A Rendezvous to Die For (11 page)

Trembling and feeling clammy from
sitting in the car with no windows open, I slowly opened the door and
stepped onto the pavement of the driveway. Hearing nothing, I dashed
to the outside wall of the carriage house. Then, hugging the bricks,
I inched my way back to the side entrance, pushed open the door with
one outstretched hand, and then quickly stepped back. I had seen cops
do that in the movies. Nothing happened. No gunshots. No blinding
light. No escaping burglars. No inside noises. I reached around the
corner of the doorway to flick on the lights. I tried several times.
Nothing happened. The intruder had either unscrewed the bulb or
turned off the power connection.

I switched on my hopelessly
inadequate laser light and played it around the inside of the garage.
Since I had little to store in the cavernous space, it didn’t take
more than a few seconds to see it was untouched and no one was in
sight. I slithered over to the stairway and crept up the stairs to my
apartment, hating the eerie silence. Staring at the door, bathed in
only the thin beam from my keychain light, I finally gathered the
courage to reach for the doorknob and give it a turn.
The door is
still locked.
Breathing an audible sign of relief, I inserted my
key into the lock, pushed the door open and reached inside to flick
on the light switch. Light flooded the room with daylight luminosity.
I tiptoed cautiously throughout the apartment, searching behind
furniture, under my bed, and in every closet. From what I could tell,
no one had entered the premises.

Returning to the kitchen door to
lock it, I stumbled into the living room and flopped onto the couch.
My once thoroughly fatigued mind was pumped with a new supply of
adrenaline and it was difficult to focus. Someone had definitely
broken into my outside door to gain entrance to the carriage house.
Why? And why hadn’t this person used the same ploy to gain entrance
to my apartment? Nothing seemed out of place.

Minutes passed as I went over
every possible scenario. Then the answer hit me.
It’s not my
apartment. It’s my darkroom.
Someone wants what I have.
But what?
Photographs? Photos that may absolve me from
complicity and pinpoint the real murderer? Os course! Photographs of
Rendezvous events!
I leaped off the couch and dashed to the
kitchen, purposely making a lot of noise. I stomped from one end of
the room to the other and finally thrashed through one of the
drawers. If the intruder were still hiding downstairs, I wanted to
give him the opportunity to make his getaway through the broken
garage door.

Armed with a more powerful
flashlight, I knew I couldn’t delay any longer. I started the long
descent down the same stairway to my darkroom, located on the far
side of the garage. I whistled and sang “The Yellow Rose of Texas,”
hoping my off-pitch rendition would scare away any boogiemen. My
hunch was right. The darkroom was in shambles. I groaned aloud. As my
eyes roamed over the mess, I realized nothing was salvageable.
Chemical powders had been pulled off the shelf and sprinkled over
mountains of photo paper strewn across the floor. Drawers had been
pulled out of my filing cabinet and their contents dumped. Mixed into
the heap, I saw scissors, tongs, and other tools. When I nearly
stepped on an X-acto knife, I gave up and returned to my living
quarters. There was nothing I could do now that couldn’t wait for
morning.

Minutes later, with a cold beer
in hand, I stewed over the latest tragic event in my life.
At
least one person knows I’m innocent. That’s a given. I have to
assume that person wants to ensure anonymity. Who? WHO? And the
bigger question . . . was the break-in successful? Am I in danger?

Too frazzled to think straight, I
triple-locked my apartment door, then called and left a message for
Marty, asking that he repair the garage door and get electrical
service restored to the downstairs as soon as possible. I made no
mention of my destroyed darkroom.

As I dressed for bed, I peered
into the bathroom mirror and saw my face of despair. Within one week
my whole life had changed. I was now both a pursuer and the pursued.

Chapter
11

Sunday

After a fitful night of sleep, I rolled out of bed, walked
zombie-like through my morning routine, dressed in a pair of
well-worn jeans and a tank top, and then forced myself to go back
downstairs. For the next couple hours, I sorted through the rubble in
my darkroom and carried one boxful of ruined photos at a time into
the garage. Several of my favorite enlarged Indian photos, which I
had positioned on an easel, were destroyed beyond repair. Although
I’d scanned the negatives into my computer, it would take time to
reprint them.

