Silencing Sam (24 page)

“Maybe I promised my sources not to reveal anything until this business at your house was finished up,” Clay said. “They might have worried you'd destroy incriminating evidence if you got a heads-up.”

Actually, that was exactly the kind of thing the chief might have made Clay agree to before telling him about the warrant.

“But there isn't any evidence,” I said.

“That's what half the bums in prison say.”

“Clay, you're just afraid I'll find Sam's killer before you do.”

“Honey, you couldn't find your head with both hands.”

“I'm getting sick of your Texanisms.”

“How about that Minnesota accent of yours, you betcha?”

“Never mock a TV market you're new in,” I advised him. “The audience won't forget or forgive.”

I decided a lesson in talking Minnesotan might be just what
Clay needed. After all, moving from the Lone Star State to the North Star State couldn't have been easy. So I started explaining how we drink pop, not soda, and eat a hot dish, not a casserole.

But he wasn't the least bit grateful and accused me of trying to change the subject. “Missy, you give aspirin a headache.”

“Headache? Me? You're the biggest headache who's ever worked here.”

“Does that mean you're declining an on-camera interview?”

“You betcha.” I stomped away.

So much for Minnesota Nice.

((CLAY, LIVE))

THIS HOUSE … WHERE

CHANNEL 3'S OWN RILEY

SPARTZ LIVES … IS WHERE

MINNEAPOLIS HOMICIDE

INVESTIGATORS SPENT THE

MORNING SEARCHING FOR

CLUES IN THE MURDER OF

GOSSIP COLUMNIST SAM

PIERCE.

When I turned on the noon news an hour later, Clay had a wide grin across his face as he broadcast a live shot in front of my home. I didn't like that he walked across my yard instead of standing in the public street. If he hadn't been live on the air, I would have called his cell phone and screamed, “Trespasser!”

((CLAY, LIVE))

SPARTZ REFUSED TO

COMMENT OR GIVE AN ON-

CAMERA INTERVIEW … AND

HER ATTORNEY DISMISSED

THE POLICE ACTION AS

“POLITICAL

GRANDSTANDING” …

SAYING HIS CLIENT WAS

“MOST DEFINITELY NOT

GUILTY.”

Infuriated, I threw a dictionary at the television set, forgetting it wasn't really hitting Clay. He'd used an old broadcast trick of talking fast and swallowing the “not” in “not guilty” to create the impression for casual viewers that even my own attorney thought I was guilty.

Even though I should probably have called my parents right then and reassured them that things were not as bad as they sounded, instead I marched to Noreen's office for a showdown.

My boss was leafing through budget papers and didn't even have the volume turned up on her wall of television screens. The noon was Channel 3's lowest-priority newscast in terms of content, ratings, and advertising. The audience was largely older viewers—demos the sales staff didn't think spent much money. Much of the advertising comes from the Cremation Society of Minnesota and various hearing aid companies.

“Did you watch his report?” I asked. “Clay made it look like I was uncooperative when I was the one who gave him the story. Noreen, you need to talk to him.”

“Was what he said accurate, Riley?”

“His words may have been accurate, but his tone was obnoxious and the notion he gave viewers was false.”

“And how many times have you done the same thing?”

How could she take that attitude? Clay must have brainwashed her.

“This is me we're talking about, Noreen. You're supposed to have my back. The deal was the station was simply going to
be first on the record with the search warrant. That's it. Let the newspaper be the one to gang up on me.”

My boss sighed and promised she'd look at his report once the newscast was over. Then she bent over a spreadsheet and ignored me.

When I got back to my desk, the newspaper's crime reporter had left a phone message asking me to call him back. I passed the number on to Benny. Getting quoted in the paper was one of his favorite parts of being an attorney. He called it free advertising.

Within an hour, I had my own breaking news and no time to worry about Clay.

((ANCHOR/PIX))

IF YOU'VE SEEN THIS

CAR … AUTHORITIES WANT

TO KNOW.

