“So you’re thinkin’ Gail was attacked and maybe even killed in that bathroom and then she was thrown down the stairs so it would look like an accident?”
Rory shrugged. “I’m just saying that it’s possible.”
Zeke’s brow wrinkled in thought. “You know, you might just have somethin’ there. If Gail’s death was staged to look like an accident and Mac’s death was staged to look like a heart attack, we may have ourselves an honest-to-goodness
motis operendi
here.”
The Latin words were so incongruous coming out of Zeke’s mouth in his southwestern drawl that Rory couldn’t help but smile. “I wasn’t aware that you knew Latin,” she said, working hard not to let it erupt into laughter.
Zeke’s jaw tightened and he drew himself up ramrod straight in his chair. “I expect there’s a heap of stuff you don’t know about me. It happens that I studied the law for a time, before I decided it was all talk and no action. Most of the lawyers I knew were too fond of their own voices. I prefer being on this end of the legal system, where I can use my gun instead of runnin’ my mouth.”
Rory produced what she hoped was a neutral expression. She hadn’t forgotten how angry Zeke became when he thought she was insulting his intelligence.
“Maybe I should see if I can talk to the workmen,” she said, trying to rescue the conversation before it went off on a tangent.
“’Cept how will you know if they’re lyin’, unless you’ve got one of those lie-detector things you can hook ’em up to?”
“There’s got to be something I can do. I hate to think this information is worthless.”
They sat quietly for a while, considering what her next move should be. Zeke tapped his fingers noiselessly on the tabletop, and Rory made wet circle designs with the condensation from the bottom of her glass.
It was Zeke who finally broke the silence. “Let’s say that either the paper on the wall, or that missin’ roll of paper, was damaged durin’ the crime. How would the killer have gotten rid of it?”
Rory set her glass down. “I guess he or she could burn it or bury it, or maybe even put it through a paper shredder. . . .”
“Or maybe just throw it away like any other trash, because they’re so danged sure no one’s goin’ to be lookin’ for it.”
She nodded. “I guess that’s a possibility, since it’s not a gun or a knife we’re talking about here, just some fancy paper. Still, it’s hard to believe that the killer would have been brazen enough to throw away evidence at the murder site.”
“You’d be downright amazed at the arrogance and stupidity of some criminals.”
“Wait a second,” Rory said with sudden animation, “the Dumpster.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s kind of a large, heavy-duty bin that’s trucked into a construction site for the building debris, and then it’s hauled away to a landfill.”
“Did you see one of them things around there?”
“Actually there was one left, a few houses down from the murder site. The trouble is, by now they’ve probably finished off all the work on that block.” The excitement ebbed away from her voice. “The Dumpster may not even be there anymore.”
“Then what are you waitin’ for?”
“You’re kidding me, right? I can’t exactly go Dumpster diving at night in the middle of a residential area. I’d have every dog in a two-block radius barking his head off. Not to mention that I wouldn’t be able to see much.”
“Every dog I’ve known barks durin’ the daytime too,” Zeke pointed out with a smile.
Rory laughed and shook her head. “During the day folks are rushing off to work or too busy with their kids to pay as much attention to the barking.”
“It’s also easier to get caught durin’ the day.”
“I can always say I think the workmen threw away an important paper of mine when they were cleaning up. If I got caught at night, my intentions would seem a lot more suspect.”
“Okay then,” Zeke said, “bright and early tomorrow mornin’ it is.”
Chapter 24
R
ory was up with the sunrise. It was going to take her at least an hour to get out to Mount Sinai in rush-hour traffic. She pulled on her baggiest jeans, her oldest sneakers and a long-sleeved tee shirt to cover her arms. If she’d had a hazmat suit, she would have worn it. Although the Dumpster should have nothing but “clean” trash in it, people often took advantage of the bins to throw away other things, including kitchen garbage. She was not looking forward to her little foraging adventure. Today she would have preferred to have Zeke’s job as consultant.
