5 - Choker: Ike Schwartz Mystery 5 (15 page)

Chapter 28

Monday it rained. Early fall, and the Mid-Atlantic states mimic Seattle for a few months. It rained a steady downpour up and down the coast from the Appalachians to the Atlantic. The first day would be bearable. After a week, area dwellers were ready to move to Arizona, where, they’d been led to believe, it never rained. Bunky Crispins, his slicker gleaming, greeted Ike with a grin and a surfeit of enthusiasm.

“Great day for fishing,” he called and started the
J. Millard Tawes’
antiquated diesel. Ike grunted a reply which, had he heard it, would have offended Bunky’s hard-shell sensibilities. He heaved a duffel bag containing the depth-finder, metal detector, and GPU onto the deck and slogged back through the deluge to his car for a second duffel. In it, embedded in a stainless steel case, packed in multiple layers of bubble wrap, lay an underwater television camera complete with its own light source, battery pack, and monitor, another present from Charlie. If a plane wreck lay in the muddy bottom of Eastern Bay, where the depth finder hinted it might be, they’d know it for certain by day’s end.

He pulled his rain gear tighter around him, and watched the shore fade into the rain and mist as Bunky cast off and headed the workboat out into the bay. Bunky sang an off-key, tooth-grinding rendition of “Somewhere over the Rainbow.” Water ran down Ike’s shirt collar and then down his back. He quietly cursed Charlie Garland, the CIA, the law enforcement profession in general, and every known terrorist group he could think of. He threw in a few prominent Washington politicians for good measure. He was not happy.

***

Samantha Ryder signed on as a deputy in the Picketsville Sheriff’s department just over a year before. She had the distinction, then, of being “the rookie” and received all the grief that goes with the designation. She took it happily, because Ike Schwartz and Picketsville had been the only law enforcement program in the country that would ignore her physical limitations. It was not a matter of a handicap. On the contrary, she’d excelled in both her studies and athletics at college. It happened, however that she’d grown too tall and become too reliant on strong contact lenses to pass most police departmental, FBI, and other security agency physicals. Ike did not care. He hired her because he recognized her keen intelligence, enthusiasm for police work, and extraordinary Internet skills. The department routinely referred all searches of that electronic phenomenon to her.

When Frank Sutherlin left the state police for a slot in the Picketsville Sheriff’s Department and moved home, he soon learned that his new office relied on her for anything referred to as “geek work.”

She reported to him in the morning, her hair still damp from the rain. She towered over his desk. Frank stood an inch short of six feet. He found her six-three intimidating. He riffled through the papers she’d laid on his desk. Printouts from, who knows how many, web sites.

“So, how have you been, Sam? Any news from Karl?”

“Nothing lately. The Bureau reassigned him or something. Since the election, things are different, he says.”

“Really? How?”

“I don’t know, he just said that the FBI is getting with the times. Whatever that means. You know how he is. Anyway it’s all on the Q.T., so I have to wait and see, I guess.”

Frank shoved the papers on his desk into an untidy pile. “You found all this by Googling Satanism?”

“I don’t Google, Frank. I have my own search engines. I didn’t stop at Satanism. I asked for peripheral hits as well. Then I put in ‘The Cauldron.’ That turned out to be an interesting exercise. I hoped the people you are interested in would have their own Web site. They did, do, but their webmaster spelled cauldron with a K and misspelled the rest, Kaldrun. It took a while, but I managed to pull up this” She laid another sheet on the desk entitled “The Kaldrun.”

Frank thumbed through the papers. “Holy cow, Sam, I’ll never be able to read all this.”

“Take your time. Most of the posts on Satanism are repetitive. They’re either a severe condemnation promising all sorts of heavy consequences or a carefully constructed apologetic for it as an authentic religion.”

“Makes you wonder.”

“It’s not my place to judge. What people do or believe on their own time is their business, as long as they don’t impinge on the rights of, or person of, others. What concerns me, though, is what happens when kids get mixed up in this stuff.”

“You think the business out at the park is dangerous? You agree with the Reverend?”

“I won’t say dangerous in the sense you mean it. But kids are naïve. As nearly as I can make out, they have no real commitment to the practice as a religion or belief set. They are acting out—being on the edge, taking risks. They think that this is relatively harmless because they don’t really believe, you see?”

“Don’t believe? Then what are they doing?”

“Being cool. They are, at the same time, shallow and sophisticated. They can construct an elaborate website, complete with a forum page and streaming video, but can’t spell cauldron. They think their parents are electronic morons, so they post pictures of themselves and their friends in compromising situations. You want to see teen sex, drunkenness, and wild parties? Go to the Internet. They can take pictures with their cell phones anywhere, in the locker room, ladies room, at parties, and God knows where else. And they post them—to brag, to embarrass their friends, to humiliate their enemies, or just for the hell of it. The pictures and comments used to show up on the better known sites like Facebook and U-Tube, but those sites are monitored more carefully now. So they build their own. They assume the adults will never see them and, worse, there’d be no consequences for what they post—pictures, words, whatever.”

