Three Can Keep a Secret (20 page)

She nodded silently, still sobbing. "How do you know this?
"

"
She told me.
"

"
When did it happen?" She didn't answer at first. "Back when you two were going to those parties?" She nodded again.

"When you met Jerry," he suggested more than asked.

She doubled over in response, as her crying turned to keening and her body began to shake.

Relentless, he rose behind her and began massaging her shoulders, murmuring, "It's okay, Nancy, get it out. It's been tearing at you for decades. Get it out. It's okay."

She finally calmed enough that he returned to her side, kneeling again, and said, "Tell me about you and Jerry and the parties, Nancy. And Carolyn."

Taking a deep breath, she straightened slightly, her face damp and her clothes stained with tears. "You were right," she said. "They were a regular thing, and Carolyn and I and some other girls were there a lot. It was new and fun and exciting. These were the most important people we knew. We ate well and drank like fish and even made some money, which meant something in those days." She faced him pleadingly to add, "And Jerry and I really did fall in love. That was real."

"I'm sure it was," Joe soothed her. "Look at how long you stayed together."

"Right," she said. "That's right."

"So, what happened to Carolyn?"

"I don't know, exactly. It was a big night. A crazy night. A major bill had gone through or something. It's been too many years, and so much was happening back then. But everybody showed up
—
lobbyists and legislators and staffers. You name it, they were there. There was a river of alcohol and girls we didn't even know . . ." She paused before finishing, "Things got carried away, even for us."

"Do you have any idea what happened?" Joe asked.

"No," she said. "We got separated. I only found her afterwards, in one of the bedrooms
—
this was at a hotel outside town. It's gone now. She was a wreck, only partly conscious, her clothes were a mess
—
what there were of them. She didn't remember much of anything.
"

"
What did you do?"

"Put her back together as best I could and took her home. Two months later, she told me she was pregnant."

"Did she know who the father was?"

"No. She said she passed out entirely during the rape at one point. She had no idea how many there'd been."

Joe moved to sit on the edge of the table, still within reach. "I need to ask you some more questions, Nancy, as you can guess. But can I get you a glass of water or something before we continue? Or would you like to take a small break
—
maybe visit the ladies' room?"

Nancy dabbed at her eyes one last time with the damp napkin and sat straight up. "No. I'm fine. It's hard, but I'd like to get it finished with, if you don't mind."

"Of course," he said. "I want to ask you about what happened afterwards, but before we move on, I need to go over a couple of things about these parties."

She took a deep sigh. "All right."

"You made it sound like they happened all the time
—
or at least frequently. But surely what happened to Carolyn wasn't part of the norm, was it? Word would've leaked out."

"There were two types of party," she explained. "I should have gone into that. I was too upset. I'm sorry. There were the regular ones
—
with drinking and dancing and maybe a little hanky-panky between consenting adults
—
they happened often, mostly on weekends, involved all sorts of people, and weren't really organized."

She stopped to concentrate. "And then there was another type," she continued, "that involved a special bunch of men. I heard them call themselves the Catamount Cavaliers once, although when I brought it up, I was told to keep my mouth shut, or else. I'd come across a pin
—
like something you'd wear on your lapel
—
that had a gold
CC
mounted on it. Very fancy. And I asked what it was for."

"Who did you ask?" Joe wanted to know.

"Oh, it doesn't matter," she said. "He's long dead, and I only knew him by his first name anyhow. He told me they were like the Hellfire Club, of Ben Franklin's day, when he lived in England for a while. I didn't really understand what he was talking about, but I knew it had to do with sex. And that it was super secretive. I was told in no uncertain terms never to say a word about any of it, and I never did
—
until now."

"Do you know how it was organized?" Joe pursued. "Who its members were?"

"I don't know about the first, but the members were supposedly very influential businessmen, politicians. I never knew. Any dealings that we girls ever had with them were under special circumstances, and the lights were either always out, or we had blindfolds on."

Joe was having a hard time imagining all this. Human debauchery was no stranger to him
—
not after so many years on the job but this was still Vermont, and while he'd always assumed that some human misbehavior made it into the state to a degree, something like an organized men's sex club would have been a stretch.

Apparently not.

"How big was this group?" he asked.

