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Authors: Donald Harstad
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It’s got to be here somewhere.”
It wasn’t.
We sat there in the dispatch center, defeated.
“Well,” I said, “somebody’s got to have it.”
The unstated implication was that Mike might have forgotten to make out a report.
“Was she hurt bad enough to go to the hospital?” I asked.
He shook his head. “No, and besides, I remember Phyllis saying that she would take care of it. They won’t have a record.”
“How about her insurance agent?”
“Possible, Dan. I suppose that could be checked out in the morning.” I was getting more disappointed. We wanted to present the day shift with her name, not with more work.
“Just a minute,” said Sally. “Wasn’t that the one where the farmer reported the mailbox vandalism the next morning, because he didn’t realize it was an accident?”
Bingo.
Back to the basement, to find the complaint report of the vandalism. Easy. Then to the case files, and there it was. Theo had apparently taken the accident report from the accident file and included it in the mailbox vandalism case file. Too lazy to make a copy.
Her name was Peggy Keller, and her age was given as thirty-one.
Sally announced that the state computer was back up. We ran Peggy Keller and got a driver’s license. The DL indicated that she was five feet four inches tall and weighed 117 pounds. With blue eyes. I wasn’t sure about the eyes, but she was blond, so that was a fair guess. We had our victim, we were sure. And her address was listed as Iowa City.
I looked at my watch: 01:58. Just about seventy-two hours after the first homicide was reported, we had identified the fourth victim. Not exactly breaking any records. It was tentative, to be sure, but I felt that we were right.
There was an air of mild euphoria in the dispatch center.
“Shit,” said Dan. “Let’s not tell anybody, and see how long it takes the rest of them to ID her.”
We all laughed.
“Sally, be sure to have the next dispatcher call Lamar and tell him we have a tentative ID on the fourth victim.”
“Come on, Carl, shouldn’t I call Theo first?” She was grinning.
“Send Theo a letter.”
7
Wednesday, April 24
02:20 hours
After identifying Peggy Keller, tentatively, of course, we all went back out on the road. I went directly to the McGuire residence and drove into the yard. Spooky. It was one of those Mary Shelley kind of nights … a light mist, patchy fog, with the trees still bare and stark. The kind of night that seems to eat your headlights, with everything just a little darker than normal, but with an uninterrupted sight distance—like it was all receding from your plane of reality a little bit.
McGuire’s house was dark, of course, but the yard light was still on.
“Comm, three.”
“Three?”
“I’ll be out of the car at the McGuire residence for a minute or two. I’ll have the walkie.”
“10–4, three’s out of the car, 02:23.”
It’s been my experience that, while it’s the criminal who’s always supposed to return to the scene of the crime, it is a lot more likely that you’ll find an officer going back. There’s a feel to the scene, somehow, that sometimeshelps to focus your thoughts. Not always consciously, of course. Frequently you’re just sort of drawn back to it.
I wasn’t looking for anything in particular. Just sort of wandering around the yard and then up to the porch. It was very quiet, only the muffled sound of my car running in the background. An occasional faint rasping sound from the police radio in the car, which was picking up traffic my walkie-talkie wasn’t.
I shined my flashlight into the machine shed. Mostly rusty farm equipment, with a fairly new tractor. Lots of steel and iron pieces lying around, most of them in pretty sad shape. I went in, knowing that I wouldn’t find anything of substance, as the lab team had already been through it very well. Especially Hester. But I wanted to get a feeling for the type of person McGuire was, and since this
It wasn’t.
We sat there in the dispatch center, defeated.
“Well,” I said, “somebody’s got to have it.”
The unstated implication was that Mike might have forgotten to make out a report.
“Was she hurt bad enough to go to the hospital?” I asked.
He shook his head. “No, and besides, I remember Phyllis saying that she would take care of it. They won’t have a record.”
“How about her insurance agent?”
“Possible, Dan. I suppose that could be checked out in the morning.” I was getting more disappointed. We wanted to present the day shift with her name, not with more work.
“Just a minute,” said Sally. “Wasn’t that the one where the farmer reported the mailbox vandalism the next morning, because he didn’t realize it was an accident?”
Bingo.
Back to the basement, to find the complaint report of the vandalism. Easy. Then to the case files, and there it was. Theo had apparently taken the accident report from the accident file and included it in the mailbox vandalism case file. Too lazy to make a copy.
Her name was Peggy Keller, and her age was given as thirty-one.
Sally announced that the state computer was back up. We ran Peggy Keller and got a driver’s license. The DL indicated that she was five feet four inches tall and weighed 117 pounds. With blue eyes. I wasn’t sure about the eyes, but she was blond, so that was a fair guess. We had our victim, we were sure. And her address was listed as Iowa City.
I looked at my watch: 01:58. Just about seventy-two hours after the first homicide was reported, we had identified the fourth victim. Not exactly breaking any records. It was tentative, to be sure, but I felt that we were right.
There was an air of mild euphoria in the dispatch center.
“Shit,” said Dan. “Let’s not tell anybody, and see how long it takes the rest of them to ID her.”
We all laughed.
“Sally, be sure to have the next dispatcher call Lamar and tell him we have a tentative ID on the fourth victim.”
“Come on, Carl, shouldn’t I call Theo first?” She was grinning.
“Send Theo a letter.”
7
Wednesday, April 24
02:20 hours
After identifying Peggy Keller, tentatively, of course, we all went back out on the road. I went directly to the McGuire residence and drove into the yard. Spooky. It was one of those Mary Shelley kind of nights … a light mist, patchy fog, with the trees still bare and stark. The kind of night that seems to eat your headlights, with everything just a little darker than normal, but with an uninterrupted sight distance—like it was all receding from your plane of reality a little bit.
McGuire’s house was dark, of course, but the yard light was still on.
“Comm, three.”
“Three?”
“I’ll be out of the car at the McGuire residence for a minute or two. I’ll have the walkie.”
“10–4, three’s out of the car, 02:23.”
It’s been my experience that, while it’s the criminal who’s always supposed to return to the scene of the crime, it is a lot more likely that you’ll find an officer going back. There’s a feel to the scene, somehow, that sometimeshelps to focus your thoughts. Not always consciously, of course. Frequently you’re just sort of drawn back to it.
I wasn’t looking for anything in particular. Just sort of wandering around the yard and then up to the porch. It was very quiet, only the muffled sound of my car running in the background. An occasional faint rasping sound from the police radio in the car, which was picking up traffic my walkie-talkie wasn’t.
I shined my flashlight into the machine shed. Mostly rusty farm equipment, with a fairly new tractor. Lots of steel and iron pieces lying around, most of them in pretty sad shape. I went in, knowing that I wouldn’t find anything of substance, as the lab team had already been through it very well. Especially Hester. But I wanted to get a feeling for the type of person McGuire was, and since this
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