A Field of Red (12 page)

“What a god-awful mess.”

Chief King was not happy. A million dollars, and their best leads, gone.

He and the other police officers and investigators sat around the police station conference room table. The disaster known as the ransom drop was hours ago, and they had met to try and figure out what had gone wrong.

“I don’t even know where to start,” King said, looking at the others around the table. “I can’t believe we’ve got nothing. Even after they got away, I assumed we’d pick up the trackers, or get a sighting, or something. How did they get away?”

No one answered him.

“First of all, we didn’t cordon off the right streets,” King said. “Agent Shale? Graves? You guys set up the roadblocks.”

Everyone turned to look at FBI Agent Shale and Sergeant Graves, waiting for an answer. Graves glanced at Shale, who didn’t answer.

“We blocked the major roads in all directions, as you know,” Graves finally said, looking at notes on a piece of paper in front of him. “But the driver used the narrow alleys. He had a car hidden behind one of the downtown shops. The young man, described as early 20s with a camouflage jacket and short brown hair, grabbed the money from the trash receptacle outside of the Old Hotel and crossed the street while our plainclothes were distracted by the female. Presumably, she was working with him. He ducked inside the shop, as everyone saw, and went through to the waiting car.”

“Had to be a local,” Deputy Peters said. “Those alleys are hard to navigate. How fast were they going?”

“Not sure,” Graves answered. “Pretty fast. By the time we figured out, they were at least two miles south of town.”

The Chief shook his head. “Sixty miles an hour down those narrow alleys? That’s impossible.”

“That’s what happened, as far as we can tell,” Graves said. “I thought we had them boxed in, between the river and the tracks, but they went south out of town, crossing near Maple Hill Nurseries and coming out by the cemetery.

The Chief nodded. He knew that back road well; it was popular with teenagers trying to get a little privacy. He’d shooed plenty of cars off that little stretch of road. He turned and looked at Agent Shale.

“No one was stationed on Canal Road?”

Shale looked at the Chief but didn’t answer. Chief King was starting to get the feeling he was lecturing a surly teenager for not doing their homework.

Finally, Graves spoke up again. “Yes, but further south. We couldn’t know they would take the alleys and skirt the roadblock. It was a lucky guess, on their part, to go west. If they had gone east, we would have caught them at Kyle Park, at the roadblock on Canal road. They just got lucky, sir.”

The room went quiet.

Chief King didn’t know what else to say. They were back to square one. He shook his head, livid, and looked around.

“Where did Nick go?” he asked.

“I took Mr. Martin home, sir,” Deputy Peters said. “He was pretty shaken up when they got away.”

King was so agitated, he couldn’t sit still. He stood and started pacing in a circle around the table.

“Well, that’s it,” King barked, furious. “Our best, and really only lead, gone.

Deputy Peters leaned forward. “Well, we do have good descriptions on both of them. If they’re local, someone will recognize them, especially the girl.”

King nodded. It was something, at least.

“Okay,” he said. “We need to get sketches made. Get the artist in here tonight and get the sketches out to all local precincts, especially those to the south, where the car went,” King said. “And let’s do another round of interviews—see if anyone knows these two.”

“We should polygraph everyone again,” Agent Shale volunteered. “See if anyone—”

Chief King put his hand up.

“I think we’ve done enough of that,” King said, shutting him down. “And putting you on point on this isn’t working. You had the ‘blocks in all the wrong places.”

The young agent looked up at the Chief, and King could tell the kid was trying to decide whether to argue or not.

“I was going by the book—”

“Field experience,” the Chief said, sitting back down. It came out louder than he thought it would, but he didn’t care. “You should get some. Especially before coming in here and telling people what to do. Experience tells you when to follow the book and when to ignore it.”

Agent Shale looked down at the table. King looked around at the rest.

“Anyone else?”

There were no takers.

“Okay, then get to work.”

The rest of the police department stood and filed away, talking quietly among themselves. No one approached King or tried to talk to him. He knew that meant they were all out of ideas.

Agent Shale looked at King for a long time, like he was trying to decide what to say. King thought he might be trying to apologize but wasn’t sure how. After a time, Shale simply stood up, nodded at King, and walked away.

The Chief stared down at his notes, flipping through all the sheets of his current pad, #4 for this investigation. For the first time during this investigation, he had nothing. No searches, no files, no information that needed to be gathered. He had all the information already, but it simply didn’t line up.

