Shadows (17 page)

“Then I see a burst of red flame and hear the blast. Came from the other side of the house. Nolan staggers around, making noises, trying to call for help, and all of a sudden somebody charges outta the dark right at 'im and blasts him a second time. Point-blank. And I get hit. I'm in the line of fire, behind Nolan. I take a shotgun pellet at the top of my shoulder, by my neck. I'm bleeding like crazy. Hurts like hell. All I want is outta there. I run around behind the house to go back down to Bayshore Drive. Then I hear somebody, something else, running, too. Ahead of me, breathing hard. The guy with the gun. He's in front of me. All kinds of screaming is going on behind me. I'm too scared to stop, I know they'll blame me. I just had the damn run-in with the juvy judge. I keep going, falling, getting cut and scratched up by the branches. I get down to the highway and don't know what to do. I call somebody from a pay phone, ask 'im to pick me up. Needed a doctor to get the goddamn shotgun pellet dug outta me. I still got the scar. If I shot him, how the hell did I get shot?”

He leaned back in his chair and studied their faces.

“I'll take a polygraph,” he offered, “but only about the shooting. Nothing else. Any time, any place. Tell my parole officer I cooperated. A hundred percent. I don't want no hassle from him. Got that? I'm telling you the truth here.

“How'd you find me?” His expression grew wiser. “Did my goddamn brother throw me under the bus?”

“You saw the gunman?” Burch asked.

“It was dark as hell out there. I was a kid. I was scared. He's crashing through the bushes ahead of me. I thought if he turned and saw me, he'd shoot me, too.”

“What did he look like?”

“Taller than me. Had a long gun, a long stride. Heard his breathing. I was praying he wouldn't turn around and come after me.”

“Was he black, white? What was he wearing? Did he say anything? Did you hear his voice?”

“Nah. Never said a word that I heard. It was dark as hell. If he'da turned around so I could see him, I probably would a had a heart attack. Never saw his face. Didn't want to.”

“When did you lose sight of him?”

“When we got down onto Bayshore, he ran left. I took off to the right, to the pay phone at the service station on the far side of the highway.”

“You sure it was a guy? Was it possibly a female?”

“No, no way it was a woman. I think he had a car. Heard the door, then heard it start. I was scared he would turn it around and come after me, but he didn't.

“Until my…ride came, I stayed in the men's room at the service station. Didn't want the guy with the gun to come back looking for me. Didn't want anybody seeing me. My face and arms were all scratched to hell and bleeding. I had splinters, thorns, scrapes, and everything else you could imagine, and was bleeding like hell from that shotgun pellet.”

“Did you go to the hospital?”

“No, my ride took me to a clinic in the Shores. We used to get our shots there cheap when we were kids. Get patched up every time we got hurt. I think the law said they had to report gunshot wounds back then, but since this was only a pellet, I don't think the doctor reported it.

“I tol' 'im I got hurt when a bunch of us guys were target-shooting at a fishing camp out in the 'Glades. That it was an accident. I sweated it for a long time, whenever there was a knock at the door, when stories about the Nolan murder ran on TV or in the newspaper. Nothing happened, till now.

“The story in the newspaper, is that what brought you to my door? I don't know nothing about any babies. Don't know what the hell that was all about.”

“All the nights you watched Summer, ever see her and her father in her room?” Burch asked.

“Yeah. Once. She was dancing, had music on the radio. He must've knocked, because she turned off the radio and ran to put on a robe. It was him. Her father came into the room. He looked so big and tall next to her. They sat on the bed for a while, talking. Then he got up, kissed her on the forehead, and said good night.

“Then she sat down at her little desk and started to do her homework.”

“That was it?”

“Yeah. I scouted around looking in some of the other windows. The younger girls were always on the phone or in their books, and the mother…she was something, too. Always wanted to catch the mother and father together, doing it. But she always drew the curtains before she got undressed. I caught her in the shower once, but it was that rippled glass that blurs everything. All you see is an image, but sometimes that's a turn-on.”

“You ever tell anybody what you were doing up there?” Burch asked. “Anybody else ever peeping at those girls?”

