At the Scene of the Crime (22 page)

Hastings paid for dinner that night at Chez René, the best French restaurant in the city. Miles, Catt, and Loman were his guests. The champagne was excellent.

They toasted traffic cameras, time-marked and dated satellite photography, clocks, and justice.

LEOPOLD’S WIFE MOLLY SOMETIMES SAID THAT HE
worked almost as hard since his retirement as he’d done during those long years as captain of the city’s violent crimes squad. While not really true, there were often times when a call from his successor, Captain Fletcher, was enough to rouse him from the stupors of advancing age. One such call came while he was eating breakfast on a sunny September morning, contemplating a quiet day in the backyard with a good book.

“I hate to bother you,” Fletcher began, “but something’s come up.”

“Something always comes up,” Leopold said with a smile. “What is it this time?”

“I’ve had a call from Fire Marshal Pedley. He’s at the scene of an overnight blaze and he asked if you could come down and look at it.”

“Me? I’m no arson investigator. And I’m retired, remember?”

“He especially asked for you. Connie is on her way out there. She can pick you up and you won’t even have to drive.”

Connie Trent had been a lieutenant on the violent crimes squad ever since Leopold retired and Fletcher replaced him as captain. He’d always liked her, and when she picked him up in her car twenty minutes later somehow it was like old times. She was middle-aged now, but still retained the youthful charm and intelligence he remembered so well.

“What have we got, Connie?” he asked, sliding into the front seat next to her.

“A bad arson, Captain.”

“You always forget I’m retired,” he said. “Not a captain any longer.”

“You’ll always be one to me.” She went on, “It’s messy. The nozzle man, first firefighter into the building, was killed by a flashover. That makes it murder if we ever catch the guy.”

“Why does Pedley want me?”

“I don’t know. Something he found at the scene.”

He remembered an arson case about fifteen years earlier, when he was still captain. A firefighter had been shot inside a burning building, apparently by the discharge of a box of cartridges. Leopold proved it was something else. Now he reminded Connie. “Remember that one?”

“Sure, I was there with you when you cracked the case. But there are no bullets involved here. It was just the fire that killed him.”

They pulled up in front of a warehouse on the south side of town, near the docks. The streets were still clogged with fire engines, though the blaze seemed to be out. Even as they left the car one of the engines turned back toward the station, its bell clanging mournfully. A woman firefighter stood outside the building, awaiting their arrival. “Watch the hose,” she warned. “I’ll take you up to Marshal Pedley.” Connie remained outside.

Leopold had known him years ago when he first joined the fire department. A smart young man whose father had been a fire marshal in New York City, Pedley came to the job naturally. Leopold hadn’t seen him in years, but he recognized him at once. He was middle-aged now, but he still had the chiseled features and jutting jaw that Leopold remembered. He’d removed his smoke mask but still wore his helmet with the chin strap hanging loose. The fire had been reduced to charred beams hung with smoke, water dripping on them from above. A faint odor of gasoline lingered in the air.

“Sorry to get you down here, Leopold,” Pedley said, shaking hands. “You’d better put on this helmet in case things start falling.”

“Thanks.” He fitted the heavy contraption over his head.

“I know you’re retired, but I felt I had to get you in on this. One of our best men died in the fire, Sam Crandel from Engine Twenty-one. He was
the first in with his hose and he caught a flashover. It was shortly after one this morning.”

“Arson?”

“There’s not much doubt.” He steered Leopold toward a charred shelf near the door. “This was a little alarm clock rigged to set off a small firebomb of some sort, maybe just a firecracker. Ever see anything like it before?”

“Plenty of times. But arsonists today are usually a bit more sophisticated.”

“How about this?” he asked, shining his powerful flashlight at a copper pipe just above their heads. Leopold made out a bit of string with a tiny piece of red plastic attached, perhaps five feet above the charred remains of a foot-high stool. Pedley reached up and detached it.

“Is it—?”