"Not big. I always thought the pins and whatever else they did were just to make them feel special. The funny thing was that their parties and the regular ones sometimes happened at the same time in the same place, like when Carolyn was raped. We'd all go to what we thought was a typical blowout, but we'd never know when some of us might be invited upstairs to entertain the Cavaliers. It only happened once in a while. It wasn't the norm. I can't even swear that's what happened that weekend, with Carolyn. But I did find her in one of the upstairs rooms, which is what made me think the Cavaliers had something to do with it."

Joe was scratching his head. "A gang rape in the same hotel while the party was going on?" he summarized.

She repeated, "I told you things got out of hand. The Cavaliers seemed harmless till then
—
group sex with hoods and costumes and stuff that usually made us girls laugh. What happened to Carolyn only happened that once, that I know of. I think it really scared them. I know I was never invited to any of their parties after that, and I don't know anyone else who was, either."

Joe pondered what she'd told him while gazing at her in wonder
—
this small, slim, gray-haired lady with slightly gnarled hands and sensible shoes. He was trying his best not to imagine her in the situations that she'd so frankly detailed, while at the same time recalling what Sammie had told him about some of the shenanigans that regularly took place at The Woods.

"Okay," he said. "Let's move on a bit. What happened to Carolyn after she told you she was pregnant?"

Kelley raised her eyes to him. "That's the crazy thing
—
she made it sound like the most wonderful thing in the world. Carolyn came home one night, waving a wad of money and laughing, saying that her ship had come in and that they were going to do the right thing and take care of her and the baby from now on. She started packing right then and there. That was right after the whole Governor-for-a-Day hubbub, when she made the papers and was squired around like a celebrity."

"Who did she mean by 'they'?" Joe asked.

"She wouldn't tell me. Said that was the deal. If she identified them, everything went up in smoke. If you ask me, everything went up in smoke anyhow, because I never heard from her again."

"She packed up that night and disappeared?" Joe asked.

"Pretty much. It actually took a couple of days, but that was it."

"Did she talk any more about it during those two days? Anything that might help?"

She shook her head. "I asked, but she kept her mouth shut, even once accusing me, 'You want to ruin everything?' like this was some great move up for her."

"How about Jerry?" Joe persisted. "You and he must've talked about this."

"We did," she conceded. "Especially after Carolyn's big day in the news. But he was as clueless as I was."

"But he was one of the Cavaliers, wasn't he?"

"Not Jerry," she said quickly, her face reddening, which made Joe suspicious.

"What about the baby?" he asked, letting it go. She'd been helpful so far, and he hadn't been gentle on her. He was willing not to challenge her devotion to Jerry.

But she couldn't help him. "The baby
—
as far as we knew
—
vanished with Carolyn," she said. "It was like a beam from outer space came down and took her away."

Joe let out a sigh. "It's an amazing story. I'm glad you got out of it with a happy ending, to be truthful."

"I know," she admitted. "You can be so stupid when you're young. Good thing I was lucky."

"What about your life afterwards?" Joe asked, looking to end their conversation on an up note.

"Jerry and I married. That whole world changed anyway. Vermont sort of joined the twentieth century, and everybody started acting more responsibly." She paused to stare into the middle distance before con eluding, "Those were incredible times."

"I'm thinking Carolyn might agree with you," Joe said, adding, "She had a sister, didn't she?"

"Yes. Barb."

"Did you know her at all?"

Nancy frowned slightly. "No. We met once, but that was it. They weren't close."

Joe thought back to his conversation with William Friel, on the same topic. "Really?" he said. "I was told otherwise."

"Barb was very judgmental. She didn't approve of Carolyn's lifestyle."

"So the break occurred because Carolyn moved to Montpelier?" Joe suggested.

"If there was a break," Kelley said. "I didn't know them before. I thought they always hated each other."

Joe nodded sympathetically, imagining the older, plainer, less playful sister feeling left on the fringes of Carolyn's supposed happiness. "How 'bout afterwards?" he asked. "After the pregnancy. Do you know how Barb was then?"

"No. The one time I saw her was when Carolyn moved in with me. I always guessed she'd have an I-told-you-so attitude, though. She struck me as the jealous type. That's one of the reasons I was happy about Carolyn hitting it rich at the end."

Joe felt bad about having shattered such a cheerful image. But it also triggered one last inquiry. "I'm going to ask you a final question, Mrs. Kelley, and I want to stress to you that if you answer yes, you'll be in no trouble. I just need to know: Has Carolyn been in touch with you recently?"

