Beneath the Weight of Sadness (39 page)

Detective Parachuk

Two months after Truman’s death

The small stream that runs in the middle of our town, the Catatunk, eventually wends its way to the Delaware and then into the Atlantic. If you follow it south from town it flows through two developments and under a highway, but eventually comes out onto fields once used for agriculture, and then into woods. That’s where I often found myself on quiet summer days attempting to catch rainbow trout with flies I made down in my cellar on long and cold winter nights. It’s there, in those woods, where another angler found the body of Tommy Beck. Like Truman Engroff, he’d only been dead for five or six hours before he was discovered. He’d been shot twice in the chest at fairly close range, five or six feet. His car, a Cadillac Seville SUV, was still in the trampled and worn area where anglers parked. Inside was his cell phone, a pair of sunglasses, a half-empty bottle of high-energy drink, a Persia High baseball cap, a
Persia Messenger
weekly paper, the car keys and, taped to the steering wheel, a note. The note was constructed of letters cut from a variety of magazines. It read: TOMMY BECK KILLED TRUMAN ENGROFF.

The following day, without incident, Ethan Engroff was arrested in connection with the murder of Tommy Beck. He was released within hours, not because his guilt was in doubt, but because there was no real evidence connecting him to the crime and he had hired one of the best lawyers in the state, perhaps in the country. We did gain a search warrant for his home, and, tucked away in a filing drawer behind a seemingly unorganized bunch of tabbed files, we found a 9mm with a fully loaded magazine, a shell still in the chamber. The gun had been fired recently. I regretted that particular fact, because I liked Ethan Engroff. He was a good man who loved his son more than he did his own freedom or, I guess, his own life.

It wasn’t that simple, however. Amy Engroff, his wife, said Ethan had been home the evening of Tommy Beck’s murder. His secretary at his business and his manager swore he was in the office for the whole of that workday. To complicate those facts was another just as staggering: After the autopsy, it was discovered that the bullets found in Tommy’s body were not from a 9mm but from a Colt .45. That didn’t let Ethan Engroff off the hook, though. The .45 that killed Tommy was old, the kind often used as a sidearm by military men. Ethan’s grandfather happened to be a one-star general. Nothing in this case, from the moment we found Truman Engroff’s body, was to be easy. I wondered if Truman Engroff looked down upon this town with condemning eyes and smiled. I know I sure as hell did. Even people who think they can behave with moral purpose quite often don’t. Two boys were killed and probably both out of hate. It’s not funny, only ironic.

To complicate matters even further, after a search warrant was acquired for the Beck home, we found the baseball bat that had killed Truman Engroff. It was haphazardly among three other bats in the trunk of Rich Beck’s own SUV. The only fingerprints on the bat were those of Tommy Beck and Carly Rodenbaugh. Carly was brought in for questioning, along with another lawyer with as much clout as the one hired by Ethan Engroff. She was never seriously considered as a suspect, and her explanation for the prints on the bat was logical. She and Tommy had often played “flies and grounders.” They’d also slept together for almost two years.

She did very little talking during that interview, and I have to say I was slightly puzzled by her demeanor. The fact that Tommy Beck was dead seemed to affect her emotional state very little. She looked all the officers square in the face with those green, penetrating, beautiful eyes and not once shed a tear. It was like we’d asked her questions about what she was doing later on that day. I don’t know. I guess I expected more from her. She admitted to having been in love with the Beck boy in the past, but it was like all the feeling attached to that admission had been erased. The only time I saw a flutter in those eyes was when we mentioned or talked about Truman, Ethan or Amy Engroff. Then something appeared in the green irises that made them even greener, darker, sadder.

It was with weariness in my heart that I went down into the bank of that stream and crouched on my haunches to look at Tommy Beck. In death, he wore an expression of astonishment. I haven’t had to see many dead bodies in my time as a police officer. Frankly, I don’t know how people stand it. I’m told you get used to it—you get to where you can look at a dead body and only think of evidence or what your wife might be making for dinner. I don’t believe it. Not for a minute. Probably the highest rate of alcoholism is among homicide detectives. They may not crouch down and want to shed tears like I did, but they can’t just go on like each lost life is the same as every other lost life. Like it’s nothing.

