4 The Marathon Murders (13 page)

With time to kill, I decided to check out the area where
Casey Olson’s car and body were found. I stopped by the sheriff’s office and
got instructions to follow Church Street, or Highway 141, south of Hartsville
and across the Cumberland River. I drove leisurely past vintage churches, an
odd lot of small businesses, and several nondescript homes on the south side of
town. When I spotted a historical marker near a sign pointing to the Battle of
Hartsville Park, I pulled in to see what it was about. Since the Japanese
hadn’t made it this far in World War II, the battle had to have taken place
during the Civil War. I’m not much of a student of that period in our history,
but a couple of friends from our Sunday
School
class
were rabid Civil War buffs. This would give me an opportunity to surprise them
with a bit of unexpected battle lore tomorrow morning.

The World War II analogy turned out
to be not all that far-fetched. The battle took place on December 7, 1862,
seventy-nine years to the day before Pearl Harbor. According to the marker:

“After marching 24 miles in four
inches of snow and crossing the icy Cumberland River, Colonel John Hunt Morgan
and 1,300 men attacked the Federal 39th Brigade under the command of Colonel
Absalom B. Moore. Although greatly outnumbered, Morgan succeeded in capturing
1,800 prisoners and
recrossing
the Cumberland before
Federal reinforcements arrived from
Castalian
Springs. Federal losses were 2,096 while Confederate losses totaled 139.”

I found the park just off the
highway behind a building that housed ambulances. Maps and descriptions showed
how the Rebels had approached Hartsville along the same route we had taken
Wednesday afternoon. The battle had been fought in this area, with a
Confederate artillery battery firing from across the river near where Olson was
found.

Back in the car, I crossed a
concrete span over the Cumberland and located the dirt trail leading off to the
spot where Olson must have been lured to his death. Realizing a party of tired,
half-frozen Rebel soldiers had fired cannons in this area nearly a century and
a half ago, I wondered if any Confederate ghosts had lingered about Monday
night when someone fired three shots into Casey Olson. If so, they weren’t
talking.

I saw tire marks where the wrecker
had pulled the Corvette out from a cluster of trees. If there had been another
car around, its tracks had likely been washed away by the storm that came
through Wednesday afternoon. I knew there was no need to search for possible
clues. The sheriff’s deputies had combed the area on hands and knees around
where the body was found at the left of the Corvette. When I checked along the
line of trees off to the right, however, I noticed what appeared to be a path
leading toward the river.

I followed the path, too rough to
reveal any footprints, through a dense stand of oak and hickory until it
emerged at the riverbank. Rocks stacked on the bluff suggested someone had used
them to prop up a fishing pole. Looking down at the brownish water that swirled
noisily along the bank, I had a sudden thought. This would make an ideal spot
for someone to toss a 9mm Beretta where it would never be found.

On my return to the clearing, I
examined every bush and every limb a person might have brushed against in the
dark. He would have needed a flashlight to find his way, but the narrow beam
likely left him at the mercy of small obstacles. I had to admit the recent rain
had no doubt dislodged any evidence of that sort. All my searching produced was
a crumpled cigarette pack. I didn’t recognize the red and blue colors on the
wrapper but picked it up with a tissue I had brought along just in case. I took
it to the car and stuck it in the glove box.

When I got back to Mickey Evans’
apartment, the front door stood open. She sat on the living room sofa, legs
curled beneath her. Now that I could see her, I noticed she wore short shorts
and a skimpy halter. Jill sat in a chair facing the sofa. Mickey jumped up and
came to open the screen as soon as she spotted me.

“You two look comfortable,” I said.
“How’s it going?”

“Your wife has been real helpful,”
Mickey said in a soft, hopeful voice. “She’s showed me how to get a better
handle on things. I, you know, needed something like that. I don’t have anybody
to turn to around here. My mother lives in South Carolina, and . . . well, we
haven’t talked in ages.”

Mother McKenzie had evidently
worked her magic. I looked across at her. “It’ll soon be one o’clock, babe.
We’d better get back and check in with Warren Jarvis.”

Jill got up and hugged Mickey. “I’m
sure things will work out for you,” she said. “Don’t get discouraged. You have
my card. If you hear of anything that might help our investigation, or if you
just want to hear a friendly voice, give me a call. And be careful who you talk
to around here.”

She waved at the girl as we got in
the car.

“It looks like you two hit it off
pretty well,” I said. I turned onto the street that would take us back into
town.

“She’s a confused little girl. She
came here a few years ago with her father, while she was still in high school.
After graduation, she went to work in a grocery store where her dad was
manager. He got arrested for taking money from the till and wound up in prison.
They fired her, though she hadn’t done anything wrong.”

“Guilt by association,” I said.

“That’s about it. She’s been
working as a waitress for the past year.”

“How did Casey come into the
picture?”

“They met at Big Mama’s place.
Mickey’s been going with him for around six months. She admits she let him stay
at her apartment a lot but, denies she slept with him.”