She fixed him with her eyes and answered, "No. The last time I saw her could have been her last day on Earth. The break was that complete."

Joe nodded slowly. "I have a feeling she wouldn't argue with you there," he said.

Dave Spinney was almost as tall as his father, having reached his later teens, and liked to walk alongside him more in public than he'd used to, especially in Springfield, where they'd lived his whole life. Back when he was a kid, with his old man younger and more full of fire
—
and a trooper for the Vermont State Police
—
it hadn't been much fun. Dave's friends steered clear of him whenever father and son appeared together, and Lester made comments anyhow, if he recognized any of them from a distance
—
referring to whatever trouble they might have gotten into, or just avoided, or the company they were keeping.

That had been a real drag. Worse than having a dad who was school principal.

But now that Lester had been with the VBI for several years, fewer people knew him, he didn't chase after them in a cruiser anymore, and
—
his son could grudgingly admit
—
Dave had also grown up considerably. Especially after Lester had risked his job to save Dave's butt when the latter had gotten tangled up with a bunch all destined for jail.

That had been a confusing time, a chance to make some hard choices, and an opportunity to recognize his parents in a more mature light
—
with their fears, their vulnerabilities, and their love for him and his sister clear to see. He wasn't happy that he'd gone through it, but he was pleased with the end results
—
enough to have announced an interest in joining the state police in a couple of years.

They were at the local supermarket, doing the weekly grocery shopping, which Dave's mom often couldn't do because of her hours at the hospital.

That was fine with the men, since they had their own style and taste in food, with which Sue didn't argue.

"You having any more headaches, Dad?" Dave asked as they walked behind their cart.

"From when that guy bonked me?" Lester asked. "No. That only lasted a couple of days. I'm good now. I can't deny that I'm happier running interviews for a while, though. I tried jogging this morning and could still feel where he hit me." He tapped his head, now sporting a recruit's high-and-tight haircut to balance out the tonsorial damage left behind by the ER nurses. "Good thing it's not a vital organ, huh?"

He poked his son in the shoulder, grabbed a loaf of bread as they walked by the bakery section, and tossed it to Dave like an underhanded football. Dave snatched it out of the air and diverted it into the cart as they laughed.

"Ice cream?" Lester asked as they neared the end of the aisle.

"Cherry Garcia," Dave answered without pause.

They rounded the corner and aimed for a row of glass-fronted freezers when a young man appeared out of the end of an adjacent aisle, carrying a six-pack of beer.

Lester took no particular notice of him, until he saw him freeze in midstep and stare, as if caught in a searchlight at night. Instinctively, Les also stopped, reaching out to grab Dave by the back of his shirt.

Dave twisted, smiling, to ask what was up, while the young man dropped the six-pack on the floor with a dull thud and took off running in the opposite direction.

That did it. Lester, having not recognized the man's face, definitely remembered his awkward running style. This was the guy who'd smacked him on the head.

"Son of a bitch," he muttered, "it's him," and took off in pursuit.

Dave didn't hesitate. He followed his father, abandoning their groceries as they all headed for the broad bank of doors beyond the checkout counters.

"POLICE
,"
Lester called out.
"Stop."

Lester glanced over his shoulder. "Stay back, Dave. I want you safe. Phone 911. Officer in pursuit."

Dave dropped out of his father's peripheral vision while staying in the chase and pulling out his cell to make the call.

One by one, they dodged and weaved through the thin crowd, bursting out into the parking lot like successive coins shot from a slot machine.

The supermarket was located on the edge of downtown Springfield, in a shopping plaza built on a small peninsula, bounded on three sides by the Black River. A major roadway capped it across the top. Aside from an access drive to the road, far from the store's entrance, there was a single narrow pedestrian bridge spanning the water between the plaza and an old mill site.

This is where the runner headed.

Lester knew this part of town from driving around in search of a parking place.

Dave, on the other hand, had hung out here as a kid every Saturday night with friends. He knew it as he did his own living room. Instinctively, therefore, with no word to his father, he split off at an angle, using his youth, his long legs, and the lay of the land to best advantage, and went to cut off their prey from reaching the footbridge.

