“Yeah. I doubt they brought this on themselves, but who knew what kind of enemies they might have had. Not to mention that dirtball Benny.”
Looking off into the distance, avoiding what I’m thinking: “If this was a dope beef with Benny and Nicky...they’re not going to spill it now.”
“It’s not your fault, RDB.”
“We’ll see when it shakes out if it’s my fault or not. Keep that angle in the back of your head.”
“I will. If you get anything let me know; I’ll filter it to Riggens’ kid brother.”
“And if it’s connected...I’ll tie the loose ends.”
“That’s the RDB I know.” He claps me on the back.
We’re done here. I rub my scalp; kick at some snow the inferno didn’t melt. Look around. A bad scene. Poor Abigail.
“I’ll drive you home,” Clevenger says. “Give me another cigarette, would ya?”
“The other one was your only one, right?”
“It was. I heard the mom crying, looked at her. She was looking over there at the other ambulance, so I looked too.”
“And?”
“And I forgot. Right before you showed up, the EMTs said the little girl took her knock like Mom and Dad...but her skull didn’t work as well as theirs.”
“Jesus Christ,” I say.
I hand him another cigarette. We drain the flask.
25
The next day I wake up and call Elam Derne.
Let him know about the blaze. He can’t come to the phone.
His house burnt down as well.
26
Elam Derne survived his fire.
His terminally ill wife did not. A different investigator caught this one: a guy named Volksman. I know Volksman. I can’t stand that guy. I wouldn’t piss in his ass if his shit was on fire.
Thomas Volksman: shitbird. Saying he was a poor street cop is like saying Clay Aiken was hiding his homosexuality well. Volksman would get dispatched to calls and deliberately drag his feet until his back up arrived first. Then he’d show up, radio that he was on-scene, get credit for the call and not be the responsible officer.
Volksman is the guy who would take felony drugs off of a suspect and flush them. Throw away paraphernalia. A lot of cops will empty a small baggie of weed rather than do all the paperwork and evidence processing. But Volksman would toss heroin.
Volksman pulled a guy over one night who was so drunk he drug his car’s passenger side along a forty-foot stretch of retaining wall. Even back then DUI’s were a lot of paperwork. Volksman has an allergy to paperwork. He let the guy go with a warning.
The next county over, deputies spent hours processing the wreck Volksman’s drunk got into. The investigator theorized the drunk got off on the wrong exit, wandered off into the country. He hit a cow who was fortunate enough to find a break in the pasture fence. Cow died. Drunk died. Volksman slipped by.
There are always reliable sources entrenched in the rumor mill. Nameless, faceless cops, janitors, dispatchers and others who make it their business to know the business of others. Faint rumors, as quiet as a mouse-fart, popped up one day saying that Volksman, who wouldn’t investigate his own mother’s murder, who wouldn’t do the paperwork necessary to claim a million dollar cash prize, got promoted.
It was fast. It was without fanfare. It was odd. It was kept hush-hush. But it was. Volksman was promoted to an arson investigator’s position.
The mouse-fart quiet rumor mill also stated the baffling reason for Volksman’s promotion: he has some Grade-A dirt on an arson captain. Something that greased the path into his promotion. I don’t know what it is; the arson captain might have been boning a TV evangelist while Rome was burning. I don’t know. But it was powerful stuff.
Stuff that needs to be kept buried to the point where Volksman could use it to buy himself a cozy gig sifting through ashes and turning over charred timbers, getting fatter and more useless with each passing day. Something cozy where he can pontificate and play with his molester ’stache while directing his subordinates to do everything he should be doing.