The fifth picture was underexposed, as though it had been taken in subdued light too far from the flash. It showed a man sitting against a tree with his hands tied behind the tree. The victim appeared to be nude, with the exception of white underwear. His head lolled forward so his face wasn’t visible behind long blonde locks, but there was blood on his bare chest. In appearance, the subject was probably a skinny man who was either unconscious or dead.
“What do the rest of the pictures on the roll of film look like?” Floyd asked.
Gordy removed them from the envelope, his earlier reluctance suddenly gone, and spread them across the table. All of the rest appeared to be vacationers playing at a resort. The subjects included adults and children in activities from water skiing to cooking marshmallows around a campfire. Floyd looked quickly between the first five pictures and the later pictures and didn’t note any resemblance in the faces or locations. Even the color definition was different. The later pictures were brighter, without the yellow cast.
“Are you sure these are all from the same roll of film?” Floyd asked. “The color balance looks so different between the first five and the rest.”
“They all came through the developer together in one strip,” Barb replied. “As a matter of fact, the first six pictures are still on the same strip of film. I noticed the difference, too, so I checked that right away. I called the Kodak help line and they told me that exposed film ages faster than unexposed film. I gave them the lot number from the film canister and they said that film was manufactured in 1997. They said that after a few years the exposed images start to lose color balance and the yellow would be more prominent, like we’re seeing in the first five pictures.”
Gordy picked up the outer envelope and looked at the name. “The name and address aren’t local,” he said, turning the envelope so Floyd could read the information. “Are these from that young woman who came in here Monday looking for camera batteries?”
“I think so,” Barb replied. “You waited on her because I was busy, but I think she was the same woman who dropped off the film.”
“She came in with an old Yashica camera,” Gordy explained. “The batteries were dead and corroded so I helped her find some new batteries and then we cleaned up the battery contacts inside the camera to get it working. She’d purchased the camera at a garage sale as an alternative to replacing a digital camera she’d forgotten at home. The person at the garage sale sold it as-is but she hoped that it worked. I assured her that it was a fine piece of camera equipment — they don’t make ’em like that anymore. When we got the thing cleaned up and working she bought a roll of 35-millimeter film and was ready to put it in when I realized there was already a roll of film in the camera.”
Floyd picked up the outer envelope and noted the name and address written there. “Have either of you ever seen this Martha Rolfes before this summer?” he asked.
Both Gordy and Barb shook their heads. “I would guess she’s a seasonal renter,” Gordy replied. “I may have seen her in the past but I really don’t recall her face.”
“She dropped the film off,” Barb said, “then said she was going to pick up some groceries. I told her they’d be ready in an hour. That was about forty-five minutes ago.”
CHAPTER 3
Floyd and the pharmacist went behind the pharmacy counter where Gordy poured coffee into two Styrofoam cups.
Floyd savored a sip of coffee like fine wine and asked, “When did Barb start working for you?”
“That’s quite a story,” Gordy said, easing onto a stool. “I put a “Help Wanted” sign in the window and she walked in, asking about the job. My first take on her, with her bleached hair, tattoos, and slow speech, was that she had some lingering mental problems from drug use. We talked a little and she started telling me about photography classes she’d taken at the University of Minnesota before getting mixed up with bikers. The whole biker thing was a little concerning, but she made it clear that part of her life was over, and her knowledge of the photo chemistry and photo equipment was a little dated, but really sharp. Since we still get a few rolls of film coming in and there’s not a lot of return on teaching someone new how to run the developer, I thought she might be a good job prospect if she was all she claimed to be.
“She promised to bring me some pictures and I figured I’d never see her again. She was back in a half hour with a portfolio of fine photographic work. She showed me how she adjusts the f-stop to get depth of field and special effects, and then she showed me some nature pictures she’d taken. They could easily equal a lot of shots I’ve seen in the major magazines. She took me to the computer and pulled out a CD of digital images she’d taken, then showed me how she used multiple exposures of the same shot to layer a close-up photo so that all the layers were in focus. She showed me a print of a flower on a lichen covered rock she’d taken on the North Shore. Everything was in perfect focus, from the stamens in the flower to the lichens on the rock and the grain of the rock itself. Then she showed me the dozen individual digital photos that she’d layered to produce the final print. It was incredible and far better than anyone else in the shop could achieve.”
Gordy paused and looked to make sure Barb was out of earshot. “The truth is, even all that wasn’t enough to make me overlook her dress and demeanor. She came in wearing a tank top that was a size too small and shorts that barely covered her bottom. I was afraid she’d scare off business with a look like that. I think she sensed my concern and told me that she knew how to dress for business. To top that off, she added that she was rooming with your deputy, Sandy Maki, and that told me she must be trustworthy if she was living with one of the deputies. I hired her on the spot and I’ve never regretted it.”
“She helped us solve the murders down in Henriette a couple of years ago,” Floyd explained. “She got to know Sandy then and they’ve been together ever since.”
“What do you think is up with the pictures?” Gordy asked.
“When I got the message from dispatch, I assumed that there’d be some pornographic photos, or maybe something even darker than that,” Floyd replied. “There’s been a lot of talk about kiddy porn on the news lately, although that seems to have thankfully passed us by. I was expecting that maybe we’d got our first taste of something like that.”
“The first three pictures look like they were taken someplace in the Far East,” Gordy said. “They looked like some scenes I saw in Viet Nam. I guess most of those Far Eastern cities look a lot alike to me with lots of people on bikes and not many cars. The fourth picture looks like something my buddies and I would have taken of ourselves when we were stationed somewhere. You know — the guy’s night out — have a few beers, talk to a local girl, and then back to the base before leave was over. It must’ve been taken in the States or Australia because the girls are Caucasian.”
Floyd nodded in agreement. “The last one is the kicker. It doesn’t look like the rest of them. The tree is more like an oak than something in Asia. It looks like the picture was taken after sunset. His chest has cut marks that were obviously inflicted while he was alive, because they’re bleeding. On the other hand, I can’t tell if the guy was dead or alive at the time the picture was taken.”
“Are you sure it’s a guy?” Gordy asked. “It might be a skinny woman or young girl.”
“That’s possible, but when someone is cut up like that it’s an act of hatred and that kind of violence is usually directed at a man.” Floyd paused, then asked, “How many shots had been taken on the camera before you replaced the batteries?”