Par Four, page 13
part #2 of Jake Hines Series
“You know the other one?”
“Seems vaguely familiar.”
“His name is Scott Rouse,” I said. “I talked to him on the phone once. He’s the friend Randy Thorson was supposed to be fishing with, the day the bar got robbed.”
“Now he says he’s the robber? What a pal.”
“Did anybody talk to them about the drownings yet, do you know?”
“No. The chief said we didn’t know all the details ourselves yet, so shut up about it and just book ‘em for the crime they were copping to. I was just getting ready to interview them when you got here.”
“Good. One thing I want to be sure of: they’re both over eighteen? You know for sure?”
“Yeah. The blond one’s got a driver’s license and the other guy carries a green card.”
“Okay. Let’s see about getting them separated, then. I want these two as far apart as possible,” I told the sergeant at the desk. “What have we got available?” Hampstead County runs the adult detention center in Rutherford. The Sheriff’s deputies give us great cooperation, but we have to ask for what we want. Politely.
“No sweat,” the sergeant said. “Slow day, I’ve got openings.” He punched up a rooming chart.
“Put Farah Tur in the most isolated one.”
“This end one here okay?”
“Super. We’re gonna take Scott Rouse to an interview room right now, but when we bring him back will you put him as far away from Farah as you can? I don’t want them to be able to talk to each other.”
“You got it, Jake.”
. “I’d like to be in on Farah Tur’s interview, okay?” Dooley said.
“Absolutely. You and I will do both interviews. I’ll question Scott while you run the recorder and take notes, and then we’ll switch for Farah.” I handed him the tape recorder and an extra roll of tape. “But hang on a minute,” I said. “I gotta make a couple of calls.”
I called the dispatch desk and asked Sally to find Maddox and ask him to call me. Then I got Kevin Evjan on the phone and told him to look up Babe Krueger’s home address and send a marked squad to secure the place. “Then get a search warrant,” I said, “and go there. Call me when you’re inside.”
“Inside how? You got a key?”
“No. Try a credit card. Take along a pry bar and a glass cutter in case it doesn’t work.” We went back to the holding cell, where a deputy unlocked the door and stood by.
“Scott Rouse?”
“Yeah?” he said. He got up and came to the gate.
“You come along with us,” I said.
“Am I gettin’ out?” he asked. “Did my dad bring my bail?”
“It’s a little soon for that,” I said. “We’re going to ask you some questions in another room.”
Farah Tur said, without getting up, “I am not comfortable here. Please call Mrs. Glover at the United Methodist Church and tell her that I am here and that this place is not acceptable.” He had a very precise accent, Brit schoolboy overlaid with African lilt. He was admirably composed, sitting erect against the wall with his long, graceful hands holding each other lightly in his lap.
“Stay cool, Farah. We’ll get to you soon,” Bo said, smiling at him the way a hungry man smiles at a steak.
We walked Scott Rouse around the corner, found an empty cubicle, and told him to sit. Bo and I brought two chairs to the other side of the table and got the recorder ready. Scott watched us nervously. Bo punched a button to started the tape rolling and said into the hand mike, “Interview with Scott Rouse, ten-thirty hours, Thursday, August 23…” When he was ready he adjusted the little legs so the mike would stand between us and wrote the date and time on the top of a lined tablet. He hit the mike button again and said, “Present at the interview are Lt. Jake Hines and Sgt. Bo Dooley.” He looked at me.
“So, Scott, how much did you get?” I asked.
“What?”
“Money. How much money did you get when you robbed the bar?”
“Um…close to twelve thousand.” He blinked a couple of times, staring at the wall behind Bo’s head. He was very pale, with a light glisten of sweat on his upper lip. “I don’t remember the exact figure.”
“Lotta money. You bring it in with you?”
“Uh, no. I don’t–I didn’t get my share yet.”
“Who’s got it?”
“Farah had it. But then–” His attention wandered away for a few seconds and came slowly back. “He gave it to somebody else to look after and now I don’t–” He concentrated on the table a while. “I don’t exactly know where it is.”
