Where Is Henderson? (Sam Darling mystery #5) (2 page)

It only took a few minutes for us to get from George’s house to 36th Street between Wismann Road and Koch’s Lane. When we arrived, the roads had been blocked off. I didn’t see a body at the intersection where the train tracks were, but noticed a flurry of activity a little to the west. There was a person-sized white plastic lump off to the side of the tracks that might have been the body.

As George parked his nondescript cop car and we walked toward the other people, I pondered the fact that just two minutes outside of town, it seemed as though we were in the country. If we continued straight, country continued with us, but if we turned left on either Wismann or Koch’s Lane, we’d be right back in the city in several blocks.

I dutifully followed a few steps behind George. As he spoke, it became clear that out of the four people there, two were uniformed cops, one was a railroad employee, and the fourth was a witness.

The one woman, dressed in a full-length down coat and a knit hat that tied under her chin, seemed agitated. “I just happened to look this way when I was at the stop sign, and I saw a body fall off the train,” she said.

“Did someone push it?” George asked.

“I couldn’t tell if it… the body… was pushed out or just fell. I do know the body—he—didn’t jump. He kind of rolled off, so I didn’t think it was his idea.”

“What happened then?” George asked.

“I parked real quick and called 911 while I ran down here to see if he was okay. He was dead when I got here. I didn’t touch him though. I just waited for the police to arrive.”

George got a description of the boxcar from the woman, thanked her, then turned to the railroad guy who said, “We got an emergency call from your 911 center and stopped the train as soon as we could. We were already going pretty slowly because of going through town. It’s about a mile or so down the track.” Another question from George elicited, “Nah, we’re just a freight train, bound from Chicago to St. Louis. Nobody on board but a few crew.”

George walked to the body and pulled the white tarp back, revealing a man lying on his side with one arm under him and the other splayed out in front. He looked pale, even gray, and he had what looked like gravel embedded in his face and arm. That’s all I saw with a cursory glance. I was sure George saw more.

George spoke to the cops for a few minutes and found out they hadn’t touched the body except to determine that it was dead. They released the ambulance that had accompanied them, because they knew there would be an investigation, and they put the white plastic covering over the deceased.

George nodded, then instructed the cops to wait for the coroner to arrive. “Conrad’s been ice fishing and it will take him a little while to get here. I’m going to look at the train. It’s freezing out here, so the body will be fine until Conrad arrives,” he said, indicating the body with his head.

He turned back to the witness. “We’re going to need to talk to you more, but not immediately. Please leave your name and contact information with one of the officers and we’ll call you later today. Thanks for your help.”

He didn’t explain my presence. He didn’t have to. I’d been involved in four different homicide situations and at this point, it almost seemed like the city should pay me. People were certainly starting to recognize me. Sometimes the recognition felt good—as in, “Sam solved the case.” Other times, not so much—as in, “We didn’t have murders till she moved back to town.”

As if I personally brought murder with me from Chicago!

As we walked back to the car, George talked to the coroner, Conrad, on the phone. Conrad Waterkotte had been another classmate of ours. In school it seemed he was president of every club and organization at St. Francis High. When he was elected coroner of Adams County, it gave him yet another reason to strut. A little self-important, he certainly was, but he did a good job as coroner and he’d probably keep getting re-elected until he chose to step down. In fact, we were lucky to have a coroner who was an MD. The previous coroner wasn’t. It was pretty common in smaller communities to have non-medical people function in that capacity, and contract a doctor to perform autopsies. Lucky for us, Conrad had tons of money and didn’t need to earn much. And in spite of everything, George and I really liked him.

I heard George say, “Yeah, I’ll meet you back at the morgue. Make sure the techs do a thorough canvassing of the area where the body is. And I didn’t check his pockets for ID. Wanted to wait until the area was checked first.” A pause. “Yeah.” He looked at me and I got suspicious. “Yeah. She promised.” Pause. “Okay.” Then he put his phone in the pocket of his coat.

