Vertical Burn (21 page)

45. MAXIMIZATION AND MINIMIZATION

Diana sat in the rear cutout of the double kayak, paddling in perfect synchronization with Finney, who was in front working the rudder pedals. Other than explaining how to put on the splash apron and how to get in without capsizing the vessel, she hadn’t needed much instruction. “It’s so low in the water,” she said, like a child with a new toy. “Everything looks different from down here.”

He heard the familiar slap of the lake water on the thin hull, felt his muscles filling with blood and warmth as he wielded the double-bladed paddle in a steady rhythm on either side of the kayak, muscles made powerful from kayaking thousands of miles over the last ten years.

He’d selected one of his three kayaks, a double, and dragged it through the missing outer wall of his spare bedroom. As he plunked it into the water, he said, “Sort of like Ma and Pa Kettle’s houseboat, huh?”

“I like it.”

“You don’t really?”

“I do. But maybe you should get it buttoned up before winter.”

“I was thinking about that.”

“I bet kayaks are great for impressing women. I know I’m impressed. Who do you generally take out in this?”

“My mother.”

She laughed. “No, who? Really?”

“The usual. Michelle Pfeiffer. Courteney Cox. Jewel.”

“Okay, so you’re not going to tell me. Fair enough. I’m not going to tell you about the time Matthew Perry tried to pick me up.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, he really did.”

“I don’t blame him,” Finney said. The craft skittered across the mirrored lake water like a four-legged bug. When the light was at the right angle, they could see deep into the gray-green water. From time to time a sloppy stroke from behind would splash the back of Finney’s arm. He found the thrill of being out on the water with Diana a studied contrast to the rest of his life. He’d almost forgotten how much speed two people who were willing to work could generate; the feel of the wind, the sunshine on their backs was exhilarating. It was clear that Diana was one of the strongest kayakers he’d ever doubled with, male or female, and he wished this little excursion could last forever.

Hugging the shoreline, they traveled north past berthed ships, small marinas, and various businesses.

When he turned around to see how she was doing, she was looking at Gas Works Park, where a man was trying to fly a kite in the windless sky, a woman tagging along behind with a pair of toddlers and a dog on a leash, a plastic bag tied around the dog’s collar for his business.

She caught his eye and said, “Remember I told you I thought I’d read something recently about the Columbia Tower?”

“No.”

“I told you Friday night.”

“Oh, yeah. Sure.” But he didn’t remember. These days his short-term memory was a sieve. It was more than bothersome. It scared him. Could early Alzheimer’s be brought on by smoke inhalation? Or was it just all the tension in his life?

“I hate to mention this when you’re just starting to relax, but when I got home I looked it up on the Web. Get this. Apparently during a pretrial hearing for Patterson Cole’s divorce, his wife claimed he was mismanaging the Columbia Tower, said it was underinsured.”

“Underinsured by how much?”

“There’s some dispute over the worth of the building, but it seems to be short by somewhere between fifty and a hundred million.”

“So he’d lose his shirt if it burned down.”

“Right.”

“Then something else is going to burn down.”

“John, I’ve been thinking about your predicament. G. A. thinks you set the fire at Riverside Drive.
You
didn’t, but
somebody
did. They say there are seven reasons people set fires and almost any arson falls into one of those seven categories. Maybe it would help if we thought about it that way.”

“I can’t even remember all seven.”

“Well, let’s see. The first is revenge. And then two would be the sex-thrill thing. Along with vandalism.”

“Three I guess would be to cover up another crime.”

“Four would be the insurance fraud we were talking about.”

“Political terrorism and social protests.”

“Along with riots and all that—five. Six is the hero gig. Somebody lights a fire so they can save people and look important.”

“That’s what people are going to think I did. To make up for my failure at Leary Way. They’ll say I placed Annie Sortland in the building so I could save her.”

“Ridiculous.”

“It won’t sound that way after G. A. puts his spin on it.”

“What’s left? We were at six, the hero gig.”

“Morons and madmen. Irrational pyromania.”

“That’s seven. Riverside Drive doesn’t fit any of them,” she said. “Does it?”

“Maybe it was done to frame me. No other reason.”