As the morning wore on and the
stacks in the garage grew higher, my frustration increased. I
couldn’t account for a single missing photo. I stepped gingerly
around the darkroom and, unexpectedly, caught sight of an envelope
that was pasted to the floor. I recognized it as one I had picked up
from Sanders’ office a couple days earlier. It was empty. All of
the Rendezvous photos had been removed. Apparently, when the intruder
opened the second drawer and found the photos he wanted, he had left
the rest of the drawers intact. My one consolation was that, although
the intruder would know whether or not he had been photographed, I
could still get copies. Deputy Shaw had the originals in his office.

Finally giving up any notion that
I could handle this new situation on my own, I called my attorney.
“You can’t withhold this information, Cassandra,” he said.
“After you inform Shaw of the break-in, I’ll go to his office and
get new copies of all the photos for you.”

“
I’ll trust your judgment,
Lawton,” I said, heaving an exaggerated sigh. “You know I can’t
stand the guy, but I’ll call Shaw right now. If he wants to meet
with me, I need you to run interference for me. Will you be
available?”

“
It’s Sunday, Cass. I doubt
he’ll want to see you until Monday morning. Let me know, though.
I’m here to see you through this ordeal.”

Fortunately, I was able to inform
Shaw of the break-in and the missing Rendezvous photographs through
his voice mail. I added that Sanders would be visiting him on Monday
to make a new set for me, to replace the stolen ones. I didn’t
bother to suggest that this might prove I wasn’t his murderer.

Later,
with a stale cup of coffee, I collapsed on the sofa. I felt drained,
yet strangely wired at the same time. I had a starting point for my
own investigation. As soon as Sanders brought me a new copy of the
photographs, I would spend hours poring over every detail. I would
see who was at every event. As I was mulling over my plan, the
doorbell chimed. “Who’s there?” I called down the stairs, one
hand clutching my throat as I swallowed my fear. It was silly, of
course. If my nighttime intruder was both Eric and Randy’s
murderer, he wouldn’t ring my doorbell in broad daylight. Or would
he?

“
It’s me. Jack.”

Dashing down the stairs, I pulled
open the door and stared at him, thankful to see a friend.

He shifted uncomfortably from one
foot to another, seemingly unsure of his reception. “I was in the
area, so I decided to stop by,” he said. “I didn’t like the way
our last conversation ended.”

I motioned him inside and we
climbed the stairs to the living room. “Make yourself comfortable,”
I said, examining him from the sides of my eyes. I perched on the
edge of a club chair facing him, where he sat stiffly on the couch.

He rubbed his hands nervously
over his jeans-clad knees. “I’m on your side, Cass. I’m not
your enemy. You can trust me.”

After studying his face, I rose
to stand at the window. The leaves on the old maple tree that
obstructed my view of Marty’s house fluttered in the breeze. “Right
now, I’m taking everything at face value, Jack,” I said. “And
if something smells a little ‘off,’ it goes into the ‘suspicious’
file I’m carrying around in my head.” I turned to see his
reaction to my not-so-friendly words.

He nodded. “That’s fair. I’d
probably feel the same way. I just hope you can file away that I’m
your friend and available to help you, if I can.”

“
I’ll do that. Thank you.”
I absently straightened magazines on the coffee table.

“
Good.” He scanned my
apartment. “Nice place.” He rose from the couch and pointed
toward the Indian pictures hanging on the fireplace wall. “Very
nice. Your work, I’m sure. I can see why you like living here . . .
but you don’t have the best security. The downstairs door doesn’t
have a lock on it.”

I managed a smile. “Well, at
least the doorbell is working. Which means Marty’s got the
electricity back on.”

“
Electricity?” He scowled.
“Shouldn’t that be a given?”

When I told Jack about the
break-in, his eyes lit up with the possibility of a “law-enforcement
issue” to pursue. “Did they take all the photos of the
Rendezvous?”

“
They took all the color
prints.”