He sat back and looked around at the others. Some were hunched over their phones or flipping through computer screens. Others had simply left. King didn’t see Agent Shale anywhere.

His cousin, Deputy Peters, was sitting across the room looking at King, shaking his head. After a second, he got up and walked over and sat down.

“You okay?” Peters asked.

 “This case doesn’t add up,” King said.

Peters nodded. “You’ve been doing this a lot longer than I have, Jeff. What do you do when you have to start over, and redo it all from scratch?”

King shook his head.

His cousin looked at him, and King could tell the young man was worried. “What do you do when you’re stuck?”

“I don’t know,” he said, but he had one more idea. “Will you get me some coffee? Have Lola make a couple pots, if she’s still here. It’s going to be a long night.”

Deputy Peters stood and left, and King gathered up all of his files. He went back to the beginning, grabbing the other notepads from his desk and spreading them out on the conference room table. He scanned each, flipping through them slowly. He looked at pages and pages of notes: his first walk-through of the crime scene, interviews with everyone involved, the ransom call and the Martins, anonymous phone calls coming into the tip line. And, near the end, details he didn’t want to forget about the botched ransom drop.

Peters retuned with two cups of coffee and sat, not interrupting the Chief’s process.

He reviewed all the other details he’d jotted down—unimportant at the time but still captured in the lined yellow pages. Which volunteers had signed up to help with the park searches. The weather each day of the investigation. Recorded times of phone calls with other agencies. Notes from his phone conversation with the Bureau office in Cincinnati, before they sent Agent Shale. Calls from concerned citizens. Pages and pages of notes and drawings and reminders—

He spotted something he’d forgotten, a loose end he’d never followed up on. King looked up at Peters, then held up the pad and pointed to a scribbled note in one corner of a lined yellow page. In King’s blocky script, it read WHO IS FRANK HARPER?

“That’s what you do, Deputy,” King said. “You bring in fresh eyes.”

Chief King walked out of the police station. It was raining.

He was immediately assaulted by flashing lights and shouting voices. The press, who had been following every development in the case with their usual morbid excitement, were positively foaming at the mouth after this afternoon’s botched ransom drop. Word had gotten out almost immediately, somehow, and he and Agent Shale had held a press conference at eight p.m., only minutes after they returned from searching for, and finding, the black bag that had once contained the ransom. They had found only the ruined trackers.

All the print and local TV stations were still there. The TV reporters were waiting to do live shots on the evening news at 10 or 11, depending on the station.

“Chief! Any news?” one of them shouted out. The others gathered around King.

“Have you made any progress on identifying the driver?” another one yelled.

Chief King shook his head. “We may know more by morning,” he said and pushed his way through the ring of reporters and camera men.

“What about the Martin family? How are they holding up?” King recognized the voice. It was Ken Meredith from CM-TV, their local public access channel. In a normal situation, he would have stopped and answered his question, but King knew he had to ignore the man. Rule number one with the press: “just keep walking.”

He got to his police cruiser and drove away. Photographers braved the falling rain and chased him to his car, flashes of light breaking the night, as he was photographed leaving the station. Didn’t those photographers have anything better to take pictures of? As excited as the reporters were, King was surprised none of them followed him away from the station.

Deputy Peters had called around and found out where the guy was tonight. He didn’t live in the area but was just visiting, staying at the Vacation Inn. The night manager had told Peters where to find him.

King drove downtown and found a parking space near Ricky’s. He almost never went in there while he was on duty, but tonight, it couldn’t be helped.

He headed inside. Even with the cold rain falling outside, it was stuffy and warm in the bar. King saw a dozen furtive glances meet his as he walked in and looked around. Having a cop in here would make a few people nervous.

King nodded at Rosie, the bartender and owner.

“Hey, Chief,” she said, smiling. “Get you something?” she asked good-naturedly. She knew, as well as anyone in town, that he didn’t drink.

“Thanks, Rosie. Just in for a minute.”

King looked around and spotted the guy instantly. He was one of the few people sitting alone. King walked up to his table.

“Mind if I join you?”

The man looked up. King was struck by his eyes, how deep and penetrating they appeared. He looked like a thinker, but a pissed-off one. And half in the bag.

Maybe this was a bad idea.

Mr. Harper sat back and looked at King, then waved at the seat across from him.

“It’s a free country.”

The Chief sat down. The guy looked like he was past help—either past anyone helping him or him helping King with the case. This Frank Harper person epitomized “rough around the edges.”