I hadn’t noticed the cold before, but as he talked his breath came out in visible puffs. I pulled my coat tighter around my body. “I know Conrad asked whether I was here or not, and he warned you that I better behave.”

“If you know all that,” he said with a smile, “there’s no real reason for us ever to have a conversation.”

He opened my car door for me. “Smart Alec,” I said, and couldn’t help but smile back. “Did you notice the guy didn’t have a coat on? Jeans, sweatshirt that said ‘Henderson County Colonels,’ and no coat. That has to mean something.”

“Maybe we’ll find his coat in the boxcar.” George was practical.

“And maybe he’s an alien and they didn’t do their research correctly, so he didn’t know he was going to require a coat.”

George’s eyebrows raised, “And by alien I assume you mean from another planet.”

“I’m not serious, of course. Just pointing out that we ought to be prepared for any eventuality, not just the obvious.”

“Just because I said his coat might be in the boxcar doesn’t mean I’m not prepared for there to be another explanation,” George said as he expertly maneuvered around a cow that had escaped the confines of its pasture. He honked a few times to try to get the thing off the road, but it wouldn’t budge. So as we slowly took a big arc around it, George called the station. “There’s a cow out here blocking the road. Find out whose it is and let them know,” he told the dispatcher.

He started up his conversation with me as if we hadn’t been interrupted. “I think it’s important for us not to have any preconceived notions before we check out the scene.”

“I agree wholeheartedly,” I responded, and didn’t remind him that I was the one who said it first.

By then we’d arrived at the train, located a little over a mile west of the body, west of the intersection of 24th Street and the tracks. Here, the tracks had veered south as well as west, so we were between Wismann Lane and Locust Street. I was anxious to reach the boxcar, so didn’t wait for gentlemanly George to open my door. I kept up with him stride for stride though, which normally didn’t happen since I was short and he wasn’t. I heard him laugh as we progressed, but chose not to mention it, primarily because I could hardly breathe from the exertion.

We looked for the Burlington Northern car that the woman had described. Trouble was that BN was the most common name on the boxcars. George said, “She also said there was graffiti on the car that looked like a vase or urn.”

“Odd,” I said, and kept walking and gasping for air.

Finally I saw what we were looking for and pointed because I had no air left for talking. There, directly ahead, was the Burlington Northern boxcar with a vase drawn on the side. When I’d caught my breath, I said, “I wonder if the urn or whatever is important.”

George either didn’t hear me or chose to ignore me. I took a picture of the graffiti with my phone and patted the phone after I put it back in my pocket. I had a feeling that somehow the vase meant something.

For once, my hunch was 100% correct.

T
he boxcar was one of what looked like a hundred in a straight line; most of them bore the same red-rust color with various names and numbers on them. I had looked at all of them we’d passed, and glanced ahead at the next few, and saw there wasn’t a vase on any of the others.

“George, I think the vase drawing is significant,” I said, before trying to climb into the boxcar.

“Okay,” was all he said as he lifted himself quickly into the train.

I shrugged my shoulders and tried to get my 5’ 2” body to jump through the door of the boxcar. It wasn’t looking promising, considering that the floor of the car began at my neck level.

“George,” I said, and realized that my voice sounded almost whiney, which I abhorred. So I swallowed and tried again. “George.” I spoke loudly and the words came out decidedly unwhiney. “I need some help.”

He was already well inside the train car, but walked back to the door and bent down to give me a hand. Our fingers barely touched and I couldn’t grab onto his hand.

Ever the gentleman, he lay down on the floor of the car and then reached for me. This time I was able to grab on to him, and we did the wrist-to-wrist grab that is common in adventure movies. I didn’t feel like a movie star though. I felt like just what I was—a short, slightly overweight, 44-1/2-year-old woman. I was grateful this wasn’t being filmed for posterity, and after a lot of groaning I was able to get my belly half in and half out of the train. George then stood up and pulled some more. I knew my stomach was getting scraped, but the effort was worth it when I was finally in the car. I rolled from my stomach to my back and looked up at my helper.

