Caching Out (10 page)

“One
for each of us, huh, Mama?  Our family, joined forever, just like the circles
on your arm.”  Gavin pushed the sleeve down to cover the tattoo and fought to
control his anger. Leaning forward he spoke quietly into her good ear. “You
should have gotten only two rings, Mama. That bastard didn’t deserve one. He
didn’t deserve us either. You know he did this to you.” Gavin ran a hand over
the scar that marked her missing ear.His father had cut the ear off in one of
his drunken rages. It was a wonder she survived the man.

Silvia
slid her hand free and pulled her new baby closer. She closed her eye and gently
rubbed the doll’s back in a soothing motion.

Leaning
back in his chair, Gavin sighed. It was getting harder to come here and pretend
that she would ever be normal again. The blank look on her face was proof
enough without the black patch covering her right eye. The patch hid the scars
of a tortured life spent with a bastard of a man, but nothing could ever cover
that look. “If the fucker wasn’t already in hell, I’d give him a one way ticket
there myself, Mama.” 

No
response.

Gavin
stood. “I’ve got to go Mama, but I’ll be back. I’ve got work to do. Got to pay
those bills, you know. I’ll be back real soon. I love you, Mama.” 

No
response.

Gavin
made a quick stop at a local liquor store and then checked into a hotel two blocks
away. Draining his third glass of whisky, he opened his computer for a little
late night freak show before bed.

CHAPTER 16

Entering
the B&B, both Tate and Martin respectfully removed their hats and stood at
a small table that Caroline Spencer used as her registration desk. Before Tate could
ring the silver-plated 1950’s era school bell sitting on the polished wood
table, a large woman with graying hair pushed through a pair of swinging doors that
lead from the kitchen. Wiping her floured hands on an apron covered with teacups
and roses, Caroline Spencer stepped forward to greet the two lawmen.

“I
suppose you’re here to see the Babcocks. Just a shame, I tell you, a shame what
those poor folks are going through.” 

Even
though the visit was a somber one, Tate had to fight back a smile. Getting a
word in with Caroline in the room was almost impossible and today was not going
to be different.

 “Well,
you boys go on into the sitting room and take a chair. I’ll let the mister know
that you’re here. Now that poor woman, if she’s finally asleep you will not
wake her up. You hear me, boys?” 

Realizing
that she had paused to take a much needed breath Tate jumped in. “Caroline, we’ll
do our best not to upset Mrs. Babcock, but we do need to speak with them both.” 

Giving
the men a hard look and a brisk nod Caroline turned and began a slow climb up
creaking stairs to the second floor landing. Still talking, her voice carried down
to Tate and Martin. “Just a shame I tell you. A sad, sad shame.”

Martin
took a seat in a faded blue wingback chair while Tate looked out a lace covered
window into the back yard. Moments later, the stairs creaked in protest,
announcing Caroline’s return. She had the remaining Babcock child pulled close
to her side. Shooting a frown Tate’s way and speaking quietly to the boy she
steered him through the swinging kitchen doors, giving Tate and Martin some
much needed privacy to speak with his parents. The kitchen doors were still
moving when both Mr. and Mrs. Babcock came down the stairs. Mr. Babcock’s arm
curved protectively around his wife’s waist, holding her up as they entered the
small sitting room. They sat side-by-side on the sofa.

Martin
shook hands with the parents. He spoke in a hushed tone to the couple, “Mr. and
Mrs. Babcock, this is Tate Echo, he’s the police chief of Pine Ridge and we’re
working the case jointly.” 

Tate
stepped forward and shook hands with the grieving couple, expressing his
sympathy for the loss of their child. He took a seat across from the Babcocks
and pulled his notepad out, waiting for Martin to open the dialogue.

Measuring
his words carefully so as not to further upset the grieving couple, Martin said,
“Tell us about your day yesterday, beginning from the time you arrived at the
lake until you noticed that your son was missing.”

