Chapter 14

THURSDAY, JULY 23

“What’s it to be, ladies, Sydney or the bush?”

In a credible Australian accent, Lydia said, “No worries, mate, in the land down under. Put another shrimp on the barbie, tie me kangaroo down, and let’s go waltzin’ Matilda.”

I said, “Well put, Lydia.” Then, to the others, I added, “That’s one vote in favor of severing our administrative bonds to the county, placing ourselves within the Developing Abilities organization, and inviting the nurses of the family medical partnership to join us.”

Greta, looking confused, said, “What?”

“We have a motion and a second. Thank you, Greta.”

We were at the Management Team meeting – which, of course, was still not a democracy. Though it was, perhaps, at least to my way of garnering consensus, a, uh ... a consensuality? Whatever.

Terry said, “Speaking of Matilda’s kangaroo court, aren’t you sort of railroading this through?”

I said, “I’m sorry, I don’t understand mixed metaphor. Could you say that in plain-speak?”

She said, “And apparently, none of the rest of us speak Australian.”

Trying my hand –er, mouth – at an Australian accent, I replied, “And yet we Ozzies speak the King’s English, ya’ sheila.”

Terry looked at Lydia. “What did you mean, exactly?”

Lydia hooked a thumb toward me. “What he said.”

Greta said, “So you’re in favor of everything? Cutting ties with the County, signing on with Margaret Deveaux, and adding the family practice to public health?”

“Jeez, for the third time, yes,” Lydia said. “Aren’t you?”

Actually, I had known Lydia was in favor of everything before we started the meeting. She knew Margaret Deveaux better than any of us and she liked the idea of a more in-depth medical service. I had the feeling that Lydia’s and my thinking probably aligned more than with anyone at the Health Center. Greta pretty much shared my thinking, but I always had to talk her into doing things. Lydia, on the other hand, not only quickly glommed onto what I was hoping to accomplish, but was also ready to jump on board. What gummed-up a closer working relationship was both of us being smart-asses.

“Yeah, sure,” Greta said, responding to Lydia’s prompt.

Lydia said, “Good, now your support has been established twice. Anyone care to try to agree only once?”

Nita said, “Do I need an accent?”

I said, “You have an accent. Everyone has an accent. It would be impossible to say whether you agree or disagree without one.”

Liz said, “For a simple vote, this has become unnecessarily complicated.”

I asked, “Was that your vote? I didn’t understa--”

“Yes. I vote yes,” Liz declared. “To all of it.” Then she muttered, “Anything that will get me out from under this nutjob.” Admin Services would be supervised by Ben Winstead rather than by me.

“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that.”

Greta said, “And the rest of us wish we could be the ones saying it.”

“I’m just going to pretend I’m in my happy place,” I said, adding an artificial sniff and a wistful, faraway expression.

Nita said, “Put me down for a yes vote. And an order of fries.”

Greta said, “That’s a good point. Why doesn’t the bakery serve fries?”

I said, “Gee, I don’t know. Maybe we should ask the team manager who supervises that program.” Oops. Guess I was still sensitive to my faux pas over the coffee machine. “Sorry, Greta, that came out wrong. It’s because we don’t have a deep fryer, which requires a lot of routine maintenance and safety-protocols for the limited use of making fried potatoes.”

“So,” she said, “we’ll make other fried stuff.”

“Raising health concerns,” Terry said.

To her credit, Greta snapped her fingers in a dismissive gesture and said, in a credible French accent, “‘Ealth? And ve should care about zis ‘ealth because...?”

Still smiling, I shrugged. “It’s your decision, Greta, but I’d add a burn kit to the first aid box, and the fryer might require an automatic fire extinguisher,” I said. Then, in a gentle tone, “Votes to you, Terry. I know it doesn’t come easy.”

She sighed. “I might lose a nurse over this. A couple of the others aren’t all that happy, either, but they don’t want to stay with the County if the rest of you are leaving, so I vote yes.”

“What about the family practice?”

“Oh, that, too. Everyone liked that.”

“Are you ready to supervise it?”

“I don’t feel ready for what I do now. Why should that be any different?”

I summarized, “So, we’re agreed that we don’t know what we’re doing, but we’re going to do it anyway.”