Chief King set his latest yellow pad and a folder down on the table between them. The tab on the edge read “Frank Harper,” in Deputy Peter’s precise handwriting. For someone who was such a klutz, he sure had perfect handwriting.

“I know why you’re here,” Frank said, nodding at Chief King. “And I’m sorry. I can’t help. Believe me, I thought about it,” he said, raising the beer he was working on—there were four other empties already on the table—and waved it at King. “But I do wish you luck.”

“Is that why you decided not to help, when Sergeant Burwell asked for assistance?” the Chief asked, nodding at the beer in Mr. Harper’s hand. “Cutting in to your ‘me’ time?”

The man looked up, and King could see he’d struck a nerve.

“I figured you’d be talking to me today,” Mr. Harper said, glancing around the bar. “Maybe about your Stan situation, but more likely about your case. That ransom drop was a fiasco.”

Harper looked around, and King wondered what he was thinking.

“I couldn’t care less,” Mr. Harper continued. “But the news is all over it—ransom paid, kidnappers sighted, kidnappers escape. Sounds like Mayberry.”

King looked at Frank sharply.

“Yes, we had a couple of missteps,” King admitted. “But Stan is suspended. We didn’t realize the extent...anyway, I don’t appreciate being lectured by—”

“Screwed the pooch, I’d say,” the man said. “A wife beater working in your office is bad enough. How many of your guys looked the other way on that one? But honestly, you looked like a cornered animal at that 8 p.m. press conference, and that FBI kid behind you was just staring at the floor.” Harper laughed, a sharp, cold laugh. “He looked like he’d just been grounded.”

Chief King didn’t know what to say. The assessment was accurate, but King was surprised by the man’s sudden sobriety.

King tapped on the yellow pad on the table. The page was covered with notes and scribbles. In one corner, it read “Birmingham Office” and “N.O.P.D.—Retired” and “St. Bartholomew Parish Hospital.”

 “We need a hand,” the Chief said, shaking his head. “This is something we don’t have a lot of experience with. You do, or so your case file says.”

The man didn’t respond.

“Why won’t you help? It’s standard, helping out other offices. Your file said you worked as a liaison with the Bureau on several cases. Surely you worked with other jurisdictions, before you retired. And you’ve got experience with kidnappings, more than anyone around here—”

“You don’t need my help,” Mr. Harper said quietly, almost too low from Chief King to hear it. Harper was staring at his bottle, then looked up at King.  “I think you’re just looking to spread the blame around a little. Today was a mess; you should get the Bureau to send you a more experienced agent. I’m assuming that was his horror show?”

King nodded as Rosie walked up to the table.

“One of my customers misbehaving?” she asked, picking up the empties.

King shook his head.

“No, everything’s fine.”

“Fine?” she said, looking around. “My sales are off by half since you walked in here, Chief,” she said quietly.

The Chief glanced around and noticed how many people were nursing nearly-empty bottles. They probably thought he was here on a drunk-driving sting.

“Don’t worry,” he said to Rosie, then raised his voice a little, so others could hear him. “I’ll be leaving soon.”

She nodded and walked away. When King looked back at the man across the table, Mr. Harper was grinning.

“Not even welcome in your own town?”

“Things are tense,” King answered, sitting straighter. “And I don’t need a drunk drifter to tell me that.”

He expected the man to say something sharp, but Mr. Harper only nodded, looking at the table.

“Look, you don’t want me involved,” the man said quietly. King had expected the man to be defiant and surly, based on the file, but this man sitting across from him just seemed sad. Sad and lost. And alone.

“Why not?” King asked.

Mr. Harper looked up at him.

“I haven’t done an active investigation in years,” Mr. Harper said quietly. “I’m retired, riding the cold case desk in Birmingham. Running out the clock, so to speak. You know that already. You pulled my file,” he said, nodding at the table.

King nodded and flipped open the file. It was impressive, for the most part. He’d been on the job 21 years, taking retirement in 2010 with a half pension. There was no mention in the file as to why he didn’t get the full pension. But the last years had been rough, after Katrina. Evidently, something had happened, something bad enough to break up his marriage and send his career into a tailspin. He and the NOPD had not parted on good terms.

“Look, is this about what happened in New Orleans?” Chief King began. “Because if it is—”

The man’s face turned red with sudden fury. “I don’t want to talk about that,” Mr. Harper said, his eyes boring into King. King could see that Harper was clenching his fists.