“So, you have some data on the park site. That’s what’s in this pile of paper?”

“They have chronicled their activities over time. Like the Rotary or the Lions Club or, God forbid, the Police Benevolent Association, they have recorded their meetings, they have a chat room, a message board, and even video.”

“Kids did this? High-school kids know how to do all that?”

“That and more. Frank, you need to see this. Is your laptop on?” Frank nodded. She turned it to face her and plugged a jump drive into one of its USB ports. “One of the kids you’re interested in is named Peachy, right?” Frank nodded again and wondered where all this was headed. Sam moved the cursor around, clicked a few times, and turned the lap top back so he could see the screen.

The picture was dim and slightly out of focus. Peachy Starkey appeared encased in a shimmering cloak of some sort. Frank couldn’t be sure, but she seemed to be under the influence of something. Her eyes were wide and glassy. Next to her stood a boy, a young man, dressed in a black robe crudely embroidered with silver symbols. The both smiled into the lens of what must have been a hand-held camera. In the background other, out of focus, figures seemed to gyrate, their faces smeared with paint or makeup.

“So what—”

“Watch.”

Peachy shrugged out of the robe. Her smile turned manic and she danced away from the camera. Whirling and staggering, she bumped into a stone bench, lost her balance, and sat down. Frank recognized the place. The Cauldron. Peachy flopped backward. The robed figure moved to her and crouched between her legs.

“Is this going where I think it’s going?”

“This particular bit ends here, but there are other postings and I’m guessing it doesn’t get any better.”

“She’s on something.”

“Satanism, at most levels, is about drugs. It’s a
quid pro quo.
”

“Christ Almighty, what do we do now?”

Sam shrugged. “If it were my kid, I’d want someone to tell me about it before something really scary happened.”

“They’re just kids acting stupid.”

“That’s for sure, but that is not a good place to be if you’re going to be stupid.”

Frank drummed his fingers on the desk. “The problem is we live in this open democracy and one man’s goose is another man’s gander.”

“Frank, I’m not saying anything really bad will come of this. She’s obviously high on something, and that’s not good. But she’s not the first or last kid who’s experimented with drugs. It’s the proximity of good and bad that is worrisome. Look, not everyone who smokes marijuana will graduate to heroin, not everyone who has a drink will become an alcoholic, and in the same way, not everyone who dabbles in the occult will become a Satanist, nor will all the Satanists then become stone killers like Charlie Manson or Berkowitz and their friends. It’s the possibilities that worry me, not the probabilities.”

“In the show, or whatever this is, do they do, like, a communion service?”

“They do. I didn’t download that bit. I thought this was the part we should react to first.”

“You’re right about that, but I’d be interested in seeing the other parts of the service as well. If I’m right, we could kill two birds with one stone. Download whatever you can find, make me a copy, and tell me when you’re done. I think the Reverend needs to see this too.”

“You want the whole ceremony?”

“As much as you can reconstruct, every bit of it…They really post this stuff on the Internet?”

It wasn’t a question.

Chapter 29

The rain pelted the boat and churned the Chesapeake Bay into dappled gray-green soup. It soaked the deck and drenched Ike. His windbreaker, its Scotchgard overwhelmed by the elements, became plastered across his back and water sieved through to his already soaking shirt. His mood worsened. Water sluiced across the decking and into the scuppers. Bunky set the bilge pump to automatic and seemed blissfully unconcerned. He’d left off singing and turned his attention to fishing. He baited a hook, tossed it overboard, and locked his rod in a socket on the boat’s gunwale.

“You want me to rig you a line, too, Mr. Policeman? The blues are running. They don’t cook up as good as a rockfish, but you throw a dab of bacon grease in the pan and fry you a fillet and, with a little corn bread and fresh tomatoes, it’s a meal.”

“No, thanks, Bunky. I just want to keep from drowning. How long is this rain going to last?”

Bunky scanned the horizon. Dark clouds stretched westward as far as the eye could see.

“Won’t end today, I reckon. Maybe tomorrow.”

Disgusted, Ike shook his head, which released a small cascade from his hat brim. He unpacked the GPU and set it up, out of the rain, in the boat’s cramped cabin.

“Let’s get to work, Bunky. I want you to put us on top of the wreck sites, assuming that’s what we have. How tightly can you maneuver this boat?”

“How tight do you need?”

“Can you hold it steady over the wreck so I can send down the metal detector and, if it turns out the way I think it will, then the television camera and inspect it?”

Bunky scratched the stubble on his chin and considered the request. “Well, sir, it’ll be tricky in this storm, but I’m pretty good at holding a position. The hard part is I gotta calc’late on the tide and current, and in this here rain it’s hard to get a fix on the shore. But I’ll give her a go.”

“Okay, take it slow over the first spot.” Ike stared at the GPU and directed Bunky with hand signals. “Stop here.”

Bunky throttled back and held the boat steady. Ike dropped the metal detector over the side. He was rewarded with a series of beeps. “Let’s try the smaller site.”

