At the Scene of the Crime (15 page)

He took a noisy slurp from his coffee cup and said, “I like you. You don’t ask much. But you want to ask me somethin’, don’t you.”

“Yes, I do.”

“Then go ahead.”

I motioned to Diane and said, “I know you were on the docks the night that Samuel Kosten showed up, with Cassie Malone. Can you tell me about it, what you saw?”

“Well.” Another bite of a doughnut, and then he chewed and swallowed and said, “It was
I Love Lucy
night. I remember that. And there was no
wind, which is good. I was by the far dumpsters, just taking a breather. That late at night, I just like to look at the harbor. Just look at all those boats bobbin’ out there, all peaceful, all in their own little universe, all quiet and like. And then this truck came by. I was surprised, it being so late.”

“Did you recognize the truck from sometime before?” I asked.

He wiped some crumbs from his beard. “Nope. But there was a bumper sticker on this truck, something about fishermen having bigger poles or something. When it parked a guy came out, and then this girl with nice blonde hair like Marcia Duller, I dated back in high school, she had hair like that. And then they went inside, and I went back to standing by the dumpsters, just looking at the boats, until he came out.”

I said, “Did you hear anything from inside the building? Anything?”

A shake of the head. “No. My hearin’ ain’t that great.”

“All right. What happened later?”

“Well. Not too sure of the time then, but then the fella, he came out, by himself. Saw his face real good by the overhead light by the door. Looked pretty damn happy with himself.”

“Did he leave right away?”

“Yep. Got in his truck with the naughty bumper sticker and drove right off. A little while later, the sun came up, and I left to get some breakfast. Then, later, I heard from a cop I know that Diane and such were looking into something strange happenin’ at the fish co-op, and that’s when I came forward. Like a good citizen should, right?”

“Absolutely,” I said. “You were certainly being a good citizen.”

He smiled. “Thanks.”

We chatted for a few minutes more and then we went outside into the cold, to let Joshua finish his doughnuts in peace. As we reached the unmarked police cruiser, I turned to Diane.

“Identification?”

“Sure. Joshua ID’d Samuel’s driver license photo. But you see how he is. Any defense attorney will be able to cut him to pieces. I mean, look at what he said back there. He saw the whole thing the night that
I Love Lucy
is on television.”

I opened the door. “Do you believe that the murder occurred on a Monday night?”

She looked surprised. “Yes. Yes, we do. How did you know that?”

“Because during its six-year run on CBS in the 1950s,
I Love Lucy
was broadcast on Monday nights.”

Inside the cruiser Diane started up the engine and I said, “Let’s go to your office. If you have time.”

“Related to this case, right?”

“Of course.”

“Then I don’t mind at all.”

 

A week later, I was back at the Tyler police station, which is in a concrete structure that wouldn’t look out of place at the Falconer nuclear power plant. The interview room was adjacent to the booking area, and I was sitting there by myself when Detective Woods opened the door leading to her office and came in. Behind her was Samuel Kosten, wearing dirty blue jeans, tan workboots, and a dishwater-gray hooded sweatshirt. A Red Sox cap topped his head and he had a three-day growth of beard, and a smiling, know-it-all attitude. I wondered what the younger and attractive Cassie Malone had seen in such a specimen.

He pulled out a chair and sat down without being asked or invited, and Detective Woods sat next to me. The conference room table was black and small and scarred with cigarette butt burns and coffee cup rings. There was a shackle set up in the center for prisoners being interrogated, but Samuel wasn’t a prisoner.

Not yet.

Diane made the introductions and said, “My guest here is a crime scene investigation consultant on the matter of your girlfriend’s disappearance. We appreciate you coming in and taking the time to talk to us.”

He shrugged. “No prob. Besides, the weather sucks anyway. Can’t go out fishing even if I wanted to.”

Before me was a file folder, which I opened up, and I slowly and methodically put on my reading glasses.

