One Through the Heart (21 page)

‘Looks like he tried to cut his wrists,’ Coe said. ‘Is that what you were looking for?’

‘It is. This is the one they called John the Baptist.’

‘Are you certain?’

Raveneau stared at what was left of his face. The helmet plastic dripped and ran down where his right ear had been. The face was badly disfigured but the body shape was right. So was this wrist scar and the remains of the thin beard under his chin. Only a little remained on the one side.

‘It’s him.’

More video got shot and another round of photos and they worked him into a body bag. They were yet to zip it shut when he and Coe started back to the car. As they did, Coe questioned him again. ‘Are you absolutely certain?’

‘I can’t be that, but it’s him.’

‘He suffered.’

‘He really did.’

‘If this is who you say it is then we’re past debating who set these fires and we’ll look for more help from headquarters.’

‘The debate is over.’

The manhunt that already included every law enforcement agency in the Bay Area would reach out across the country now. With the fires in Colorado in June and the other wildfires in the west and LA with its Santa Ana winds, the hunt would get attention. Alan Siles and Ike Latkos would get apprehended and quite possibly killed during the arrest. That wouldn’t surprise Raveneau at all.

‘What is this really about?’ Coe asked. ‘I can’t get my head around why they are doing this. I don’t think anyone in our office understands it.’

‘Do they understand fanatic, zealot, and ideologue? Siles says he believes in a place called the Boundary. Siles isn’t the first to incorporate paranormal into his reality. We’re dealing with a true believer.’

‘Not with Lindsley.’

‘No, not with Lindsley, but maybe as Siles says, Ann Coryell wasn’t really murdered. She was freed.’

‘He said that to you.’

‘Pretty close to that, and he knew her.’

‘Do you know what Lindsley was accused of when he was sixteen?’

‘I do and he gave me a chance to talk about it with him but I haven’t yet. I’ve been waiting on a call from a retired Chicago assistant prosecutor, but there’s no time for that anymore. We need to push Lindsley harder. He knows more than he’s told us. It’s time to rock his boat.’

D
e Haro Press was the name of the publisher who brought out the book on Coryell’s writings and then vanished. Raveneau was still trying to figure out who was behind that book, though now he believed he’d found the source of the publisher’s name. If he was right the name tied to the nineteenth century and so maybe tied to Lash, Lindsley, or Siles.

By June of 1846 tensions between ambitious American settlers and the Mexican rulers of the province of California led to minor skirmishes between irregular Mexican forces and those called ‘bear flaggers’ for their newly adopted flag that carried a bear, a star, and the words ‘California Republic.’ When two Americans were killed and their mutilated bodies left near what is now the town of Healdsburg in northern California, a retaliatory band of one hundred and thirty men, many of them bear flaggers, searched for their killers.

Taking charge of these men was John Charles Fremont, an ambitious man dubbed ‘The Pathfinder’ for his surveying expeditions as a lieutenant in the Corps of Topographical Engineers. With him was the famed Indian scout, Kit Carson, and perhaps Fremont believed the time had come for greater boldness.

In prior months while camped at Sutter Buttes he’d been content with a campaign of terror directed at local Indians he suspected of plotting against settlers. But now he took charge of the ‘California Battalion.’ Under his lead the battalion spiked Mexican cannons in San Francisco and prepared for a war of independence. They were camped on the Marin shoreline on the morning of June twenty-eighth when Fremont made a decision that ten years later may have cost him the US Presidency when he ran as the first candidate of the newly formed Republican Party.

That morning two nineteen-year-old-twins, Francisco and Ramon, rowed a boat from Point Molate on the eastern shoreline in what is now Contra Costa County north toward Marin. With them was an older man, Jose Berryessa. Why they crossed the bay that morning is unclear. Possibly they were bringing messages intended to help Berryessa’s imprisoned son. Whatever their motives, they were intercepted by Fremont’s band of bear flaggers in Richardson Bay, and reading now, Raveneau saw where Ann Coryell’s beliefs connected to the story.

