Death Casts a Shadow, page 8
8
FIRE AND ICE
In Friday’s bitter predawn cold, Cubiak slipped out the side door to the deck. His breath came out in clouds that instantly disappeared in the frosty, brittle air. Beneath a charcoal sky, the icy black water scraped against the frozen shoreline like sludge. Cate and Joey and the dog were still inside, asleep and warm. Tempting as it was to stay under the covers, the sheriff had forced himself out of bed with the first alarm because the old-timers never surrendered to the weather. Hot or cold, rain or sleet, they would be at the historic downtown diner when the door opened, and if he wanted to hear what they had to say about local doings, he had to show up early, no matter the season or the conditions.
A hodgepodge of holiday lights glittered along the way into town and gave the ride a festive touch. In the country, the large, old-fashioned Christmas bulbs sparkled red and green and yellow and blue on trees and front porches. But in town, strings of delicate white lights hung in scallops from the eaves of the yacht club and the grand old homes along the frozen bay and laced the downtown shop windows. In a few weeks, the decorations would be taken down and packed away for another year, but until then, they twinkled day and night in defiance of the harsh winter.
For more than a decade, Cubiak had eaten his Friday morning breakfast at the old Sturgeon Bay café. During the early hours, the restaurant was an informal gathering spot for locals. Over black coffee and crisp hash browns they exchanged the kind of information that rarely made it into print or was broadcast on the air and never appeared in social media. It was the kind of talk that revealed people’s attitudes and opinions; listening to the gossip was like eavesdropping behind closed doors. Mostly he overheard idle chatter, but he always left the wiser for it, and once, he had gleaned information that helped solve a murder case.
Inside he nodded a greeting to the venerated elders of Door County gathered around the corner table, and then he took his usual seat at the counter and ordered his usual breakfast—the early risers special of two eggs sunny-side up, sausage links, hash browns, and wheat toast. While he waited, a white mug of steaming black coffee was set in front of him with the usual “Morning, Sheriff, you’re up early today” that the assistant manager never failed to deliver. Cubiak drank the coffee and listened to the old-timers speculate about the Packers’ fading chances for a Super Bowl bid, grumble about the proposed highway expansion, exchange rumors about layoffs at the shipyards, and exclaim over orders for yachts costing upwards of ten million. What he wanted to hear were whispers about Lydia Malcaster and speculations about her death. But no one in the restaurant seemed to be concerned about her. And why should they be? They probably had never met her. Lydia Malcaster had lived in Door County for more than fifty years, but she had existed in a different world from that of the diner’s customers.
Cubiak cleaned his plate and lingered over several more cups of coffee before he got up and dropped a ten spot and four singles on the counter. On his way out, he wished the elderly gents a happy new year.
“Another one for the geezers,” quipped a wiry man in a red vest.
“Hardly recognized you in that fancy getup,” another said. “Where are you going all duded up?”
Cubiak chuckled. He had forgotten that he was wearing a sports coat that day.
“I’m giving a lecture on firearm safety over at the yacht club,” he said. “You’re all welcome to come.”
The men rolled their eyes. They were veteran hunters, experts when it came to handling weapons. “A waste of your time and our taxpayers’ money,” one of them said.
“You think so?” He reminded them about the three accidental shootings the previous fall: one that involved a novice hunter, one a child, and one a senior citizen.
“Nobody was seriously injured, but people want to know what they could do to protect their families,” he said.
Coming from the warm restaurant into the cold was a shock and climbing into the jeep barely helped. The sheriff made a quick U-turn and headed back toward the bay. The sooner he reached the yacht club, the sooner he would be back inside a warm room.
The winter freeze had begun Thanksgiving weekend with the first major snowfall of the season, followed by twelve days of record-breaking cold. For nearly two weeks, temperatures hovered around twenty during the day and dropped below zero at night. By the middle of December, the ice on the bay was thick enough to support the winter fishing fans. The anglers drove their pickups and SUVs out onto the frozen surface, augured holes through the crust, and set up heated wood shacks to keep out the wind and cold. For them, life on the ice was a tradition.