I remembered being in the game room with Tommy that night, weeks before. I remembered how he’d been nervous about that fight with the Brown boy. I remembered how he both wanted and didn’t want his father to take over for him. There’d been a kind of embarrassment or anger when his father walked into the room. He was a boy, is what he was. Just a boy with a real talent, and then he was lying headfirst toward the edge of the stream with his eyes wide open and his face looking astonished that he wouldn’t be doing anything anymore. Not a thing. Now this town had two dead boys almost the same age. All the grief as a result of those two dead boys, permanent grief for some—it made me sick. I hated thinking about it.

But also, we knew now that he’d killed Truman Engroff. Beat that poor, smart boy to death with a baseball bat. Where did rage and hate like that come from? Of course, even though the bat was found in Rich Beck’s trunk he was making a big stink about how it couldn’t possibly be his son who’d murdered Truman Engroff. His boy wouldn’t do such a thing no matter what kind of person that Engroff kid was.

It’s funny, though. The most verbose Carly Rodenbaugh became was when we questioned her about her opinion on why Tommy may have beaten Truman Engroff to death. Her lawyer was there along with two FBI agents and me. One was named Beckham, arrogant and young, and the other one was Treadville. He was my age and more down to earth, you might say.

“I don’t think anyone in this room thinks you killed Truman Engroff, Carly,” I said. “We’re all aware of how you felt about him. But what about Tommy? Do you think he was capable of killing that boy?”

Her lawyer put his hand on her arm and shook his head. She ignored it.

“At one time I would’ve said no, definitely not. But there was another part of Tommy that it took me a while to learn about.”

“What was that, Carly?” Treadville asked. “What part was that?”

Carly paused.

“He only saw everything in his life in one way,” she said finally. “He was a complicated person, but complicated, I guess, in the same way baseball can be complicated. But not fuzzy complicated. The rules are the rules and Tommy didn’t like to step outside those white lines. I guess that’s why he hated Truman.”

“What do you mean, Carly?” I said.

She looked at me and I saw a slight change in her eyes. I thought she might cry, but she didn’t. Instead she shook her head.

“Truman was so different and never played by rules. I don’t think he knew what the word meant. He was too smart for all of us. That’s what he was.”

Beckham leaned towards Carly.

“That really doesn’t make any sense. I mean, you know, if that’s why you think, because he was different, that would justify Tommy killing the Engroff kid with a bat. There has to be more than that.”

This time her lawyer gripped her arm tighter, but again Carly ignored it. Most kids her age would’ve shown fear with an FBI agent bearing down on them like that, but not Carly. Part of it was probably how beautiful she was. Beauty gives those people a confidence the rest of us don’t have, usually, but also part of it was the privilege and power she’d been raised amidst.

“Truman being dead doesn’t make any sense.”

She stared directly at Beckham and then she began to cry and everyone in the room was silent. “I don’t know the motives for why someone would kill someone else. You tell me what more there has to be.”

“Alright, Carly,” I intervened. “We found Tommy out in the woods next to the Catatunk. He’d been shot twice in the chest. And who more to want him dead than Ethan Engroff? We know he went to a town in Pennsylvania and had a woman buy him a gun only a week ago. So we know what his intention was. Did Ethan Engroff kill Tommy Beck, Carly? Is that what happened?”

“I don’t know.”

She looked at me and I could see something in those eyes, but I wasn’t sure what it was. “I guess I wouldn’t blame him if he did, Mr. Parachuk.”

“Why do you say you wouldn’t blame him?” Treadville asked. “Do you think Tommy deserved to die?”

Again her lawyer with the hand and again Carly shrugging it off.

“I didn’t say that, but I’m not Ethan Engroff, am I? I’m not the one who lost a son, am I?”

Beckham leaned forward again and I was reminded of an aggressive dog leashed and snapping.

“You were seen with Ethan Engroff in…” He leafed through his notes. “You were seen on Wednesday afternoon two weeks ago at George Manner Park. The two of you. What were you doing?”

