Fruits of the Poisonous Tree (41 page)

“This is wrong. You are wrong.” he shouted.

“Then prove it. Let us in. Let me talk to them.”

His face jammed up with frustration. Thomas Lee was no stranger to us. The Blue Willow was a popular, highly profitable restaurant, and almost everyone I knew had at one time or another enjoyed at least one meal there. It also employed a huge and faceless staff of Asian workers, some of whom we suspected had bogus papers. One of the INS’s two Vermont-based investigators had dropped by the restaurant recently, but what he’d found—beside a suddenly diminished crew that day—hadn’t been enough to warrant any action. Nevertheless, it was a common law enforcement assumption that the Blue Willow was one of dozens of way stations along the Montreal-Boston-New-York illegal alien pipeline.

Lee, of course, knew of our suspicions, and no doubt guessed that our present interest fell a little shy of the altruism I’d just spouted. But he also knew we had him over a barrel. Slowly, as if yielding to a great weight, the door finally swung back.

Without a word, he stiffly led us back to the kitchen. Throughout the house, furniture was broken, pictures smashed, closets emptied and their contents ripped and torn, and spray paint had been used on the walls. If this attack had taken a half hour, it seemed a short time for such utter destruction. The people responsible had obviously been experienced.

The kitchen was in similar turmoil, its cabinets empty, the floor covered with a gritty, slippery mixture of food. The refrigerator stood wide open, there being nothing left inside to protect from room temperature.

At the counter separating the breakfast nook from the rest of the room, an exhausted and anguished middle-aged woman was daubing the face of a teenage girl with a wad of alcohol-dampened cotton. The girl, whom I guessed to be about sixteen, was strikingly pretty, despite the livid bruise on one cheek, and the cut on her chin that her mother was trying to tend. The girl’s expression, however, was unmistakable. It was the same blank-eyed look of desolation and loss I’d seen haunting too many victims of sexual assault.

Thomas Lee wordlessly introduced his family with a vague wave of one hand. I nodded formally to both women and introduced myself. The mother didn’t answer; the girl didn’t seem to know I was there.

I stepped closer to them, gently putting my hand on Mrs. Lee’s to interrupt her ministrations. “I need to ask you some questions.”

She shook her head. “No question.”

“Mrs. Lee,” I continued, intending my words more for her husband and daughter than for her, since I remembered hearing she understood little English. “I think I know what happened here. Your home was invaded and you were attacked. Your daughter may have been hurt in ways you don’t want to think about. Is that right?”

“No question.”

I stood in front of the daughter, forcing her to look at me. I kept my voice to just above a whisper. “I’m Joe Gunther. What’s your name?”

She took a long time answering, as if trying to separate me from a crowd of other pictures all shoved together in front of her. “Amy.”

“Amy, would you like to see a doctor?”

Her eyes flickered over to her father, who didn’t move a muscle. Nevertheless, I gestured to George, who immediately escorted Thomas Lee docilely into the other room. Before the door shut behind them, I could hear George starting a conversation, trying on to get Lee to open up. I hoped one of us would get lucky, but I wasn’t counting on it.

“What do you say, Amy?”

She shook her head ever so slightly. “No,” she whispered.

“What happened here is wrong, but we can only help you if you help us.”

“No.”

“You realize this won’t just go away?”

Her eyes seemed to regain their focus slightly. She looked at me with more care.

Instead of answering my own question, I tried a tangent. “These people aren’t like vandals on a joy ride. You saw how fast they worked, how thorough they were. They’re professionals. Do you think there’s anything you can do against them on your own?”

Her voice was barely audible. “No.”

Reluctantly, I played on her fears. “What do you think will happen when they come back?”

Her mother was looking from one of us to the other, at least getting the gist of what I was saying. She put her hand flat on my chest. “No question.”

Her daughter said something conciliatory to her, but Mrs. Lee’s action seemed to have stiffened Amy’s resolve, I hoped to my advantage. I was immediately disappointed.

“My mother’s right. We have nothing to say.”

Knowing what she’d just gone through, I couldn’t keep the frustration from my voice. “Amy, please. I understand your parents’ reluctance. I’ve been to Asia. I know the distrust they have for most cops. But you’ve lived here most of your life. You know what we stand for. We’re the ones that can stop this from happening again, to you or someone else.”

But she shook her head. “Talk to my dad. I won’t go against him.”

“That’s what my partner’s doing right now. You wouldn’t be going against him, anyhow. Do you want these characters to kill your father next time? Or to assault your mother the way they did you?”

She winced at the image, and I was angry at having to use it, but the knowledge that I was about to leave here empty-handed was beginning to burn inside me.

As if in confirmation, she shook her head one last time. “I’m sorry. I cannot speak with you.”