“Hell, no. I wouldn't have been up there if I didn't think I was alone.”

“You ever hear about any of the Nolan girls being pregnant?”

“No way. Far as I knew, they were untouchable little virgins. Funny. Never saw Summer again except for her picture in the paper at his funeral, but years later I saw a girl who looked just like her, uncanny resemblance, in a cowboy movie. She got abducted by Indians. That little fantasy kept me going for a while.

“Went to see it two or three times, read the credits, some girl named Kathryn or something. Had me going, reliving all that shit, all those hot nights.”

“We'll arrange a polygraph,” Burch said, “and call you.”

“Right,” Nazario said. “We want you to go home. Think hard about that night, then write down everything you remember, even the smallest details.”

 

“He's telling the truth,” Nazario said sadly, outside the interview room.

“Crap,” Burch said. “I really wanted it to be him.”

Rusty paper clips held some related papers together, others were loose and faded. Tax forms, canceled checks, receipts, and bills from vendors.

A snapshot of his parents, his father's arm around his mother, both beaming from behind the counter at Stone's Barbecue.

There were pamphlets on how to operate a small business and directions on how to apply for Small Business Administration loans, along with the application forms.

Optimistic booklets on how to franchise a business. Framed pictures of Jesus, Martin Luther King Jr., and John F. Kennedy that had hung behind the counter, along with articles and inspirational quotes on how to succeed in life, love, and business, clipped from magazines and newspapers. Some of the passages were highlighted. One read, “You never know how high you can fly until you spread your wings.” It all made him want to weep. There was nothing here about why anyone would kill them.

He went through business cards from wholesalers and from area organizations that had ordered food for employee luncheons, picnics, and special events. There were receipts for ads his father had placed in a small weekly newspaper for “the best barbecue in town.”

A small leather-covered telephone book full of alphabetically listed numbers, mostly friends, relatives, purveyors, and customers. Stone recognized his mother's neat, legible handwriting.

Tucked inside the front cover was a snapshot of himself, Sam Stone Jr., smiling at age three from his grandmother's lap. He was surprised at how young Gran looked in the photo. Next to it, a wallet-sized copy of his third-grade picture taken shortly before the murders.

He felt despair. He saw nothing here that could help, only a painful history of dreams and lives cut short. He knew he would keep every scrap of paper as long as he lived—in remembrance of them. But he would have to look elsewhere for clues to why they died.

He sighed and closed the address book. Taped to the back was a small form, one of the preprinted paper meal checks presented to customers with their orders. This one had not been used. All that was written on it, in his father's handwriting, was a name, Asa Anderson, and an out-of-state number with a 601 area code. The meal checks came in books, consecutively numbered, so it appeared that the name and number had been written on this one sometime shortly before the murders.

He checked the area code. Mississippi.

They had no relatives there.

He dialed the number. The woman who answered knew no one named Stone and had only had the number for six months. He tucked the snapshots of his parents, and him with Gran, into his wallet and closed the box.

Online, back at his computer terminal, he located a database with old Mississippi city and telephone directories and began to research who that number was listed to in 1987.

He got a hit. Surprisingly, it was not to a man named Anderson.

In 1987 that was the telephone number of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Justice Department in the Southern District of Mississippi.

What did that have to do with his father?

He found the current number, called, and asked for Asa Anderson.

“I don't show anyone by that name on any of our personnel rosters,” a young woman drawled.

“Okay, can you put me through to the person with the most seniority in your office, somebody who was on staff in 1987?”

“I've only been here a year,” the woman said. “But I guess that would be Mildred. She's been here at least a hundred years, but don't you dare tell her I said that.”

“I won't,” he promised.

Mildred proved talkative. “Oh sure, I was here in 'eighty-seven. I started here as a clerk right outta high school. Now I'm the office supervisor.”

“I'm looking for Asa Anderson.”

“Sure, I remember him. One of our investigators, retired 'bout five, six years ago. Top-flight. Nice fella.”

“Is he still around?”

“What did you say your name was again? What department are you with?”

There was a long pause after he told her.

“Do you know where he's at now?” Stone asked.