After the three men were captured, Kit Carson informed Fremont and asked what he should do with the prisoners, and Fremont perhaps empowered by the hubris of the moment responded that he had no room for prisoners. Carson returned to the bear flaggers waiting on the beach with the prisoners. He relayed Fremont’s message and helped shoot Jose de Los Reyes Berryessa and the two brothers.

If Fremont had been a less ambitious man the summary executions might have been forgotten, but ten years later on September 27, 1856, the
Los Angeles Star
ran a story that left readers wondering if a possible Presidential candidate had ordered three men murdered. With that story the
LA Star
planted the seed of doubt, and James Buchanan, a Democrat, won the election.

Fremont never escaped the stain. He was unable to discount the testimony of numerous witnesses. What he thought might have been forgotten in the birth of the great state of California wasn’t forgotten. As a consequence, Fremont’s stature diminished and four years later, ahead of the onslaught of the American Civil War, another man, an Illinois lawyer, Abraham Lincoln, became the first Republican President, and Fremont’s political career ebbed.

Raveneau clicked out of the de Haro articles and returned to making phone calls, working his way down a list of those who called in to say they had information about Alan Siles, Ike Latkos, or the third man the public knew only by his first name, John. Finding out who the now dead John actually was had become critical. He was the best lead to the others and it was possible that lead was in the twenty-two pages of names and numbers that was Raveneau’s share of tip calls to make. When Coe dropped him they left it that they would talk tomorrow, and he stayed in the homicide office now making calls until eleven that night.

Much later, he fell asleep on the couch at home and awoke to a late night call from Coe.

‘We’ve got a new problem, a health problem. Three of the Evidence Recovery Team who handled the body, the bike, and backpack, as well as two at the lab, are sick.’

‘What are their symptoms?’

‘Nausea, diarrhea, fever, and other symptoms consistent with radiation poisoning. That’s now confirmed and why I’m calling you. The victim’s body is hot. He ingested radioactive material and enough to kill him. The guess is he was in bad shape when he went down on that bike. It’s probably why he went down. They’re saying he must have dragged himself with pure adrenalin. You need to get checked immediately, Ben. This stuff accumulates in the thyroid. Bring the clothes you wore last night with you, but put them in a bag in your trunk.’

‘Great.’

‘Your place is going to need to be swept too. Did you shower?’

‘Yes.’

‘Good.’

Raveneau brought the clothes and they were scanned and he was fine and about the clothes he was told, ‘Leave them here and go shopping. The reading isn’t serious but you don’t want to wear these anymore and you don’t need any X-rays for awhile.’

‘How many have I had?’

‘About a dozen.’

‘How long was the dead man exposed?’

‘Probably less than an hour and closer to half an hour, but that’s just a guess. The sport drinking bottles in the backpack are hot. If radioactive particles are small enough they can be suspended in a fluid and easier still if the fluid had other particulate in it. He drank it and he carried it and probably spilled some, and those bottles melted and the fluid evaporated so that spread the radioactive material.’

A subcontractor working for the Feds followed Raveneau home and swept his apartment with a Geiger counter and also Visa, the cat, who lived on the rooftop and had been in and out. Visa was clean but the apartment read higher than background radiation and Raveneau ended up making calls from home as he waited for a team that specialized in this kind of cleaning.

That ate a lot of the morning. By mid afternoon a number of the smaller fires were either out or under control, though that wasn’t the case with four majors, the Mt. Tamalpais, the Mt. Diablo, what was being called the Castro Valley blaze, and a fourth in the Oakland Hills. The Tam fire did reach Mill Valley and burned commercial buildings along the north-western edge of the town. And there were new fires, but fire crews believed most were caused by the fire jumping or by embers carried and the wind continued to lessen. So there was hope of more containment by midnight. Eleven deaths were now attributed to the fires. Three hundred fifty-three homes had burned and thirty-six other structures.

That afternoon the FBI called a press conference and briefed the media on the mountain biker suspect found dead in the Lake Alpine watershed. They said though it was not yet confirmed they believed the as yet unidentified dead man had placed the incendiary devices on the eastern watershed slope carrying them in a backpack. They believed it possible he had an accomplice, as other incendiary devices were placed on the western slope, and asked anyone who had seen a vehicle in the vicinity on either the day of the Tam fire or the day prior to please call or email.