“A balloon filled with a liquid accelerant, probably gasoline. You can still detect the odor. I believe there were several. Once the original flames burst them they created fireballs that spread quickly throughout the building. It’s a terrible hazard to firefighters and probably cost Sam Crandel his life.”

“This is what you brought me to see.”

Pedley nodded. “I wanted to know if your memory was the same as mine.”

Leopold moistened his dry lips, conjuring up a half-forgotten name from deep within his memory. “Parker Oslo, the arsonist. This was his specialty. But that was—what? Almost twenty years ago? He must be still in prison if he’s not dead.”

“Could we check? I didn’t want to suggest it until I was sure, and I remembered you were the one who tracked him down.”

“Connie Trent is outside. I’ll ask her to check on him.”

 

Connie had a way with computers that Leopold would never equal. Working from her laptop in the car she quickly accessed Parker Oslo’s name. “Here he is. He drew a twenty-year sentence in nineteen eighty-nine.

He was released on parole a year ago. Want his address?”

“Is he still in town?”

“Yep. Got an apartment on Schaefer Street.”

Leopold grunted. “How old would he be now?”

“Sixty-seven, according to his record. Old enough to be retired.”

“Do arsonists ever retire?”

“I doubt it,” Connie replied.

Schaefer Street had once been home to some of the city’s top executives. A white colonial house that had been the address of the telephone company’s president was now a funeral parlor. An adjoining house had been divided into four apartments, with an enclosed outside staircase ruining the perfect symmetry of the structure. It was there that they found Parker Oslo’s apartment, at the top of the outside staircase.

Leopold’s knock was answered by a young man wearing jeans and a faded rock group T-shirt. “Yeah?”

“We’re looking for Parker Oslo,” Connie said.

“Not here.”

She showed her ID. “Where can we find him?”

“Jeez, is this about his parole?”

“Who are you?” Connie asked.

“I’m his son. Randy Oslo.”

“Do you live here with him?” Leopold asked.

“I’m staying here a while, between jobs. I was only a little kid when he went to prison. It’s time I got to know him.”

“Is your mother in town?”

He shook his head. “California. That’s where I lived for sixteen years. She divorced him after his conviction.”

“When will he be home so we can talk to him?” Connie asked.

“He works part time at the supermarket down the block. You can probably find him there. He works till the business slacks off, then they send him home.”

They found the market without difficulty, one of those customer-friendly
places that employed retired men to help carry groceries to your car if needed. “That’s Oslo,” Leopold said, spotting him near the entrance.

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure. He’s missing the little finger on his left hand.”

Again, he allowed Connie to conduct the questioning. She approached the man and asked, “Are you Parker Oslo?”

His years in prison had left him with a pallid complexion that Leopold had seen many times before. For his part-time job he wore a plaid shirt and jeans, with a baseball cap hiding strands of stringy white hair. He seemed older than his sixty-seven years, but Leopold knew prison could do that. “That’s me,” he admitted in a gruff voice. “Who wants to know?”

“Lieutenant Trent,” she said, showing her ID. “Is there somewhere we could talk? We have some questions to ask.”

“I heard about the fire on the news. I suppose it’s that again. Can’t you people ever leave me alone?”

“You’re a convicted arsonist,” she reminded him.

“I’m retired.”

“My experience is that arsonists and pedophiles never retire.”

“Firebugs, maybe, but not arsonists.”

“There’s a difference?”

“Sure. An arsonist does it for money, a firebug is nothing more than a pyromaniac.”

“Was there money in burning an empty warehouse?”

“Maybe insurance.” Oslo pushed the cap further back on his head. “What time did the fire start?”

“About one o’clock this morning.”

“Then I’ve got an alibi; I was playing poker with some guys from ten o’clock till nearly two.”

“The arsonist used a timer,” Leopold said, speaking for the first time. “It could have been set well before ten o’clock.”

Oslo squinted at him. “Who are you? I remember you from somewhere.”

“Retired Captain Leopold. I’m the one who arrested you the last time.”

“Yeah. You were younger then.”

“Weren’t we all?”