She must have felt burdened with
some small-town scruples. “Did she tell you anything about his friends?”

“Some race car people, like his dad
said. And lately, he’d been real chummy with a guy he knew at
Samran
. I believe she said it was his supervisor, someone
called
Kayjay
.”

“Is that a name or just initials?”

“I asked. She thought it was a nickname.
He had been to Mickey’s house, but she didn’t particularly like him. The last
time she saw Casey was on Sunday, so she doesn’t know who he might have been
with on the day of the murder.”

I turned off Main Street, headed
for the restaurant. “What else did she tell you about Casey?”

“He was an occasional pot smoker,
though he didn’t smoke regular cigarettes. She said he drank too much and liked
to gamble. She hated that he was using marijuana and tried to get him to leave
the stuff alone. She told me something interesting on that score. Casey had
bragged about his connection with a supplier who knew of a
bigtime
local source. Mickey thought they were growing plants in a cave.”

“Is that what you had in mind with
that
be
careful who you talk to?”

“Right.
I
knew it had the potential to get her into a lot of trouble.”

“If the wrong people heard her,
that’s for sure.”

I pulled into the lot in front of
Big Mama’s restaurant and parked.

Jill turned to me with a troubled
look. “I hope I did the right thing. I didn’t mean for her not to be forthright
with Agent Fought or the sheriff.”

“I imagine she got the correct
message.”

“Do you think she could really be
in any trouble?”

“Over the
marijuana business?
I was just wondering
,
could
that be what Sheriff Driscoll referred to when he talked about an operation
where Pierce Bradley could have spooked somebody with his low-level flying?”

“You’re not suggesting that could
have something to do with Bradley’s murder?”

“Not at all.
I just hope that idea doesn’t resonate with the sheriff or Wayne Fought. We
don’t need any more complications to sidetrack our case.”

We got out and went into the
restaurant, where the front windows glowed with a halo effect, the result of
blinds closed to ward off the afternoon sun. The halo hadn’t touched Big Mama,
who led us grim-faced to a table in the back.

“Did you find Miss Mickey?” she
asked in a gruff voice.

I reached out to take a menu from
her. “Right where you said she’d be.”

“The poor girl has been through a
rough time,” Jill said. “I tried to cheer her up.”

“She needs to get her tail in here
and get back to work,” Big Mama said. “I’m short-handed. She
don’t
need to mope over that Olson boy. He wasn’t worth
frettin
’
over. Among other things, I think he hung out with dopers.”

“Do you know any of his friends?” I
asked.

“Only one he ever brought in here
was a young guy he said was his boss. He worked at the
Samran
plant.”

“When was this?”

“A week ago
maybe.”

“Must be the
Kayjay
Mickey mentioned,” Jill said after Big Mama left with our order.

“Yeah.
We
need to find him and see what he knows. The plant probably won’t be open until
Monday, though.”

A slim red-headed waitress brought
our sandwiches a few minutes later, and I had just started on mine when the
cell phone rang. I put the sandwich down and answered it.

“Have you been talking to the
newspapers?” Agent Fought asked in an angry voice.

“No. I avoid the press like the
Asian
Flu
. Why do you ask?”

“I just got cornered by a reporter
in Hartsville who knew more details than she should have.”

“A newspaper
reporter?”

“Right.
All the way down from Boston.”

“The hell you say. Boston?”

“Bean Town.”

“Who does she work for?”

“Would you believe
The Christian
Science Monitor
? Why the hell would they send a reporter down here on a
story like this?”

“There must be some intriguing
angle to this case we hadn’t considered.”

“Well, there’s one you damned sure
did consider. She asked about your Marathon Motors affair.”

I called Warren Jarvis after getting
Fought
off the phone. “I found out where
where
Kelli is,” I
said.
“Or at least where she was.”

“Where?”

“Here in Hartsville. She posed as a
newspaper reporter and interviewed TBI Agent Fought.”

I told him about the call I’d just
had.

“You’re sure it was Kelli?”

“Who else?
She claimed to be a
Christian Science Monitor
reporter and knew about
the missing Marathon papers. Have you been talking to the
Monitor
?”

“I’ve never even read a copy of
it.”

“I haven’t seen one in years, but
it’s a well-respected newspaper. Anyway, I asked Fought what the reporter
looked like. I backed into it so he wouldn’t start wondering about my
questions. I asked first if she was at the funeral home or the cemetery.”

“Was she?”

“He saw her at the cemetery and asked
around, but nobody knew who she was. She cornered him later when he was leaving
a restaurant after having lunch with Sheriff Driscoll.”

“How did she look?”

“Like Kelli in size and shape, but
she had auburn hair and lots of makeup.”

“Damn.” I let him mull that over
for a moment. Then he gave a short grunt and said, “Maybe I should head on up
that way.”

“You won’t find her unless she
wants you to. I’d suggest you stick around and listen for your cell phone. If
she needs help, I’m sure she’ll call.”