I looked at both of them—their faces haggard, bruised, fearful, but set—and let out a sigh. “All right. I won’t add to your problems.” I pulled out my wallet and removed a business card. “If you want to talk to me for any reason at all, even if it’s unrelated to what happened tonight—please call. I really am here to help.” I took out a different card and wrote Gail’s name on it. “You know about Women for Women? The women’s crisis organization? Gail Zigman is on their board. She’s also a rape survivor. You can call her or them and ask for help, too. They know what you’ve been through. They’re caring and supportive and they have nothing to do with us. Everything you tell them will be confidential. They will only be interested in your recovery. If you won’t talk to us, at least promise me you’ll give them a call.”

She gave me a small smile and nodded, at last, taking both cards.

I reached out and gently touched her shoulder. “Good luck. Think about what I said. Get your folks to let us help.”

I left them to go into the other room—the remnants of a dining room—and found George and Thomas Lee standing against opposite walls, looking like they’d been the cause of the shambles between them. Lee’s expression was a sterner, darker version of his daughter’s determination; George merely rolled his eyes in frustration when I looked at him.

I crossed over to the restaurant owner. “My guess is these people told you to fall into line or be targeted again. Am I right?”

Predictably, he didn’t answer.

I pulled out another business card—one of my own. “You can reach me here, day or night. I’ll give the dispatcher your name and instructions to locate me no matter when. Okay?”

He took the card and nodded.

There was an awkward silence. I rubbed the back of my neck and turned toward the front hallway. “Good luck. I hope all this is worth risking your family.”

Outside, I paused on the lawn to take in a deep breath of cold air.

George Capullo shook his head wonderingly, a lifetime small-town cop, whose experience ran deep but narrow, and didn’t include Asians. “I’m not real clear on what happened in there.”

“I’d say a home invasion—standard Chinatown extortion. Three or more creeps kick down a door, trash the place, rape and/or beat the occupants, rob them blind, and if there’s a business involved, apply a little pressure for future regular payments. Kind of like how Al Capone made gin-joints subscribe to his ‘protection’ service during Prohibition. I’ll order some surveillance of the restaurant to see what comes up, but I doubt they’ll be that obvious.”

“I thought home invasions only happened in Boston and places like that. What’s to be gained here? We don’t have a Chinatown. You think one of the other Chinese restaurant owners worked him over—a little hard-nosed competition?”

Startled by the suggestion’s compelling simplicity, I turned and looked back at the house, as silent now as its occupants, and found my memory returning to the speed stop on the interstate back in January, and to three close-mouthed Asians whose presence had reeked of violence. In the weeks that followed, I’d discovered that Truong Van Loc, while never convicted, was suspected of having organized crime connections in California, and that another man with the same family name—presumably the brother he’d mentioned—had been killed in a gang-related shooting years ago. Two days following that conversation by the road side, the Montreal Police had reported finding one of their own Asian gang members killed execution style, with a bullet in the back of his head.

I glanced at George and began walking back to the cars. “I don’t know, but my gut tells me we’re in for a lot worse than that.”

Over the years, Archer Mayor has been photographer, teacher, historian, scholarly editor, feature writer, travel writer, lab technician, political advance man, medical illustrator, newspaper writer, history researcher, publications consultant, constable, and EMT/firefighter. He is also half Argentine, speaks two languages, and has lived in several countries on two continents.

All of which makes makes him restless, curious, unemployable, or all three. Whatever he is, it’s clearly not cured, since he’s currently a novelist, a death investigator for Vermont’s medical examiner, and a police officer.

Mayor has been producing the Joe Gunther novels since 1988, many of which have made “Ten Best” or “Most Notable” lists of the
Los Angeles Times
, the
New York Times
and many other publications. His latest book is a
New York Times
bestseller. He has received the New England Booksellers Association Award for fiction.

Find him on the web at 
www.ArcherMayor.com

Open Season
Borderlines
Scent of Evil
The Skeleton’s Knee
Fruits of the Poisonous Tree
The Dark Root
The Ragman’s Memory
Bellows Falls
The Disposable Man
Occam’s Razor
The Marble Mask
Tucker Peak
The Sniper’s Wife
Gatekeeper
The Surrogate Thief
St. Albans Fire
The Second Mouse
Chat
The Catch
The Price of Malice
Red Herring
Tag Man

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Fruits of the Poisonous Tree
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Copyright © 2012 by Archer Mayor.

ISBN: 978-1-939767-05-9

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Lt. Joe Gunther of the Brattleboro, Vermont police force has a serious problem: in a community where a decade could pass without a single murder, the body count is suddenly mounting. Innocent citizens are being killed—and others set-up—seemingly orchestrated by a mysterious ski-masked man. Signs suggest that a three year-old murder trial might lie at the heart of things, but it’s a case that many in the department would prefer remained closed. A man of quiet integrity, Lt. Gunther knows that he must pursue the case to its conclusion, wherever it leads.