(Thursday, July 23)

FRIDAY, JULY 24

Friday morning, I got up to make breakfast for Emily while Greta slept in. Then my plan was to mow the lawn as soon as the dew had dried.

But my cell phone buzzed just after we finished eating, while Emily was brushing her teeth and I was stacking dishes in the dishwasher. The caller ID showed it was Tate.

“Hey,” I said. “What’s up?”

“I’m out at John and Wanda’s place. More bad news, Gary. It looks like Wanda’s killed herself. I’ve been out here for a while, and the state OIC just got here, so I stepped outside.”

My brain had some trouble finding traction, and I think I replied with, “Uh, um, did ... uh, does Louise know?”

“Yeah. She’s on her way over to Wanda’s mom’s house. They know each other through Wanda.”

“Does the mom know?”

“John went over there earlier to tell her. He’s coming back here after Louise gets there.”

“Holy crap, Tate. What happened?”

I could here Tate sigh. Then he said, “John told me he was awoken from sleep about oh-four forty five by what must have been the gunshot, but at first he thought he’d imagined it or dreamt it. Then he realized Wanda wasn’t in bed and the bathroom light wasn’t on, so he got up to see where she was. He found her on the floor by the kitchen table. The gun, a twenty-two revolver, was on the floor by her hand. He called the EMTs and they called me.

“From what I’ve seen, it looks like she’d been sitting at the table, drinking. There was a bourbon bottle, half empty, on the table, along with a glass. She must have stuck the gun in her mouth.”

“My god, Tate, this is ... oh, it’s ... beyond belief. Uh, how are you and Louise doing? I know you were friends with Wanda.”

“I don’t know. I mean, it’s been such a roller coaster ride with them the last couple months. This kinda just feels like one more twist. Though it’s...” He paused a moment. “Louise, oh, you know how she is. She started crying when I first told her, but then she-- whoops, sorry, gotta go. Poitier’s waving at me.” He clicked off.

Behind me, Greta asked, “What’s going on?”

I turned to find Greta and Emily standing by the stairs, Emily in her work-casual, Greta in her bedtime-nudity.

“It appears that Wanda Durkee has committed suicide, using a twenty-two pistol.”

Greta said, “Are you fucking kidding me? What in the hell is going on?”

Emily put her arm around Greta’s shoulders and pulled her close to her side.

“I know,” I said. “It’s incredible.”

Emily said, “All of the women discussed in our butterfly hunt are dead. That can’t be a coincidence.”

“Does Louise know?” Greta asked.

“She does. She’s gone to Wanda’s mother’s house.”

Glancing at the time display on the house phone, Emily said, “Shit. I’ve got to get going.” She kissed Greta on the lips, gave her one more hug, then came over and did the same to me. She said, “Let’s eat out tonight. How about Linguine’s?” Linguine’s was an Italian restaurant in town.

“Works for me,” and I gave her another kiss before she turned and headed into the hall and down the stairs to the garage.

Greta came over and wrapped her arms around me. “Come back to bed,” she whispered.

Tate took a few minutes to greet people in Linguine’s, Louise at his side. Greta, Emily, and I had drinks as we waited at our table; Louise had warned us that neither she nor Tate would be partaking of the demon rum.

In the mood for a milk shake, which Linguine’s did not have on their menu, I settled for a Toasted Almond cocktail, a mix of amaretto, coffee liqueur, and cream. I had vodka added to mine, making it a Roasted Toasted Almond. Yummy, but difficult just to sip, when its dessert-like flavor urged one to gulp it down.

The dinner conversation moved quickly, but quietly, to Wanda’s suicide.

Greta asked, “Was it really suicide?”

Tate shrugged. “There’s nothing to indicate it wasn’t. Her blood alcohol was point one-one and only her fingerprints were on the gun, and there was gunshot residue on her right hand.”

“Was there a note?” Emily asked.

“Not that we found.”

“No indication of what it was about?” I asked.

Louise said, “Alicia -- that’s her mom, Alicia Erdmann -- she told me that Wanda had been anxious and depressed all summer. She thought it was because of John running against Tate for sheriff, but Wanda denied it, denied that she was depressed, though she said that the election campaign was stressful.” She sighed.

Greta said, “I suppose this belies her denial of being depressed.”

“What does John say?” I asked.

Tate said, “That the campaign was taxing and she hadn’t been sleeping well, but had given no sign that she was that troubled.”

