A Fountain Filled With Blood

“Looks like Dessaint hiked in and pitched camp. I’m guessing he knew what he was doing. His equipment was top-of-the-line, but a few years old, well used. He was ready to travel light. A single-man tent, a bedroll, a couple changes of underwear. But he had a lot of food with him—that fancy dehydrated crap—and two bottles of purification tabs for water.”

“He was going to disappear into the mountains?”

“It wouldn’t be the first time.”

MacAuley was right. Any number of people had hiked into the Adirondack State Park and disappeared, intentionally or not. An experienced camper with enough food and water could stay out of sight a long time in the summer. Dessaint might have hoped to lie low until things cooled down. Or hike west to Route 30, the narrow road running more or less north through the million-acre park, and from there hitch and hike his way over the Canadian border. The Adirondacks were a wilderness, but a wilderness with small towns, camps, and settlements.

“Any money on him?”

“A little over three hundred bucks.”

Russ snorted. “That’s not much to start a new life with. Even with the Canadian exchange rate.”

MacAuley shrugged. “He had maybe another four, five thousand in drugs—meth and coke, and enough OxyContin to fill one of those economy-sized vitamin bottles.”

They reached the chain-link fence. The shadows from the hangar swallowed them as they went through the gate into the parking lot. Russ unlocked his car and opened the door, spilling light onto the gritty asphalt below their feet. “So what was the cause of death, Doctor?”

“Obviously I don’t have either a toxicology screen or an autopsy to go by. But I feel safe in giving you a first opinion that he shuffled off this mortal coil due to an overdose.” Scheeler beeped his car with his remote key. Russ could hear a dull thunk as the doors unlocked. “Based on the fact that he had a needle in his arm and his works spread out on the tent floor next to him. I’m guessing—and it’s just a guess, mind you—that he gave himself a highball.”

Russ leaned against the top of the squad car. Out of sight of the helicopter, he felt more relaxed, more thoughtful. “That doesn’t jibe with what his weasely little friend McKinley told me. He described Dessaint as a sort of fitness buff. Hardly the kind of guy to shoot up heroin and in-jectable cocaine.”

“Yeah,” MacAuley said, “but according to McKinley, Dessaint was the one handing out the goodies as well as the cash after they’d had a party.”

Russ frowned. “Were there any signs he was a regular user?”

“I didn’t see any tracks on his arms,” Dr. Scheeler said. “That doesn’t mean he wasn’t an occasional user.”

“Wait till you see the real jackpot item, though,” MacAuley added. “Remember I told you that it was a flock of birds that brought the Cornell folks down for a look-see? Well, most of ’em got scared off when all of us arrived and started working the site. But there were five or six of them, big buggers, that kept hopping around and pecking at one spot nearby, underneath a tree. So I went to take a look at it, and it’d been dug up recently and smoothed over. It was shaped like a drop pit. You know, for—”

“I camp, Lyle. I know what a drop pit is. But birds aren’t going to be pecking at someone’s latrine.”

“That’s what I thought. So we dug it up. Guess what we found.”

“Jimmy Hoffa.”

MacAuley crossed his arms and leaned back. Russ had an idea what he was going to say, but he wanted to give him his moment. Lyle loved a little drama. “No, really, I don’t know,” Russ said. “What?”

“Clothes. They had been rinsed out, but there were still visible bloodstains on ’em. And a tear in the sleeve that looks like a match to those threads we found at the scene.”

Russ looked at Scheeler. “Could they be what Ingraham’s killer was wearing?”

The medical examiner spread his hands. “Could be. I didn’t want to examine them at the site, for fear of losing possible hairs, fibers, or skin flakes. The blood traces we could see were very faint, which would certainly be the case if the killer went into the river after he garroted Mr. Ingraham. Most of the blood would wash away in the cold water, but not all.” He clasped his hands together like a man savoring the prospect of a good meal. “I think going over those clothes with a microvacuum and some Luminol will be very informative. First thing I’ll do is type the remaining blood, of course. If I were a betting man, I’d put money down that it’ll match Bill Ingraham’s.”

Russ reached under his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. “So it looks good that Dessaint is our killer.”

“Yep,” MacAuley said.

“And that he conveniently offed himself while sampling his wares.”

“Yep.”

“We can pretty much look forward to marking this one closed.”

“Yep.”

“Except”—Russ looked at MacAuley over the tops of his glasses—“we still have McKinley’s story about Dessaint’s mystery contact, handing off drugs and money in exchange for beating up on a few selected targets.”