“Sure thing. Think he's at Eagle Lake, up in the Delta. Has a fishing cabin up there.”

Stone sighed in relief. At least the man was still alive. This was probably nothing. For all he knew, Asa Anderson had vacationed in Miami and enjoyed Stone's Barbecue. But why didn't he leave a business card? Why was his number simply scrawled on a blank food check? That indicated that the man must have called and that his father, busy behind the counter, jotted his number down on the first handy scrap of paper. Why did somebody from the Justice Department in Mississippi call his father? Or mother?

“You have his home number?”

Mildred was suddenly guarded. “Sorry, don't think I'm allowed to divulge that information. Gotta take another call now.”

Stone called back, asked for Human Resources, identified himself, and got Anderson's number.

He called several times throughout the afternoon. The phone rang endlessly, no answering machine. He wondered if he had the right number. Shortly after five
P
.
M
. a man answered.

“I'm looking for Asa Anderson, former investigator for the Justice Department field office in the Southern District of Mississippi.”

“You've got him,” the robust voice replied cheerfully. “What can I do you for?”

“Glad to finally catch you. My name is Sam Stone. I'm calling from Miami.”

“Sam Stone? From Miami? Is that what you said? You bastard! You sick son of a bitch! Who the hell is this?!”

“Excuse me?” Stone said.

But the line went dead.

“Go, go, go!” K. C. Riley waved them toward the elevator. “Before the chief changes his mind. You know how hard it is to squeeze travel money out of the budget.”

“Stokoe looked so good,” Burch mourned. “I really thought we had our guy for a while. Thanks for softening him up.”

“Anytime,” Riley said. “Now go. Bring back some answers.”

The trip to interview Spring Nolan at the Villages had blossomed into a cross-country itinerary. The Villages, San Antonio, Frisco, and Oxford, Ohio.

“It would be a hell of a lot easier if the members of this family would live in the same state,” Burch said. “But they can't stand to be that close to each other.”

As he confirmed their Orlando flight, every other phone line in Homicide was busy. Word had leaked out that a person of interest had been questioned in the Shadows case. Inquiring minds wanted to know.

The detectives suspected Padron, the public information officer, of tipping the press, trading favors with certain reporters.

“Nazario!” Emma waved. “Pick up your phone. Your lady friend.”

“He
has a lady friend?” Corso hooted. “Since when?”

“Pete! I'm so glad you're there!” Kiki sounded excited.

“We're on our way to the airport,” he said. “To see some of Nolan's family.”

“Perfect! Perfect! You won't believe what I found! I think I've solved the mystery!”

“Shoot,” he said, expression skeptical. “We need all the help we can get.”

Burch caught his eye, pointed to his watch, and frowned.

Nazario covered the mouthpiece. “Hang on a sec, Sarge, this might be important.”

“You know that a number of Irish fighters fought against Franco during the Spanish Civil War, right?” she said.

“Never mind,” he told Burch, and got to his feet. He grabbed his jacket.

“Look, Kiki, I gotta go.”

“Wait! Pete, this is huge. The family may know the truth.”

“The Spanish Civil War?” He lowered his voice so Burch couldn't hear. “Wasn't that back in the thirties? The one where Ernest Hemingway—”

“Right. It all makes sense,” she crowed, heady with excitement.

“All right. Spit out the short version. We have to catch a plane.”

“Okay! I went to the South Florida Historical Museum to do some research and stopped to see an exhibit by David Beale, the famous Spanish Civil War photographer.

“He shot group photos of Irish soldiers in the International Brigade. A face in one of them stood out. The caption included the name Clifford Nolan. It was the same one that caught my eye. Captain Cliff Nolan, the rumrunner, the man who built the Shadows!

“It fits,” she said. “All was not forgiven after Prohibition ended in 1933. The feds still wanted to prosecute Nolan for the deaths of the two lawmen killed in that gun battle off the Jersey coast. Federal murder warrants had been issued. Old records show several attempts to serve the outstanding arrest warrants on him. He would have been taken to New Jersey to stand trial. He faced the death penalty or life in prison.