“You realize, of course, that the police are continuing their investigation into the disappearance of Cassie Malone,” I said.

“Yeah. Though I don’t know if she’s gone or not, you know what I mean?”

Diane said quietly, “Are you telling us that you’ve heard from her?”

“Oh, hell no, not that.”

“Then why are you convinced that she’s not dead?”

He shrugged. “Like I told you before, and before that, and before that. Cassie was getting burned out at her job at the nuke plant. They had an outage coming up. That’s when they shut down the plant and do a lot of maintenance work. Then you get to work six-tens, as they call it. Six days in a row, ten hours a day. Sometimes more if there’s a problem that develops. She told me a few weeks ago she couldn’t stand the thought of working another outage. She said something about just running away, just running away and not contacting anyone, so she didn’t have to work the outage.”

I said, “Is that what you think happened?”

“Sure. Why not?”

“And you don’t think she would have contacted her mother? Or other family members? Or her place of employment?”

He laughed, and I decided I didn’t like the look of his teeth. He said, “Thing about Cassie is, Cassie does what Cassie wants to. And if she wants to run off without telling anybody, including me, I wouldn’t put it past her.”

“I see.”

I made it a point of flipping through the papers and watched to see his expression, but his expression didn’t change. He seemed to be the kind of guy who liked putting one over on officialdom, whether it be a harbor-master or coast guardsmen or the local police.

I stopped flipping through the papers and said, “Could you tell us again the last time you saw Cassie?”

“Lunch, couple of weeks ago. At Jimmy’s Fine Catch, over in Falconer.”

“And you haven’t heard from her since then?”

“Nope.”

“And never saw her again?”

“Nope.”

I looked to Diane and gave her the slightest of nods, to prepare her for what was coming, and she gave me just the slightest nod in return. So much was riding on that quick little gesture, from her career to bringing me in on a case like this, to possible embarrassment for the Tyler Police Department, and up to and including seeing whether or not this charming slug across from me ever got justice.

I flipped another sheet of paper. It looked like he was trying to read it upside down. Good for him. I said, “What would you say, Mister Kosten, if a witness came forth to allege that two Mondays ago, he saw you and Miss Malone enter the Tyler Harbor Fishing Cooperative building, and saw you depart without her?”

His face flushed. “I’d say he was lying, that’s what.”

“So. Two Mondays ago, you were never in that building.”

“No!”

“And you were never in that building with Miss Malone.”

“No!”

Here we go. “And you’ve never been in that building with Miss Malone at any time?”

His face was even more flushed. “Never! Jesus, how many times do I have to tell you? Cassie put up with me but didn’t like fish that much. She’s never been in that building. Not ever.”

He looked to me and then looked at Diane and there was just the faintest hint in his eyes that perhaps he had gone too far. Maybe. But I thought I could tell what was going on there, that he was reviewing what he had done, how he had cut up the body and ground up the pieces and cleaned and cleaned and cleaned, and maybe, if there was something, that they’d be making an arrest, not talking, not then, they’re just bluffing, that’s all, keep cool, they have nothing. . . .

Now he smiled. “No, not ever.”

I looked at him and said, “How long did you know Cassie?”

“Eight, nine months.”

“A number of witnesses said that you had a rocky relationship. Many arguments.”

“So what? Who doesn’t have a fight with his girlfriend?”

I said, “Did you ever strike her?”

“Huh?”

“Did you ever hit her? Or punch her?”

“Never! And anybody who says that happened is lying. And you can count on that.”

I went back to the files for a moment, and then said, “You ever see her at work?”

“Huh?”

I said, “You said you never brought her to the co-op building. Did she ever bring you to the power plant?

He shook his head. “Nah, never. Once she wanted to do it but it was too much of a hassle. Had to do a background check to get in there, even for a quick visit. Give up your birthday and your social security number. Who needs crap like that?”

“Do you know what she did for work?”

“Yeah. Something in the health physics department.”

“Doing what?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “Some sort of technician or something—hell, what is this? A final exam or something?”