Abandoned in a north Minneapolis neighborhood, a green station wagon was towed to a storage yard after thieves made off with the tires and stereo. But the cops didn't care about the vandals, they cared about the owner: Lucas Harlan, the dead wind bomber.

One of the lot workers, a news junkie, had recognized the name.

((CAR GUY/SOT))

I RAN THE PLATES AND

THOUGHT, ISN'T HE THAT

WIND BOMBER GUY

WHO BLEW HIMSELF UP?

A forensics team examined the vehicle and discovered, on the hood, traces of blood and tissue—Lucas Harlan's blood and tissue. That crucial clue placed the vehicle at the location of the blast and proved the existence—but not the identity—of a co-conspirator.

((POLICE, SOT))

SOMEONE MOVED THAT CAR

MORE THAN A HUNDRED

MILES AND WE WANT TO

FIND HIM.

The feds also released another photo of the wind bomber. In this one, he had hair.

Maybe it was his angular cheeks or the way he held his chin. But in a flash of clarity, I recalled Batman's dark eyes and shaggy mane. I looked back at the video from the Bat Protector interview but Malik had saved no shots of him from the video card, only Serena. And I was uncertain where to look for her just now.

I thought of one other person who might have been able to make an ID. I phoned Toby and left a message that I wanted to show him something. I headed out to his and Noreen's animal house in the country while the sky was drizzling. But after I handed him the photo, I wished I hadn't. Because Toby needed a lawyer more than I did.

The weather was clearing, so we sat on Toby's covered porch. Husky and Blackie lay by our feet. Toby stared at the photo of Lucas Harlan like he'd thought he would never see him again.

“Batman said I could be the lookout,” he said. “It seemed like excellent training. And I believed his cause worthy.”

Then Toby said something that changed our personal dynamics forever. He'd been a source. He'd even been a friend. But
I didn't know what to call him anymore when he told me he was watching when Batman exploded.

“One second he was there, the next he was gone.”

Shivers went up my back. “How horrible. Obviously, for him, but for you, too, Toby.” I meant it. I'd never actually seen human remains after a bombing, but I'd heard enough descriptions to know how gruesome it can be for those in the vicinity. And Toby had a sensitive soul. A dog whisperer's, even.

“I know you're blaming yourself, Toby. You probably have survivor's guilt. But something clearly went wrong and Batman accidentally blew himself up. I'm just glad you're safe.” I meant it. And for the first time since we'd met, I hugged him because I thought he needed it.

I didn't know what else to say, so we sat silently together for a few minutes.

“It was no accident.”

“What do you mean, Toby? Of course it was. You don't think Batman was a suicide bomber, do you? He gained nothing by his death.”

He shook his head. “It was no suicide.”

“Toby, you're not making any sense.”

He looked at me with his long droopy basset-hound face. “I detonated the bomb.”

I felt my stomach cramp. But I didn't doubt his confession for a minute. He'd been oozing regret over something. I'd just assumed it was Noreen. Now the whole episode was starting to make sense.

“What happened, Toby? Did you hit the wrong button?”

Toby said they parked about a hundred yards away in a farm field driveway to hide the car. Batman turned off the headlights and handed a flashlight to his new eco partner. Toby described how Batman removed a cell phone motor, hooked it up to a blasting cap, then put it in a small package with explosives—a crude remote-control trigger.

“He gave me a disposable phone with the bomb phone number programmed on the screen and told me I could be in charge of pushing the send button as we drove away.”

Toby took a deep breath, like he was reliving that particular moment of power. Then he confided how much he'd been looking forward to witnessing the blast and feeling the crash when the turbine hit the ground.

The pair walked toward the windmill, but instead of stopping at their destination, Batman moved past. “I asked where he was going, and he said the time had come to send a real message to the owners, farmers, and world.”

Blowing up turbines wasn't getting fast enough results, he said. The blades still spun; bats still died.

“He kept talking about how the deaths could have far-reaching consequences because so little is known about their population size,” Toby said. “I agreed with everything he said, except his plan.”

“What was his plan?” I suspected I already knew, but I wanted to hear it from Toby.