“Had she ever made a suicidal gesture before?”

“Not that we’ve discovered so far.”

“A gun’s a bit unusual for a female,” I commented.

Tate shrugged. “Maybe, but with a husband in law enforcement, maybe not, especially with a rural background. What I found noteworthy was the caliber. One doesn’t see that many twenty-two pistols around. John said Wanda had encountered a couple rattlesnakes in her vegetable garden and that there are shot loads for twenty-two revolvers.”

“But not for automatics?”

“The shot loads don’t produce enough back-pressure to work the reloading mechanism.”

“I don’t know,” Greta said, “that’s a lot of dead women from out of that one social group.”

“I think Sergeant Poitier is uneasy with that, too. Still, I’m all but convinced that this was at Wanda’s own hand.”

“But why?” Louise insisted.

(Friday, July 24)

MONDAY, JULY 27

I was deep into converting the Developing Abilities contract into an agreement that would cover the entire set of county-sponsored health and rehab services. My phone double-beeped an internal caller at eleven oh-three.

“Health Center, this is Gary.”

“Poitier turned up some interesting details.” It was Tate. “He had the bourbon bottle examined and found two things. First, the bourbon had been fortified with the addition of neutral spirits, in other words, pure grain alcohol. It was nearly a hundred sixty proof. Second, the bottle had been wiped clean of prints. Finally, he found a credit card receipt for gas and coffee at the Fuel Ngo by the interstate. Nick Durkee’s card was used at oh-four twenty-two Friday morning. Nick was on their video, moving a little unsteadily.”

“But that was twenty minutes before the shot woke John.”

“And John reported that he’d never known Wanda to drink that much.”

“So Nick got Wanda drunk? Didn’t John know Nick was there?”

“He says no, and I’m inclined to believe him. I know John’s a heavy sleeper, and maybe Nick knew Wanda was having trouble sleeping. So Nick came for a late-night visit, bearing gifts. And, like the Trojan horse, his gift of over-strength booze let him into Wanda’s psyche.”

“Holy shit, do you really think so?”

“It’s Occam’s Razor,” he said, sounding a bit boastful. “It answers questions and reduces variables.”

“You have learned well, grasshopper.”

“Eat grass,” he said.

“Is Poitier acting on it?”

“You’re not going to believe this: he wants to talk to you. Not only you, but the same group of us that went on the last butterfly hunt.”

“No shit?”

“He’s frustrated and wants to test his own theory of the crime which, I suspect, is pretty close to our theory, but he wants us to try to tear it apart.”

“But we’re amateurs.”

“Not exactly. Two of us are cops and you, Greta, and Emily are Mental Health Assessors, and you, at least, have considerable experience in preparing cases for court. Besides, everyone’s smart and even you know how to fake it.”

“When and where?”

“At seventeen hundred, in your big conference room.”

“Not that I’m complaining, but what’s wrong with your conference room?”

“It’s here at the Combined Cop Shop and Poitier doesn’t want to draw attention.”

The Joint Law Enforcement Center, known colloquially as the Combined Cop Shop, was additional residue of the late Wall Street Recession. The Coldwater County Sheriff and the Leaufroide Police Department elected to share office space when the courthouse was condemned and the city police coincidentally needed more space at a point that saw tax revenue evaporate. The building was a former Safeway store that had the additional benefit of backing on the Coldwater County Detention Center. Abandoned when Safeway had moved to new digs on fast food row, the vacant store’s proximity to the jail had compromised its value in the real estate market but made it a real bargain for the cops in the even more depressed market of the recession. In the end, the owner had donated the building jointly to the county and city for the tax break it would earn him.

“You’ll have those oatmeal cookies, right?”

“I better call down to the bakery now. They may have to go to the store for more oatmeal.”

Trooper Rick Mellon, in a suit and tie, arrived with Poitier and, after I shook the Sergeant’s hand, I shook Mellon’s.

“Run out of clean uniforms?” I asked him.

“Naw. I’m just demonstrating to Sergeant Poitier how good I look in plain clothes.”

“Ah. Sort of priming the pump?”

“You could say that.”

“Is it working?”

He reached into his suit coat’s breast pocket and pulled out an ID wallet which he flipped open for me. In it was a gold-colored badge and, under his name on the OCI identity card, the legend, “Detective, First Grade.”

