a little. Danny stopped for a second to scoop up a handful of snow and pressed the clump of frozen crystals to his lips. He tried to lick at it, but it hurt his tongue too much. He leaned his head back and dropped in a few chunks of snow and let it melt down the back of his throat.

He started walking again, but his arms and legs were growing heavier, making it harder to trudge through the snow. He let his eyes flicker closed, and he walked blind. With his hands held out in front of him, he felt his way deeper into the woods. A low-hanging branch tore at his face, leaving a thin red welt on his cheek, but he kept walking, waiting for the voice to tell him what to do next.

Okay. We're here, Danny. Time to rest.

Danny forced his eyes open but saw nothing except darkness and more trees.

“I don't see nothing.”

The wind blew in response.

“All I see is the woods.”

The voice wasn't there anymore. It must have left him again. He turned in a complete circle and searched all around him without knowing what he was looking for.

“Why am I stopping here?” His answer came to him when he leaned against a tree and felt something hard and smooth press into his lower back. He reached behind him and ran his hands over the trunk of the tree until they came into contact with a wooden plank nailed into the bark. A foot above it was another plank. He peered up at the tree and saw that the planks continued upward and disappeared into the darkness above him.

He gripped a plank at chest level and pulled himself up the tree.
His fingertips reached up and found the next piece of wood, and he pulled himself up the side of the tree, plank by plank. One felt kinda loose, so he balanced himself as carefully as he could and continued on.

The boards were frozen solid and real slippery. Halfway up the tree, he glanced down but couldn't see the ground through the darkness. He looked above him and saw darkness up there, too. He kept climbing the ladder and was glad it was nighttime, because he didn't like high places. They scared him. He had always been afraid of heights and never climbed trees like all the other kids did.

When Danny reached up again, his knuckles knocked against a piece of wood that was too big to be a climbing plank. Working in the dark, he let his fingers feel around the edges of a wooden platform, soft with rot, which had been built on top of a few thick branches. He pulled himself onto the wooden stand, which couldn't be more than a few feet wide and a few feet long. Danny thought for a second that maybe kids had built a tree fort way out here in the forest but then remembered that Uncle Brett used to climb trees to hunt for deer sometimes. Uncle Brett had built three or four deer stands out in the woods and would hide up in the branches and wait for a deer to pass under him before he shot it with a gun.

On his hands and knees now, Danny felt along the platform to check for the edges. Four pieces of two-by-four had been nailed to the tree limbs a few feet above the platform and served as a railing. He touched one of the two-by-fours, and the piece of wood jiggled with rot. He scooted himself to the middle of the planks and rested. Something rattled and flapped beside him. When he reached over, he felt a piece of plastic tarp whipping in the wind.

Danny squatted and pulled the small piece of plastic over him. It
didn't help much. He could still feel the wind and snow smacking against his makeshift blanket, but it would have to do.

After he put his head down on the rough wood, he gathered a clump of damp leaves for a pillow. He thought about his room above the laundromat and how warm it always was. The dryers always made it nice and cozy in the wintertime.

As his eyes flickered closed, he remembered that he hadn't locked the laundromat up for the night. He hoped that Mr. Bennett wouldn't be too sore with him. He was never supposed to leave it unlocked at night. Kids might come in and mess around with the washers and dryers. And Mr. Bennett didn't like folks using the toilet. Said folks don't treat public bathrooms as well as the ones in their homes.

Right before sleep took him away, Danny wished that he would get the chance to see Mr. and Mrs. Bennett again. They sure were nice to him.