“Tom LaRouche,” Shepard said. “He’s over in the Lakeside Center.”
“Okay, good, I know him,” Good Thunder said. And, “We basically have hard information that you know about your husband’s taking a bribe from PyeMart Corporation, in exchange for his vote on the zoning. We are willing to offer you immunity from prosecution on the basis of your providing us that information. Do you think you will have something to discuss? I’m not asking you to commit yourself, but just to tell me whether we’re wasting our time.”
“If you give me immunity, we’ve got something to talk about,” Shepard said, blowing a hank of blond hair away from her eyes. “When I found out about what Pat had done, I felt terrible. So many people are getting hurt. I felt even more terrible when I found out he was having an affair.”
“You know about the affair?” Virgil asked.
She stopped, looked at him: “You know about it?”
Virgil said, “Yeah . . . I guess, our source . . .”
She shook her head and said to Good Thunder. “Carol Anne Moore? You know her? She works for the county, in the license office. I couldn’t believe it. . . .”
Virgil thought, Oh, boy.
SHEPARD CALLED HER ATTORNEY, explained the situation to him. He told her to stop talking to Virgil and Good Thunder, and said that he could see her that afternoon, and Virgil and Good Thunder immediately afterward.
She hung up, made a hand-dusting slap, and said, “Finally. Something is getting done. But he says I shouldn’t talk to you again until I speak to him.”
“Well, we’ll see you this afternoon, then,” Good Thunder said.
BACK IN THE TRUCK, Good Thunder said, “So Pat Shepard tells his pal that he’s having an affair with Marilyn Oaks, but Pat’s wife thinks he’s having an affair with Carol Anne Moore.”
Virgil said, “I feel bad about myself for saying this, but if the lawyer tells her that she might not want to talk to us . . . I bet Marilyn Oaks could change her mind.”
“I’ve got to go talk to the boss,” she said. “This is going to get ugly, on a lot of levels.”
VIRGIL DROPPED HER at the courthouse and drove back to look at his boat. It was still blown up. The crime-scene tech had finished, and had thrown a blue plastic tarp over the hulk, like pulling a sheet over the face of a dead man.
He left it that way, and walked into the motel. Thor was behind the desk, saw him coming, and asked, “Did you talk to Mrs. Shepard?”
“I can’t really talk about that,” Virgil said.
“So, was she as hot as I said?”
“She was . . . yes, she was,” Virgil said. “Did some deputies come around and talk to you about people prowling your back lot?”
“Yeah, they talked to everybody, but nobody saw anything,” Thor said. “You think I got a chance to get Mrs. Shepard before Mr. Mackey?”
“I gotta go,” Virgil said.
From behind him, Thor said, “Sonofagun, he already got there, didn’t he?”
VIRGIL TURNED AROUND and Thor said, “I’ll tell you what’s got me scratching my head.”
Virgil turned back. “Yeah?”
“Why’d they try to kill you?” he asked.
Virgil said, “Well, see, I’m a cop, and I’ve been assigned to find the bomber—”
“Yeah, and what happens if you get killed? About, what, a hundred more cops come in?” Thor asked. “Right now, we got the sheriff’s department, and Sheriff Ahlquist is a nice guy, but to be honest, his deputies couldn’t find a stolen bike unless it was parked between the cheeks of their ass. So we got two real cops here, one state and one federal. If he kills a real cop, what happens? We get a hundred real cops, and they’re all pissed off. So, what’s the percentage? Is the guy stupid? He doesn’t seem stupid.”
Virgil had no answer for that. He said, “You need to lie down and take a nap before your brains burn up.”
SO, VIRGIL ASKED HIMSELF, back in his truck, why’d he try to kill me?
14
VIRGIL INTENDED TO SPEND SOME time thinking—stretch out on the bed and have at it. As a backup, and just to make sure he didn’t fall asleep, he set the alarm, and the alarm woke him a half hour before he was to meet Good Thunder at Shepard’s lawyer’s office.
He got up, checked his vital signs—he had an after-nap erection, which was always good—brushed his teeth and took a quick shower.