“The arsonist used your technique,” Connie told him. “Complete with balloons. That’s why we’re here.”

He merely smiled at that. “It’s not patented. I won’t sue the guy.”

“It’s no joking matter. A firefighter was killed. We’re trying to determine if you were involved.”

“I never killed anyone,” he insisted. “I got that sentence because it was a third felony conviction.”

“I remember a firefighter was badly burned by one of your balloon bombs.”

“I didn’t do it to kill people.”

“Why did you do it, Oslo?” Leopold asked. “You never stayed around to watch your fires so you’re not a pyromaniac.”

“I did it for cash.” He glanced over his shoulder. “I gotta get back to work or I’ll lose my job.”

Connie wanted to question him further but he was already walking back to the store. “We’ll catch him later,” she said. “Let’s check in at headquarters.”

 

The death of a firefighter had brought out the media in force. Leopold was almost pleased that none of the younger TV journalists recognized him as he followed Connie into the building. They found Captain Fletcher in conference with Marshal Pedley and the dead fireman’s widow. Janice Crandel was a short young woman with dark hair and a pretty face now marred by tears. In happier days she was a woman who took care of herself, with perfectly manicured nails peeking out of a Band-Aid on one finger. She sat across from Fletcher but was more intent on what Pedley was telling her.

“I want you to know he died a hero, Mrs. Crandel. I knew Sam to be a brave firefighter, always one to lead his team into the flames. He’ll be buried with full departmental honors.”

“All the honors and death benefits you have won’t bring him back,” she told them, shaking her head. “He gave you twenty-four years of his life. You
can’t know what it was like to be married to him. He was already a firefighter when we met. He’d come home after his shift and tell me about it, about the terrible tragedies, the dead children, the arsonists, all of it. All the years he’d spent with the department. I wanted to share it with him. Sometimes I wished I could join the department myself, but Sam would just laugh and say I was too short.”

It was Fletcher who asked Pedley, “Do you have any ideas about this?”

The fire marshal frowned. “An empty warehouse usually means insurance, unless we’re dealing with a firebug. Do you know who owns that place?”

Fletcher motioned toward Connie. “See what you can find out about that.” He turned back to Janice Crandel. “Thank you for coming in. I’ll have an officer drive you home.”

Leopold walked outside with her. The breeze had blown her tears dry and she looked up at him. “I hope you get the man who killed my husband.”

“We’ll get him,” he promised.

“He’d been home sick with a stomach bug Monday night. I wanted him to stay home last night, but he insisted on going in. If he’d listened to me he’d be alive now.”

But someone else would be dead, Leopold said silently.

After she’d gone Fletcher asked Connie what luck they’d had with the arsonist. “We found Parker Oslo quite easily. He’s living right where he’s supposed to be and his son is with him temporarily. He claims he was playing cards with friends when the fire started this morning, but that means very little when a timer is used.”

“Do you think he’d risk going back to prison?”

Connie thought about it. “If someone paid him enough. I don’t think he’d do it just for a thrill.”

“Find out who owns that warehouse and question him.”

“I want to go along too,” Leopold requested. “If it’s really Oslo behind this, I’d like to be with you when you collar the bastard.”

Connie smiled at him. “Be my guest, Captain.”

The warehouse was owned by a New York realtor named Mitch Kovak who divided his time between Manhattan and Leopold’s city. They were in luck, finding him in his suite at the Rainbow Tower, one of downtown’s newest office buildings. Kovak was a big, jovial man not much younger than Leopold, but showing no signs of retirement. He kept them waiting only a few minutes before his secretary ushered them into his office. Its windows offered a panorama of the city and Leopold couldn’t help noticing that the ruined warehouse was visible along the waterfront.

“I’m Lieutenant Trent,” Connie told him, “and this is Captain Leopold, retired. He’s helping us because he knew the man who could be a suspect in torching your warehouse last night.”

“Well!” He swiveled his chair to peer out the window. “You know, the corporation owns so many old buildings like that, I didn’t even realize it was ours until my secretary told me this morning. You say you have a suspect?”