No Man's Dog (21 page)

“I could have it towed,” Charlie said. “Johnny Dobbs’s boy, Lester, does all my towing. He could bring it to Dobbs’s Garage, or he’ll bring it here. But do you want to be driving around in that car? It sticks out like Johnny’s pecker when he sees a woman.”

“Just bring it here, if it can be done without bringing the revenooers with it,” Mulheisen said. “When I went by to get it before, the sheriff was up there, keeping an eye on it.”

“They ain’t now, as far as I can tell,” Charlie said, “but it could be someone is watching. Lemme think.” He stood and audibly scratched his chin. “Maybe I oughta just take a run up there and have a look. Pull your truck into that open bay.” He pointed toward his garage. “I’ll be back in a sec.”

The two men waited while Charlie jumped in his truck and drove the four blocks or so up the hill to the Queen’s Castle Motel. He was back before any customers deigned to stop.

“I think it’ll be all right,” he said. “Trudy Morehouse is running the front desk. Lester knows her. I didn’t see nobody else around.” He went to the phone and dialed. “Hey, Johnny! Yeah. I need Lester to go pick up a car for a customer, haul her down to me. It’s at the motel. If Trudy’s up there, which I think she is, and she asks, it’s for the sheriff. Thanks.”

He hung up and said, “Anything else you need, Mul?”

Mulheisen shook his head. “Just like that, eh?”

“Wal, a feller buys you a drink, you got to reciprocate.” He grinned. “I like that word. Especially if it means piss in Imp’s boot. What’s Imp done to you, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“He pissed in my boot,” Mulheisen said. “What did he ever do to you?”

“’Bout the same,” Charlie said. “You ever run into a guy that just rubbed you the wrong way? That’s Imp. That sumbitch all’s had everything his way, ever since we was kids. I never liked him. His ol’ man, Eb, was all right, I thought, what I knew of him, but Imp was a pain in the butt. Anything else I can do for you? How ‘bout you, Phantom?” he said to Joe.

Service just laughed. “Actually, Mul’s too polite to ask, but he needs a place to stay. Someplace quiet and private, if you know what I mean.”

Charlie thought he might have something in that line. It wasn’t too fancy, he said, but it had a phone. He could also provide an old pickup truck. “It runs good,” he said. “Four-wheel drive and everything. Got a good radio. It’ll get in and out of the cabin.”

The cabin was back in the woods, at the end of a long road, next to the Manistee River. Good brown trout water there, Charlie said. The cabin had been built by a friend of Charlie’s, Old Tom Adams—“his grandfather invented the Adams fly, for Tom! One of the greatest fishermen ever.” Adams had built the cabin himself, as a fishing retreat, and when he died he left the cabin to Charlie, having no heirs. Charlie didn’t use it much. “Only trouble was,” Charlie said, “he built it on some land belonged to Eb Luck. Tom claimed Eb give him the property, and I think he did, but we ain’t never found a deed. Still, Eb never contested it. I used go out there with Tom and fish and drink. But with him gone it wasn’t the same. Made me lonely. Fish were gone, too.”

Nowadays, he rented it for hunting—“For a ton of bucks to some guys from down below. Imp wants it back, but he ain’t getting
it.” The hunters wouldn’t be up for a couple of weeks; until then it was just lying empty. Mulheisen was welcome to it. Charlie refused any payment, and ditto for the truck.

Mulheisen was amazed. The cabin was ideal. As Charlie had warned, “it wasn’t too fancy.” It also needed some cleaning. It was a log building, but built with vertical half-logs in a clever system that alternated the interior half-logs in such a way that they covered the joints of the exterior logs and permitted a layer of insulation; it was very tight and snug. There was a single room for kitchen and living, with a so-called cathedral ceiling. A bedroom, bath, and utility room took up the rear and above that was a large loft that overlooked the living area, obviously where the hunters slept.

The cabin had electricity, running water, an indoor toilet with a shower, and a woodstove. The hunters brought cots, Charlie had said, and slept five or six there. Refrigerator—Mulheisen had stocked up at a store out on the highway, well east of Queensleap—no television, but plenty of privacy. No other buildings seemed to be within miles.

It was positioned on the side of a hill, at the edge of a mixed forest of hardwood and pine, with the river flowing by in a great bend, some thirty feet below the cabin, no more than fifty feet away. The river was quiet, sliding smoothly past. Beyond it lay a great marsh, with dense cedar. One could see for miles to a distant wooded ridge.

