With the bolt still back, I dropped the magazine, which hit the floor with a solid thunk. The bolt stayed open. I tried to smell the chamber, but with my sinuses, it was hopeless. But old Howler didn’t know that.
‘‘When did you last fire this?’’
‘‘Early this morning.’’
‘‘Where.’’
‘‘In the woods.’’
I looked at him. ‘‘At what?’’ I bent over, and retrieved the round and the magazine, which contained several more.
‘‘A deer.’’
‘‘Howler,’’ I said, straightening up slowly, ‘‘that’s illegal. You can’t hunt deer in Iowa with a rifle. You know that.’’
He just looked at me.
‘‘Howler,’’ said Hester, ‘‘we’re going to have to ask you to come to the Sheriff’s Department with us. We have some questions to ask you.’’ She turned to the trooper. ‘‘Cuff him now, please.’’
‘‘Sure thing, ma’am.’’
‘‘I’ll give you a receipt for the rifle,’’ I said, smiling, ‘‘as soon as we get to the office. We’ll have to keep it.’’
‘‘I know,’’ said Howler. ‘‘It’s these new fuckin’ gun laws.’’ He caught himself instantly. ‘‘Excuse my language, ma’am.’’
We gave Howler to a deputy from James County, who had come over to assist, and let him take Howler to our jail. We thanked the young trooper again, eliciting another barrage of ‘‘ma’am.’’ Hester wasn’t in the best of moods when we left.
I notified Lamar that we were en route to the office for an interview. Hester called her boss, Al, and gave him more detail over her cell phone. We just had to get those things for our department.
When she was done, we talked. Mostly about Howler and the gun. It could be a murder weapon. The caliber was right. But the owner didn’t seem to be a good possibility.
‘‘He’s not nervous enough,’’ said Hester. ‘‘Not by a mile.’’
‘‘Yeah, I know. And he was sleeping, but not apparently drugged.’’
‘‘So?’’
‘‘I don’t know. I wonder, though. I mean, shit, Hester, these dudes are both into Howie. They know about the dope. They either know, or should, who was with him. They’ve just about got to be involved, at some level or another. Don’t you think?’’
Even as I heard myself, I knew that there was something wrong.
‘‘I wonder.’’ Hester slid down in the seat a bit, and reached for her now warm can of pop. ‘‘Something isn’t working.’’
I nodded. ‘‘Tell me.’’
Seven
When we got to the office, the mood was more somber than I had ever seen it. Hester and I, having generated some activity, and having been away from the crime scene for a while, had managed to push the gravity of the events to the back of our minds. You learn to do that. But back at the office, it all came homing in on us with a rush. Nobody was crying, or anything like that. But there was no life. No remarks. No rapid movements or speech. All the noises seemed muted. Even the phones didn’t sound right.
I called Sue first thing. News gets around, and although the office had called her and said that I was all right, I wanted to touch base. She was glad I was alive, and wondered when I could get back home. I told her I didn’t know, but that I was anxious to be there too. Which I was. I was also glad to be at the office and in the middle of things. Hard to explain to a wife, so I didn’t bother. She knew that anyway.
I checked in at the dispatch desk, just to be certain that they knew we were in the building. Sally, my favorite dispatcher, was at the main console.
‘‘Carl,’’ she said, not looking up, ‘‘the ME has a message for you. Call him at the Maitland General Hospital.’’
‘‘Okay.’’
‘‘It’s about the autopsy. That’s all I know.’’
‘‘Okay.’’
‘‘One of the agents from the scene will be in in a couple of minutes. He wants you to be sure to wait for him.’’
‘‘I’ll be in the back room.’’
‘‘The Freiberg officer is waiting for you in the kitchen, with a prisoner.’’
We don’t have interrogation rooms. The kitchen is the best place, because it has fresh coffee.
‘‘That’s fine. Can I go now?’’
She looked up for the first time. No smile, but she spoke softly. ‘‘Sure.’’
‘‘Either of the guys talk to you about what they were doing up there?’’
She shook her head.
‘‘That’s all right, they really shouldn’t have anyway. You remember Turd from a few years back?’’
‘‘Sure.’’
‘‘You get a chance, leave me a note about what you know about him, will you?’’
‘‘Won’t be a very long note.’’
‘‘ ’S all right. Anything will be a help.’’
‘‘Want me to run stuff?’’
‘‘Yep.’’
By 2200 hours, what we had was this: We had a dead DNE officer, killed by gunfire. A dead doper, also killed by gunfire. An officer witness, who hadn’t actually seen anybody but the two dead people, but who had heard at least one and most likely two shooters. He’d never actually seen either of the two victims shot. Two possible suspects, who were linked to the shootings only by their association with the dead doper, and with no evidence of their actual presence at the murder scene. A preliminary report from the lab crew at the scene which indicated that the only footprints available were going to be those from the trail area, as the grass was simply too thick to let a footprint be made elsewhere. We also had sixty-seven empty shell casings. That’s right, sixty-seven. All rifle ammunition, either 5.56 mm or 7.62 mm. Turd’s shotgun had been a pump-action model, and he had fired only one round, and apparently he hadn’t either the time or the presence of mind to jack a second round into the chamber. Moreover, his shells had been 6? shot. Both too small and possessing too little energy at the involved ranges to enable him to shoot through an officer’s vest and seriously injure him, let alone kill him. And, in the person of Dr. Peters, who was sitting at the kitchen table with us, the preliminary autopsy reports. The pathology laboratory details were going to take a bit of time, but the preliminary was what we were after. It didn’t clear anything up. And maybe complicated things for us, instead.
Dr. Peters put down his coffee cup. ‘‘Pretty good.’’ He spread his hands. ‘‘Let’s do the civilian first?’’
‘‘Fine,’’ I said. Lamar, Hester, DNE Agent Dahl, a man named Frank who was doing the photos for the lab, and I were all present. Dahl, Lamar, and this Frank had been at the autopsies, along with two DCI General Crim. agents.
‘‘Right,’’ said Peters. ‘‘Well, we have a nearly emaciated white male who was struck at least six times by high-velocity rifle rounds. I say ‘at least’ because there is a possibility that there could have been a second round into the head. Not a strong one, but a chance. However, all six or seven rounds appear to have exited the body. Just small metallic fragments on the X-rays. Lots of nearly vaporized bone fragments. Massive damage.’’
He took another sip of coffee. ‘‘I’ve seen the patterns of automatic weapons fire before, and that’s what this reminds me of. It looks to me like the first round entered just below the navel, through and through, with the subsequent rounds… one more in the upper abdomen, one in the lower chest, one in the upper chest, one at the base of the neck, and one in the head.’’ He smiled apologetically. ‘‘Or, possibly, two.’’ He leaned back in his folding