“Nice badge,” I said. “It’s very shiny.”

“Poitier told me to stop buffing it on the way over. I think he was afraid I’d start polishing it during this meeting.”

Just then, Poitier said over his shoulder, “Mellon, put that damn thing away,” but it was with a soft edge.

Emily arrived just as we were taking our seats. She said, “Hello, everyone,” as she sat down next to Greta, “but you could have started without me.” I think she found my smart-ass tutorial videos.

Chet was on Poitier’s right, then Lindsey, Greta, and Emily. Mellon was on the Sergeant’s left, then Tate, Louise, and me. That left three empty seats at the end of the table.

As we were pouring coffee and passing the oatmeal cookies, Poitier sighed and addressed the group. “I really appreciate all of you showing up for this, uh, this whatever it is. Conference, perhaps. I’ve never done something like this before, but this case, the investigation of Evelyn Durkee’s murder, has left me with a shi -- a, uh, a boatload of suspicion but not a thimbleful of evidence. And even the suspicion is murky. And now, with two more deaths associated with Miz Durkee’s case, I felt a sense of urgency to try to bring things to a close.

“I realized that, for the most part, this murder was mostly about people who lived in Coldwater County and that, except for the principals involved, you folks made up the group that was most familiar with many aspects of the victim’s life, in its various facets.

“Hence, I thought I’d try what you call your butterfly hunt approach. However, I think I have identified my butterfly, so to speak, and I want you to try to convince me I’m on the wrong trail. I want to test my theory against your knowledge.

“Mister Mazur, how would you suggest we go about that?”

I took a moment to form my response, then I said, “Roughly speaking, the primary feature of chaos theory is that it posits that apparent chaos actually has an order to it. To discover that structure requires identifying the point of origin or the original action, at least to our understanding. In practice, we look for the earliest unassailable fact or least complex conjecture that contributed to the crime. We refer to that as the butterfly, before it flaps its wings -- the original action which eventually causes the hurricane. Then we use Occam’s Razor to whittle away the extraneous.” I gave him a Still with me? look.

He said, ‘I’m familiar with the notion of the butterfly effect, as well as Occam’s Razor, though I’ve never used either in this way.”

I said, “I wouldn’t be so sure. From what you’ve said so far, it sounds like that’s exactly what you’ve done. But more to your purpose here, you need to tell us the first concept that you’ve determined that led to Evelyn’s murder.”

He looked briefly at Mellon, then turned back toward me. He said, “Evelyn’s murder was unintentional.”

Chet chimed in with, “And why do you make that assumption?”

“Detective Mellon and I drove up to that ghost town, Carbon, and we looked over that gravel lot.” He reached into a top-opening briefcase that was on the floor next to him and produced an evidence bag, similar to a resealable food storage bag. “We found this wrapper from a sterile bandage in the weeds at the edge of the lot. There were fingerprints that showed it had been handled by Wanda Durkee.”

Tate asked, “Was there any way to tell when that paper scrap came to be there?”

“No.”

“So it could have been there weeks or even months.”

“It was about six weeks after Evelyn was killed when we found it.”

Emily said, “Or it could have been dropped there a few says before you found it.”

“All true,” Poitier said. “But I have a coherent theory which readily explains the reason this paper was there. Any other explanation requires additional speculation without any accounting for it, unless one were to chase rainbows rather than butterflies.”

There were smiles at Poitier’s metaphor.

He said, “Two fairly dependable inferences can be drawn from this paper wrapper: Wanda Durkee was at Carbon, and she dealt with a wound. This wrapper is from a two inch by two inch gauze pad, so it suggests that the wound was larger than a common adhesive bandage strip would cover.

“Furthermore, Detective First Grade Mellon called all the hospitals and walk-in clinics between Carbon and the town of Fossil Creek, including Plattsburg and Leaufroide, and found no report of services for either Evelyn Durkee or Wanda Durkee, at least not in the last six months.

“So I have further concluded that Evelyn Durkee was conscious following this injury and refused professional medical intervention.”

“Whoa back,” I said. “Seems to me you’ve climbed out on a flimsy pretext. How do you figure?”

He tipped his head toward Mellon, who said, “On the assumptions that the injury was the unintended result of an emotional outburst that became physical and that Wanda performed first aid, it would follow that Wanda was concerned about the wound and would have sought medical care if Evelyn was unconscious.