“Jeez, Scott. You want money bad enough to steal it, seems like you’d hang onto it.”
“It’s safe.” He was traumatized, I thought. He had trouble following my questions and his answers sounded detached and hollow. “Farah has it.”
My phone rang. I said, “Hang on a second.” Bo punched the recorder off. I stepped out of the cubicle and answered. Maddox said, “I’m at Rowdy’s Bar.”
“Is it open?”
“The door’s open, but the cook says they haven’t seen Babe since the day before yesterday. Right after she talked to you here? She went home to rest, he says, and she hasn’t been back. Randy closed the bar Tuesday night and came in yesterday morning to open. But then he said he had to see some people, and he’s never come back. The bartender didn’t show up today either, and Jack says he hasn’t got any money to work with, so he’s thinking maybe he should close.”
“Better tell him what’s happened, Clint.”
“Which is what?”
“Oh, sorry. You’ve been out on foot patrol, haven’t you? We fished Babe and Randy out of the river this morning.”
“Aw, shit. You mean they’re dead?”
“Yes. Better tell Jack to lock up. And then bring him in to the station. Deposit the bar keys in the evidence room. Then call me, or one of the other detectives, Lou French or Darrell Betts. Somebody should take his statement.”
“I’m kind of concerned about the dishwasher,” Maddox said. “That Dozey? Guy’s not really dealing from a full deck and he’s confused.”
“Bring him along too, if he’ll come. Maybe we can get him together with victim’s services. He’s probably going to need some help.”
“Right,” he said. “You be there a while?”
“Probably, but if you can’t find me, get one of the other detectives to take their statements, will you?”
“Sure. Soon as you have some time I’d sure like to talk to you about the pawn shop.”
“What pawn shop?”
“The one up here on Eleventh, Kwik Kash.”
“Oh, yeah. I’ll get to it as soon as I can, Clint.”
I went back inside the cubicle, said, “Sorry,” and nodded to Bo, who started the tape rolling. “What made you decide to come forward?” I asked Scott.
“Oh…Farah’s mom. She found out and she got really mad. She said we had to come in and tell. She’s real religious,” he said, looking at us earnestly.
“Mmm. How’d she find out?”
“Oh, Farah’s stupid little brother tells everything.”
“And Farah tells everything to his little brother?”
“No. But this time…he was waiting outside so he knew.”
“You mean you left him in the street for a lookout?”
He twisted in his seat. “Somethin’ like that, I guess.”
“How did you get in?”
“In–oh, you mean the bar?”
“Pay attention, Scott. Of course the bar. How did you gain access to the bar?”
“Randy gave us the keys.”
“Oh, he did? So Randy was in on this too?”
“Well…sure. I mean, this one was all his idea.”
“This one?” When he realized what he had said, he flushed pink and his eyes watered.
“I didn’t mean that like it sounded.”
“Some of the other jobs, you and Farah planned those, huh? Tom’s liquor Store, for instance, was that one your idea, Scott?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said, bunching up smaller in his chair. “All’s I know anything about is Rowdy’s Bar.”
“When did Randy give you the keys?”
“Well…um. Sunday night. Yeah, right, Sunday night, the night we got the money.”
“You got the money Sunday night?”
“Sure. Had to. Randy said his Mom would take it to the bank on Monday. So we got keys from him and waited till after he closed…”
“Wait, now. I want to be sure I understand. Randy gave you his keys, the key ring that he got from his mother to run the bar with. That right?”
“No, no. He had to take those keys home to his mom. The keys he gave us were copies.”
“Randy had copies made Sunday night?”
“I guess. Or he mighta had ‘em made earlier. Anyway he had ‘em for us Sunday by seven o’clock.”
“Where’d he have ‘em made?”
He shrugged. “Here in town, I guess.”
“I mean, which shop?”
“Oh…I dunno.”
“So you got the keys and waited around till, what? Two, three o’clock?”