“People don’t usually murder someone in order to frame someone else.”

“Maybe they were just going to light the place and the old woman stumbled onto the perp while he was doing it, and he was afraid she’d tell the police it wasn’t me.”

“And then they put your jacket on the back porch?”

“They were probably planning that all along.”

“Did you recognize the voice on the phone that night?”

“Nope.”

“I guess if there were eight reasons, number eight would be framing another person to get them out of your hair. You find this house prepared for arson. The house is evidence. The house burns down, the evidence is gone, and you’re discredited and removed from the picture because you’re the prime suspect. What I don’t understand is why G. A. is so determined to get you. There’s a good chance any other FIU investigator would have handed you that jacket and said, ‘Here, you forgot this when you were here the other day.’ He started building a case right away.”

“He and I have been butting heads over Leary Way.”

“So he had a grudge against you before the fire?”

“I would say so.”

Keeping close to the beach, they circled Lake Union, paddling slower when there was something Diana wanted to see, faster during the open stretches. They passed the Lake Washington Ship Canal Bridge with the freeway running atop it and then headed west, paralleling a former rail line that had been converted into the Burke-Gilman jogging trail. Two in-line skaters paced them for a few blocks.

On the west side of the water they doubled back and passed under the Aurora Bridge and Highway 99. Finney knew Diana was an active athlete, but still he was surprised at the depth of her competitive spirit. Nobody had ever outpaddled him from the backseat, and only a few of the strongest had been able to match him stroke for stroke the way she was doing. On the west side of the lake they got into a playful contest to see who would quit paddling first, their speed gradually picking up. “You’re welcome to take a rest anytime you want,” he said.

Breathing hard, she said, “Yeah, so are you.”

They were both arm-weary by the time they began closing in on the houseboats off Westlake Avenue, by the time Finney noticed a man standing on the dock in slacks and a navy-blue fire department windbreaker. Captain G. A. Montgomery. Oh, God, Finney thought, the bastards have come to arrest me in front of Diana. Robert Kub and Chief Reese loitered in the shadows farther along the dock. As expressionless as a bum requesting spare change, Montgomery waited while Finney held the kayak snug against the wooden dock and let Diana climb out. Kub met Finney’s gaze as Finney climbed out and held the bow rope. Reese folded his arms behind his back.

“What do you want?” Finney asked.

G. A. moved forward, and an angled sunbeam spotlighted a patch of beard his razor had missed. “This would be better if you and I were alone,” he said, giving Finney the full effect of his intimidating stare.

Mirroring his cocky demeanor, Finney said, “Why? You afraid of witnesses?”

“John, go easy on the insolence. I just wanted you to know we went through that jacket one more time. Don’t know how we missed it earlier, but there was a ticket stub in one of the pockets. Want me to tell your friend here what it was for?”

“There’s no other reason for you to find a stub you couldn’t find earlier except to frame me.”

“I’ll ignore that. You go to the movies?”

“Not for about a year.”

“How about a movie the night before Riverside Drive?”

“I was with you that night.”

“After we spoke you went to a flick. One of those artsy-fartsy theaters in the U District. We have the stub.”

“I haven’t been to any movies.”

After several beats, G. A. continued, “You want me to explain to your friend here the significance of this?”

“The significance is that you’re a liar. I know what you’re doing. You’re going to introduce the jacket in court. I’ll say it was stolen from my station locker and you’ll say it couldn’t have been because I was wearing it the night before.”

“We can prove to the jury you were wearing it the night before.”

“If I wanted to torch that house, why would I tell you it was set up for arson the night before I did it?”

“A man who plays with fire knows how it starts, but not how it ends. You assumed Engine Twenty-six would be first in and you could run upstairs and save the old woman and get yourself a medal. You weren’t counting on catching that aid run just before the fire was called in.”

G. A. and Finney stared at each other. They both knew he hadn’t been to a movie. It was bad enough that incriminating details were piling up against him by accident and that somebody had tried to frame him.

“I don’t understand why you feel the need to falsify evidence,” Finney said.

