Inmate 1577 (11 page)

May 16, 1958

Columbia, Alabama

Walton MacNally adjusted his black fedora. He was standing half a block away observing the First National Thrift building—specifically taking note of the flow of people entering and exiting. Evaluating the quality of the clientele and looking for potential pitfalls and traps.

Last time, he more or less had gone in unprepared and, in the end, that had worked out pretty well. But he knew that it wasn’t worth taking such a risk again. He was smart enough to know that he’d gotten lucky.

This time, he wanted to think things through, have a sense of what the bank looked like inside, where the security guards were located, how the tellers dealt with the customers. He wasn’t sure what he should be looking out for, but he would keep his mind—and his eyes—open.

MacNally made three trips past the bank on foot before going inside. It was a stately interior, with marble columns and intricately carved wood desks, velvet-looking drapes covering the tall windows. This was a classier outfit than the community thrift he’d robbed last time. Three security guards stood at strategic locations, in a triangle formation: one at each end of the teller’s row, and one in the back, amongst the executive desks.

He tapped his foot with nervous energy. This would undoubtedly be a tougher job.

“Can I help you with something?”

MacNally spun around, nearly knocking over the woman who was behind him. “I—I was just looking. I was—I was just thinking about opening up an account and I wanted to check the place out.”

The middle-aged woman with poofed beauty parlor-set hair tilted her head. “Are there any questions I can answer for you? Would you like to come over to the vice president’s desk and talk with him about the ba—”

“No-no, that’s okay,” MacNally stammered. “I think I’ve seen enough.”

The woman nodded slowly. “All right. Well, if you think of anything you want to ask, my name is Nancy and I’ll be right here.”

MacNally managed a half smile and, like he had seen Sinatra do in the movies, he brought two fingers up to his fedora and tipped it back. He then gave one more glance around and walked outside.

MACNALLY SAT AT THE DINNER table, a pathetic spread of food in front of him and Henry. In addition to a hunk of stale bread and a boiled potato, the only thing that held any substantial nutrients were two carrots he’d pulled from a neighbor’s garden on his way home.

“I went by the bank,” MacNally said. He felt odd discussing this with his son. But he had no one else. And Henry, despite his youth, possessed insight and hardened analysis that never ceased to astonish him. “I’ve got concerns.”

Henry put his fork down. He tilted his head, examining his father’s eyes. “You’re afraid. I can see it on your face.”

“No, that’s not it at all.” But of course, that’s exactly what it was.

“We need the money.” Henry looked down at the dinner plate, as if emphasizing his point. “You want me to go by tomorrow, take a look see? Maybe I can think of something.”

“No. I don’t want you going anywhere near there. I’ll handle it.”

Henry stared for a moment at his father, then grabbed the loaf of bread and yanked off a handful. He shoved it into his mouth and looked down at the table as he chewed.

MacNally stared off at the wall. Embarrassed. His pride bruised like an apple dropped on a hardwood floor.

“There’s this guy a few blocks away who needs somebody to mow his lawn. He ain’t got no kids. I can do it, git us some money.”

MacNally did not look at his son. “No.”

“I already told him yes.”

“You—” MacNally locked eyes with Henry, then dropped his gaze to his plate. The hunk of bread stared back at him. “Okay,” he said in a low voice.

They finished eating in silence. Then MacNally took an axe out to the yard and began chopping wood. It would be cold tonight, and splitting the logs worked up a sweat—but more than anything, it worked off his anger and frustration.

MacNally would go back to the bank tomorrow. There had to be a way to get at the money. He just had to figure it out.

Vail and Burden walked back into the Homicide Detail while Friedberg finished with the digital tape and asked the technician to create a still print of their suspect. They agreed that even if it was unrevealing, it still helped eliminate, to some extent, suspects with certain body types, ages and constitutions. He was also going to check on that enhanced image, in case there was any hidden data in the tape that, when modified, could reveal a facial trait not previously visible.

Before Vail had settled into Burden’s side chair, Friedberg burst into the suite.

“Birdie. Another vic.”

Vail cursed beneath her breath. “Where?”

“Totally different part of the city. At the Cliff House.”

“Cliff house?”