She found her sturdy gardening gloves in the shed behind the house. Every spring since Mac bought the house, she’d planted dozens of flowers for him, while he tackled the job of clearing the detritus of winter from the yard. A sharp, bittersweet ache accompanied the memory. She’d finished the planting this year just weeks before Mac died. Her determination to find his killer redoubled, she hurried back inside and threw the gardening gloves into a canvas tote, along with a clean plastic bag in case she was lucky enough to actually find evidence. She also added a change of clothes, since she’d have to go directly to work after her date with the Dumpster. When she turned onto Pheasant Lane, her heart sank. The Dumpster was gone. She was pulling into the closest driveway to make a U-turn when she spotted it on the back of a truck that was turning right at the far corner. If she’d arrived there even a second later, she would have missed it altogether. She whipped her car back onto the road and took off after the truck, tempering the urge to speed with the knowledge that at any moment youngsters who lived on this block might come running out of their houses.
By the time she reached the corner, the truck had turned right and was no longer in view. She made the right and drove slowly past each intersecting road, hoping to catch a glimpse of it. No luck. The truck was probably on its way to the nearest landfill, but she had no idea where that might be. She could really use the help of someone with a computer. Calling Leah was out of the question, and even if Zeke knew how to do more than just scroll through photos online, she couldn’t exactly reach him by phone. She was on her own.
She backtracked to the expressway without seeing any sign of the truck and its cargo. Since landfills were few in number and never in the more affluent areas of a town, there was a good chance that the driver had taken the highway, but in which direction? The traffic light she was stopped at turned green, forcing her to make a decision. Reasoning that the land farther east on the Island was both less populated and less expensive, she turned onto the south service road of the expressway and took it to the first eastbound entrance ramp.
As she merged into the heavy traffic, she scanned the road ahead, straining to see past eighteen-wheelers, vans and SUVs with tinted windows. If she’d chosen the right direction, she should be able to catch up with the slower-moving truck. She made a deal with herself. If she didn’t see it in a few more minutes, she’d take the next exit off and try her luck going west instead.
Time was up. Frustrated, she crossed back into the right lane, prepared to take the upcoming exit. A produce truck directly in front of her exited first, and with it out of the way, she finally had a clear view ahead. At the last moment, she swung her car out of the exit lane and back into the right lane. The Dumpster was a quarter mile ahead of her.
Once she caught up to it, she stayed close behind, determined not to lose it again. Two exits later she followed it off the expressway to County Road 21 and from there to Horseblock Road and the Brookhaven Landfill. The truck turned into the landfill, slowed as it came to a small guardhouse and was promptly waved on through by a stoop-shouldered elderly man who was leaning against the side of the wooden kiosk, smoking a cigarette.
Rory drove up to the guard, trying to decide on the best strategy to use on him. The guard dropped his cigarette butt and crushed it beneath his shoe before walking up to her door. He was wearing a white shirt with a name tag that read, “Burt Avery.”
Since she hadn’t come up with any brilliant plans, Rory tried a variation of the “important paper” routine.
“Sorry, miss,” Avery said, “but I can’t let you in there. It’s an insurance issue. If you were to get injured, well, I’m sure you can understand.”
What Rory understood was that she had only one ace to play. As much as she hated to use it, the thought of being turned back this close to finding what could be critical evidence was even more unacceptable. She pulled out her detective’s shield and prayed that the guard would be intimidated enough to let her through without asking any questions. If he told her she needed a search warrant, she could just forget about ever locating the trash left by that particular Dumpster. As it was, the truck was already out of sight.
Avery looked from Rory to the shield and back again. Rory frowned and tried for a stern “you don’t want to mess with me” expression, which was difficult given the delicate features she had to work with.
He scratched his head, disturbing the few white strands that had been arranged to camouflage his balding pate. “I don’t know, Detective, I’m thinking maybe I should call the office and get permission to let you in.”