They cruised fifty yards to the second site. Again, Ike positioned the boat over the second set of GPU coordinates and lowered the metal detector. More beeps. He hauled in the equipment, stowed it, and unpacked the television unit. It took him a few minutes to assemble the components and power up the camera and monitor. To Ike’s annoyance, Bunky had a strike on his fishing rod and allowed the boat to fall off into the current while he reeled it in.

“Wooee, that’s a beauty,” Bunky held up a large bluefish by the gills. He disengaged the hook and dropped the fish in his cooler, and rebaited,

“Bunky, I chartered this boat to do some work, not to provide you with a fishing trip. I think I paid you enough to supply you with groceries for a month, so I’d appreciate it if the work comes before the damned fish.”

Bunky seemed a bit taken aback by Ike’s outburst. But he stowed the rod and resumed his place at the tiller. “Cripes, no reason to cuss me,” he muttered.

Ike lowered the camera, switched on its light boom and studied the monitor. Seaweed and an occasional cousin to Bunky’s dinner drifted by. The camera seemed to be facing in the wrong direction.

“Hold it steady.” Ike rifled through the instruction manual. He needed to know how to pivot the camera in the direction he wanted. He’d assumed it would swing and when something came into view he could lock it in place. The manual seemed to say so when he read it in the early morning hours. He found the place in the manual, and that is how it worked. He’d missed the method. Apparently small servo motors on the edges of the light boom positioned it on command. By alternating the direction of each, he could rotate the camera, move it forward and back. Once he had his field in focus, he could press Lock On, and the servos would hold the camera on the object. Amazing.

He manipulated the motor controls to rotate the apparatus. Still nothing. He checked the GPU. The
J. Millard
Tawes
had yawed off the mark.

“Bunky, we’re drifting. Pull her back to the coordinates.”

Crispins made a face. “Whyn’t you bring that doodad back here so’s I can see it. You play with your toys and I’ll keep her in place.”

Ike kicked himself for not thinking of that. Of course, once Bunky figured how to read the screen, he could manage locating the boat. Ike carried the GPU aft and positioned it in on the thwart. The rain made the screen immediately unreadable.

“You sure picked a beaut of a day to play what’s-his-name…Captain Cousteau.”

“Can’t be helped. If we’re lucky we’ll have divers aboard tomorrow or Wednesday.”

“Divers? Shoot, you’re real serious about this, ain’t you?”

Ike nodded and went back to his camera, just in time to keep it from being buried in the mud on the bottom. Bunky wiped the GPU’s screen and held the corner of his slicker over it. It took a few minutes of trial and error, but he got the hang of maneuvering the boat using the GPU instead of dead reckoning.

“Hey, this here is slicker than an eel. How much do one of these cost?”

“Tell you what, Bunky, you hold this boat steady, help me with the divers, and forget about fishing for the next four days, and I’ll have an accident—lose that thing overboard so you can salvage it.”

“You wouldn’t really pitch this overboard, would you?” Ike cocked his head to one side and gave Bunky the look. “Oh, right, I get it. You’d do that?”

“Just get me over those two sites and hold this boat steady.”

Bunky repositioned the
J. Millard
over the second site. Ike lowered the camera and rotated it. “Ease it off a little.” Bunky let the boat slip. The plane’s tail section came into view. The picture was blurry and jumped in and out of focus as the boat pitched at the surface. The plane’s rear section had torn away from the rest of the fuselage and settled in the mud at an acute angle. Ike could just make out its N number. No doubt about it. They had the spot and they had the plane. He raised the camera up toward the boat.

“Okay. Now take her back the first spot.”

Bunky punched up the coordinates Ike had saved into the GPU’s memory and worked the boat farther out into the bay. He waved to Ike, who lowered his camera down again. It took five minutes before he had the plane in view. Except for the missing tail section, the plane rested on the bottom as though it had made a perfect three-point landing. He directed Bunky to reposition the boat so he could view the cockpit’s interior over the motor cowling. He thought he could make out a body. He was in the process of adjusting the focus when the boat pitched and the camera’s tether became entangled in the wing strut. Ike worked it back and forth. The boat pitched again.

“Hold it steady, Bunky,” he yelled.

“Trying to, boss, but we just caught a wake.”

Ike looked up. Sure enough, a large yacht had crossed within twenty feet of their stern, and the wake had pushed the
J. Millard
forward. The camera was now hopelessly entangled with the plane and stretched to its limit. The monitor started to slide off the cowling. Ike unplugged the tether and let it fall over the side.

“You done lost your cable and camera thing there, Mister.”

“The divers can retrieve it when we send them down. We have what we came for. Take her home, Bunky.”

“You don’t mind if I throw over my fishing line on the way home?”

“Knock yourself out.”

“You get the registration on that dinged yacht? If I didn’t know better, I’d think he tried to swamp us.”

“Too busy with the camera to notice. Did you?”

“Same problem as you. Are you sure you don’t want me to put a line over for you?”

“No, thanks anyway. Cooking is not on my to-do list this month. I’m on vacation.”

“Funny durned way to take a vacation, if you ask me.”