“We went home first. And went to bed. So our families would know we were in bed. Then when everybody else was asleep we, uh, we snuck out and came back downtown.”
“What time was that?”
“Musta been close to three.”
“Where’d you meet?
“Oh, uh, in the alley behind the pawn shop.”
“You were walking, driving?”
“Riding our bikes.”
“Okay. Then you went to Rowdy’s, used the keys Randy gave you…”
“Yeah.”
“Entered by the front door, back door…”
“Front.”
“And went to the cash registers…”
“No, no. Downstairs. The office is in the basement.”
“Were the lights on or off?”
“Upstairs they were off. But they were on downstairs. When we got to the office, Randy’s mom was there, working with the money. So we had to tape her up. We never meant to do that,” he added apologetically.
“Why didn’t she recognize you? She’s seen you, hasn’t she?”
“Sure. Plenty of times. But we had masks on.”
“How come?”
He shrugged. “Farah thinks it’s a good idea,” he said.
“That right? What kind of masks does Farah think it’s a good idea to wear?”
“Oh…you know. Um, nylons…”
“Stockings? Women’s stockings?”
“Yeah. You pull a pair of panty hose over your head. It flattens your face so nobody can tell what you look like.”
“You had all that along with you? And the tape?”
“Yeah.”
“How come you had the tape?”
“Huh?”
“How did it happen that you were carrying that big roll of duct tape?”
“Farah always carries one.” I sat and stared at him a minute and he added nervously, “He says it comes in handy.”
“For all his burglary jobs, you mean? Like when the two of you go in and clean out an apartment at Kiowa Towers, for example?”
“No! I never said that!” He looked appealingly at Bo, who gave him a nasty smile.
“Listen, I came in here voluntarily,” he said, trying for indignation. “It seems to me I should get some consideration for that…”
“Uh-huh.” I got up. “You just sit tight a minute there, Scott. We have to see about something and we’ll be right back.” Bo put the tape on hold. I stopped at the desk and asked the dispatcher to keep his eye on the prisoner in the cubicle. “Let’s get a cup of coffee,” I said, and Bo and I walked down the hall to the break room.
“Not the sharpest knife in the drawer, huh?” Bo said.
“Couple of things he said are very puzzling.”
“For instance?”
“Well, he’s way short on the money. The deposit tickets for that weekend come to over twenty-eight thousand dollars, and they got all the change from three cash drawers besides.”
“Farah’s probably holding out on him.”
“Possibly. But then his description of the masks is all wrong. Babe said they were wearing ski masks, balaclavas.”
“She was getting taped up, she might have made a mistake.”
“Babe Krueger would know pantyhose if she saw them. But the oddest thing is that he says they robbed the bar Sunday night, and I know that isn’t right. Babe told me how she always went in on Monday to write up the deposits, and that’s when they found her and taped her up, early afternoon Monday.”
“Why would he lie about the time?”
“No idea. But why would she? More to the point, why would Babe get up in the middle of the night, on her one night off, and go down to her place to write up bank deposits? After she already paid Randy to close up the bar for her?”
“No reason. I just don’t see any reason why he’d change the time. Anyway”–Bo finished his coffee and scraped his chair back–“you ready to go back and tackle him on the murders?”
“No. Let’s see what we think of Farah Tur first.”
Bo snorted. “I already know what I think of him.”
“Put that aside, will you? Drug charges can come later. Right now I think you and I should review the tape of Scott’s interview together. Then we’ll get Farah at the table, you ask the same questions we asked Scott, and we’ll see if their stories match.”
My pager sounded. I called the department and got a patch-through from Kevin Evjan. “I’m in Babe Krueger’s house,” he said. “The door was unlocked; the keys were in the middle of the kitchen table. In the middle of the worst–This is a helluva mess, Jake, totally trashed, and there’s blood all over the place.”
“Shit,” I said. “I should have thought to check it before the BCA crew left.”
“Well,” he said. He was working for me, now. He didn’t want to hear about my mistakes.