“Be careful, or I’ll sue you for slander while you’re away getting your education. Don’t think I won’t do it either. And don’t forget, when that old woman dies, and she will die, we’re going to call you back and tag you with murder. My advice is to make it easy on yourself. Cop to a plea, and we won’t press for the death penalty.”

The death penalty? It hadn’t even occurred to Finney. Was this guy nuts? He had to know Finney hadn’t set that fire. Or had he convinced himself Finney had gone off his nut? The death penalty! This was all just too . . . bizarre. It all came into focus now. G. A. was part of the group setting the fires. Of course he’d investigated Leary Way himself. He’d probably set it himself, too.

“Hell, I can think of a million reasons you didn’t mean for anything to happen,” G. A. continued. “You told me about the house, said it was ready for arson, but you knew I didn’t believe you, so you decided to cross the line. I bet you didn’t even know that old woman was around. That wouldn’t be murder; that would be an accident. Lighting a match is a pretty small act in itself. You’ve been under duress. I think we’ll be able to convince a sympathetic judge to be lenient. Keep denying this and we’re going to end up throwing the book at you.”

“What did you and Bill talk about the day before he died?”

Nothing Finney had said until now had fazed G. A., but this seemed to stop him like a .300 Magnum slug hitting a bull elephant. Or maybe it was just the fact that it was a non sequitur. “What are you talking about?”

“We worked on the eighth of June. Bill died early the morning of the ninth. He called you from home on the seventh, didn’t he?” He was stabbing in the dark. Finney was guessing that because Bill Cordifis had written down those three phone numbers he’d called them. Maybe he had. Maybe he hadn’t. He certainly hadn’t called Finney. Maybe he’d phoned his father. He was flailing, but right now flailing was all he could do.

“We talked all the time.”

“Emily had some notes he’d written. There was a list of phone numbers. One of them was yours. On that same piece of paper was the address of Leary Way. Why did he have the address of a fire that hadn’t happened yet? And why call you about it?”

“I didn’t say he called me. And Emily never told me this.”

“She doesn’t know.”

“She doesn’t know? That’s convenient. Who knows? Just you? Of course, just you. Anybody can get a pen and write some crap on a piece of paper. You did that yourself. Man, you’re really stretching here. You’re just . . . pathetic.”

G. A. gave Finney a long look, swiveled around on his heel, and strode up the dock past Robert Kub and Chief Reese. Maybe that was what Finney should have done when G. A. accused him, turned around and walked away without a word. It was effective.

As soon as G. A. was out of earshot, Robert Kub approached, but before he could speak, Finney went on the attack. “You really see him take a ticket stub out of that jacket pocket?”

“Sorry to say that I did.”

“There’s no way he could have been the one who put it there?”

“G. A. wouldn’t do that.”

“Who would?”

“You’re telling me Annie Sortland isn’t going to ID you?”

“I don’t know what she’s going to do.”

After Kub left, Diana touched Finney’s shoulder and said, “I’ve been up to visit her, but they won’t let anybody in. G. A. was on the ward, too, arguing with one of the doctors. I think he was trying to get in to see her.”

As she spoke, Charles Reese stepped within hailing distance, a crooked smile on his face. He stared past Finney as if he wasn’t there. “How are you doing, little lady?”

“Fine, Chief. You?”

“I’d feel better if your boyfriend would listen to reason. They tell me the case against him is rock solid.”

“It doesn’t sound like it to me.”

Watching the sun gleam on Reese’s dark hair, it occurred to Finney why he wasn’t behind bars. After boasting to one and all that he had a witness who would finger Finney, G. A. was afraid Annie Sortland would come out of her drug-induced stupor and name someone else. Even if G. A. wasn’t conspiring to frame him, he might have guessed Finney hadn’t left his jacket at the fire scene and he should have known Finney had gone to him in good faith the night before the fire. He certainly knew Finney had not purchased that movie ticket stub. What he didn’t know was whether or not Annie Sortland would ID him. If she ID’ed someone else, G. A. would end up looking like a boob, since he’d already told half the department Finney set the fire.

Because Finney had chatted with Annie that morning, he, too, had assumed she would name him. But there was at least one other person she might finger: the arsonist, whoever that was.