Mr.
Babcock cleared his throat. “We got to the lake about nine yesterday morning
and checked in. Went to the cabin and unloaded our stuff, and then me and the
boys took a boat out on the lake.” Choking back a sob, he continued, “We only
caught a couple fish but Justin caught the biggest one and he…he couldn’t wait
to tell his mom.”  Reaching out in silent support Mrs. Babcock caught her
husband’s hand, holding it tightly in both of hers.

Seeing
the couple struggle to maintain their composure, Tate waited before speaking,
giving them a minute to collect themselves and their thoughts. “After you came
in from the lake what did you do then?” 

Mrs.
Babcock pulled a wadded up tissue from her hand and blew her nose. She lifted a
tear stained face to meet Tate’s. “Lun..lunch. We took sandwiches down to the
dock so that I could see the fish. The boys had left them tied to the dock.” 
Large tears pooled in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks. Stumbling over her
words she tried to continue, “My baby’s last lun…”

Mr.
Babcock wrapped his arms around his wife and pulled her close as she sobbed. Shaking
her head, she pushed away from her husband and turned to face Tate and Martin. In
a burst of strength she said firmly, “I want you to find whoever did this. I
need to….”

Martin
spoke up, “We intend to find Justin’s killer, ma’am. I promise that we--” 

Tate
cut Martin off before he could make promises they might not be able to keep. “Mr.
and Mrs. Babcock, we’ll do everything in our power to make sure that we catch
the killer.” Steering the conversation back to a more productive line of
questioning Tate asked, “Now, what did you do after lunch?”

Mr.
Babcock continued, “We hiked around the lake and did some geocaching.” 

Tate
looked up at this. “Geocaching?  That’s when you use a GPS to play a high tech
game of hide and seek right?” 

Mr.
Babcock opened his mouth to speak but stopped when his wife excitedly grabbed
the sleeve of his shirt and shook her husband’s arm.

“Richard!
Oh, my God, Richard, oh, God.”

 
“What is it?  What’s wrong?”  He took his wife by the arms.

Jumping
up from her seat on the couch, Mrs. Babcock took a few steps away from the
sofa, wrapping her arms around her middle. She faced the three men in the room.
“Richard, the place where Justin was. The place that they found Justin, that’s
where we found the cache yesterday afternoon. And
that man
. You know, that
man who was in such a hurry. Oh, Richard what if he took Justin?” Collapsing
back on the couch and burying her hands in her face, Mrs. Babcock’s shoulders
shook; her sobs barely audible through her hands.

Giving
her a minute, Martin finally spoke up, “Tell us more about the geocaching, and this
man you mentioned.” 

Mr.
Babcock explained that they used their laptop to search the geocaching website
for caches in the lake area before programming them into their GPS and going
out to search for them.

Tate
took notes and wrote down the web address for the geocaching site, as well as the
Babcock’s login ID and password so he could log into their account. “Now I need
you to think back to the man you met there and describe him for me. What color
hair did he have? How was he dressed? Anything that you can think of could be
helpful.”

Questions
and answers went back and forth and Tate and Martin didn’t notice the passing
of time until the third time Caroline stuck her head in to announce lunch. Deciding
it was time to give the family a break, both men stood to leave.

Tate
shook hands with Mr. Babcock, and handed him a business card. “Give me a call
if you remember anything else and we’ll touch base with you again before you
leave Pine Ridge.” 

Mr.
Babcock nodded. “We want to go home, but we’re waiting.” His voice broke,
“We’re waiting for Justin.”

Once
back in the SUV, Tate turned to Martin. “The interview took longer than I
thought it would but I think we have some good information. I’m betting that
the ME has already sent the Babcock report over to your office. What say we
grab a burger from the diner and head back to the courthouse?”

Martin
nodded, “Sounds like a plan to me.”

