Jodie, Reggie, and three uniform officers stomped through the snow, kicking it in fanning sprays as they were lifting their feet and putting palms on passing trees for balance. They filed into a small clearing around Graham’s house. Smoke chuffed from a chimney from the top of the small home built of logs and stone. The residence reminded Jodie of a rustic frontier home nestled in the woods in a dramatic Western film. Two other structures were separate from the home but were of such a similar style you could discern the same hand had built them. The snow-covered roof was marred by fallen branches from barren trees. Other than the isolation of the home, it had a happy family gathering vibe rather than a backwoods Deliverance feel to it.
As they approached, the door opened and Bryce stepped out with a steaming cup in his hand. Behind him stood a shadow. As she walked closer, Jodie could smell the coffee.
She smiled at Bryce and said, “Making yourself at home Bryce?” There was a light tone to it but Bryce, looking at the coffee in his hand, knew it had been meant as a reprimand. He hadn’t wanted the coffee, but he’d been damned cold outside and the pot had been freshly made and he thought it couldn’t hurt, right? Jodie made him think he had been wrong.
“He offered me a coffee while we waited for you. I was cold and uh, I didn’t want to be rude.”
“Of course.” She extended her hand to the man behind Bryce, “Mr. Richards?”
He nodded and stepped back to let them in.
Jodie stopped at the door and said, “Before we come into your home,” she looked at Bryce when she said ‘we’, “I have to make you aware of a few things okay?”
Standing behind Bryce she could see an outline of Graham. To Jodie, it seemed he moved where the shadows would be and because of that, all she saw was the nod.
“Before we come into your home, I need to let you know that you don’t have to let us in. This is purely voluntary on your part and that you are inviting us in without any coercion from the police. Is that correct?”
He nodded and Jodie shaking her head said, “No, I need to hear you say it. Are you inviting us in?”
“Yes.” The word sounded weird as though half of his mouth had cotton in it.
“Have the police in any way intimidated you so that you feel you have to let us in?”
“No.”
“You understand that if we find anything criminal in there after we were lawfully invited in, you could be held accountable?”
“Yes.”
“You also have the right to revoke your consent at any time. Do you understand that?”
“Yes.”
“Are you still inviting us in?”
“Yes.”
“Do you mind if I have some K-9 dogs with their handlers out here? To look, actually, smell around the property?”
“No.”
“Well, okay then. Thank you.”
Bryce and Graham stepped out of the way and Jodie and the other officers walked in behind her. Jodie noticed behind the door a plastic bag from Giant Tiger. In it were the items Graham had bought the previous day. Minus the padlock and chain.
. . . . .
In the kitchen, Jodie removed a digital audio recorder from her backpack and placed it on the kitchen table. Graham sat across from her and waited. Bryce stood behind Jodie, leaning against the glass door with his coffee. Jodie removed her notebook and saw Graham’s face out of the shadows for the first time. Graham’s jaw bulged on the right side giving it a swollen look but at the same time, the thinness of his face made it appear sunken. A pink scar bisected his face disappearing into the beard lining his jaw. Parts of his cheeks and nose were as melted wax. And the missing eye, that was a showstopper. The eyelid, covering nothing, appeared nothing more than a fleshy depression in his skull. The other eye, clear and so dark it was almost black, measured her, making her feel almost naked under the knowing glare. Graham saw her and for the first time Jodie felt like how a criminal must feel when she was interviewing them, as though all her secrets were not secrets at all; merely a poorly constructed facade. She swallowed, looked away and turned back, taking in the broad shoulders and the callused hands resting on the table between them. She paused and forcing a smile, opened her notebook and removed a pen.
“Do you mind if I audio record all that stuff I said outside? Since we’re in your house now?”
“No.”
Jodie turned on the audio recorder and restated what she had said outside and also made Graham aware of his rights. Graham had agreed to let the other officers search his home, his two outbuildings and anywhere they wanted.
Jodie said, “Behind the front door I saw a bag from Giant Tiger. You were there yesterday, right?”
Graham nodded.
“I didn’t see the padlock or chain in the bag. I was told you bought those items, is that right?”
Graham said, “Yes.”
“I might have missed the items because I didn’t search through the bag. Are they in there? The chain and lock?”
“No.”
“What did you do with them?”
Graham stood and Bryce dropped one hand to his waist, where his gun sat. Jodie frowned at Bryce and he stuffed his hand in his pocket as though that was what he had meant to do all along and took another sip of coffee. Graham kept his eye on Jodie. He must have noticed Bryce’s reaction but looking at him, Jodie couldn’t tell if he did.
Graham said, “Follow me.”