Burden grabbed his jacket off the back of his chair. “I’ll explain on the way.”

SEVEN MINUTES LATER, THEY were getting into a gray unmarked Ford Taurus that was parked beneath a freeway overpass a block from Bryant Street’s Hall of Justice. The top of the vehicle was caked with pigeon shit, a clear tipoff to any skel who knew anything about the SFPD and where the detectives parked their cars.

“Love your ride,” Vail said. “Don’t they have car washes in California?”

“We’ve got a budget crisis,” Friedberg said. “Haven’t you heard?”

“I would think you’d call it fiscally challenged,” Vail said as she swung her body into the rear seat.

“Ain’t that the truth,” Burden said with a chuckle. As they turned onto Fulton Street, he said, “The Cliff House is in an area that the locals refer to as being ‘out in the Avenues.’ West area of the city.”

“And what is this place? A house on a cliff?”

“The Palace of Fine Arts really was a kind of palace where fine arts were displayed,” Friedberg said. “But the Cliff House isn’t a house—at least it hasn’t been since the late 1800s. Or maybe the early 1900s. Anyway, it’s been rebuilt or remodeled a few times, and has been a restaurant for several decades. But it’s not just a restaurant. It’s part of the National Park Service and used to have a penny arcade on the lower level.”

“Anything else that might make it a prime location for a body dump?”

“It’s secluded after hours,” Burden said. “But during the day, there’s a steady flow of visitors.”

“Do we know when the body was placed there?”

“We’ll have to find out when we meet up with the first-on-scene.”

Vail watched as the terrain changed subtly from city to shoreline. “Something else to think about. If we’ve got another body left in a public place—”

“What do you think?” Burden asked. “We gonna find a companion somewhere else in the city?”

“If this is our offender’s ritual, then yeah. Very likely.”

A few blocks later, Burden gestured with this chin. “It’s coming up.” He headed down a sloped two-lane road, the Pacific Ocean swinging into view directly ahead of them. Off to the right, a sizable low-slung cream-colored structure dominated the waterfront. Large capital Art Deco lettering announced that the flat roofed building was, indeed, the Cliff House they were there to see.

Two San Francisco Police Department cruisers sat at the curb, idling with lights flashing in front of a large, glass-walled midsection of the restaurant. A cop stood out front, a blue SFPD baseball cap topping off his uniform.

Burden brought the car to a stop beside the squad cars. Vail was the first out and caught the brunt of a strong, whipping wind that blew her red hair across her face. “Where’s the body?” she managed to ask as she swept the locks away from her mouth.

“Down by the Sutro Baths,” the officer said.

Vail turned to her cohorts for clarification.

“Sutro Baths, got it,” Friedberg said. “This way.” He led them up the steep sidewalk, away from the Cliff House, past a couple of sightseeing telescopes on the left and street vendors selling handmade jewelry on the right. In front of them was a small, family-owned seafood café. But before they reached it, Friedberg turned onto a sloping dirt path.

To their left rolled a hillside, tufts of wild grass, scrub, and bushes sprouting from the rocky face. To the right, a steep, nearly barren shale cliff. And directly ahead, abutting the beachfront and the gray Pacific beyond, was a complex of ruins—sans roofs—with half walls divided into what appeared to be rooms, partially filled with pooled water.

“What’s that down there?” Vail asked.

“Those are—were—the Sutro Baths,” Friedberg said. He tripped on an emergent rock on the increasingly steeper dirt and graveled path, but regained his balance. He stopped and shielded his eyes from the glare. “Back in the late 1800s, I think, there was this guy Sutro, who solved some engineering issues they had with a major gold mine up north. Made him a multimillionaire. He built this complex, which had six humongous, glass-enclosed, indoor swimming pools, a skating rink, a museum, and other shit like that. People came from all over. Anyway, it was still standing after the 1906 earthquake, but ironically burned down a year later. Go figure.”

“Indoor glass-enclosed pools,” Vail said, looking out at the gray Pacific. “Must’ve had a magnificent ocean view.”

“I’m sure that’s why it was such a huge hit. Come on.”