Ten
minutes later the bell over the diner door clanged a greeting as Martin and
Tate entered. Stepping up the counter near an old fashioned cash register Tate
made eye contact through a rectangular opening behind the counter with a huge
thick necked man in the kitchen. Burt Walker had been a cook in the Navy before
retiring and moving to Pine Ridge over twenty years ago. Tate nodded a greeting
and Burt nodded back.

Burt
yelled, “Customers out front, girl!”

Reva
hurried through the swinging doors connecting the kitchen to the dining area
wiping her hands on a faded dish towel as she went. She slung the towel over
one shoulder and smiled, “Hello, Tate. Martin.” Pulling a pad from her apron
pocket she asked, “What’ll you boys be having today?” 

Martin
smiled back at her, “Just a couple burgers and some rings to go.” 

Reva
made a note on her pad and ripped the top sheet off then clipped the order to a
stainless wheel spinning it toward the kitchen for Burt. “Get you something to
drink while you wait?”

Tate
shook his head, “No, thanks. I do have a question for you though. You ever hear
of geocaching?”

Reva
nodded, “Sure. It’s a lot of fun. Why do you ask?”

Ignoring
her question, Tate took a seat on a round swivel stool at the bar. “You and
Saralyn ever do any caching out at the lake?”

“Yeah,
we did. Me and Saralyn both liked looking for caches. Her daddy gave her a GPS
for Christmas last year and we spent just about all our free time looking for
them around Pine Ridge. You wouldn’t believe how man--”

Tate
interrupted her, “Any chance that you were looking for caches the day that
Saralyn was murdered?”

Looking
thoughtful Reva replied, “Well, yeah. We did go caching out at the lake that
day.”

“Order
up!” Burt yelled from the kitchen.

Reva
pulled a brown paper bag from the window and moved to the decades old cash
register to ring up the order. Holding one finger up, she said, “Let me get
this order out for Mr. Brownlee and I’ll be right back with you.” She stepped
around the counter with the bag in hand and walked toward an elderly man who sat
near the door. Smiling down at him, Reva waited while he moved a three-legged
cane aside and pulled some cash from his pocket before returning to the
register to get his change.

Finished
with her customer, Reva returned to the men at the counter. “He is just the
sweetest little thing. Comes in once a week and takes burgers home for him and
Mrs. Brownlee. You know, she can’t get out much anymore. Burt always gives them
extra…” Stopping mid-sentence she seemed to remember that Tate and Martin were
there on business. “Oh my, I’m sorry, what was it you wanted to ask me about?” 
   

After
giving her the description of the man the Babcocks met while they were caching,
Tate asked, “Reva are you sure you didn’t see anyone matching this man’s
description while you were caching that day?”  

“No,
like I already told you, we didn’t talk to anyone that day other than when we
signed in at the gate. You thinking that geocaching has something to do with Saralyn’s
murder?”

Martin
cut in, “We’re not sure, but it’s something that we’re looking into.”

Reva’s
eyes clouded, “I heard about that kid that died out at the lake. Was he caching
too?”

Catching
the young woman’s eye Tate asked, “What exactly did you hear about Justin Babcock’s
death?”

Reva
looked around to make sure that no one else in the diner could hear. “Several
of the regulars were talking about it this morning over coffee. Said he was cut
up just like Saralyn.” 

“And
what else did they say? Anything?”

Her
voice dropped lower. “Well, Tate, they said that you wasn’t doing a damn thing
to catch the killer.” She turned her eyes away. “And then Tim Webber said that
some of them was going to talk to Mayor Hooper about having you replaced as
chief, but Walt Mabry said they should leave things alone and let you do your
job.”

“Order
up!” Burt yelled from behind them. Another brown paper bag appeared in the
opening between the kitchen and dining area and Reva pulled it down, glancing
at the order form stapled to it.

“This
one’s yours,” she said.

Tate
took the paper bag full of burgers and slid some bills over to Reva. “I
appreciate you telling me that Reva. You know that we can’t talk about the
Babcock case any more than we can go into the details of Saralyn’s murder, but
we are working both cases and we will do our best to catch this guy. You have
to believe that.”