Running Dark (26 page)

Service went back into the cabin and found Kharlamov in the bedroom the two had bolted from. The floor in the closet was propped open. The deputy handed him a flashlight and motioned for him to climb down.

There was a sturdy ladder down to a landing and another ladder going straight up. Three wooden steps led down into a cellar, which was cold. Service shone the light around, saw rifles and clothes and chain saws and tools. “Looks like Laurel and Hardy missed the jackpot last time they were here,” Kharlamov said, a simple statement, no sarcasm.

Service found it difficult to focus his thoughts, and when he finally managed to corral them, they were not on the mysterious goods, but on the trapdoor into the bedroom, Hegstrom's questions, and Gumby's blathering about “him-her.”

41

MARQUETTE, MAY 13, 1976

“If not the girl, who?”

Joe Flap agreed to let Service have his place in Trenary for the night, and a quick telephone call to Nikki-Jo Jokola secured her agreement to place another ad in the Manistique paper. He promised Nikki-Jo this would be the last one.

Acting captain Dean Attalienti looked frazzled as Service stood in his doorway, waiting to be waved in. “You are supposed to be recuperating,” Attalienti said.

“I am.”

“We had another incident last night—three shots fired at the PB-4 off Garden. One of the rounds went through the cabin and missed Len by a couple of feet. He got out of rifle range, and two of our patrol units went through the village and came up empty-handed. This thing just keeps going on and on,” the acting captain lamented. “What do you want?”

“The rifle from Middle Bluff.”

“For what?”

“Ballistic tests.”
If
he could find the missing slugs.

Attalienti looked exasperated. “It was never fired at us.”

That day.
“Different case, sir.”

The regional law boss said, “Don't patronize me. It's in the evidence locker. Sign a chain-of-custody form and leave it with Fern. You're resting, right?”

“Yessir.”

He still had not located the slugs, but he delivered the rifle to the state police lab in Negaunee. The intake tech stared at him. “What're we supposed to compare?”

“I'm working on that,” Service said, feeling like a fool.

Service got to the Marquette County Jail around 12:30
p.m.

Eugene Chomsky's lawyer had a new briefcase and a stiffness that suggested she was either new on the job, or not happy about this assignment. She didn't smile when Marquette County Detective Kobera and Service walked into the interview room.

“Emily Linton,” Kobera said. “Grady Service, DNR.”

Service looked at a grinning Eugene Chomsky. “Hey, Grady!”

“Hey, Gumby.”

“Hey, Grady,” the boy repeated.

“My client has nothing to say,” Linton said officiously.

“Relax, Counselor. This won't hurt your client,” Service said.

“Sidebar outside the room,” Linton said.

“We're not in a courtroom,” Kobera told her. “Chill out, Emily.”

Chomsky stared at Service. “Where badge?”

“On my uniform,” Service said.

“Like badge,” Chomsky said.

Service glanced at Kobera. “Do you think we could get a badge for Gumby?”

“You bet,” the detective said, leaving the room.

“How are you feeling, Gumby?”

“Okay.”

“Have you seen Ivan?”

“Got my own place,” the boy said proudly.

“This is ludicrous,” Emily Linton said. “The boy can't comprehend
any
of this.”

“
Grady,
” Chomsky told her, pointing at Service. “Grady nice.”

Service ignored her. “Can you help me with something, Gumby?”

“Okay.”

“Stand up.”

“Eugene, remain where you are,” Linton ordered. To Service: “What do you think you're doing?”

“Not
Eugene,
” the boy said. “Gumby.” He stood up. His lawyer looked at the ceiling in exasperation.

Kobera came back into the room and stood next to Linton.

Service positioned the boy near the end of the table on the side opposite the door into the room. “You like to play pretend, Gumby?”

The boy grinned. “Uh-huh.”

“Can we pretend the table is a bed and you're at the door of the bedroom? You remember that night, right? Remember, you stepped inside to turn on the lights?”

“No,” the boy said with a tight jaw.

“You don't remember?”

“Door there,” the boy said, pointing at the other side of the room.

Service smiled. “Right you are.” The boy remembered. He looked at Kobera as he walked the boy to the other end of the room. “The table's the pretend bed, okay?”

“Okay.”

“You went into the bedroom to turn on the light.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Okay, this is just pretend. I want you to step into the room like you did that night, okay?”

The boy sucked in a deep breath. “Okay,” he said, stepping forward and turning to the right.

“Where's the light switch, Gumby?”

The boy put his arm out. “Pretend?”

“Right, pretend. Show me where it is.”

“There,” the boy said, pointing to his right.

“Good,” Service said. “That's good. Now I want you to pretend to turn on the light and say ‘ouch' when you get pretend-stabbed.”

“I won't stand for this,” Linton said, trying to rise.

Kobera kept her pinned in her seat with his hand on her shoulder.

“Pretend, right?” the boy asked Service, concern on his face.

“Pretend. Nobody will hurt you. Turn on the light.”

The boy took a half-step right, reached out with his right hand, made a small downward motion, turned to his left and said, “Ouch.” There was no emotion in his voice.

Service sat on the table and asked Kobera to stand to the boy's right. Service pushed himself back on the table. “This is about where she was,” he said. “Kneel,” he told the detective.

Kobera nodded, got down on his knees, and made a couple of swipes with his arm, like he was stabbing at someone.

“Good,” Service said. “Let's do it again, and let Jimmy pretend too.”

“Jimmy,” the boy said. “Okay. Him there,” he added, looking down at Kobera.

