Finding the gun took a while. The impact and influx of seawater had knocked it around the inside of the truck cab. One of the divers finally located the weapon—an old Smith & Wesson .357 Magnum revolver—wedged in a crack under the glove compartment. It was almost certainly the one the imposter had been wearing the night he stopped the girls.
Finally, Sheriff Rhine pulled me aside. “So you don’t recognize this guy at all? You and he never crossed paths?”
“I wish I could help you.”
“I do, too.”
“What about your officers, Sheriff? I can’t believe no one in your department recognizes him.”
“Don’t take that tone with me, Warden.”
“It was my name this man stole to commit his crimes. I think I am entitled to be pissed about it.”
“Not with me, you’re not,” she said.
“Any indication whether this was a homicide or a suicide?”
“His skull was cracked, but that might have been from the impact. The medical examiner should be able make a determination. If his lungs are full of water, it means he drowned. If there’s no water, it means he was already dead when he went under.”
“But you’re positive this is our imposter?”
“We sent a picture to the girl driving the car he stopped. Reese Brogan made a positive ID.”
“Is Reese Brogan the daughter of Joe Brogan who owns Call of the Wild Guide Service and Game Ranch?”
“Yes, she is. Why?”
“Just trying to make a connection.”
Joe Brogan leased miles of fenced timberland that he populated with all manner of exotic animals: bison, red deer, mouflon sheep, boars, even an ill-fated zebra once. Hunters from across the country rented his cabins and paid sizable sums to shoot these essentially tame creatures. Brogan knew what I thought of his vile business. It would not be inaccurate to say we hated each other’s guts.
I could only imagine what a violent son of a bitch like Joe Brogan might do to a half-witted punk who had terrorized his little girl.
A bronze GMC pickup pulled up at the end of the line of police vehicles. It was Rivard’s unmarked truck. He came toward us without any of his usual strutting.
“Sorry I’m late,” he said. “My ex-wife and I really got into it and—”
Rhine pointed at the body bag. “We need you to take a look at the deceased, Marc.”
Rivard stuck his hand in his pocket and removed a tin of moist snuff. He dug his fingers into the soil-colored tobacco. He wedged some of it between his cheek and gums.
The sheriff must have sensed he was stalling. “Ready when you are, Sergeant.”
She lifted the edge of the plastic. Rivard didn’t even need to study the face. One glance and his Adam’s apple began bobbing in his throat.
“You know him then?” she said.
“His name is Tommy Winters.”
“Where do you know him from?”
“The Narraguagus Sporting Club. His dad, Tim, is the range master there part-time. The Winters live over in Aurora, I’m pretty sure.”
It was a hamlet in the next county and therefore out of Rhine’s jurisdiction, which partially explained why neither she nor her deputies had recognized the dead man.
“Does this make any sense to you, Marc?” the sheriff asked.
“Does what make any sense?”
“Tommy Winters impersonating a game warden? Did he have a reputation for breaking the law or pulling dumb stunts? Was he an opioid addict looking for the score of a lifetime?”
Rivard hung his head over the wharf and spat tobacco juice into the water. “I barely remember meeting him.”
“So this is all a big surprise to you?” said the sheriff doubtfully.
“I honestly had no idea. All I know is this is going to break Tim’s heart. That man has had the worst run of luck of anyone I know.”
“How so?”
“He was a lifer at the mill in Bucksport until he took a tumble from the top of a machine to the shop floor. Then his wife Karen was diagnosed with a brain tumor. I’m pretty sure Tommy was their only child, too. If this isn’t the last nail in Tim’s coffin, I don’t know what will be.”
I sometimes forgot that my sergeant, for all his failings, was a father himself. It was always easier for me to view him as a cartoonish villain. We never want to see the people who annoy and infuriate us as three-dimensional human beings.
Half an hour later, I found myself bringing up the rear of a three-vehicle caravan led by Rhine in her Crown Vic cruiser, followed by Rivard in his unmarked GMC pickup, and then me in my battered patrol truck. The sheriff had requested I accompany them to the Narraguagus Sporting Club to notify the next of kin. She hoped Mr. Winters might be able to shine some light on his son’s decision to use my name to commit crimes.
The route took us along logging roads down which eighteen-wheelers stacked high with timber would come barreling, forcing us off into the lupines that grew with such exuberance along the gravel shoulders. By the time we turned off the main road, my recently washed pickup was coated with a quarter-inch layer of dust.
I heard the gunshots—the pops of small caliber pistols and the rapid bursts of AR-15s—even before we pulled into the parking lot. Like most fish and game associations, the Narraguagus Sporting Club included an outdoor shooting range. As range master, Tim Winters was the man charged with keeping trigger-happy members from carelessly shooting one another.
The clubhouse was one story and constructed of varnished logs. Its roof was orange with fallen pine needles.
I counted four vehicles in the lot: two blue pickups, both beat to hell; a black SUV of the kind I associated with mafia dons; and a vintage red Mustang that someone had recently restored and repainted.
“I made some calls on the drive over,” said Rhine. “Tommy Winters was twenty-one. He had five speeding violations,