I finished my thought for Jill
after snapping the cover shut on the phone. “And I have serious doubts that
she’ll call.”

“What do you think she’s up to?”
Jill asked.

“I wish I knew. Her big advantage
over us is that she doesn’t have any constraints on who she talks to and how
she approaches them. We have to play it legally and reasonably fair to protect
our licenses.”

Jill suddenly turned to me with a
frown. “You haven’t told me where you went while I was talking to Mickey Evans.
You must have been sniffing around somewhere.”

I told her about my visit to the
Casey Olson murder scene and my hapless forensic foray, which produced only a
single piece of unlikely evidence.

“What did you do with it?”

“I put it in the glove box. We’ll
take a closer look when we get back, but it’s unlikely to have any
fingerprints.
Particularly considering the weather since
Monday night.”

“And it’s probably a popular brand
that won’t lead you to anybody.”

“More than
likely.”
But I never rule out any possibility, which is why I picked it
up.

We drove straight back to Nashville and stopped by the
office before going home. I looked up the number I’d gotten for the Chamber of
Commerce guy, Craig
Audain
. Getting his wife on the
phone, I explained what I was after.

“I’m sorry, Mr. McKenzie,” she
said. “Craig called a little while ago and said he wouldn’t get back until very
late tonight. I’ll ask him to call you in the morning.”

“I’d appreciate it,” I said,
leaving both phone numbers. I was beginning to feel like a big fat telephone
put on permanent hold.

Jill got up from her desk and
retrieved her handbag. “If you’re not in any hurry, I think I’ll go by the
craft shop down the street. I’m getting tired of that flower arrangement on the
buffet.”

Flower arrangements didn’t do a lot
for me. I could take them or leave them. I was happy to relinquish any interest
in home decorating to Jill’s capable hands. She hadn’t been gone but a few
minutes when the phone rang.

“Greg,” said the cooing voice of
Camilla
Rottman
, “I wondered if you might be there today.”

“We just got back from Trousdale
County and stopped by the office on our way home.”

“Is your wife there?”

“No, she just walked up to a nearby
craft shop. I’ll be happy to have her call.”

“That won’t be necessary. You’re
the one I wanted to talk to.”

I didn’t like the sound of that but
let it slide. “What can I do for you, Mrs.
Rottman
.
”

“It’s Camilla, you silly man. I
need your help.”

“What sort of help?”

“I have a problem that requires
some detection.”

“Actually, we try to avoid detecting
on weekends.”

She gave a warbling laugh. “But
you’d do it for me.”

“What’s the problem?”

“You need to come by here and let
me explain things. Could you do it this afternoon?”

“I’ll have to check with Jill when
she gets back. I don’t think we have anything pressing.” Despite my reluctance
to risk becoming one of her minions, taking on a client in her rarified circle
of acquaintances couldn’t be bad for future business.

“Quite frankly, Greg, this is a
situation that requires a man working solo. I need you to come alone.”

Was she for real? I wondered. I had
encountered a few women with suspect pasts who set up questionable scenarios to
try and trap a red-blooded American male. But I was a lot younger in those
days. I had received no hints about Camilla’s past. More compelling, I was on
the downhill side of sixty-five.

“I’ll see what I can work out,” I
said. “It’s nearly three o’clock. I doubt I could make it before four.”

“That will be fine. And, Greg,
please don’t mention anything about this to your wife. It’s highly
confidential.”

She hung up before I could say
anything else. She was really putting me under the gun. Did I stonewall Jill
and make up some excuse? Or did I ignore Camilla’s wishes and tell Jill the
whole story? Damn!

Being an old hand at taking risks
that not always appeared worth the possible consequences, I agonized a bit over
how to handle it. Failing to come up with anything better, I decided to leave
Jill a note saying something had come up I needed to check into. I would fill
her in on the details when I got back.

When the phone rang again, I
debated whether to answer it. Enough was enough. Then I saw Warren’s motel
number on the caller ID.

“I’m going stir crazy over here,”
he said. “This sitting around waiting and staring at the phone is about to
drive me batty.”

“Would you like me to drop by and
chat a bit?”

“I don’t want to put you out if you
have plans, Greg, but I’d be grateful for the company.”

Put me out? It gave me an excuse to
head toward Belle Meade, and I wouldn’t have to lie to Jill.

“I’m waiting for Jill to get back
to the office,” I said. “I’ll drop her off at home. Then I have a little
mission to accomplish, and I’ll see you shortly.”

When Jill came in toting a large
flower arrangement with fall colors, I told her about my conversation with
Jarvis. “He’d like for me to drop by and talk to him a bit.
Says
he’s about to go batty staring at the phone.”

“You’re probably just what he
needs, dear. I have some things to do at home. Just drop me off and I’ll get to
work.”

I rationalized that I was not lying
to her, just omitting part of the truth. If I told her about this now, she
might say to hell with Camilla, stay out of that vixen’s path. But it could be
an opening to some good business down the road. When I got a handle on the
situation, I’d be able to tell Jill the rest of the story.