“Because now he was dead.”
“He wasn’t for four years.”
He stared at the middle distance between us, lost in thought for a moment. “I didn’t want to force her to choose.”
“And killing him solved that.”
“Oh, Christ,” he muttered and dropped his chin down on his chest.
A surge of genuine pity washed over me suddenly. I had always liked John Woll, had respected his quiet, conscientious manner over the years, and the courage he’d summoned to beat his drinking problem. Now his life was a shambles. It was partially his own fault, of course, but other factors had played a part. That I was one of those factors gave me no pleasure.
But my job now was to peer into the inky murk of his life, to distinguish not why things had happened to him and Rose, but what those things were. At this late date, with the pressure building under me, I couldn’t afford to worry about how ham-handed I was, or what damage I might do to what was left of their marriage. Besides, regardless of the other threads left dangling in this case, I couldn’t overlook the possibility that Katz was right about John Woll.
“Why’d you lie to Billy and me when we asked you how well you knew Jardine?”
John looked up at me, a new strength in his voice. “He was dead. It was over. I didn’t know who killed him, but I wasn’t surprised somebody had. I heard about his death and felt nothing but relief. With Charlie gone, Rose’s temptation was gone, too. That’s how I saw it. Charlie was Rose’s addiction, like booze is to me. And now that it was gone, I didn’t want to say anything that might mess that up.”
I didn’t mention that the removal of something tempting didn’t automatically cure an addiction.
“What about the flare over the embankment?” I asked, curious whether he would stick to that part of his story.
“There was a flare.” His fist clenched in emphasis. Despite his obvious distress, I far preferred it to the listlessness I’d encountered upon entering this room. But I also knew it was probably a mere passing gust of wind.
“We never found it. We did find one of your cigarettes, though; in Jardine’s grave, in fact.”
His mouth fell open, a reaction I found in his favor.
“Do you smoke while you’re on patrol?”
His face reddened. “Sure; sometimes.”
“Were you smoking when you got out to check on the flare?”
“I don’t know-Jesus-maybe.”
I leaned forward in the chair for emphasis. “Not maybe, John. People are sharpening their knives for you; I need answers. I said the cigarette was in the grave; that means under the soil, buried with the body, and the saliva on it matches your blood type. So concentrate.”
He closed his eyes, his legs still crossed, making him look vaguely meditative. I thought how much I’d hate to be in his shoes.
“I flicked it.”
“Where?”
His eyes opened. “As I got out of the car. I took it out of my mouth, flicked it into the street, and reached for my flashlight.”
“You’re sure you flicked it into the street?”
“Yeah, because I remember the smoke stinging my eye as I got out.”
“Did you see anyone while you were checking out the flare?”
He shook his head, a little mournfully.
“Did you go into Ed’s Diner afterwards?”
“No. I just drove on.”
I thought a moment. Something was wrong with all this; something I’d thought of while we’d been speaking of the cigarette. “If you only told Rose you knew about the affair two days ago, why did you assume they’d broken it off before then?”
He brought his fingers to his temples and held them there, as if staving off a migraine. “It was just a feeling; nothing specific. Jesus-I thought Charlie’s death was the best thing that could have happened to us. Now everyone thinks I killed him.”
“Did you know Milly Crawford?”
His hands dropped from his temples. “Crawford? No. Why?”
“You know about him?”
“I heard his name mentioned, you know, at work.”
“Do the names Mark Cappelli, Jake Hanson, Kenny Thomas, or Paula Atwater ring any bells?”
He looked totally baffled. “I’ve never heard of them.”
I hesitated a moment, doubtful of the wisdom of what I was about to suggest. Given the case’s dim prospects, however, I was getting desperate. “John, would you grant us a consent to search this apartment?”
“A consent… Holy Jesus, Lieutenant.” He knitted his brows in concentration, trying to fit my request into the context of our conversation. If what he claimed was true, he was the victim of a damn good frame, and sitting by passively hardly seemed constructive. So I hoped he’d decide to take part in his own fate. On the other hand, I couldn’t help wondering if now wasn’t exactly the wrong time for him to act. Sometimes, the best defense against a frame is immobility.
“All right,” he said finally.
I got up. “Come out to the car with me while I get the form.”
I kept a sampling of most of the paperwork we use in the field in my car. A Consent to Search is a warrantless, spur-of-the-moment device allowing a police officer to examine a house or car without the rigamarole of submitting an affidavit to a judge. It is granted by the owner of the property to be searched, can be withdrawn at any point during the search, and is viewed with distaste by any prosecutor or judge. The problem is that the grantor, at any time following the search, can claim he or she was coerced into cooperating. If that claim sticks, which it tends to in Vermont, then anything found under the consent is inadmissible in court.
But I felt myself guided by a strong sense of inevitability. John Woll was being painted, step-by-step, into a corner, either by his own devices or by outside manipulation. The question no longer was would he fall, but who would push him. I flattered myself by thinking that if we did, it would be on the basis of carefully evaluated evidence, not the kind of innuendo and inference that fueled Katz’s accounts.
Also, I wanted to search John’s place myself before James Dunn took over the investigation, which I feared he might do at any moment. Once that happened, not only would all contact with John be off limits, but so would any hopes of finding Woll-related clues that might apply to the Crawford and Jardine homicides.
I retrieved the single-sheet form from a battered briefcase in my back seat, filled in the blanks, and handed it to John as we walked back to his apartment in the half-light of sunset. He read it through several times, shaking his head. “This is so unreal.”
“I know. Right now you’ve got a few circumstantial things against you, enough to titillate the news crowd, but not enough for an indictment.” I patted his shoulder, conscious of my opposing desires. If he were being framed, by someone who knew all the tricks, chances were good this search would do him more harm than good. My motivations, I realized, were now almost entirely selfish, despite my liking for John, or my sorrow at his predicament. “You don’t have to sign that,” I added halfheartedly.
He shrugged, and signed it on the banister, taking matters into his own hands, or so I hoped.
It was awkward, having him stand around as I began poking through his belongings. I was used to being armed with judge-signed paperwork, accompanied by a complete search team and at least one uniformed man to escort the homeowner out the door and out of the way. With John watching, I felt more like a guest who’d suddenly been seized by an insane desire to ransack the place. I found myself gingerly shifting through the kitchen drawers and carefully replacing sofa cushions, so that any trace of my passage would be minimal.
My real interest was the bathroom and bedroom, where I’d found in the past most people tend to hide their secret pleasures. But I was holding them until last to make damn sure I covered the apartment thoroughly. Not that I had long to wait; the place was so small it wasn’t forty-five minutes later that I crossed the threshold into the bedroom.
Throughout this ordeal, John kept silent, standing away from me, watching me work without expression or comment. I checked occasionally, over my shoulder, to see if his demeanor had anything to tell me, but his face told me nothing.