Louise said, “Hold on a second. Where did this ‘unintended result of an emotional outburst’ come from? Why couldn’t someone simply have tripped and fallen?”

Poitier said, “Two things lead to that conclusion. That it was unintended is justified because Wanda performed first aid, or at least helped. An assailant doesn’t normally assist the person they’d intended to hurt, so mine is the less complex explanation. Secondly, we conclude that Wanda was, to some greater or lesser degree, criminally responsible for Evelyn’s injury because Evelyn’s body was dumped in the river, rather than handled as if she’d simply tripped and fallen, and then died from the head trauma. And then there were the ancillary facts of Evelyn’s evisceration and the burning of her car.”

Lindsey said, “It seems to me we skipped over the part where Evelyn and Wanda decided to meet at Carbon. What makes you think that happened?”

Poitier nodded. “I don’t have any evidence of that, nor of much of the rest of my theory. I can only say that it fits in seamlessly with the theory.”

I said, “But what if Evelyn simply went for a drive in the mountains and decided to stop at Carbon, or anywhere else up there, and some guy came along and assaulted her, killed her, and threw her body in the river?”

“And removed her reproductive tract and drove her car to Kingston and burned it out so thoroughly? Meanwhile, Wanda, coincidentally, had to use her first aid kit at Carbon but never mentioned it during questioning? That all adds more complications, which Occam wouldn’t sanction.”

Louise said, “Then let’s hear your theory, beginning to end.”

“Yeah,” Greta said.

“Well, it’s almost the same as your theory, so I won’t justify my suppositions unless someone has a question.”

Poitier then commenced to tell us the same sequence of events that we had agreed upon over three weeks before. However, he had added several major refinements. The first, as we’d earlier discussed, was the insight that Evelyn was likely conscious after her head trauma, at least until she and Wanda had reached the vicinity of Fossil Creek.

Another was that, once it had been determined that Evelyn had died, that it was almost certainly Nick, with the direct collusive support of Marty August, who had contrived the remainder of the cover-up attempt. After questioning John and Nick in several interrogation sessions, and following conversations with Tate, Poitier had concluded that John was too moralistic to devise such a plan, but that he had a weakness in subjugating himself to his brother. Nick, on the other hand, demonstrated personality traits that pointed to opportunistic and unprincipled schemes.

Marty August was much the same type of person, but Poitier’s take was that both August and Babbitt had acquiesced to the plan because they were concerned that a murder investigation might discover their bribery conspiracy. Once on board, August became Nick’s active co-conspirator.

We took a few potshots at his story, but they were always deflected by his application of Occam’s Razor.

The problem was, it was just a story, with the only real evidence being a bandage wrapper with some partial prints.

Poitier had approached Madeleine Red Cane, the Assistant State Prosecutor who was handling the MH Unlimited bribery case. He had asked if he could offer August or Babbitt a reduced sentence in return for testimony in the Evelyn Durkee case. But while Red Cane was willing, neither of the defendants would accept any deal other than complete immunity and the dropping of all charges, thus allowing either attorney to retain his or her law license if he or she were the one to cooperate.

Poitier considered offering the same sort of deal in the murder case, but he expected that the most likely suspect to take the deal would be Nick Durkee, whom Poitier believed was the primary driver of the cover-up, a scheme that Poitier felt included the sheriff’s candidacy.

“I think I could break the case, but it would mean immunizing Nick, the man who devised the plan and brought the others into it.”

Louise said, “You talk about this cover-up as if it had been a long time in the making. But if Nick came up with this, it had to have been within the span of just a few minutes on Labor Day afternoon, before Wanda or John, or maybe even Adrienne Babbitt dialed nine-one-one. I mean, both John and Nick seem fairly intelligent, but do you think that’s even possible?”

Poitier, who had turned her direction, sighed. “I’ve met people, criminals, I mean, who always seem on the lookout to do the wrong thing. A large part of that seems to be a desire to get away with it, to demonstrate that they can pull it off right under the nose of whatever authority is involved. Nick seems to fall into that type, always alert for the opportunity to do no good.”

Tate added, “I agree with your assessment of Nick. And I certainly can vouch for the category of perp you describe. Always on the ready to do dirt to someone else.”