Good Thunder had given him directions to the lawyer’s office, and wearing his most conservative T-shirt—an unauthorized souvenir from My Chemical Romance, with the band’s name only on the back, and with a black sport coat covering it—he set off for the lawyer’s office.
The office was in a low, low, rustic strip mall—fake log cabins—with Butternut’s most complete collection of upscale boutiques, including one called Mairzy Doats with a window full of stuffed velvet moose dolls. Good Thunder was sitting on the hood of her car, a new fire-engine-red Chevy Camaro, waiting. When Virgil got out of the truck, she said, in a phony baritone, “Johnny Cash, the ‘Man in Black.’ ”
“You seem to be in a pretty good mood,” Virgil said.
She hopped off the hood. “My boss put a thumb in the wind—that’s not where he usually keeps it—and decided that if we can bag the city council, if they really did it, then he’ll be a lock for reelection. What he really doesn’t want, though, is for us to screw it up. He’s gonna be really unhappy if we just wound them.”
Virgil nodded. “I know how it is. You get a wounded city councilman out in the brush, they’ll charge at the drop of the hat.”
“Whatever,” she said. “Let’s not have any show of wit in here. Let’s just play it straight.”
“This lawyer’s pretty smart?”
“As a matter of fact, he is.”
THE LAWYER WAS an extremely white man named Thomas LaRouche. His secretary ushered them into his office, where Jeanne Shepard sat in a corner chair, looking apprehensive. LaRouche was tall, courtly, and silver-haired, wearing a blue suit and a white shirt, open at the throat; a burgundy necktie was curled on a corner of his desk. He was maybe sixty, Virgil thought.
When they came in, he stood up, smiling, said, “Shirley,” and came around the desk and kissed Good Thunder on the cheek, and shook hands with Virgil and pointed them at two leather visitor’s chairs.
“I heard your boat was blown up this morning,” he said to Virgil, as he settled behind his desk. “That qualifies as a war crime.”
“You’re right,” Virgil said. “People keep asking me if I’m all right, but I keep thinking about the boat. I took that thing all over the place.”
LaRouche asked him what kind of boat it was, and when Virgil told him, he lit up, a bit, and said, “I used to have one like that—but it was years ago. I had a 40 Merc tiller off the back. One time up on Mille Lacs . . .”
By the time he got finished, he had Virgil liking him; that had happened before with lawyers, usually the kind who won in court. “So,” he said finally, “we have a situation here. I’ve agreed to represent Jeanne, and I have to say that I was a little disturbed when I heard about your conversation this morning.”
Then he and Good Thunder went back and forth for a while, on the propriety of having spoken to Jeanne Shepard without a lawyer being present, and while he scored a point or two, when they were done, Virgil had Good Thunder four points up and standing on the free-throw line with two seconds left in the game. It was over, and LaRouche knew it.
“The point being,” Good Thunder said for emphasis, “we do not necessarily have an issue with Mrs. Shepard, although, of course, she should have spoken to police immediately after learning that Mr. Shepard had taken a bribe.”
“We should be able to handle that,” LaRouche said.
“Oh, I think so. I’ve spoken to Theodore”—Theodore was her boss—“and he is totally on board with immunity for Mrs. Shepard, contingent only on her complete cooperation.”
“I should put in here,” Virgil said, “if Ms. Good Thunder doesn’t min
d, I’d like to say that we’re coming from several different directions on this investigation. If Mrs. Shepard declines to cooperate, then, of course, there will be no immunity, and no second chance.”
“Aw, c’mon, Virgil, you don’t have to bring the knives out,” LaRouche said. “We’re all friends here, trying to do what’s right.”
When he was finished, and everybody agreed they were friends, Good Thunder produced a file of papers—a contract, more or less—that defined the terms of the immunity and the scope of her cooperation. LaRouche said he would look at them overnight, brief his client in the morning, and, if everything was properly done, return them signed that afternoon.
“The terms are all standard stuff, they shouldn’t give you any trouble,” Good Thunder told LaRouche. “But time is a major problem. It’d help a lot if we could get them back this afternoon, and talk with Mrs. Shepard tonight. We understand that she’s left her husband, and that could signal to him, and to the other people involved in this conspiracy, that there could be trouble. Evidence could be lost, if there’s a delay; or the conspirators could have a chance to talk about a common defense, before we can get to them.”
