“No.”
I was about to ask him why the hell he didn’t try to help her, at least. Do something for his own sister or half-sister or whatever he wanted to call her. But I figured I wouldn’t get very far with that.
I kept driving. It was another typical long, straight Michigan road. There was no snow on the pavement, so we were making good time. We saw the lake a few minutes later. The road ended in the small town of Port Austin, right at the very tip of the Lower Peninsula’s thumb, extending out into Lake Huron. I saw a lot less ice than I’d seen on Lake Superior, but I still wasn’t about to go swimming.
He had me make the right turn and head east, past driveway after driveway, each leading down to a small house near the water. Most of them were sealed up tight for the winter, I was sure. There wasn’t much reason to be here in the middle of April.
“Why would he come up here?” I said.
“Various reasons. If he’s not asleep, he’ll probably be smoking. Just so you know.”
“Smoking, as in…”
“What do you think?”
“I thought he was clean now.”
“It’s just pot,” Connie said. “You want him coked up and getting in a fight with the police? Or hanging out watching old movies and smoking a joint?”
“I don’t care what he does. I just want to talk to him. But you’re telling me this is the designated smoking house?”
“It’s the hangout house, yeah. Plus he keeps all his old stuff up here.”
“What kind of old stuff?”
“He collects vintage film equipment. Spring-wound Bolex cameras, sixteen millimeter film. He even has an old Steenbeck up there.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s an edit bay. From back when they had to splice actual strips of film together. It’s like ancient history.”
“So that’s his other hobby, aside from the smoking?”
“It’s his whole life,” Connie said, an even harder edge to his voice now. “I know you wouldn’t understand. Everything’s digital now, but he still loves real film so much. He even develops the film himself sometimes. You know how hard that is to do?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Trust me. There aren’t many people left who can do it.”
We went down the road maybe a mile and a half, then he pointed to a driveway. It was unmarked and completely unremarkable. You’d definitely have to know where you were going to find this place. I could see a faint indentation where the last tracks had been made.
I stopped in front of the house. The weather had beat the hell out of the place. The siding was so split and worn, it was starting to fall right off the exterior walls. There was a big black vintage Cadillac parked haphazardly by the front door. A vintage car to go with his vintage film gear.
“He’s here,” Connie said. I could tell he was at least a little relieved. “Come on.”
We got out of the truck and went to the door.
“I know it don’t look like much from the outside,” he said. “That’s the way he likes it. Beat up all to hell, just like himself.”
“Okay, whatever you say.” Personally, I couldn’t have slept one night in the place without going outside and working on that siding.
Connie tried the front door. It was locked.
“Since when do you lock the door?” he muttered to himself. He reached down under the little wooden front porch and grabbed a key off a hook. Not the most secure place in the world, obviously. As he unlocked the door and pushed it open, he called out to his father. There was no answer.
When I came in behind him, I could see he’d been right about the place. It looked like crap from the outside, but the inside was immaculate. There was a leather sofa in the front room facing a big hi-def television. Above the sofa was a framed poster for Road Hogs, with the young Clyde C. Wiley himself posed on the back of a Harley, looking ready to kick some serious butt.
I stood there for a moment, looking at the movie star with the tattoos and the arms rippling with muscles. He might be seventy-two years old now, I thought, but he’s not ninety-two. I bet he could still put a hurt on you if he really wanted to.
As I turned around, I didn’t see Connie anywhere. Might as well make myself at home, I thought. I took a quick look into the kitchen. It was small but well-appointed with high-end appliances. There was a small eating area with a glass table, and more framed movie posters. I was definitely picking up the faint, sweet odor of marijuana now. If anybody ever bought this place, they’d have to air it out for a month.
I went down the short hallway, past the bathroom, to the only bedroom in the place. There was a desk over by the big window, which looked out over the lake. There was a pile of manila folders on the desk, each of them stuffed with papers. I took a quick look down the hallway, but still didn’t see Connie. So I started thumbing through the folders. I couldn’t help myself. I had come this far and I had to see if my gut feeling about this guy could be validated.
The first two folders were a collection of court documents. They portrayed a lifetime of trouble with the law, and right there on top was the most recent record of all, an arrest record dated ten years ago. Clyde C. Wiley detained on a certain mile post of I-75, just north of Indian River. Arresting officers, Sergeant Dean Haggerty and Trooper Donald Steele, both of Michigan State Police Post 83, St. Ignace. I paged through the report, which listed the initial assault on a man named Darryl Bergman. Along with menacing and unlawful detention. There was an attempt to intercept Wiley at the Mackinac Bridge, then as I kept reading there were details of the pursuit itself, from the bridge down to Indian River, then a description of the extreme physical resistance offered by the arrestee once the vehicle had been stopped. There was some question about whether the resistance itself constituted lethal force, which would of course have upped the ante considerably. Then finally the list of items found in the car, the firearm, the cocaine residue, the three bottles of prescription painkillers. Stacked onto the probation violation from California, it was no wonder he got a stiff prison sentence for this little joyride. As a repeat offender, it was actually kind of amazing he didn’t do a lot more time. He must have had a hell of a lawyer.
I didn’t see any mention of Razniewski or Maven in the arrest report. We’d already been told that by the FBI agents, yet here it was in living color and I had to read through every word to make sure nothing was missed. There were no other officers assisting on the arrest. No other officers mentioned in any way.
I looked through the other folders, but they were all from earlier arrests and mishaps, and none of them had even taken place in the state of Michigan. It was all California and Oregon and Texas. This man certainly got around, I thought. And he seemed to make quite an impression wherever he went.
I put down the last folder and left the bedroom. “Hey, where did you go?” I said.
There was no answer.
I went back into the kitchen and stood there, trying to figure out where the hell Connie could be. That’s when I noticed the leather portfolio sitting on the counter, right under the phone. I opened it and there on the right side was a pad of yellow legal paper. On the very top sheet there were three names written.
Steele.
Haggerty.
Razniewski.
That was it. Nothing else. No other information. Just three last names of three men who buried children and then who died themselves in the most violent ways imaginable.
Right there in the man’s kitchen. Those three names.
I picked up the phone. I was about to start dialing. That’s when I heard the sound. It was like a repetitive scraping. Over and over. It was coming from somewhere… below me? I looked over and saw the door to what had to be the basement. It was ajar. I hung up the phone.
The sound got louder as I opened the door. There were rough wooden stairs leading down to a concrete floor, and just enough light to see where I was going. I picked up the musty basement smell as I started to go down, along with something else-a faint chemical smell. When I finally reached the bottom of the stairs, there was