Emily looked at me, “That begins to sound like a narcissistic personality disorder.”

Poitier said, “Whatever that amounts to, it sure has the right sound.”

I said, “It’s an ingrained set of personality features with very specific definitions that require a careful examination to determine its applicability.”

Greta added, “There is a list of nine possible traits and behavior patterns, five of which have to be exhibited by the individual to make the appropriate diagnosis. It’s hard to determine without a direct interview with the individual and sometimes it’s necessary to question close family members and acquaintances.”

I said, “Both Emily and Greta are right, and I’m pretty much opposed to making second hand diagnoses. But just for this discussion’s sake, let’s look at a general rundown of a narcissistic personality, without applying the diagnosis to anyone. Keep in mind that all of us are narcissistic to some degree, it’s a measure of self-preservation. Those with a personality disorder, however, have extreme and unbending traits, such as grandiose self-delusions, feeling self-entitled, and readily taking advantage of others. Um, what else? Em? Greta?”

Emily said, “Needing constant admiration, always acting in a haughty manner.”

Greta added, “They often lack empathy toward other people. I know there are a couple more, but they escape me at the moment.”

I said, “That’s why I always have the Papa Handbook nearby when I’m interviewing potential clients. There are a lot of details that many professionals tend to skip over in making diagnoses. When I was the Community Mental Health Team Manager, I always insisted that the evaluating counselors, psychologists, and social workers enumerate the required traits and cite confirming incidents in the client’s life or in their responses in the interview.”

“We still do it that way,” Greta said.

Poitier shrugged. “On the other hand, I’m not a mental health professional. I think narcissistic personality disorder fits Nicholas Durkee to a T. His pal Marty Augustiniak, too.”

“And what are you going to do with that?” Chet asked.

Poitier said, “I need to clear this case. Reckon I’m going to lean on John Durkee while he’s still hurting from his wife’s death. Maybe there’s some narcissistic traits in me, too.”

(Monday, July 27)

WEDNESDAY, JULY 29

For supper, Emily had made an icy-cold, spicy, chunky gazpacho, which she served with a crusty baguette accompanied by a lemon-tinged avocado spread.

“This is delicious,” I said. “You really went all out. Did you leave work early?”

“No, I cheated. The soup is half chunky salsa, that one from Safeway we like. I mixed it with low sodium vegetable juice, Safeway’s house version of V-8.”

“Clever girl,” Greta said.

I said, “For sure. I’d never have guessed. And I like the bread and avocado.”

“I will take credit for the avocado spread,” Emily said.

I was just finishing a second bowl of the soup when my cell buzzed. The screen showed “Leaufroide PD.”

“This is Gary,” I said.

“Gary, it’s Terry McGovern.” McGovern was one the city police department’s patrol sergeants.

“What can I do for you, Terry?”

“Chief Schoenfeld said I should call you direct, rather than the crisis number, so that’s why the call.”

“You guys can call whoever you want; don’t worry about it.”

“Okay. Ah, I’ve got a situation down here, at the Roundhouse Bar.” The Roundhouse was your basic saloon. It was across the street from the rail yards.

“Go ahead, I’m listening.”

“It’s John Durkee. He’s in there, in the back room, where they play poker. I reckon he’s drunk, but I don’t know, from what the bartender says. Anyway, he has his service weapon in hand, and mostly he’s pointing it at himself, but sometimes he waves it around when he’s yelling about Wanda being dead.”

“Is he threatening to shoot anyone?”

“Yeah, himself.”

“You want me to come down there?”

“If you would.”

“Okay, I’ll be right down. But you need to know, talk therapy doesn’t work well with people who are high or drunk. But I’ll give it a try.”

“We’d really appreciate it.”

“I need to take a piss, then I’ll jump in the car and be right down. Give me eight or ten minutes.”

Nine minutes later I walked through the Roundhouse’s front door and paused to let my eyes adjust to the dim interior of the bar. There was a row of booths along the right-side wall and a long bar lined with stools on the left. The place was empty, save for the bartender, who I knew to be the owner. He was seated on the stool closest to the front door.

He said to me, “Sorry, we’re closed for the evening.”

“I’m Gary Mazur, from the mental health crisis team. Sergeant McGovern called me.”

“Yeah, he’s by the card room door, back there on the left. He said for you to go on back.”