“Detective Kobera is helping us. He wants to play pretend.”

“Not him-her, him-
Cap'n,
” Chomsky said.

“Jimmy won't hurt you.” Service held out his hand and Kobera tossed the badge to him. Service pinned it on the boy's shirt and the boy stared down at it, beaming with pride.
Him-Cap'n
? They were close to something, he could feel it. But what? The boy had something firmly in his mind, but how could he get it out of him?

“Badge.”

“Gumby?”

“Yeah.”

“Pretend one more time?”

“Okay.”

They went through it again, and his lawyer declared, “That's enough, Eugene!”

Chomsky glared at her and said defiantly, “
Gumby!
” He tapped his chest. “Badge.”

Linton's head dropped.

“Thanks, Gumby. You did great,” Kobera said.

Service patted the boy's massive shoulders. “You see where we are?” he asked Kobera.

“If this reenactment is even halfway close, there's no way Anise Aucoin stabbed him.”

“Do I get an explanation?” Linton asked.

“When we have one, Counselor,” Detective Kobera said.

“Badge mine?” Gumby interrupted.

“Yes, you earned it,” Kobera told the boy. “Thanks.”

“Let's talk to the surgeon who patched him up,” Service said when they were outside the room.

“I've got all the medical reports.”

“I want to hear the words come out of his mouth.”

The surgeon met them in the doctor's lounge and immediately lit a cigarette. There was dried blood on his scrubs and his hair was greasy. “Jimmy,” the doctor said.

Kobera said, “Dr. Guild, Grady Service of the DNR.”

“It's Fred,” the doctor said, shaking hands. “What can I do you guys for?”

The man had a powerful grip. Service reminded him of the case.

“I remember,” the surgeon said. “It's all in the medical records.”

“I just wanted to hear it from you.”

“Sure. The stab wounds were upward and from the boy's right.”

“Based on?”

“My eyes and ten years in Detroit Receiving Emergency. They like blades down there almost as much as guns.”

“Why didn't the blade hit something vital?” Service asked.

“The third wound was more parallel than the other two. It was still slightly upward, but basically parallel. Up a little bit more and the kid would have had serious problems.”

“Parallel to the floor?” Service asked.

“Or the ceiling—take your pick.”

Service got down on his knees and feigned two quick thrusts into Kobera's buttocks; then he extended slightly upward and struck again.

Dr. Guild said, “I think that looks pretty close to what happened. The third blow was meant to go deep. The assailant probably lifted a little to get additional leverage.”

They thanked the surgeon and walked outside. “You got somebody in mind?” Kobera asked.

“You agree it couldn't have been Aucoin?”

“Theoretically. The assailant was in the closet. If not the girl, who?”

“I'm working on that,” he said.

“You going to tell Hegstrom?” Kobera asked.

“In time,” Service said.
Where the hell had he put the damn rifle slugs?

42

TRENARY, MAY 16, 1976

“Who's the ‘Cap'n'?”

Joe Flap had vacated his house for the night to visit a friend in Ishpeming.

Cecilia Lasurm arrived around 8
p.m.
and stood in the dining room, shaking her rain hat like a wet dog. “U.P. weather,” she said.

“It rains everywhere,” he reminded her.

“Not in the Gobi Desert,” she said, tilting her head back to kiss him. “I was beginning to think our time had passed,” she said, hugging him gently, and after they lingered in the embrace, she turned away and sat down at the dining room table. “You pushed it too close out there on the lake,” she said.

“Thanks to Moe,” he said.

“Word is he never touched you.”

“Not with his hands. He tried to give me the last rites with a weighted priest.”

Lasurm's eyes were locked on him. “That's Moe. I've been visiting Anise,” she added. “I do most of the talking. Near as I can tell, she's been on junk since she left.”

“How're you?” he asked.

“My diagnosis is the kind that doesn't change. I'm coping.”

“Anise didn't stab the boy that night,” he said. “I think I have proof.”

“Actual evidence?” Her eyes were intense.

“The detective on the case buys it,” he told her.

“She refuses to talk about it,” Lasurm said. “Odd had a psychologist talk to her. He thinks she was too high to remember any of it.”

Service remembered the blank look on the girl's face that night. “Maybe she will now.”

“Have you told Odd?” Lasurm asked.

“Not yet. We know Eugene didn't stab himself. We know Ivan Rhino was in custody in the patrol car at the time, and we're pretty sure Anise didn't do it. All we know for certain is that the boy got stabbed.”

“You're not boosting my confidence,” she said. “Nobody else was there.”

“Who's the ‘Cap'n'?” he asked. Gumby and Ivan Rhino had been involved with Anise Aucoin, who was a Garden woman, and Gumby was now talking about “him-Cap'n.” It was a stretch, Service knew, but maybe there was another Garden link—and who would know better than Cecilia?

Lasurm lowered her eyes. “The army ranger captain or the fishing boat captain?”

“There's two of them?”
Shit,
he thought.

“Just one. For a while he claimed he served as a ranger in Vietnam, but I knew he was a cook with a habit and he never made it to Vietnam. They booted him out on a general discharge.”

“A step above dishonorable,” the said.

“I suppose,” she said. “When he got into fishing with the rats, he insisted whoever worked with him address him as captain. It's Moe,” she said. “Moe is the Cap'n.”

“Moe Lapalme?” Service said.

“Moe Lapalme,” she echoed. “What's Moe got to do with this?”

“Everything,” Service said. If he could find the damn slugs and get a match.