The same ice that supported the winter fishing enthusiasts made it difficult for the lake freighters to reach the Sturgeon Bay shipyards where they lined up for their winter tune-ups and repairs. Several fishing shacks were already in place when the coast guard cutter Mobile Bay made its first pass through the Ship Canal and the bay. Gnashing and plowing through ice that was two to three feet thick, the cutter sliced a fifty-foot-wide gutter through the middle of the snow-covered ice field.
To Cubiak, standing at the yacht club’s conference room window, the channel of open water looked like a strip of black tar.
“You’re too close to the edge, get back,” he wanted to shout to the anglers who sauntered casually on the ice and let their dogs run free on the slippery surface. No people or pets had ever fallen into the crevice of frigid water during his tenure as sheriff; no vehicle had ever slid over the lip into the frosty bay, but to the sheriff it seemed the ice fishermen were courting danger, even if it was only one that he could see from where he stood. To them it was business as usual.
“Looks like a toy village, doesn’t it?” said a man who joined the sheriff at the large span of glass.
“Or a disaster waiting to happen,” Cubiak said. “It’s a wonder no one falls in.”
The man guffawed and clapped his shoulder. “I wouldn’t worry none about that. These folks have been going out there forever. They know what they’re—”
Bam! An orange fireball exploded near the far shore. The window rattled. The walls and floor, the tables, the cups and saucers—everything in the room—shuddered.
Across the bay, a wooden fishing hut erupted in flames. Black smoke swirled into the blue sky.
Nearby a woman screamed. At the door, Cubiak yelled over the commotion. “Call nine-one-one.”
As he raced down the stairs, the first sirens went off.
When he reached the ground, his phone dinged. Without looking, he knew that the emergency dispatcher was calling him.
“I got it,” he said as he ran toward the jeep. “I’m on my way. Get Rowe and every available deputy out here.”
The sheriff jumped the jeep over the curb. As he shot out of the lot, his siren joined the chorus of alarms screaming from town. Police. Fire. Ambulance.
In a crisis, with the Sturgeon Bay police chief on vacation, the Door County sheriff was de facto in charge of both departments. Swerving through traffic, Cubiak tore down the street and onto the bridge. Traffic had pulled off to either side, making way for the emergency responders. He was the first across. As he flew over the span, he watched as a handful of people scrambled toward the burning hut. One after another, they darted toward the flames and then fell back.
“Oh, Jesus, somebody’s in there,” he said under his breath. Then “Go, go,” he cried, urging on the would-be rescuers as they struggled for purchase on the ice.
In the few minutes that seemed endless, he was back on land. Now where? It would take precious more time to follow the official road to the shoreline. Instead, he swung off the highway and onto the bumpy shortcut that the anglers had carved through the snow.
At the shoreline, he skidded to a stop and reached for his parka. The passenger seat was empty. He had run out of the yacht club without his jacket.
“Damn.” He nabbed a pair of gloves from the console and a crumpled flannel shirt off the back seat.
On the bridge, onlookers massed along the rail and looked down. On the ice, men and women clustered together in stunned silence. Their faces were white from cold and shock. A woman knelt in prayer. Another wept but her sobs were lost in the cacophony of sirens descending on the bay.
In a torrent of shouts and cries, the half-dozen would be rescuers darted toward the burning hut, but each time they were driven back by the heat and the flames. City police and deputies from the sheriff’s office joined the effort, but no one could get close to the burning hut.
“Someone was in there?” Cubiak asked.
A tall, burly man answered. “Yeah,” he said. He kept his gaze on the wooden shanty. “Bobby Fells. Poor fucker.”
Just then the fire truck and ambulance thundered to a stop near the frozen bay. The firefighters scrambled out of the truck and dragged hoses and equipment over the ice toward the blaze.
Within minutes, the fire was under control. Cubiak stood nearby with the fire chief and told him what he had seen from the yacht club and heard from the anglers.
“If anybody’s in there, any chance they’re gonna make it?”