“Tell you what,” I said. “Lock it up. Who’ve you got there for security?”
“Stearns.”
“Fine. Post him on the front door and start talking to the neighbors. I’ll be there as soon as I can.” I hung up and told Bo, “Will you go ahead and start the prisoner exchange? Put Scott back in his cell and bring Farah Tur to the interview room. I have to make a couple of phone calls and then I’ll be there.” I watched the energized way he moved toward the door and said, “Don’t start with him, huh? Till I get there.”
“Oh, right,” he said.
Lulu answered in the chief’s office and said, “He’s just walking out.”
“Catch him! Can you?” For once, she didn’t argue. I heard her in the hall, and then heavy footsteps came back and the Chief said, “McCafferty.”
“Chief, I sent Kevin to check Babe’s house. He just called me and he says it’s a mess and there’s a lot of blood. Sounds like I might need to call BCA back. You got any objection to that?”
“No,” he said. “Get ‘em if you need ‘em. Uh…you been to the house yet?
“No. Gonna go as soon as I can get clear here.”
“Of what?”
“I’m halfway through these interviews with the boys who claim they robbed the bar. But Bo can finish that for me. Seeing the house is more important.”
“Uh…Maybe I’ll go with you,” Frank said.
“Don’t you have a lunch?”
“It’s no big deal,” he said. “How soon you gonna be ready to go?” Frank loves being chief of police in the town he grew up in, but sometimes administration and booster luncheons get to seem a little tame to him. I could tell he was hearing the call of the wild.
“Ten minutes?”
“We’ll take my car,” he said. “I’ll be outside the garage.”
Pokey’s secretary said he was with a patient. I gave her Babe’s address and told her, “Tell him Jake Hines wants his opinion of a crime scene.” When I hung up, I realized I could have just said I wanted his opinion; he’d come across town any day for that.
I called Rosie Doyle’s number and asked her, “Can you break away from what you’re doing to come over to the jail and help with an interview?”
“Absolutely,” she said. She’d been sniffing down cold trails on old burglary cases all morning, so she was ready for a change of pace. I told her where we’d be and walked down the hall to the interview room. Bo was seating Farah at the table.
“Have you called Mrs. Glover yet?” Farah demanded. “When is she coming?” It was only in jail that his take-charge manner seemed outrageous, I suddenly realized. Put this guy in a boardroom in a good suit and we’d all be calling him a winner.
“Sure, Farah,” Bo said. “We called the bishop too while we were at it.” Farah turned his upper body slowly toward Bo and fixed him with a stony stare that said, Don’t let me catch you alone on a sand dune, white boy.
“Farah, did they tell you when you were booked that you could have a phone call?” I asked him.
“Yes.”
“Who’d you call?”
“My mother.”
“Why’d you call her?”
His regal features projected exaggerated patience. “So she would know where I was.”
“Have a seat,” I said and asked Bo, “Can I see you?” In the corridor I told him, “Remember he said that. He called his mother so she’d know where he was. Scott said they came in here to confess because Farah’s mother insisted. Now, listen: I have to go with the chief to look at Babe’s house. Will you go ahead and talk to him?”
“Sure.” He tried to conceal his delight.
“Good. Ah, here’s Rosie. I asked her to sit in on the interview.” Bo barely nodded when Rosie gave him a cool hello. Bo wanted Farah to himself and Rosie had apparently heard some department buzz about the Drug Czar. They’re grown-ups, I decided, let them work it out.
“Rosie, I want you to run the tape recorder and take notes. Bo will ask the questions. Let’s agree on a couple of things,” I said. “Your primary task is to find out whether Farah tells substantially the same story as Scott about robbing Rowdy’s Bar. I still don’t want you to question him about the killings. First we need to decide if these two really did the robbery together, or why they’d confess to it if they didn’t. So take as much time as you need, stop and consult notes whenever you have to, make sure you cover all the same points. How’d they get in, what time was it, what were they wearing, where’d they put the money.”