They continued down the path. To their right, a large brown and white sign read

CAUTION
CLIFF AND SURF AREA
EXTREMELY DANGEROUS
People have been swept from the rocks and drowned

“Good to know,” Vail quipped. “Watch out for giant, man-eating waves.”

“It’s no joke,” Friedberg said as they passed the warning placard tunnel. “Over thirty ships have been pounded to smithereens against those rocks below us.”

“Looks like we found our crime scene.” Burden gestured to an area at the end of their path, where an SFPD officer stood guard. “By that hole in the rock face.”

“And what is that hole in the rock face?” Vail asked.

Burden shrugged.

“Beats me,” Friedberg said. “I’ve only been here once, for dinner. I read about the Sutro Baths in the gift shop.”

“And here I thought you were a scholar, a historian to be taken seriously.”

“As a matter of fact—”

“Please,” Burden said. “Don’t get him started on that.”

As they reached the bottom of the path, another brown Caution sign rose from the scattered boulders, warning people of the dangers of falling off the cliffs and into the ocean.

The ruins were now directly off to their left. A pelican was perched on a former wall of the structure; a photographer with a long lens was creeping up, a step at a time, attempting to capture the shot that would add polish to his portfolio.

The wind was appreciably firmer down at the ocean’s edge, and Vail wrapped her arms across her chest.

“What’ve you got for us?” Burden asked the officer, who stood at the mouth of a fairly regular opening in the cliffside, roughened edges encircling its periphery.

“Body’s in there,” the cop said. “Got a call from a tourist. Kind of hard to figure out what he said—dispatch said he was from Denmark, I think—but he was pretty upset. Something about a body that wasn’t moving.”

“Is he still around?” Friedberg asked.

“We got here, no one knew anything about him. And he’s not answering his cell.”

“Okay,” Burden said. “Where’s our victim?”

“Inside, all the way down.”

“Down where?” Vail asked, squinting into the darkness.

“It’s a tunnel. He’s at the end. Any of you have a flashlight?”

Vail fished a small LED keychain light from a pocket.

“That’s useless in there. Take mine. Be careful, the terrain’s a little rough.”

The upper three quarters of the rock facing surrounding the tunnel’s mouth was a creamy, rose-colored tint; the bottom portion was gray and appeared to have layers etched in its surface, like the rings of a tree. A few feet beyond the opening, the walls were black.

Vail suffered from claustrophobia, but it was inconsistent: sometimes she had little difficulty with enclosed places, while on other occasions merely getting in an elevator would fill her with consuming anxiety. She had developed the condition after a recent case that left her in the custody of a killer who traumatized her in a confined space.

Vail took the flashlight and switched it on. The roughened walls and ceiling of the tunnel, which appeared to be about eight feet high, stared back at them.
I can do this.
“Shall we?”

Vail led the way, her shoes crunching on the course, compacted sand. The ground seemed to slope away from her, undulating into the distance as far as the light carried.
So far, so good.
Approximately seventy-five feet away, a semicircle of light blasted through the opening from the tunnel’s opposing end. An object appeared to be silhouetted against the glare.

“Is that—” She swung back over her shoulder. “Hey! Officer. Is that our guy down at the end?”

The man bent over and peered in. “That’s him,” he said, his voice reverberating off the walls. “He’s tied up against something.”

“That would fit,” Burden said.

Vail moved further in. A few steps later, smashing ocean waves echoed somewhere off to their left. The hand-smoothed sheen of a metal railing caught her light beam. They stopped and listened: a sliver of light followed the water into the cave, a tributary that ran below them and perpendicular to the tunnel’s main trunk. Vail crouched and looked into the crevasse.

With her flashlight, she followed the water to an area just below them. “High tide, I’m sure the ocean floods this tunnel. We’d better get to that body. CSI on the way?”

“He was dispatched same time we were called,” Friedberg said. “Should be here soon.”

They walked toward the open end, where, against the gray light of the sky, a shape that resembled the body of a man stared back at them. As they approached, Vail shined the beam on something to the right of the corpse. The reflective coating on a brown Caution sign, similar to the one they had seen earlier on the trail, lit up brightly: End of Trail.

As if the cable, the abrupt end of the tunnel, and huge boulders ahead weren’t clues enough.