The property abutted Luck’s property, according to a large U.S. Forest Service topo map that was pinned to the kitchen wall. The map had numerous ballpoint markings, obviously drawn in by hunters to indicate good hunting sites, or routes to get to them. Between this property and Luck’s house was a considerable forest, an entire section on the map. By road, it was easily five miles, a long, awkward route.

Joe had driven out with Mulheisen to the site, although it was understood that he wasn’t staying. He had plenty to do in town,
he said. But he was clearly charmed by the cabin and the setting. “I’ve got to get myself something like this. I tell you, Mul, you fell into it here.” He walked about admiring the handiwork, explaining that he had become something of a carpenter himself lately.

Mulheisen was surprised. He began to relate his recent experiences in building his study. “It’s turned into a cottage,” he said. “I was thinking, eventually I’ll be moving back into the old homestead, but once the study is finished it’ll be a good retreat. Nothing as fancy as this, no Manistee River at my door, but I do have the lake, the St. Clair River . . .”

Joe said he’d seen the place, when he had visited Mul’s mother. He complimented him on the style and appearance. They fell into a discussion of building problems, flooring, insulation, the cost of plumbing and wiring.

“I like this post-and-beam style,” Joe said. He admired the huge, double-glazed windows that looked out over the river, some thirty feet below, winding in a great bend before turning west and disappearing into a vast cedar forest. The view was impressive—one could see nothing but trees for miles, until the horizon loomed in the blue distance.

“Not a sound,” Joe said, “just the river gurgling by. You fish?”

“Oh, I’ve tried it, when I was out looking for you, in Montana,” Mulheisen said. “I didn’t get the hang of it.”

Joe smiled at the reference to that old episode. “I’ve taken it: up,” he said. “It gets under your skin. This guy was supposed to be a great fisherman. I’ve used those Adams flies. Great all-purpose fly pattern. You can use it just about year-round. I’ll bet he left some gear.” He began to poke around until, sure enough, he found the rods and reels in the utility-room closet. One rod was already strung, with a fly tied on the leader.

Joe brought it out. “Here you go! All set. You ought to go down and cast a bit. I’ll get out of your hair.”

Before he left they settled their plans for contact. Joe warned Mulheisen against using the phone.

“Tucker will have your mother’s phone tapped, I’ll bet,” he said. “Use a pay phone when you’re in Traverse,” he recommended, “or wherever else you get to, as long as it isn’t too close by. I can call you on this phone—I’ll ring twice, then call back. You can figure out some way your mother can reach you, if you’re careful and she doesn’t use her home phone.”

“I think I can figure it out,” Mulheisen said patiently.

Joe caught the tone of exasperation. “I know, I know, I’m the horse’s butt and you’re a hardened ol’ copper. But the thing is, I know how not to get caught by making dumb mistakes. It’s a street thing.”

Mulheisen sighed. “I could use the cell phone.” He’d recovered it, along with his other stuff from the Checker, which was now stashed in Charlie’s garage, out of casual sight.

Joe shook his head in mock despair. “Forget the cell. I don’t know how it works, but they can track those things. Satellites, maybe.”

Mulheisen walked out to the pickup with Joe. They settled that Joe would see what he could find out about Luck’s late wife, Constance. Mulheisen would drive to Cadillac tomorrow, a city to the south about twenty miles, actually somewhat closer than Traverse City but in another county. He’d contact friends at the Detroit Police Department to see if he could gather anymore information from that source.

“I’ll call you when I get a motel,” Joe said, “and we can figure out how to communicate from there.” He stopped at the door of the pickup and said, “You’re not armed, are you? Let me leave a couple of pieces with you.”

Mulheisen refused, but not vehemently. He was shocked to see the arsenal Service revealed. He ended up accepting a Llama 9mm automatic pistol.

“A beautiful piece,” Mulheisen said, turning the elegant handgun over in his hand. “Where did you get it? Or should I ask?”

“A friend of mine left it with me,” Joe said. “It’s a Model XI. Here’s some clips.” He prevailed upon Mulheisen to also accept a Stoner .223 automatic carbine—“Just in case one of Luck’s guys comes snooping around. This will put out a lot of lead without making a big mess. Just leave it in the cabin.”