Their target saw him coming
—
as did Lester, whose caution shifted to pride at the sight
—
and veered off toward an awkward juncture at the edge of the plaza, where the river, the road's embankment, and a row of tangled trees all met up in an ignored and jumbled eyesore behind another building.

"Stop where you are," Les repeated, now panting with exertion.
"Police."

Of course the other man didn't stop, and, judging the underbrush near the trees to be impenetrable, he plunged down the embankment through a tangle of storm rubbish and mud, toward the water.

"Damn," Lester swore under his breath as he and David followed suit.

Fortunately, they were spared anything beyond wet and muddy feet, as the guy before them slid on the loose talus of river rocks and went sprawling into a filthy mixture of water, mud, and urban trash that swirled lazily in a small eddy. Without com merit, Lester and David each took hold of a leg and dragged their prize back to dry land, where
—
finally defeated
—
he just lay on the ground, looking up at them.

Expressing himself via gesture only
—
still gasping for air
—
Les reached out, smiling broadly, and slapped his son on the back.

"At the grocery store?" Joe asked, incredulous.

"It happens," Lester told him. "It's not that big a state. His name is Travis Reynolds. I ran his criminal record. Typical stuff
—
nothing over the top. He's a bad boy heading for worse. I have him locked up at the Springfield PD right now. Thought you might like talking with him."

Joe was back home in Brattleboro and checked his watch instinctively, not that he had anywhere else to go, or anything else to do just then. "You think he'll play?" he asked.

"I think he might with you," Les told him truthfully. "If you were introduced as the big boss holding a deal in his hand. I've let him know that we could lock him up for a very long time on what he did to me. He has no clue I couldn't pick him out of a lineup if you paid me."

"Sold," Joe said. "I'll be there in half an hour."

Springfield was less than forty miles north of Brattleboro, one among a scattering of industrial-era towns lining the shores of the Connecticut River
—
all once reliant and dependent on the water as a power source and a conduit to urban centers like Hartford and beyond, and now largely left to their own wits, surviving in a very post-industrial world.

As if reflecting this downturn, Joe's journey was thin on traffic and shrouded in darkness, in contrast to similar trips that he'd taken into Massachusetts and beyond, where signs of commerce and manufacturing burned late into the night. It was Vermont's particular burden to be the envy of its powerhouse neighbors
—
whose residents flocked to relax in its pastoral spaces
—
while it aspired to acquire at least a fragment of their capitalist musculature.

A burden that had been thrown even more into contrast by its beauty being devastated by Irene.

Springfield itself, however, had suffered little. A community founded on the force of its river, which carved through the heart of downtown, it had long ago harnessed, dammed, and confined the water's force between fortified embankments
—
and thus escaped most of the storm's rage this time. As Joe pulled into the police department's parking lot, the town looked much as it always had.

This was more than Joe could say for Lester Spinney, who greeted him in the lobby looking like a slime-fouled clam digger from the knees down. Behind him, Joe also noticed the poster telling of Carolyn's having gone missing, prominently displayed on the public bulletin board.

"I take it he ran," Joe suggested.

"You take it right," Lester confirmed, gesturing toward an inner door. "This way."

They located Travis Reynolds in a small windowless room, sitting on a steel chair at a bolted-down table, with one wrist handcuffed to a large ring mounted in concrete beside him. His entire body looked like Lester's shoes.

"Hey, Travis," Joe said cheerfully, entering the room alone and shutting the door with a theatrical clang.

"I'm Joe Gunther, second-in-command of the VBI," he said as he sat opposite the encrusted young man and began methodically laying out a pad, pencil, and a voice recorder. "Heard you've had better days, is that right?"

Travis made to ignore him until, startlingly, Joe half rose from his seat, leaned into his face, and shouted from inches away,
"I
s
that right?"

Travis pulled back, his eyes round. "What the fuck, man?"

Joe followed, resting his hands on the tabletop to loom over him. He kept his voice loud.
"What the fuck?
Is that what you just asked me, Travis?
What the fuck?
Really? Is that what you're offering?
Answer me."

Travis was pressed against his chair back, his chin tucked in, his cuffed hand pulling on the ring. His voice was plaintive and whiny. "Are you crazy? What do you want?"

Joe sat back down and looked at him pleasantly, his voice back to normal. "I want you to be very practical, Travis," he said. "I want you to think about what's best for you when you talk to me."