“Thanks,” was all I could manage, but there was a lot more I wanted to say. Like, “I promise I’ll start running again and get in shape,” and “You are so wonderful, helping me like that, even when you wanted to be looking at the place the body came from.” A few gulping breaths later I was finally able to stand.

The inside of the boxcar was dark, and we couldn’t find a light anywhere. I turned on the flashlight function on my smart phone. George had thought ahead as usual and brought the flashlight from his car.

“You go to one end and I’ll go to another. Try not to disturb anything, and we’ll compare notes afterward.”

I nodded, then realized he might not have seen my nod. So I answered, “Sure thing.”

I took off in the indicated direction. When I noticed the entire back of the car was empty except for some litter, I told myself to remember a question we needed to ask the train guy—was the entire train empty? Or just this car?

The litter caught my eye and I leaned down to pick up a piece of what looked like newsprint. I aimed my light towards it. The heading said “Henderson Gleaner,” with a date of January 3, 2015. I wondered where Henderson was, and why this scrap was here. I picked up a few more random pieces of scrap and found part of a Snickers wrapper that automatically set off a salivating response; another small piece of newspaper that had the name Nibby Hender on it plus something about a bed and breakfast; and a blank scrap of what looked like notebook paper. Even though George had told me not to disturb anything, I put these treasures in my pocket and planned to talk to George about them when we were finished canvassing the area.

I didn’t find anything else that interested me, so walked the rest of the inside perimeter until I met George.

“Anything?” he asked.

“Not really. I picked up a couple pieces of paper that might mean something, but we’ll talk about that when we’re done. Okay?”

I was able to see his nod since we were standing by the door. We each repeated the same process on the other side of the boxcar. I didn’t see anything but dirt. Suddenly it hit me that I shouldn’t just be looking down, but should be looking at eye level and upwards as well. So I did just that—and saw a vase drawn on the wall. I got closer and noted it was probably spray-painted since the edges weren’t well defined.

Does this have something to do with the body?
I wondered. Normally I would have yelled at George to come see this immediately, but was able to put my hand over my mouth to stop myself from doing so. I decided to wait until we were both done with our respective sides of the train car.

I did take a picture of the vase, and it was the only one I saw. The rest of the car was the same rust red as the outside.

George and I met at the opposite door and he asked me the same question—“Anything?”

This time I was able to give him more information. “Yeah, I saw the vase painted on that wall over there.” I turned and pointed in its general direction. “I still think it’s significant,” I said, “and I took a picture of it and also the one outside.”

“Thanks. Good instinct.” Praise from my beloved. My day was made, and that was no exaggeration. George was sweet and gave me compliments freely. However, for him to say something good about my police instincts, well, that was a fairly infrequent occurrence.

I think I might even have blushed. George gave me a quick hug and then said, “Okay, it’s time to jump down. You up for it?”

“Yep. If you go first and help me.”

Of course that had been what he had in mind anyway. He jumped to the ground, giving lie to the fact that he was the same age as I was.

When I looked down, it appeared to be the distance from the earth to the moon. “I know I’ll break my leg if I jump.”

George smiled. “Then turn around, get on your stomach, and scoot until you are more than half-way off. You’ll be able to drop to the ground easily. Plus, I’ll catch you at the same time. C’mon, you can do it, honey.”

His pep talk was helpful so I said, “Okay.” However, I was still a little nervous. Plus my bottom would be sticking out right in front of the face of my soon-to-be husband. I hoped the sight wouldn’t deter him from marriage.

I did just as he suggested, although my stomach was tender and scraped from the climb up, and I had the feeling the same thing would happen on the downward “jump.” I inched my way backward until I could feel my legs dangling. Although the idea of all this was scary to me, I felt George hold on to my legs around my knees. I did my best not to think of my bottom near his face and kept progressing on my backward trek.

Inch by inch I moved, until the balance of my body was out of the car and I had no choice but to push the rest of the way. With a final “Oof,” I landed on firm ground with George’s arms around my entire body from behind.