“Listen,” Rory said, backing off to a more affable buddy-to-buddy approach, “the police have absolutely no problem with this landfill and no interest in it other than those papers that may have accidentally wound up in the Dumpster that just went through here. I’ll be fifteen minutes tops and no one need ever know I was here.”
Avery was blinking rapidly, becoming more and more distraught by the decision he had to make. “Well, I guess—”
“Great, thanks,” Rory said, afraid to let him finish the sentence. “I owe you one.” She drove on past him before he could object. When she looked in her rearview mirror, he was still standing where she’d left him, as if frozen in his indecision.
She’d seen the truck carrying the Dumpster take the road to the left, so she headed in that direction. Looking around her, she realized that the landfill was specifically for construction-related trash. She was spared the terrible odors that came with tons of rotting food and other decaying organic material. She followed the road around the mounds of refuse, driving as fast as she dared. Her job was going to be a lot more unpleasant if the Dumpster had already disgorged its contents.
As she came around a curve, she saw the truck backed up to a relatively flat area. The door at the back of the Dumpster had been opened, and the driver was in the process of raising the truck bed beneath it, so that the trash would tumble out.
Rory sped toward him, honking as she went. She screeched to a stop a few feet away and jumped out of her car. Detective shield in hand, she approached the truck. The driver had stopped what he was doing at the sound of the horn and was stepping down from the cab as she reached him.
“Hey, what’s going on?” he asked, hiking his brown work pants up beneath his pendulous belly, where they immediately began their slide down to his hips again.
“I’m Detective McCain,” she said. “And you are?”
“Johnson. Norman Johnson. So what can I do for you?”
Trying to sound as authoritative as possible, Rory explained that she needed to search the contents of the Dumpster as part of an ongoing investigation.
The driver wasn’t impressed. He consulted his watch and grumbled, “How long is this gonna take?”
“As long as it takes, sir,” Rory replied, her tone polite but clipped. She pulled on a pair of the latex gloves that she’d taken out of the car with her, then tugged the gardening gloves over them. The type of debris she’d be going through was likely to have sharp edges.
Norman followed her to the back of the truck, where the Dumpster sat at a forty-five degree angle to the ground. Rory started going through the trash that had already fallen out. Since it was mainly comprised of large pieces of wood, metal and other building materials, she was hopeful that the wallpaper would be easy to spot.
When she was satisfied that she hadn’t missed anything on the ground, she asked the driver to slowly increase the angle of the Dumpster.
“Hey,” he said as he came up beside her again, “if you tell me what you’re looking for, I can maybe give you a hand.”
“I appreciate the offer, but I’m afraid it’s completely out of the question,” Rory said without looking up. “But you can go ahead and raise the Dumpster some more.”
Norman walked away, muttering under his breath.
“Hold it,” Rory called out a moment later. “Hold it right there.” Pastel colors had caught her eye, peeking out from between other, darker debris. She pulled off the gardening gloves and carefully extricated the wallpaper from its burial place. She wanted to shout out her success or do a little end-zone dance, but given the circumstances, she settled for a whispered, “Yes!”
Although the wallpaper was torn in places and generally smudged and dirty, it was mostly intact. There appeared to be close to half a roll unwound from its spool, along with a smaller section that was separate from the rest.
“That’s it?” Norman asked with an expression somewhere between disgust and disappointment, as if he’d expected her to dig out a gun or a knife at the very least. “That’s what you were looking for?” He’d clearly been hoping for a juicier story to tell his chums, a story that would have compensated him for his time.
“That’s it,” Rory said. “Thanks for your help.”
“Yeah, whatever,” Norman mumbled as he climbed back into the cab of his truck.
Back at her car, Rory placed the wallpaper carefully into the plastic bag she’d brought along for that purpose and locked it in the trunk. Then she slid behind the wheel and started the engine. If her watch was right, she should have just enough time to stop at the diner near her office, grab some coffee to go and change her clothes in the ladies’ room. During her lunch break she was going to pay BB another visit.
Chapter 25