LaRouche: “I’m afraid we’ll need a little more time than that.”
Good Thunder: “Agent Flowers is planning to continue his investigation—time is of the essence. I have to warn you, that if there’s another development, with another suspect, the same deal might not be available tomorrow.”
LaRouche: “Shirley, gosh darn it, we need a little time.”
Good Thunder: “I’m not trying to be harsh, Tommy, I’m just saying that we have a serious time problem. Things are moving fast. If something else breaks . . . it breaks. We’ll have to jump at it. We have to take the bird in the hand, we can’t count on the one in the bush.”
There was more back-and-forth, and LaRouche asked them to step out of the office for a moment, so he could talk privately with Shepard. Virgil and Good Thunder sat outside for twenty minutes, talking about nothing, for the benefit of LaRouche’s secretary, who listened carefully while pretending to type, and finally LaRouche called them back.
“Shirley, I’m about ninety percent that your stance here was an effort to stampede us.”
“Tom, I’d never—”
“If so, you’ve succeeded. I’ve canceled my plans for the evening, and if you can get back here at six o’clock, we can at least start the conversation.”
“That will be fine,” Good Thunder said, with a smile. “I think this will be best for all of us.”
BACK OUTSIDE, SHE SHOWED some excitement: “Damnit, Virgil, I’m actually gonna do some of that stuff we talked about in law school. Clean up the town. So far, it’s mostly been plea bargains to small amounts of marijuana. Tire theft and public urination.”
“Will you go after Shepard, or try to turn him?”
“I gotta talk to my people,” she said. “Jeanne Shepard might get us only her husband. If we can nail him down before anybody finds out, we might be able to make a deal with him. Put a wire on him, even. Get the whole bunch.”
“Up to you,” Virgil said. “I’d go for the whole banana stand, if I were you.”
“That’s what I’d do, too, but the boss might see one of those birdin-the-hand deals.”
“So: see you at six,” Virgil said. “If you don’t mind, I want to tip Ahlquist off: I don’t want it to catch him with his pants down. He’s already been in the paper standing next to Pye.”
She was hesitant: “He’s gotta keep his mouth shut.”
“He can do that,” Virgil said. “We’ve worked together in the past, and he’s good at that, when he needs to be.”
VIRGIL FOLLOWED HER toward the courthouse, but swung into a McDonald’s drive-through for a shot of calories, talked to Davenport about the Shepards, while he waited for the food, then went on to the courthouse. Ahlquist had just left, going home for dinner. Virgil got one of the deputies to call him, and Ahlquist said he’d come back.
When he arrived, Virgil was finishing his cheeseburger while looking at the hundred and seven letters that they’d already gotten back from the survey group. Twenty-two had declined to participate, for reasons ranging from a lack of time to concerns about civil rights, leaving eighty-five lists of names. More were arriving every few minutes. They’d asked for ten names, and had gotten back as few as four, on a few lists, to as many as twenty-one on the longest list. Most were ten.
Virgil had opened his laptop, set up an Excel spreadsheet, and started entering names. In the first five letters, he’d had three duplicates, a Lyle McLachlan.
Ahlquist came in, looked over his shoulder, stole a couple of Virgil’s french fries.
“McLachlan isn’t smart enough to pull this off,” he said. “He’s crazy enough, and violent enough, but he’s not the guy.”
“Bummer.”
“SO WHAT’S UP?” AHLQUIST ASKED. He took a couple more fries.
“These rumors about the city council being bribed,” Virgil said. “Uh, they’re true.”
“You say that like a cop,” Ahlquist said.
“Yeah.”
“Ah, shit.” Ahlquist dropped in a chair. “How bad?”
“We got at least one, Pat Shepard. He’s gone, unless Good Thunder decides to flip him.”
“Ah, man. He teaches civics up at the high school. How to be a good citizen.”