The fire chief shook his head. Then he looked at the sheriff. “Where the hell’s your jacket?”
Instantly Cubiak felt cold. “I’m okay,” he said.
“Yeah, well, I wouldn’t stay out here long like that if I was you,” the chief said.
Cubiak went back to the group of six. “You did everything you could,” he said.
“Wasn’t enough.” The man who had addressed him earlier spoke. This time he turned toward the sheriff. Under his hood, his wool cap was pulled down to his eyes. His cheeks were red from the heat, but ice crystals dotted his beard. His voice was deep and harsh, as if he were challenging the sheriff to sugarcoat the situation.
Cubiak nodded. “Sometimes, it’s not.”
The man grunted.
“You said Bobby Fells was in there?”
“It’s his shack. I saw him go in there last night.”
Cubiak stared at the smoldering ruins. A week ago, he had never heard of Bobby Fells; now it seemed he couldn’t get away from him. “You’re sure?” he said.
“It looked like him, but it was dark out, past midnight. It’s his shed. Who else would be going in there?”
The sheriff reached for his pen and notebook and only then remembered that they were in his coat pocket and that the coat was hanging in the yacht club conference room. The full force of the frigid air hit him again and he began to shiver.
A woman in a blue snowmobile suit appeared from nowhere and handed him a cup of hot coffee. Orange curls framed her round face, a reminder of the orange flames that had engulfed the hut.
The burly fisherman nodded as a second cup was thrust at him. He wrapped a thick gloved hand around it and held out the other.
“George Landis,” he said. He leaned forward and peered at Cubiak through the cloud of steam that floated up between them. “Jesus, man, look at your face. You’re getting frostbite. We gotta get you inside somewhere. My shack’s right here. Let’s go.”
There was no use in protesting. The rest of the small crowd encircled the sheriff and escorted him across the ice behind Landis. Before the sheriff knew what had happened, he was in the shelter sitting in a worn red-plaid recliner. The heat stung his cheeks. The air stank from the smoke and sweat that the anglers had carried into the packed room. The sheriff had lost his cup of coffee on the ice, but his host gave him another—spiked, he said—and went on with his spiel as if there had been no interruption.
“People tend to set up in the same spots every winter. That was Bobby’s father’s for years. Bobby took it over when the old man died.”
The mention of death cast a pall on the room.
“What time was it that you saw him?” Cubiak asked Landis.
“Past midnight. One, two o’clock. I was out here late and fell asleep.”
“What about the rest of you?” he asked.
A dark-haired woman spoke up. “I saw some guy there when I was pulling up this morning. It looked like Bobby.” She glanced around the room. “Hard to tell though, seeing as how we’re all dressed pretty much the same. Plus, it was snowing like the dickens.”
“Does anyone else ever use his shack?”
“Not that I know of.” Landis pivoted to the others. One after another, they shook their heads.
“Did any of you notice anything unusual this morning?” the sheriff said.
Again, the answer was no.
“What about Bobby’s vehicle?”
“The only thing I ever seen him in was an old green pickup, but it ain’t here now. Maybe he left it on shore or his sister dropped him off. I seen her do that a couple of times,” Landis said.
“Did anything like this ever happen before?” Cubiak said.
“No. We’re all real careful.” Landis’s response was echoed five times over.
Using a borrowed pen and the back of an old receipt from someone’s pocket, the sheriff recorded the names and phone numbers of the people who had tried to save Bobby Fells.
“I suppose you’re gonna want us to give statements,” Landis said.
“It’s a matter of procedure, and I know this has been a tough day for all of you.” In the cramped quarters, Cubiak shook hands with each of the four men and two women.
He was at the door when Landis handed him a black parka. Strips of camo duct tape sealed several holes on the front. “It’s a spare. Take it, you’ll need it,” he said.
Outside the hut, Cubiak was grateful for the jacket. A heavy layer of clouds had blown in from the west, and without the sun, the temperature continued to drop. Bobby Fells’s shack was a heap of smoldering timber when Emma Pardy arrived. In another ten minutes, the fire was out.