“He knew he couldn't dodge federal agents forever. So, in 1936, Captain Cliff started the rumor that he and the
Sea Wolf
had been lost off the Cuban coast. Then he went off to join the Irish members of the International Brigade and fight fascism in Spain.”

“That sounds pretty far-fetched,” Nazario said. “A good old boy. A South Florida pioneer going to—”

“No, it isn't,” Kiki said confidently. “Nolan was born in Ireland. Even though his parents brought him to America as a child, he still had relatives there, had cousins in the Brigade. It makes perfect sense. He must have felt that by the time the war ended, things would have blown over here and he could come home. His wife, Pierce Nolan's mother, must have been in on it. Cliff wouldn't have left his wife and young son alone, wrongly believing he was dead. Pierce and his family might have known his father was still alive as well.”

“So, why didn't he come back?”

“I think he may have been killed. A number of the Irish soldiers died in that war. I'm looking for casualty lists now. I'm so excited, Pete. It's a major find, the last chapter of a major saga of early Miami finally unfolding.”

“Good for you, Kiki. We'll bounce it off the family. I'll let you know. Can't wait to see you. I'll call you from the road.

“What a woman,” he said, hanging up. “And she cooks, too.”

 

“Nice try,” Burch said en route to the airport. “Wrong mystery. Wish you'd put her to work on a case
we
need to solve.”

“To her, a Miami historian, this is big, very big. How often do you get to solve a seventy-year-old mystery?”

“How often do we get to solve anything? That's our problem. If nothing else,” Burch said grudgingly, “maybe we can use it on Diana Nolan as an icebreaker.”

Between business travelers and families bound for Disney World, the Orlando flight was full.

An energetic little boy behind them tapped Burch on the shoulder to announce that he was four.

“He's really only three and a half.” His father frowned apologetically as he tried to restrain the squirming child in his seat.

“Why does he do that?” his mother asked peevishly.

“He's in a hurry to be a big boy,” Burch said. “Right, son?”

“Vincent,” the father warned when Burch again turned his back, “you're bothering that man in front of you. Next time he'll turn around and smack you—and I'll let him.”

“Vincent,” they heard the man say minutes later, “they're going to make you get off the plane and leave me and your mom here alone. You don't want that, do you?”

The flight was only thirty minutes, less time than it had taken to pass through airport security.

During the approach to the Orlando airport, they saw hundreds and hundreds—thousands—of what looked from the air like blue roofs, tarps covering damage to homes as far as the eye could see. Some blue roofs were in huge clusters in a single development, with adjacent developments almost unscathed, indicating the erratic paths of whirlwinds spun out of the storm—or the shoddy work of certain builders. A few roofs were covered with new wood, under reconstruction, but very few. Brown forests of uprooted trees were everywhere.

“Look at all that misery down there,” Burch said.

“We could be next,” Nazario said grimly.

“It's not if,” Burch said, “it's when.”

They shared the restless anxiety of all Miamians, living on the edge, knowing that today is borrowed time and tomorrow is uncertain.

“How often can you dodge the bullet, or catch it in your teeth?” Burch said. “Something will zero in on us, sooner or later. Mother Nature on a rampage, out of the sea or the sky, lightning, hurricanes, or tornadoes, terrorists at the Turkey Point nuclear plant or the port, or El Loco with a gun. Sooner or later, something's coming for us.”

Behind them, Vincent apparently committed some unforgivable infraction. “Okay, Vincent.” The father's voice was raised. “Get off the plane. Now. You heard me.”

“This,” Burch said, “I gotta see.”

 

The detectives could discern no sign of storm damage at the airport. An ultramodern monorail whisked them into the terminal through a lavishly landscaped Disney-like vista. The Villages was more than an hour's drive away, but near the car rental counter, they spotted a driver holding up a
VILLAGES SHUTTLE
sign.

From his running commentary en route, they learned that the Villages had its own radio station, daily newspaper, several movie theaters, nine golf courses (two of them championship), six supermarkets, hard- and soft-top tennis courts, archery and air-gun ranges, banks, a hospital—and a hospice.