Mulheisen was relieved when Joe left. He felt like he was on vacation. He spent spent some time sweeping out, washing dishes, and straightening out the bedroom. He even found a clean set of sheets and made the bed. He still had time to walk down to the river with the fly rod Joe had found. He’d had a little practice with casting when he was in Montana, more than a year ago, but he found it difficult at first; the fly wouldn’t turn over and the bushes kept snagging his backcast. Eventually he got the hang of it.

The water was nothing like the mountain streams he’d seen in Montana. This water was opaque, it seemed, not broken into riffles by rocks and gravel bars. He had no idea where to cast, no sense of where the fish might be lying. And after a half hour of erratic casting and untangling the fly from brush, he became discouraged. Like every novice fisherman, he became convinced that there were no fish in this stream. Still, if Old Tom Adams had built his cabin here, he supposed that it was for the obvious reason.

It was getting toward dusk anyway. Time to quit. Suddenly, he noticed that there were quite a few small insects hovering over the water. This must be the famous “hatch,” he thought. And shortly, a fish leaped out of the water, not far off, falling back heavily with a great splash. A trout! He made several casts, each one an improvement. The fly line hardly made a single
splat.
And with the very next cast, he hooked something!

It was astounding. The fish leaped into the air, almost three
feet—to his eyes—and with a terrific contortion snapped the leader. The trout disappeared.

Mulheisen stood on the edge of the water, his mouth open in awe. So that was it! He was amazed. He’d actually hooked a trout. He thought, That son of a gun must have been . . . oh, two feet long! He suddenly realized his feet were getting wet. He scrambled back to the bank.

He was thrilled. But it was too dark to go on. He knew he’d never be able to tie on another fly. In fact, he hadn’t one with him. He went back to the cabin and prepared a sandwich and drank some water. He felt very good.

Thoughts of his mother intruded. He drove out in the old truck along the two-track road and eventually got on the highway. He went to the place where he’d bought his groceries and made a call. He wanted to tell her about the trout, but as it happened she had already gone to bed. He told the nurse not to wake her. He asked if anyone had been around, asking for him, but the nurse said no, not that she knew, but she hadn’t been there earlier, of course.

Mulheisen thought quickly. Then he said, “Tell her I may be home tomorrow, but if I’m not, I’ll call. I may ask a friend to stop by, possibly later this evening, just to sort of check up. He’s a policeman, Captain Marshall. Let’s see, you go off duty in a couple of hours, don’t you? He’ll stop by before that, if he can, but don’t worry if he can’t make it.”

The nurse said that would be fine, and if Captain Marshall didn’t show up before her relief, she’d leave a message.

He called Jimmy Marshall at home.

Marshall was excited. “People looking for you, man,” he said. “What’s up?”

Mulheisen asked him to go to his mother’s house. “I know it’s a long way, clear across town, but I need your help,” he said. What he wanted, he explained, was for someone he could trust to
check out the situation there. His mother had met Jimmy and liked him. Then he explained in some detail about his detention, but for some reason he left Joe Service out of the account.

He gave the phone number at the cabin. “You can call me there, but not from Ma’s,” Mulheisen said. “She’s already in bed, there’s no need to wake her. Just make sure there’s no one snooping around and everything’s all right. There will be a nurse there. You can leave a message with her. She, or my mother, can call me at the cabin, in case of an emergency. By the way, did you check out that Dr. Johnson, in Indiana?”

“Yeah. He’s deceased,” Jimmy said. “Died two years ago.”

“Damn,” Mulheisen said. “That would be not long after Constance Luck died. How’d he die?”

“He was killed, Mul. Got blown up in his car.”

Mulheisen was silent. “No other details?” he said, after a moment.

“I talked to a guy on the Indianapolis squad. They didn’t have a clue. And now, guess what? The files are impounded. Homeland Security.”

“What does your friend say, in Indianapolis?” Mulheisen wanted to know.

“They were working on the theory it was drug-related,” Jimmy said. “The trouble was, Dr. Johnson wasn’t ever suspected of that: kind of activity. He was just a GP, in family practice. He’d never been implicated in any drug dealings.”

“Could you check on Constance Luck, or Constance Malachi, as far as where, when, or if she was buried in those parts? How far does this Homeland Security thing go? Would it prevent you from finding out if she ever lived in Indianapolis?”

Jimmy didn’t grumble at any of these requests. He just said he’d call back after he’d been out to St. Clair Flats.