“He wanted to blow up a house. Dead bats. Dead people. He was convinced it was only fair.”

“What did you do?”

“I tried to change his mind. But he wouldn't listen.”

I stayed quiet and let Toby talk.

“I told Batman to leave the bomb by the turbine, but he ignored me and kept creeping toward the house. There was a light upstairs, so I knew people were home. Maybe children. Maybe even their pets. I stayed behind, but his shadow grew closer to the house. I saw a tire swing in the moonlight and knew time was running out.”

That's when Toby hit send. And Batman went boom.

Toby whimpered like a puppy. “I'm an activist. Not a terrorist.” Then he started to snivel softly. “But now, they're going to call me a murderer.”

• • •

I gave him a few minutes to calm down. Blackie and Husky tried licking his face. “Who else knows about this?” I asked.

“Nobody,” he answered.

I asked him about Serena, the local leader of Bat Protectors. And he told me she wasn't involved in the explosions. Batman operated solo.

“I don't want to get in the middle of your marriage, Toby, but what about Noreen?”

“She knows I was gone that night. She's upset.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I don't know,” he said. “What are you going to do?”

“I don't know either.”

Nobody else had this story. So I didn't have to worry about Channel 7 or any other media beating me. I wasn't even sure if my boss would let it hit the air once she knew the ramifications.

Garnett would be angry if he ever heard I knew the details of the bombing death and kept quiet.

I mentioned to Toby that there might be forensic evidence linking him to the getaway car. Maybe even fingerprints. I told him he needed to consult an attorney. And level with his wife. He didn't let on whether he was going to follow through on either idea.

He'd been arrested for various animal rights protests and once on suspicion of abducting Minnesota's record large-mouth bass. But nothing was as serious as what he faced now. I shouldn't have been surprised that such a development was festering. Toby had been acting staggeringly unhappy, even for Toby.

Clouds were rolling in again. As I avoided stepping in a puddle on the sidewalk, I saw a worm stretched across the cement. “Toby, what about the worm guy?”

He seemed to blush, though the sky was getting too dark to tell. “I made him up. I wanted to divert your attention from bats.”

I didn't answer but decided to go home and sit on the dilemma until tomorrow. But the tomorrow I was expecting never came.

The police didn't wait until morning to arrest me.

But they did allow me to change out of my pajamas and into some normal clothes before hauling me off to jail that night on homicide charges for the murder of Sam Pierce.

“Can't I just turn myself in?” I knew courts routinely made deals like this with white-collar criminals.

They shook their heads. “Chief gave the order himself to bring you in.”

That I could believe.

The two blues recommended I leave my purse at home, because it would just be put in jail inventory.

“How about my cell phone? Can I take that?”

They shook their heads, herding me toward the door.

“Don't I get to call my attorney?”

“Later,” one of them replied. “Jail has phones.”

Then I learned the main reason they didn't want me to bring anything along was because they intended to handcuff me.

“What if I promise to behave?” I asked.

“Sorry, it's procedure.”

Obediently, I held my wrists in front in me, hoping cooperation might win me some points. But they insisted on cuffing me
from behind, again resorting to that same excuse of police procedure.

Off balance, I nearly tripped on my way to the squad car and one of them had to steady me. The handcuffs cut into my wrists. They loaded me into their Crown Vic, where a barrier separated me in the backseat from them in the front seat. I wondered if any famous criminals had ridden there before me.

The cops didn't seem in the mood to talk. And for once, I wasn't in the mood to ask questions. I was afraid of the answers.

As we drove away, I thought I saw a still photographer across the street and hoped the newspaper hadn't been given advance warning about my arrest.

The two miles to downtown had never seemed so long. I was torn between wanting to get there fast to fix this crazy mess, and wanting to never get there in case they never let me out.

The car drove down a ramp to an underground garage and I was escorted into the booking area of the Hennepin County jail. Years ago, I recalled Channel 3 airing a story about what a fabulous jail this was—accredited even. But from my perspective just then, the only good part was that the cuffs came off.