The body of a man was found inside.
Also found: a space heater and propane generator.
“This was either an accident or arson,” Cubiak told the medical examiner.
He reported the incident to the Appleton Field Office of the state Division of Criminal Investigation. Due to the holidays, the office was short-staffed. It would be at least forty-eight hours before anyone could be sent to examine the body, assess the site, and analyze any items recovered with the body or from the shed to determine the cause of the explosion and fire.
In the meantime, Pardy would conduct an autopsy and prepare detailed drawings of the burns on the victim’s body. Before the corpse could be moved, the scene had to be photographed and every detail carefully recorded. By midafternoon, Cubiak and his deputies had completed the work, erected a canopy to protect the burned-out shelter from the elements, and cordoned off the area.
Cubiak watched as the EMTs prepared to move the body to the morgue.
“You okay, sir?” Rowe said, coming up behind him.
The sheriff crossed his arms against his chest and rocked back and forth. He couldn’t remember ever being this cold. “I’m fine. Better off than that poor bastard, Bobby Fells,” he said, indicating the charred hut.
Cubiak kicked a chip of ice and sent it skittering across the frozen bay. “I don’t like it. Two suspicious deaths in one week.”
“Could be a coincidence,” Rowe said.
“Maybe,” Cubiak said, rubbing his arms. “But you know what I think of that kind of thing.”
The sheriff looked up at the handful of onlookers who remained on the bridge. “What I want to know is, where’s Bobby’s sister? Why isn’t she here? By now, word must have gotten around that it was Bobby’s shed that burned. Someone would have called Tracey, don’t you think?”
“She could be working up north.”
“Still, she’d have heard by now. If it was your brother, you’d drop whatever you were doing, job or no job. I’d expect her to race down here to see if he was okay.”
“Maybe she’s sick. She could be home in bed with the phone turned off.”
“That would be another coincidence, wouldn’t it?”
Cubiak turned toward his deputy. “There’s nothing more we can do here. I’ll go see if I can find her.”
9
THE OAK TREE ARMS
Stiff with cold, the sheriff staggered over the ice. Everything hurt. His knees buckled. His fingers tingled. His cheeks burned and his lips cracked. Despite the borrowed parka layered over the old flannel shirt, the cold seeped into the very marrow of his bones. The jeep cut the wind but that wasn’t enough. Even with the heat on high, he felt a flood of ice pebbles coursing through his veins. Beads of sweat rose along his neck, but his body refused to thaw.
Cubiak stabbed Tracey’s number into his cell. No answer, and her mailbox was full.
Maybe he was being too cynical. Maybe Rowe was right, and she was at home, sick in bed. He wished he could go home. He would take a long, hot shower and drink a hot toddy in front of a roaring fire. But when he reached the highway, instead of taking a right and heading for Jacksonport, he turned left and drove toward the Oak Tree Arms, a new apartment complex on the other side of town, where Tracey lived. He would tell her the sad news first and then fix a cup of tea for her. He would sit with her for as long as necessary. He would ask if there was someone he could call and make sure she was okay, or as okay as she could be under the circumstances. He would be gentle but would ask the questions that needed answering: How often did Bobby use the shack? Had he had any problems out there before? Was he in any kind of trouble? Did he have any enemies? Was there anyone she could think of who would want to hurt her brother?
In town, he passed the shop windows with their holiday decorations and twinkling lights, but the gaiety escaped him. Death dulled the world, and now he had two deaths to investigate. In life, Lydia Malcaster and Bobby Fells were linked by a tenuous relationship, and although each had died as the result of an apparent accident, Cubiak sensed a connection, a link he hadn’t discovered yet.
He was mulling over the situation when he reached the Oak Tree Arms, a U-shaped complex stuck in the middle of a barren, wind-swept field. Tracey lived at the west end in Unit 312 of Building A. Her car wasn’t in the lot. He cruised the other parking areas as well, but the gray compact wasn’t in either one. Undeterred, he circled back to the first structure. A sign on the outside door warned against soliciting. One inside read Manager on Site.