The Chief sat back.

“Okay. Look, I know you’re retired,” King said, trying to take a different tack. “I know about some of the things that happened to you. But I don’t care. We need a fresh perspective.”

 “I can’t. I hope you understand,” Mr. Harper said, shaking his head again.

King pressed on. “We just need someone to look over the files, to see what we missed—”

“No,” Mr. Harper said quietly. Before the Chief knew what was happening, the man suddenly stood and walked toward the door. It all happened so fast, King didn’t have time to react. Thank God the man hadn’t drawn on him. Chief King was certain Mr. Harper was carrying.

But the only thing the ex-cop did was to drop a stack of ones on the bar and walk out into the rain.

The Chief sat back and flipped his file closed, flummoxed.  Mr. Harper could have been a valuable asset, with his background, but clearly the man was unstable. And unpredictable. It probably wasn’t worth it, bringing in yet another wrinkle into a case that was exhausting everyone, pushing them to the breaking point. King didn’t need to be trying to solve an impossible case and, at the same time, try to manage an unstable drunk.

But King also knew the case needed fresh eyes. It wasn’t going anywhere but downhill, and fast.

Hurrying, Chief King gathered up his things and followed Mr. Harper out the door, nodding at a relieved-looking Rosie as he left.

Outside, the Chief looked around. Mr. Harper was walking up the sidewalk along the south side of Main Street. The rain was falling in sheets, and the gutters were small rivers, carrying along leaves of many colors. King saw one of the playing cards from the ransom drop fiasco wash down the gutter and disappear into a grate.

Chief King shook his head and followed Harper. King caught up with him as they passed under the green awning at O’Shaughnessy’s, the restaurant on the corner of Second and Main. The awning was decorated with shamrocks and a leprechaun, the mascot for the restaurant.

“Wait up,” King said.

Harper stopped and turned, shaking his head.

“Look, I’ve thought about it, okay?” Harper said. “I appreciate the offer. And it would probably do me some good, getting back to work. At least, that’s what people have told me. But I had too many of these kinds of cases go bad.”

The Chief nodded. Finally, some honesty.

“I understand,” King said. “And this one might go bad as well—that’s just the nature of our job, right? You do what you can, chase the leads. But we’ve got nothing. On this case, nothing adds up. And now, with this ransom drop fiasco, we’re back to square one.”

Mr. Harper glanced out into the rain.

“Well, even so, you’re better off without me.” He started to turn, but King grabbed his shoulder. Mr. Harper looked down at King’s hand, and the Chief suddenly realized the man was trying to decide whether or not to retaliate.

Chief King let go.

“Look, I didn’t want to do this,” Chief King said. “But I need your help.”

“Didn’t want to do what?” Mr. Harper said, staring at him, those eyes boring into the Chief. “You gonna arrest me? Over that horseshit with Stan? I doubt he’ll press charges.”

Chief King shook his head.

“No, no, nothing like that,” King said. “But I did see your files. Your last few years at the NOPD were rocky, and times have been lean for you. Even with that cold case job, you’re flat broke.”

Mr. Harper didn’t say a word. The Chief could tell what he was thinking. It was the same thing King would be thinking, put in the same situation. He’d be calculating, figuring the angles. After a moment, the man looked at King.

“You ran my credit?”

King ignored the question.

“What I’m saying is there’s a substantial reward. $50,000,” King said. “Or I can pay you for your time. As a consultant, or investigator, or whatever. Either way.” King looked at Harper for a long moment. “But I need your help if we’re going to catch these guys. There are a bunch of things that just don’t add up.”

Mr. Harper looked at him. The moment hung in the air between them. King had laid out the bait, and, after a long moment, the man finally took it.

“Like what?”

King pointed off into the rain, in the general direction of the crime scene, several blocks away.

“The abduction scene, for one thing,” King said. He stepped closer to Harper, leaning in. “Middle of the morning, lots of visibility, lots of houses around there. Right by the school, and no one saw anything.”

“That doesn’t mean anything—” Harper began.

“It’s one of the busiest parts of town on a school day. Someone saw something, and isn’t talking. Why? And the girls were gone for almost a whole week before the first contact came in. Why wait so long?” King said.

Rain pounded the green awning above them, rivulets of water making tiny rivers that ran down the fabric and fell to the ground. King watched the man, watching for a decision. Biding his time. They were the only ones out in the downpour, alone except for the rain around them.