“Yeah, well . . . I got Good Thunder to agree that I could tell you about this, on the basis that you not mention it to a single person,” Virgil said. “We don’t want Pye shoveling dirt on it, we don’t want people hiding cash in coffee cans out in the woods. When we move on it, we want it all raw.”
“I can keep my mouth shut,” Ahlquist said.
“That’s what I told her,” Virgil said. “I just thought you oughta know, so you don’t wind up standing too close to Pye.”
“I appreciate that, Virgil. You’re a good egg,” Ahlquist said. “So how’d you bag him? Shepard?”
Virgil filled him in on the details—the affairs, the probable divorce, the money, and the immunity agreement with Jeanne Shepard.
“Ah, Jesus. I dread all of this, what’s going to happen,” Ahlquist said, when Virgil finished. “We’ll be busting old friends. Or acquaintances, anyway.”
“It won’t be pretty,” Virgil said. “If you want, I can talk to my boss, bring in a BCA crew. Keep you out of it.”
“That’d make it look like you guys thought I couldn’t handle it,” Ahlquist said. “Or maybe was involved.”
“You can handle it, Earl, but the question is, do you want to?” Virgil asked.
“I gotta think.”
Virgil said, “We could fix it for you to make the announcement, along with the county attorney. You could say something like, ‘I’ve recused myself and the sheriff ’s department to avoid any appearance of a conflict of interest.’ ”
He bobbed his head: “That might be the way to go. Once you say I can talk, I’ll tell Mary Alice about it, ask her what she thinks. She’s my brain trust.” Mary Alice was his wife.
“We’ll probably move in the next day or two, so you gotta decide what you’re gonna do, and pretty fast. You think Mary Alice can keep her mouth shut?”
“When she needs to,” Ahlquist said.
“Then talk to her,” Virgil said. “Let me know tomorrow morning what you’re gonna do.”
“I’ll tell you tonight,” Ahlquist said. “I want to see your final list, so I’ll be back anyway.”
VIRGIL WENT BACK TO WORK on the list, pushing hard. Lyle McLachlan, he thought, must be an enormous asshole, because he was on about every other list. George Peck was on one list. Virgil checked the number of the letter that nominated Peck, against the secret numbered list, and found that Peck had nominated himself.
Interesting.
The desk officer came in and handed him more letters. He put them in the pile, and went back to sorting names.
Time went by. He was fifteen minutes from finishing w
hen he glanced at his watch and realized he didn’t have fifteen minutes: it was time to get back to LaRouche’s office.
He went out past the front desk, and found he had sixteen more letters. “Hang onto these, will you?” he asked the desk officer. “I’ll be back in a couple hours to finish up.”
WHEN HE GOT TO LAROUCHE’S, the office window was dark, and the door locked, but Good Thunder’s Camaro was parked outside. He knocked, and pushed a doorbell, and a minute later, a clerk-like woman came to the door and asked, “Are you Agent Flowers?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She let him in, said, “I’m Coral Schmidt, I’m the reporter,” and he followed her down a hall past LaRouche’s office, to a conference room, where LaRouche and Good Thunder were chatting, while Shepard sat next to LaRouche, listening and toying with her purse. Schmidt sat down next to a black steno machine and, as Virgil took a chair, nodded to Good Thunder and said, “Anytime.”
Good Thunder dictated some time and date stuff to the reporter, the identities and offices of those present, then she and LaRouche agreed that they would abide by the terms of an agreement reached earlier that day, with copies to everyone, etc. With the bureaucratic bullshit out of the way, they started.
Good Thunder said to Shepard, “Mrs. Shepard, you’ve asserted that your husband, Patrick Shepard, a member of the Butternut Falls City Council, received a bribe of twenty-five thousand dollars to change his vote on a zoning application from PyeMart Corporation, in regard to a PyeMart store to be built on Highway 12 West in Butternut Falls. When did you become aware of the offer from PyeMart?”
Shepard unrolled the story: the first contact with a PyeMart expediter named John Dunn, a series of discussions between Dunn and other members of the council. The discussions had the effect of softening up the council members, she said, and when an offer came to “help” Shepard with some credit card and income tax debt, it was not unexpected.