“
A damn shame. You spent hours
on that project. Have you got any more?”

“
I have a compact disc of
photos the sheriff returned to me. They’re in my computer.” I
nodded toward my office.

“
Shows that the intruder wasn’t
tuned into contemporary times,” he said, shaking his head. “Bet
he thought he had cleaned you out.”

I straightened a pillow on the
couch and moved across the room. “I should take a look at the ones
in the computer right now. They might give me a clue as to what he
was looking for.”

“
I’ll help, if you want. Two
sets of eyes are better than one.”

“
Sure, I’d appreciate the
company. I’m still a little on edge.” I led the way to my office.
Once settled in front of my notebook, I opened the file that included
the photos.

“
Holy shit! There must be
hundreds of pictures in your computer!” Jack said. “This is not a
ten-minute job.”

I laughed. “It’s easy to take
a ton of digital photos when you don’t have to think about film
costs.” I started up the slide show, which displayed each
individual photo full screen.

“
What specific things are we
looking for?” Jack pulled his chair closer to the table.

“
Don’t have a clue,” I
said. “But for openers, I’d say shots of anyone we know.
Eventually, I can organize them by subject, but not today.”

We viewed photos of people and
events taken from several angles and various distances— close-ups,
long shots, some with backgrounds out of focus, others in clear
context. “Some nice shots of my landlord,” I said, displaying the
photos of Marty. “Here he is, in the ’hawk-throwing contest.”

I leaned closer to the screen. It
was hard to see Marty’s features, because he wore a wide-brimmed
hat, pulled low over his eyes. The rest of his face was shadowed by
his bushy beard. I had caught him in one moment of short-lived
jubilation when the ’hawk landed where he wanted. He had pulled off
his hat and was waving it in the air, while he kicked out one of his
boot-clad feet. I had zoomed in to get a close-up, but he turned just
as I clicked the shutter. I regretted I hadn’t photographed him
standing on the sidelines after the competition. And, unfortunately,
I had taken no pictures of him
before
the contest either.

In another photo, Willis Lansing
was drinking coffee at a vendor booth in the early morning light. He
was dressed in the costume of a trader—white cotton shirt tucked
into pants held up by red suspenders. His pant legs were tucked into
leather boots. He carried his beaver hat under his arm, as he used
one hand to wipe away perspiration from his brow.

I especially liked some of the
people shots and knew that Photoshop magic would turn them from okay
shots into very good ones. “Isn’t that Eric behind the Indian
woman doing the weaving? Yes, it is! I’d recognize him anywhere.”
I marked the photo. “And, there’s Randy, over by the horse
corral.” I felt my shoulders droop. “Both dead,” I murmured.
“Both murdered in the same week. I can’t stop asking myself why.”
The slide show had run its course. I turned to face Jack. His eyes
were glazed over and he looked ready for la-la land. “See anything
suspicious?”

“
Not a thing. It looks like a
big party to me. Everyone’s having a good time. It’s hard to
believe a murder was being committed nearby at the same time some of
these pictures were taken. A murderer is loose in our town. A
murderer who was probably in your house last night.”

Chapter
12

Monday—Week
Two

I was up at the
crack of dawn, after a night of tossing and turning and sitting up to
hear sounds that weren’t there. Clearly, my Saturday night visitor
had me spooked. I had relived every hour of every day since finding
Eric’s body in the sweating lodge. Nothing special stood out,
except something Deputy Shaw had said in his last questioning
session. He had asked me how well I knew Frank Kyopa, the head of the
Prairie River Band. Although I had testified in his favor, by
labeling the photograph Eric had taken of him entering a land
developer’s building in Chicago as a fake, I hadn’t mentioned it.
I had passed off my knowing him only as a casual business contact. I
hadn’t been convincing. My dancing around the mulberry bush had
kept me firmly on Shaw’s suspect list, especially since the episode
I had failed to mention on my own was the one that ended Eric’s
career at the
Star-Tribune.
But why was Shaw so interested in
connecting me to Kyopa? Certainly he didn’t think Frank and I were
in cahoots and out to get Eric.