But finding that someone was proving to be difficult.
He entered the VBI office carrying more documents from downstairs and was only slightly surprised to find Sammie Martens hard at work, even on a Saturday. So far, Joe had been tackling the Oberfeldt case alone, not wishing to add to anyone else's load. Since the only new activity related to this had occurred out of state, Joe had been hesitant to officially assign anyone to help him out.
"Just got a call about a murder in Tunbridge," she commented, looking up from her paperwork.
He stopped in midstride. On average, there were about seven murders in the state every year. Hardly a bloodbath by New York standards, but as a result, any homicide was a real topic of interest up here.
"At the fair?" he asked, as aware as most locals of this regional tradition.
"Yeah. They found a woman's body this morning in the river. She was tangled up in the footings of a pedestrian bridge. That's what the report said, anyhow. I have no clue. Fairs aren't my thing."
Joe smiled and continued to his desk to deposit his files. No, Sam would be more inclined toward a good, competitive paintball battle, he thought.
"Who's on it?" he asked.
"VSP's the lead, but we have a couple of our guys from the Waterbury office there."
"By invitation?" he wanted to know, sitting down.
She gave him a look, knowing all too well the VBI's cardinal rule of engagement. "Yes, Mother. We're doing the usual, offering money, manpower, and expertise," she added. "And this time we got invited from the get-go."
He nodded with satisfaction. "Nifty."
That was a first, and an important one. Where the state police went, others often followed.
"Usual sex-and-liquor falling-out?" he asked her, sitting behind his desk.
"A whodunit," she replied. "Guy used a knife. Caught her under the ribs and sliced her descending aorta, according to the ME's office-unofficially, that is."
Joe stared at her, speechless.
"You okay?" she asked.
He held up his hand. "Wait a second." He began rummaging through the piles before him as she watched keenly. This man had been her boss in two different jobs by now and could safely be considered her mentor. The times when she despaired of her abilities the most were those when she feared she'd never acquire his sixth sense. Saying negative things about Joe Gunther was ill advised in her presence. Which was where she and Willy Kunkle sometimes clashed, among other places. Despite the fact that Gunther had saved Willy's job countless times, Willy was not a man to play favorites, although, to be fair, he treated Joe with a tiny bit more respect than he did everyone else.
Gunther finally extracted a copy of the medical examiner's report done on Pete Shea in Massachusetts, and read aloud, "Trauma was apparently inflicted with an approximately seven-inch-long, single-edged blade, administered in a single thrust, completely transecting the descending aorta at the T-six level."
He placed the report carefully down before him. "How old was the victim in Tunbridge?"
Sam felt a tingling at the back of her neck. "Mid-fifties, I think."
He raised his eyebrows. "You up for a drive in the country?"
The Tunbridge Fair ran for four days, the most heavily attended being Saturday, which was, naturally, when Joe and Sam headed its way. Joe poked along the narrow two-lane road off of Interstate 89 in a Boston-style traffic jam, enjoying the late summer weather rather than using his lights and siren to save time. Despite the surge of adrenaline that he'd experienced hearing the method of this woman's death, Joe had been around long enough to distinguish between a real emergency and his own excitement.
Sammie Martens, true to her nature, was disposed altogether differently. Sitting unhappily in the passenger seat, she stared glumly out the window, occasionally cursing under her breath at the drivers ahead.
When they finally did draw abreast of the uppermost fair-grounds entrance, however-blocked by sawhorses-Joe did pull out his badge to demand entry. The young man at the gate, overwhelmed by the number and variety of police vehicles already allowed through, barely gave the badge a glance.
Joe parked on a grassy strip behind a string of cruisers, a mobile command truck, and the crime lab van, and walked down toward the low-slung cow barns to the right, casting an eye over the swarm of people roaming the floodplain below him.
"I can't believe they're still running this thing," Sam commented.
"Better that than send everyone away," Joe said. "At least this way, some witness may still be around to be interviewed." He pointed ahead. "There they are."
He led the way to the area near the footbridge, by now cordoned off with yellow tape. A young state trooper approached them as they neared.
"Agents Gunther and Martens," Joe told him. "VBI. Is Paul Spraiger here?"
The trooper studied their credentials, more out of curiosity than protocol, Joe thought. Word was out by now, especially among younger officers, that to join the VBI was to reach a law enforcement pinnacle. This may not have been the view of its many sister agencies, but Joe got a kick out of it nevertheless. Getting this far had not been easy.
Returning their badges, the man lifted the tape so they could pass under it, and pointed upstream along the bank. There they could just see a small grouping of men in plainclothes.
"Hey, Paul," Joe called out as they came within earshot.
The group opened up; handshakes were exchanged. Not surprisingly in a state so thinly populated by police officers, those within the even smaller tribe of investigators all knew one another well.
Paul Spraiger, a scholarly man fluent in French, who'd once teamed with Joe on a case in Sherbrooke, Canada, filled them both in.
He pointed to a small disturbance in the mud by the water's edge. "Looks like this is where she was knifed, and probably died, given the wound. Not sure if she was then pushed or just rolled into the river, but she ended up hung up among the bridge pilings."
"So we heard," Joe said. "You have a name yet?"
"Hannah Shriver," intoned the lead VSP detective, a lieutenant named Nick Letourneau with whom Joe had also worked before. "D.O.B. 5/16/49. Lived in Townshend."
Joe glanced at him, wondering if his having answered for Spraiger meant his nose was officially out of joint. The address he'd mentioned, however, was of special interest. "Just outside Brattleboro. For how long?"
Letourneau gave him a blank look. "I don't know. Why?"
"I'm working an old open case, and someone directly related to it just got knifed the same way in Massachusetts. I'm thinking there might be a connection."
Letourneau's response caught him pleasantly off guard. "Well, that probably makes this one yours, too."
Joe stammered slightly in answering. "Oh. No. That wasn't what I meant. We're not horning in here…"
"I know," he replied with a small smile. "Paul's made that crystal clear. But we've been kicking this around since dawn, and I've got a gut feeling it's going to cost a fortune in overtime. What with all the bitching upstairs about money, my ass'll be grass if I turn down free help. So I'd just as soon hand the whole thing over. Happy to assist," he added, almost as an afterthought, "within reason."
Joe smiled in appreciation. "Okay. Well, we still don't like hogging the trough, so I'll take you up on that-within reason-and we'll still make you look good at the end."
"Assuming it works out," suggested Letourneau meaningfully.
Gunther laughed. Too much, he thought. "Gotcha. We end up with zero, we take the heat, despite VSP's best efforts to make us look good."
The implied irony of the last comment had no effect on his counterpart. "Great," he said. "It's a deal."
Next to Joe, Sam let out an impatient sigh and walked off toward the bridge, clearly pissed off.