“He followed me there,” Carly said. “I sometimes go there after school just to be alone. He followed me there from school. I think he needed to be near me…to be near someone that was so close to Truman. I hadn’t seen him or Amy since the funeral.”

“Why?” Beckham pushed.

“Why what?”

“Why haven’t you seen them since?” Beckham reiterated. “I mean, if you’re so close to them. If you’re like family.”

Carly actually laughed in his face.

“What would I say to them? What could I possibly do for them? I didn’t go…”

But this time she let her lawyer stop her. He told us he didn’t want Carly answering that line of questioning. She wasn’t obligated to. It was her decision to stay away and it was done out of respect for them. For their private grief.

“What did you talk about with Ethan at the park?” I said. “Why did he follow you there? You said to be close to someone who knew Truman.”

“I guess that’s what it was. I ended up crying. He smelled like Truman and I was so reminded of Truman. They were close without ever knowing it. Truman always got along better with Amy, but he and Ethan were the most alike. I couldn’t help think that when he sat next to me at that tree.”

“Did he ask you anything like, ‘Do you think Tommy Beck killed my son?’” Treadville said. “Did he say he wanted to seek revenge, find out who’d done it? Anything like that?”

“No, he didn’t say anything like that. Not to me, anyway.”

“So you just talked about what, Carly?” I said. “Why did he follow you there, do you think?”

“We talked about Truman mostly, and Ethan’s grief. We talked about Amy and how she’d disappeared into her own world since Truman died. Like I said, Mr. Parachuk, I think he came because he needed to be near someone who’d been close to his son.”

We concluded the interview soon after that. The three of us were frustrated, not so much because Carly hadn’t told us anything, but because there wasn’t anyone to arrest even though all three of us thought the people to arrest were right in front of us. We were certain Ethan Engroff had killed Tommy Beck. But there wasn’t any gun and he had an alibi. Not his wife’s alibi, but the people at his plant. There was evidence he’d been there that entire day. People had seen him. But would so many people lie for him? I don’t know.

When I drove to the Beck house and informed Rich Beck of his son’s death, he wept like I hadn’t expected him to do. I stood there in the rain holding my hat and waiting for him to stop, but he didn’t. He just finally closed the door and I still stood there in the rain for a moment longer. I thought about what would be said on the other side of that door. What kind of grief would result from what I had to tell those people.

And the Engroffs, and the kind of grief that would make a seemingly normal and good man decide to murder a boy. I was still convinced he’d been the shooter, but we didn’t have any proof, no evidence placing him at the scene. And no weapon with which to link him to the murder.

I wondered how long it would be before those people ever healed, if they ever did. Maybe something like that never ends until you take your own place in the ground. And what is incredible about this whole awful event is that it revolved around one boy, and who he was. If he hadn’t been gay, I suspect none of this would’ve ever happened. I think about that a lot. Truman Engroff was a remarkable kid. I’d interviewed enough people to know that. And he didn’t give a damn what people thought of him, but he also didn’t throw who he was in anyone’s face. He truly didn’t care, and I guess he didn’t get out of this town soon enough. Or maybe people like him never survive this world. I just don’t know. It makes me sad, though. I’ve lived in this town my whole life, mostly, and it’s changed. The people have changed. They don’t live simple lives, but they want to cling to simple rules. Maybe that doesn’t make any sense. I don’t even know about that. It’s what I figure, though.

Carly

Three months after Truman’s death

There’s an old limestone quarry just north of Persia. After it was no longer quarried but before the country got strict about dumping, people would take their garbage out there and just let it tumble down into the huge pit where limestone had been taken out for many years. I learned that from my father. He’d take me out there with my great-grandfather’s army pistol from World War I, an old Colt .45, and he’d teach me how to shoot. My mother was appalled—“She’s only thirteen for God’s sake, Frank!”—but even sometimes she’d drive out there with us. There were always lots of cans and bottles to set up and fire at. My father would take the gun out of its velvet-lined, engraved, wooden case, like a miniature casket, and he’d take a box of shells and we’d go out and shoot. Lots of people did it, shot guns out there. The place was away from houses or farms and nestled in so rifle shots couldn’t carry and hurt someone. It always seemed like no one else was there when we were there, though.