Every evening, free entertainment in the town square, ranging from jazz to country-western to rock and roll. Residents boarded trolleys, drove golf carts or their own cars, and could choose from more than 250 clubs and activities.

The most popular sports, the driver confided, were bowling, golf, and pickleball, a fast-paced cross between Ping-Pong and tennis.

The local lifelong learning college offered year-round classes on any subject one could want, without tests or stress.

“The energy here is unbelievable,” said the silver-haired driver as they passed Rollerbladers in their eighties and seniors waterskiing without boats, clinging to electric pulleys as they skimmed across a controlled water course.

“It's like Disney World for retirees,” Nazario said.

“Or the Evil Empire,” Burch said. “Listen to this.”

He read a list of residents' rules and requirements from a brochure. “No fences, no hedges more than four feet tall. No boats, trailers, or disabled cars allowed in a driveway for more than three days. No clotheslines, etc., etc.”

The Villages sprawled into three counties, with fifty thousand residents already, the driver said. New houses were being built at a rate of four hundred a month. “A few weeks ago you could see a lake right over there.” He pointed to a row of new homes. “But this new section went up in front of it overnight. Now you wouldn't even know there was a lake.”

The detectives took the trolley to the address of Spring Nolan Grayson and her husband, a retired insurance executive. The sprawling house, a top-of-the-line model called the Sanibel, according to the brochures, had a golf cart outside and twin Lincolns in the garage.

Spring Nolan's hair was a soft salt-and-pepper. Wearing casual golf clothes, she looked like the mother of the girl she had been, the one the detectives had seen only in old photos.

She knew about the dead infants from the news accounts, she said.

“I have no idea who they might be.”

“You can appreciate, I'm sure, that we'd like to return them to their families for decent burials,” Birch said.

They talked in a screened-in lanai with a view of a serene lapis lake beneath a Wedgwood sky.

“Ask my mother how they got there,” she suggested sweetly.

“Are you saying she knows?” Nazario asked.

“I can't speak for her,” she said.

“Did your family have problems before the murder?”

“That's the hell of it. I didn't think so. Our childhood seemed idyllic until that moment. Everything after the loss of my father—the change in my life, the changes in my mother—was shocking, so totally out of character with all that happened before.”

“How did your mother change?” Burch asked.

She sighed and rolled her eyes, as though she didn't know where to begin. “From a vibrant, vivacious, warm, and outgoing woman, which is how I remembered her, to a vicious, paranoid, accusatory, abusive…I can't even go on.” She held up her hand for a moment, as though shielding herself from her own dark thoughts. “I don't want to be upset.”

“Did your father ever molest you, any of your siblings, or your friends?” Burch asked.

“Never!”

“Do you believe the others will give us the same answer?”

“Of course! Though, as I said, I can't speak for anyone else. Brooke is emotional, so weak and impressionable that if she's told anything often enough, she'll believe it.”

“Do you have any theories about where those infants came from?”

“I don't think I should answer that, gentlemen. I'm doing my best to be helpful and courteous, but both my therapist and my husband felt I shouldn't even see you. Stirring up old wounds and painful issues from the past isn't healthy. Anytime I hear from anyone in my family, it's a definite setback.”

“Is that why Sky left?”

“My brother was lucky in that respect, yet in another way, I always pitied both him and Brooke because they're the youngest. They had less time during their formative years with both parents and a lifestyle both healthy and perfect. It was a time when the future held nothing but promise. Then it changed, and as a result, none of us ever achieved our full potential.

“Brooke fancies herself a fashionista, a businesswoman, owns some little boutique that couldn't survive without financial help from our mother. She's never mustered enough strength to cut the apron—or purse—strings. Never will.

“We were all affected by what they now call post-traumatic stress disorder. They had no name for PTSD then.”

“Did you know that a Peeping Tom was stalking your sister Summer in the months before the murder?” Burch asked.

“No!” Her hand flew to her heart.

“He watched her through her bedroom window. He was there that night.”

“Did he kill my father?” She looked pale.

“No,” Burch said. “We believe he was a witness. He saw it happen.”

“Who did he say did it?” She leaned forward, eyes intense.