Jodie and Bryce trailed Graham down one hallway lined with bookshelves. Jodie noted books written by Joe Abercrombie, Walter Mosley, J.K Rowling and other authors, ones whose names she didn’t recognize. The hallway ended at stairs going into a basement. At the bottom was a door. The chain and padlock shone on the outside of the door, shiny and new.
Jodie said, “Do you mind opening…” but Graham had already removed a key from his pocket and slid it into the lock.
Jodie shared a look with Bryce, wanting him to chill and to reassure herself he didn’t have his gun out and naked in his hand like some overzealous rookie. Bryce’s hand was resting on the butt of his gun. She didn’t like that, but at least it wasn’t out and pointed at anyone.
Graham pulled the chain out of the brackets and held it in his hand. The stairway was narrow and after he pushed open the door, he stood back to let the officers go before him.
Jodie stepped down the stairs, aware how close Graham was to her. She turned sideways and entered the earthy-smelling room.
A bright light hung from the low ceiling. She pulled her head into her shoulders and took her flashlight out of her pocket. She shone it around the room and realized she stood in the center of a shrine. Framed photographs crowded the walls. The smiling face of a woman and a young boy stared out at Jodie and she suddenly felt dirty for forcing her way into this room and into this man’s most private pain. On a table before her was a kid-sized baseball glove. A hardball, the surface scuffed and ragged still showed an autograph decorating one side. In one picture, she saw the woman and Graham standing beside each other. He wore a suit and she glowed happily in her wedding dress. The Graham before her seemed such a different man to the one in the picture. The man in the picture had both his eyes and his flesh was smooth and unmarred. His expression and bearing portrayed that of a confident man, happy about his place in the world.
Jodie left the room and closed it behind her. To Graham, she said, “You can lock it up.”
Back at the table, Jodie said, “I’m sorry for all this but you know why we have to do it right?”
In a deliberate way Jodie was getting used to, Graham said, “Yes. I’m your Boo Radley.”
Bryce said, “What’s that mean? Did he say, Boo Radley?”
Jodie said, “He’s saying we got the wrong guy.”
Bryce chuckled and giving Graham a dark glare he said, “They all say that don’t they?”
Looking at Graham, a suggestion of a smile at the corners of her mouth, she said, “Yes, they do.”
. . . . .
Jodie and all of the other officers left Graham’s home. She walked at the back of the group and turned her face up to the darkening sky. Snow spiralled down. The staggered falling flakes made her think of seconds passing by. Francine was running out of time and they were no closer to finding her. She stopped and turned back to Graham’s home. She smelled woodsmoke on the air. In the window, she saw Graham watching them leave. He raised a hand, acknowledging her and she raised one back. They returned to their cars and drove to the RV without speaking. They walked towards the command vehicle appearing like a group defeated.
They entered the RV, passing news people shouting questions. They ignored them and closed the door shutting out the voices and the chaos. They had a media officer specifically trained to deal with the group outside. Right now, Jodie sensed no one had the energy to issue statements that didn’t state anything. Once inside, Jodie started a pot of coffee and the aroma filled the small interior. On the whiteboard was a picture of little Francine, the one Jodie had given to the media to circulate. Francine smiled at her from it.
Jodie said, “Well, back to square one. Reggie, we’re going to need an update…”
Bryce said, “Wait. We’re backing off the cabin in the woods guy? Just like that?”
“What would you suggest? We searched his house, his lot, hell, we even had the dogs go through. One of them was a cadaver dog. And nothing, nada, zilch. I think there is a better way to utilize our resources than snooping on a guy without any reason to snoop on or from a place from which to snoop. So yeah, back to the start. Review the data and create a plan accordingly.”
“I don’t like it.”
Jodie, crossing her arms said, “I know you don’t like him. You made that very clear. But like has nothing to do with anything. We follow evidence. And your dislike of him is not evidence.”
“He’s fucking weird! That’s evidence to me.”
“And that’s why you work surveillance and not cases. And by the way, I think if you got shot in the face and then woke up to find your family dead, you’d be fucking weird too. Anybody would be.”
Bryce stood and left without another word. The door slammed at his back.
“Ok, let’s see what the searchers have turned up. And do we have anyone watching any of the video we gathered?”
They worked into the darkening night and Jodie kept seeing that picture of Francine. A happy child, expecting to be safe in the night, expecting to be safe at home. Jodie feared they would never see her again. So the next morning, when Francine showed up on the doorstep of her home, ringing the doorbell, when Jodie learned of it, she was so surprised she went into the washroom of the RV and cried. Jodie hadn’t expected a happy ending. She’d seen so few of them.