I made a point of closing the folder. “No, it’s not. It’s an explanation of what’s about to happen next. You see, Mister Kosten, Cassie worked at the power plant in and around certain radioactive materials. She was constantly exposed on a daily basis to these radioactive materials. At no time was she ever in any danger or physical harm. In fact, the radiation that she was exposed to is strictly monitored and measured.”

His face was expressionless. I went on. “But radiation is a funny animal. When you place a radioactive material next to something else, that second material also becomes radioactive. Not as much as the source material but
still, it’s a measurable amount. And it never goes away. Do you understand that? It never goes away. It’s always there. It can’t be cleaned. It can’t be scrubbed. It can’t wash off. It’s always there. Forever.”

Samuel shifted in his seat. I said, “And the funny thing is this, due to the different areas of the power plant where Cassie worked, the different types of radiation that she was exposed to, her exposure is unique. Like a fingerprint. It’s all her own.”

I opened up the second folder. “As you can see here, this is Cassie’s personnel file. And enclosed here are her radiation exposure records. Something like a DNA sample. If we can match the radiation that she received with something that she was in proximity with, we can then determine that she was there. Detective?”

Diane got up and left the room, and then came back in with a young man in a dark gray business suit. He had a large black case with him, like the old sample cases from traveling salesmen of years gone by, and he placed the case on the tabletop, and then opened it up. From inside the case he pulled out a small yellow metal box with a digital readout and dial, and a small black probe that was attached to the box by a black vinyl cord.

“Permit me to introduce State Police Detective Joseph Stevens,” I said. “In addition to his regular duties, Detective Stevens has also received training from the Homeland Security Department, and is a radiation health control officer. As you can see, he has brought a sensing device with him today. Detective Stevens, if you would.”

Holding the probe out before him, he swept it near Detective Woods, paying particular attention to her hands. There was the faintest click-click coming from the machine as he slowly did his work. Then he went over and did my hands, and there was the same result. Click-click-click.

When he was done with the two of us, he paused. I looked to him and nodded, and he went over to Samuel Kosten, whose face seemed to be suddenly perspiring.

When the probe reached the fisherman’s hands, the faint click-click started chattering, chattering loud and fast, until it was almost a roar.
Detective Stevens made a point of reviewing the digital read outs and dials, and looking at Cassie Malone’s personnel record.

“It’s a match,” he said.

Samuel drew his hands away, like they had suddenly been burnt. “Of course there’d be a match! Hell, I was with her! I touched her! That doesn’t prove anything!”

I said, “Perhaps. But I believe Detective Stevens has one more place he wants to examine with his sensing device. Go ahead, detective.”

The state police detective went back to the large black carry case and reached in and pulled out something wrapped in light blue plastic. He let it fall to the conference table with an audible thud that made Samuel jump a bit. It was about a foot long, six inches wide. Stevens unwrapped it, revealing a screw-type piece of metal.

Samuel was studiously looking at his hands. I said softly, “If I’m correct, this is a piece of the disposal unit system at the Tyler Harbor Fishing Cooperative. It was removed earlier this morning and brought here by Detective Stevens. Let’s see what happens when he examines it, shall we?”

The probe went down to the exposed piece of metal, and the sensing device roared into action. Click-click-click it went, and it was amazing, just seeing Samuel Kosten’s face change color from fleshy red to ghastly white. The state police detective looked to me and then Diane, and then switched off his sensing device.

“Another match,” he said.

“Very good,” I said. “Mister Kosten.”

“Yes.” His voice was barely audible.

“You’ve said here and in other interviews with Detective Woods that your girlfriend, Cassie Malone, was never at the Tyler Harbor Fishing Cooperative. Yet we now have evidence that not only was she in the building, but that her body was processed through the disposal system. Combine that with the witness who put you and Cassie Malone at the fishing cooperative building just over two weeks ago, I believe there are some questions that need to be answered.”