"I don't have to talk to you," Travis replied, but his voice lacked conviction.

"Oh, Travis," Joe said. "Do you want to take that chance? I mean, you're the one who put a cop in the hospital. Not something the state's attorney or any judge is going to like." He stopped, as if in thought, before continuing, "Let's see . . . what are you? A two-time loser? Damn. Not a great bargaining position. You never know, of course. You might get lucky and duck the hangman. It happens. Once in a blue moon."

Travis stared at him, clearly flummoxed by what he was hearing. In fact, he wasn't a two-time loser, nor was he facing any hangman, metaphorically or otherwise. Judges tended to belittle assaults on police officers, even with the additional charges Reynolds was facing.

"Travis?" Joe asked, his voice growing rich with warning. "I'm not a patient man, and I am seriously pissed off at you."

Travis swallowed, once. "What d'you want?" he asked quietly.

"To balance the books," Joe told him. "You tell me everything that got you in this jam, and I'll see what I can do to cut you some slack with the state's attorney."

Travis made a face. "You'd make my putting your cop in the hospital go away? I really believe that."

"Okay," Joe said, counting off the charges. "Aggravated assault, assault on a police officer, breaking and entering, theft, evading arrest, failure to obey a police officer . . ." He looked up. "That's just off the top of my head. I got more to play with, and I won't take any of it off the table unless you give me something. How good that is dictates how much I take off. Your choice."

Reynolds stared at him, but without defiance this time.

"No tricks," Joe said. "You do the math. This is a straight-up deal, 'cause I know you have something to give me."

Still, the young man resisted.

"Tell you what," Joe went on. "I'll add murder to the list for good measure, since you're the only guy we have for that, too."

"What?"
Travis exclaimed. "I didn't murder nobody."

"Why do you think everybody's so interested in that fancy apartment?" Joe asked. "The old-timer who lived there was killed, Travis. Now, I don't know if you did that or not, but do you really want me to think you have something to hide?"

Joe slapped his hand loudly on the tabletop, making Travis jump in his chair.

"Now's the time to talk,"
Joe yelled.

"I didn't kill nobody," Travis said quickly. "It was just a grab job."

Joe smiled supportively, his voice again conversational. "Something you were paid for?"

"Yeah."

"Who paid you?"

"Some guy. I don't know his name."

"Tell me about that."

Travis pressed his lips together briefly, and then began his confession. "I got a call, like out of the blue. This guy said he heard I do odd jobs, and did I want to pick up five hundred bucks."

"He say how he heard of you?" Joe asked.

He shook his head. "And I didn't ask. What do I care?"

"Of course," Joe agreed.

"Anyhow, I said cool, and he tells me to go to the old folks' home, to go behind a Dumpster near the back, and find a cardboard box with a uniform in it and a key."

"How were you going to get paid?"

Travis tapped his temple with his finger. "Right, right. There was an envelope, too, with half the money in it." He laughed suddenly. "And I mean it," he added. "It was cut in half. Five one hundreds, cut in two. A note said I'd get the other half afterward."

"You keep the note?" Joe asked.

"Huh? No. Why?"

"How 'bout the money?"

Travis smiled. "Hey, man. Like that was a long time ago. That's long gone."

Joe nodded, resigned. "What else did the note say?"

"Told me to go to one of the apartments
—
gave me the number
—
told me to use the key, and told me to do stuff."

Joe merely raised his eyebrows in inquiry.

"Right," Travis repeated. "Let's see. There was a photograph in one room I was supposed to take. He told me to erase the answering machine. And there was a box in the dresser, in the bedroom, with a pin or something in it I was supposed to grab. That's where I bumped into your cop."

"How about some files, from out of the desk?" Joe asked, caught by the omission.

Travis looked at him. "Oh yeah. I forgot. Them, too, but they were already missing. It was just those three things."

"You're saying you were already in the apartment when the police officer entered?" Joe asked.

Travis registered surprise. "Oh, yeah. Scared the shit outta me. I was in the office, doin' the picture and the phone, and I heard him come in. I thought for sure he'd find me, but then he went the other direction."

"Why didn't you leave then?" Joe asked.

"And miss out on the five hundred?" Travis protested. "I don't think so."

"You knew he was a cop?"

"Oh,
sure,"
Travis
replied without thought. "You know, he had the camera case. Plus, he looked like one."