1 A Small Case of Murder Read online

  “How can you prove that this is the same body your parents and Lulu Jefferson found? They’re dead now.”

  “But Rick Pendleton is still alive,” Joshua reminded him.

  “Even if it was well preserved, I’m sure that body doesn’t look anything like it did when Rick Pendleton saw it.”

  “Circumstantial evidence is strong enough to suggest that it’s the same body,” Joshua argued. “That article is dated only two months before my parents and Lulu Jefferson and Rick Pendleton saw it. Pendleton said that the body had a chest wound. So does this body. This body was found only five hundred yards from where the old Bosley barn used to be, which is where the body in ‘63 was found. That crypt was sealed in April 1963. How much do you want to bet it was the day after my parents found the body? The high school should have a record of when their prom was in 1963, and the funeral home should have a record of when that funeral was held. The killer probably hid the body in the barn with the intention of dumping him inside the crypt after the funeral, before it was sealed.” He raised an eyebrow. “Do you want me to go on?”

  “No.” Sheriff Sawyer placed both pieces of paper in a manila folder.

  “Do you have any leads on the mail bomb sent to Tad?”

  “No, but I will,” the sheriff answered. “The feds are saying that it wasn’t complicated. Whoever built it very well could have put the thing together by information gathered on the Internet. We’re looking at anyone and everyone.”

  “Wally Rawlings is anyone and everyone,” Joshua said. “He has no experience in the military or with explosives, but he’s smart enough that he could build a bomb if he got good enough instructions.”

  “Why would he want to kill Doc MacMillan?”

  Joshua refrained from mentioning Tad’s affair with Wally’s missing mistress. Instead, he said, “Because Wally’s late wife was in love with Tad. She told Tad the very day she died that she believed Wally was poisoning her.”

  Sheriff Sawyer said, “But Doc Wilson ruled her death as natural causes, and that was a decade ago. Why would Rawlings care now?”

  Joshua lost his train of thought at the mention of Dr. Wilson and Wally Rawlings in the same breath. It occurred to him what had happened four years earlier. Now, it made sense.

  “Thornton? Are you still on this planet?”

  Joshua started. “Can you get me a copy of the police report on the post office break-in and the break-in here at the courthouse? Both occurred in the same week four years ago.”

  “I probably will have trouble with the post office break-in,” the sheriff said. “We’re talking federal territory there. They like to keep things close to the vest. I can get you our file. Can I ask why?”

  “I’m working on a theory.” Energized to see the pieces coming together in his head, Joshua added, “I also need for you to get me any information you can from missing persons in Steubenville about two women and a girl, last name Hitchcock, who disappeared four years ago. The detective assigned to the case closed it as presumed dead.”

  “Who the hell are the Hitchcocks and what are you looking for?” Sheriff Sawyer’s tone held an annoyed note.

  “A source told me that Monica Hitchcock was Wally’s mistress and that she had his baby. Then, suddenly, out of the blue, she disappears. A witness stated that they were on that plane to Chicago that crashed in Pittsburgh. I want to know if the Steubenville police have any proof that they were on that flight.”

  “I don’t recall Wally Rawlings ever being a suspect in any murder or missing person’s investigation.”

  “That isn’t the only reason I want to know what the police have on this case.” Joshua reminded him, “Did you hear me say that Monica Hitchcock had Wally’s baby? Translation, that baby is Vicki’s half sister.”

  The sheriff added, “And DNA says that the strand of red hair on the murder weapon came from Vicki’s half sister.”

  “That’s why I want proof that Alexis Hitchcock is dead. If that’s not available, I want to know where she is and what she’s doing now.”

  “You’re good, Thornton.” Sheriff Sawyer stood up and stuck out his chest. “You continue working on your theories, but I hope you don’t mind if I continue working on my own agenda.”

  “You keep right on doing that.” Joshua shook his hand. “I promise my children won’t get in the way again.”

  The sheriff warned him, “I hope not. I’d hate for them to get hurt. I consider curiosity a virtue. At least, it is in my business. But if it’s not harnessed, it can get you into trouble.”

  “I’m aware of that.”

  “Maybe you might want to find something else to take their minds off these bodies that seem to keep turning up.” Sheriff Sawyer stated in a stern tone. “I understand that you recently lost your wife. I’d hate for you to lose one or more of your kids, too.”

  “Don’t worry,” Joshua assured him. “I’ll make sure no harm comes to them.”

  “I’m not the one who needs to worry.”

  Joshua’s children thought his silence all the way home from New Cumberland was due to anger over their criminal act. In reality, he was preoccupied with what Dr. Wilson had told him that night after he had regained consciousness in the hospital after landing on his head during that football game.

  Maybe he could remember it in his dreams, Joshua prayed before he went to sleep.

  It happened again. The football game. The charging Norton as Joshua threw the long pass, and his sailing head over heels through the air before everything went black.

  “Tell me, Josh, have you ever experienced joy?” Dr. Wilson checked Joshua’s eyes with a penlight.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “If you spend your whole life chasing after brass rings, then in the end you can find yourself with nothing but regrets for not taking the time to enjoy the real treasures.”