As the press conference turned to questions from reporters it got a little heated with the Feds, and it was no longer just Coe. Coe was in the background as a spokesman defended the Bureau’s inability to find Siles or Latkos. Another reporter jumped in with questions about Brandon Lindsley. They were all over Lindsley’s past now and Coe took the mike and made it clear Lindsley was cooperating with both the San Francisco Police and the FBI.

Coe looked to the back of the room where Raveneau stood near a door. This was the plan. This was the signal they wanted to send Alan Siles. But as Coe delivered this he was challenged on it. A reporter said he’d been told yesterday by someone who should know that Lindsley was a suspect and Coe caught Raveneau’s eye in the back of the room and reaffirmed, ‘Mr Lindsley’s working with us and with the San Francisco Police. He has provided valuable information that we are acting on right now. We expect his help to lead to the capture of the other two very soon.’

‘Shouldn’t have said that last,’ la Rosa whispered, but it was already done.

T
he next morning the retired Chicago assistant district attorney, Stan Pierce, called Raveneau and began to talk as if they were old friends. Pierce referred to his website as he talked and Raveneau brought it up on his computer monitor.

‘Bottom line, Inspector, is Lindsley murdered his parents when he was sixteen and got away with it. His best friend helped him and they stuck with each other. The detectives thought they’d get the friend to talk, but he never did. They tried everything and neither talked. Lindsley inherited three and a half million dollars from his parents. He probably paid his friend, Jules, later, though I don’t yet have proof of that.’

‘What do you mean, you don’t yet?’

‘I haven’t quit. He killed them for their money and to get them out of his life. There was nothing impulsive about it. He planned it carefully. He didn’t feel any remorse, any guilt. He put on a show of looking sad and crying and when he finished doing that he turned it off like a light switch. He didn’t feel anything for them. You’ve probably seen my website.’

‘I’m looking at it.’

‘Kids killing their parents is comparatively rare and usually there’s some reason, rage or a feeling of being trapped, something. Lindsley insisted he loved and got along with his parents. But he didn’t. We had plenty of witnesses willing to testify, but we also had a district attorney who needed everything perfect or he wouldn’t touch a case. Brandon killed them for their money but there’s an irony to that. He was a young man very upset with the state of the world and thought of his parents as part of the problem.

‘His father was an executive for a chemical company and his mother a tax lawyer for the well-to-do. After they were murdered he was asked what his mother did for a living. He said she helped people cheat on their taxes. I know that because it was me he said it to. He was sociable, got good grades, and his teachers liked him. If you’ve met him, you know he likes to talk. He’s studious and deceptive. Underneath there’s a monster looking out at you.’

‘You’re talking but you’re not really giving me anything. Tell me what makes you certain he killed them.’

Raveneau wasn’t sure Pierce heard him, continuing as if Raveneau hadn’t said a word.

‘We were just short of having enough evidence for a slam dunk and that’s the only way Harris would go forward.’

‘Who’s Harris?’

‘Albert Harris was the District Attorney. If you’re on my website, you’ll see his name. You’re on the website now, aren’t you? Harris was born in the wrong country. He should have been a prosecutor for Stalin. That way he would have won every case he tried and not ever needed to run for re-election. Lindsley got this best friend of his, Jules Owens, to lie for him. His parents were due to leave early in the morning on a four-day vacation and Lindsley was to stay at the Owens’ house while his parents traveled. That’s an arrangement they had used with previous vacations.

‘His parents planned to drive to the airport very early in the morning so they dropped Lindsley at the Owens the night before. They went out to dinner after they dropped him off and were murdered that night. What happened was Brandon rode his bike back home at two in the morning, killed them, then rode back to the Owens’ house, a distance of two point three miles. The bodies weren’t discovered for another four days. He used a bike path and an old farm road. He was on a residential street for less than half a mile. It’s all on the website.’

‘Tell me what you know that isn’t on the website.’