  “What treasures are you talking about?”

  Dr. Wilson said, “If you stop to look around, you’ll see them. Life is so valuable, but it’s also very fragile. I became a doctor because I value life. It’s the most precious thing God has blessed us with. That’s why it’s the very thing Satan wants to take from us. When the devil offers us all we desire, it’s our life that he wants in return.”

  “I thought it was our soul that Satan wanted?”

  “Without our soul, we are condemned to death. Eternal life is no longer an option.”

  Joshua shook his head in an effort to remain conscious. He didn’t want to end the conversation before he knew what Dr. Wilson was trying to tell him.

  “The story is real, Joshua.”

  “What story?”

  “Faust. The man who made a deal with the devil in exchange for his soul.” Dr. Russell Wilson’s expression was grim. “Only in Faust’s story, the man regretted making his deal. This man has no regrets because he’s evil.”

  “Who’s evil?”

  “And you are good.” Dr. Wilson eased his head back onto the pillow. His expression softened. “Josh, no matter what happens, don’t ever lose your faith.”

  “I have faith.” The teenager wondered if his doctor was going senile before his eyes.

  “Good will always win over evil. God won’t have it any other way. As long as you have faith in that, then you will win, because you’ll always have God on your side.”

  “Doc, why are we having this conversation?”

  The doctor smiled down at Joshua. “I’m sorry. You need to rest. You need to take some time off from chasing the brass ring. In November, I get away from it all and go stay in my hunting cabin in Raccoon County.”

  “You don’t strike me as the hunting type.”

  “I don’t hunt. I go up to my cabin and spend a week by myself. I eat too much, drink too much, and sit with my feet up in front of the fire.” He whispere
d, “Don’t tell your cousin Tad that. He’ll use that against me the next time I tell him he drinks too much.”

  Dr. Wilson’s laughter echoed through Joshua’s dream until he woke up before the sun.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The stone house on Rock Springs Boulevard was quiet the morning after the cemetery incident. Even Admiral sensed that it wouldn’t be a good time to disturb Joshua Thornton by asking to go outside once too often.

  When Tracy got up at six o’clock to cook breakfast, her father was behind the closed door in his study. No one was brave enough to disturb him, not even to offer him coffee. The door didn’t open until well after seven when the children were gathered around the kitchen table for their breakfast of chocolate chip pancakes and bacon.

  “Good morning,” Joshua greeted them after sipping the fresh coffee before sitting at the head of the table.

  Tracy set a plate filled with pancakes and bacon in front of him before taking her own seat on his left.

  J.J. again apologized for the previous night. “We thought we were helping.”

  “Trespassing into a cemetery and breaking into a crypt was helping?” Joshua asked. “I thought we raised you kids better than that.”

  “Dad,” J.J. asked, “would you have ever been able to get a warrant to search that crypt based on our suspicions?”

  “That wasn’t a suspicion. It was a guess. A crazy guess.”

  “But the body was there,” Sarah said.

  “That was dumb luck. The dumbest luck I’ve ever seen in my whole career.” Joshua dismissed any continuance of the conversation with a wave of his hand. “It doesn’t matter. Maybe you kids will be lucky and I’ll cool off by the time you get back.”

  “Get back?” Murphy asked. “Get back from where?”

  “You’re not sending us to military school, are you?” Donny shrieked.

  “No, I’m sending you to the beach.”

  Joshua’s announcement was met with silence.

  “The beach?” Donny asked. “You mean you’re punishing us by making us go on a family vacation?”

  “No, I’m staying here. I talked to your Aunt Carol this morning. They’re staying at the beach house this month. You’re going to go to the Outer Banks to stay with them.”

  “Why are you sending us away?” Tracy wanted to know.

  “Isn’t it clear?” Sarah said, “He doesn’t want us around. We’re too much trouble for him.”

  “When you’re out breaking the law,” Joshua responded, “yes.”

  “But we just got here,” Murphy pointed out, “and we’ve started making friends.”

  “Last night, I saw what you and your friends are capable of,” Joshua said. “Listen, this Sheriff Sawyer isn’t the type of guy you mess with. You were very lucky I managed to talk him out of locking you all up and putting last night on your records. Some time away from here might make him forget what you did. Plus, a cooling off period would do me some good. Look, I’m not locking all of you in your rooms. That’s probably what has happened to your friends. You guys are going to be fishing, windsurfing, and scuba diving. Damn! I wish my grandmother had punished me like I’m punishing you. End of discussion. Go pack. You’re leaving in the van tomorrow after church.”

  Jan Martin caught up with Joshua Thornton in the same spot where they had their first fight.

  It was on the corner of Rock Springs and Sixth, outside the Martin home, where the five-year-old girl told the boy from up the block to not step on her hopscotch board or she’d kill him. Being one to never turn away from a challenge, little Joshua Thornton stepped on little Jan Martin’s chalk drawn squares and received a bloody nose in her attempt to carry out her threat.

  Thirty years later, Joshua stopped at the same corner to let a Volkswagen pass before crossing the street on his way to Tad’s apartment. Through her front window, Jan saw him and ran out to confront him with the latest news. “So you found another body, huh?”

  Eying the rolled up newspaper that she slapped into her open palm like she was preparing to train a naughty puppy, Joshua realized he was in trouble. “Not me. My kids.”

  “And you didn’t call me.”

  “I didn’t have the time, or the means, to call you. I didn’t know about it until I was out at the cemetery at one o’clock this morning.”

  “Haven’t you ever heard of a cell phone?”

  “I didn’t take it with me.”

  Jan slapped him on the top of the head with the paper. “I thought we were friends.”

  The newspaper fell to the ground. While taking cover, Joshua caught a glimpse of the headline. The body in the crypt, the source of her rage, was on the front page.

  It was the banner headline that caught his attention: “Channel 6 Journalist Murdered”.

  Joshua picked up the newspaper and studied the picture under the headline. The dead reporter was Morgan Lucas, the anchorwoman who had interviewed Amber about the murders.

  “I’ll bet you called Tess Bauer.”

  “I called no one.” Joshua held up the newspaper for her to read. “Did you see this?”

  All she could see was the broken promise. “What do you think I’m yelling at you about?”

  “I mean Morgan Lucas.”

  “What about her? Is she another one of your tootsies?”

  “Hey, I have five kids. When would I have time for any tootsies?” He pointed to the headline. “She was murdered. She’s the reporter that interviewed Amber.”

  While Jan fumed, Joshua scanned the article. The news anchor had been found in her Pittsburgh condo Friday afternoon when she failed to show up for work. She had been stabbed to death in her bedroom.

  With his lack of remorse for not calling her, Jan fired her final shot. “Some friend.”

  Joshua was startled out of his thoughts. “What did you say?” He folded up the paper to read in detail later, but he was too late. She was trotting up the steps to her porch.

  Why should I even care? For twenty years, we didn’t keep in touch. Why should it matter to me that Jan Martin is mad?

  But it did matter to him.

  Maybe if I had handled things differently, Beth wouldn’t have died the way she did.

  “I found out what the key goes to,” he called to her.

  Jan stopped on the top step.

  “You can be there when we find it. I’ll even give you an interview.”

  Jan trotted back down the steps. Suspecting a trick, she squinted at him with eyes that he noticed, for the first time in their whole lives, were both the shape and color of almonds.

  “Can I interview Tad, too? It is Doc Wilson’s autopsy report. Tad is the medical examiner now. If the story is to be complete—Two lovers, who, due to circumstances beyond their control, are never able to be together. Then, years after her death, the boy avenges his true love’s murder.”

  “Tad will let you interview him if I ask him to.” Joshua had a sudden thought. “You haven’t missed out completely on this story. That body in the cemetery was perfectly preserved. You can interview Tad for a feature about it, and why the body didn’t decompose. That’s an interesting story in itself.” He offered her his hand. “I’m on my way there now.”

  “Let me get my recorder.” She rushed inside. She didn’t see Joshua cross his fingers that Tad would be agreeable to keep the promise he had made for him.

  Dressed in a pair of worn sweat pants in lieu of pajamas, and no bathrobe, Tad was finishing his morning pot of coffee when Joshua and Jan knocked on his door.

  Embarrassed to see Tad bare-chested, the reserved drug store manager tried not to stare at his well-formed chest and flat stomach. In all the years she had known him, Jan never realized what he kept concealed under oversized shirts and sweats.

  “I see you made it back from the state
lab,” Joshua observed while greeting Dog, who sniffed his clothes for Admiral’s scent.

  “Only a couple of hours ago.” Tad gestured towards the coffee maker. “If you guys are going to have any coffee, make a fresh pot.”

  After pouring a mug of coffee for himself and another for Jan, Joshua polished off the pot by freshening Tad’s mug before launching into making more.

  While Joshua filled the decanter with water from the tap, Tad smiled at his back and winked at Jan. “Do you still have five kids?”

  Joshua poured the water into the back of the coffee maker. “I let them live. They’re going to the beach.”

  “That’s some punishment. I wish I had you for a father,” Tad said.

  “Too many bodies are popping up in this town, and I want them to concentrate on something else right now.” Joshua spooned the coffee grounds into the filter. “They’re going to the Outer Banks to spend some time with Val’s sister and her two kids.”

  “Tell me about the body,” Jan demanded of Tad, who responded wordlessly with a raised eyebrow.

  “I promised her you’d give her a story.” Joshua took a seat across the table from him. Now, it was his turn for the raised eyebrow, followed by an “Hmmm” through eyes narrowed to slits.

  She laid her recorder in the center of the table and leaned across to ask him, “What did you find out when you examined the body?”

  Tad looked at the recorder like it was a ticking bomb. “I didn’t find anything. I watched the state M.E. do a cursory examination. White male. Late thirties. Sucking chest wound.”

  “Did you find any ID?” Joshua wanted to know.

  “No ID on him. The only thing on him was that article. But his fingerprints are in perfect condition so they’re running them through the database.”

  “What article?” Jan glared at Joshua for holding back on her.