The Facepainter Murders Page 15

  "Will we be flying over mountains today?"

  "The Taconics are south of our route, the Green Mountains ahead. To the north are the Cold Hollow Mountains. When we get closer to New Hampshire, if the weather holds, we'll be able to see Mount Washington, in the White Mountains. It's the highest mountain in New England and home to some of the worst flying weather, so I'm going to stay to the south and take a little longer than usual."

  Below them, the fertile farmland of the Champlain River Valley rose to the rolling foothills of the Green Mountains and then the mist-covered peaks of the mountains themselves.

  "I'm sorry about what happened at the hospital."

  "So am I. You were concerned about my injury, and I responded as if you tried to take over my life."

  She turned to him and touched his arm.

  "I have issues with control. It was a problem in my marriage and my relationship with the children. I want you to know I've had therapy and I haven't erupted like that for many years."

  "I'm not used to that in a man in my personal life. Michael would have found it strange if I couldn't handle whatever came my way."

  "So would I. It won't happen again."

  "I won't let you bully me, Thomas, and I won't be around if it is a problem. Deal?"

  "Deal."

  "What's that river."

  She pointed to a winding silver line.

  "Connecticut. We're over New Hampshire now. If you look north, you can see Mount Washington."

  "You said it had bad weather. It looks lovely."

  "The weather at the summit includes gale to hurricane force winds, rain, snow—even in September—sudden changes in visibility. A little plane like this couldn't withstand what goes on up there."

  "Your flight plan takes us to the south?"

  "Yes, over the lower elevations of the mountains. We're almost there. Laconia is up ahead."

  To the north and east, lay a broad expanse of water—Lake Winnipesaukee, Thomas said—and a small town near its shores. Other lakes and streams dotted the area, giving it the tourist name of the Lakes.

  After they landed, Thomas picked up the car he'd arranged.

  "Where to now?" he asked.

  "The Gale Memorial building. It houses the library. I called ahead and arranged to look at their newspaper archive for the period I that interests me."

  "It's on Main St. I found it described as a "fine example of the Romanesque Revival Style, using Deer Island granite, New Brunswick granite, oak paneling and stained glass windows." Red brick with rock facings and heavy arches. It also has a romantic tower. The man who built it must have had an interesting father. He gave him the name 'Napoleon Bonaparte Gale'. The building was constructed in 1903 and reminds me of the Post Office in Arnprior, Ontario, built about the same time, also with New Brunswick granite."

  They covered the three miles to the city center, crossing a bridge and admiring the old mill and town hall reflected in the Merrimack River. Thomas drove off to explore the town and area while she climbed the steps to the main floor of the library. Directed to the archives, she was delighted to find the newspapers she ordered waiting for her, spread out on an oak table under tall, stained-glass windows. Almost like being in a church she thought.

  Her first objective was to find the Blakelys, Alice and William. She thought a birth notice would be the most likely, starting a few months after the wedding date. The ill-fitting white gloves the library provided made her fumble-fingered and awkward as she turned the pages of the Laconia Democrat to scan the birth announcements in each issue. She found baby Arlene in 1910. Now for death or marriage.

  By lunch-time, Anne had found the wedding of Arlene and David Windeman, in 1929. The notice said the bride and groom would reside with the bride's family. The librarian had a copy of the census of 1930, and Anne found them with infant daughter Marilyn.

  After Thomas returned for her and took her to lunch at a delightful restaurant overlooking Lake Winnipesaukee, she searched for a wedding for Marilyn. She found her in 1949, married to Kurt Andrews, a soldier stationed nearby. Korea, Anne thought and searched forward through the war years. Sometimes a local paper would do a homecoming story.

  Not this time. Kurt died in Korea in 1952. The story mentioned Marilyn but no children. She wondered what had become of her. The library had a collection of old phone books, but after the 1952 entry, there were no further Andrews listed.

  Anne took the information, called Thomas and met him for a brief tour of the area before they flew back to Culver's Mills.

  "Do you want to say over?" he asked.

  They stopped to admire the classic white facade of the 1875 Inn at Tilton, the centerpiece of a small village near Laconia.

  "No, I'm still tired by the end of the day and today has been full. Wouldn't it be lovely to come back here, though?"

  "We'll put it on the list," he said as he turned the car around and headed for the airport.

  "Is it more difficult to fly in the evening? That's when the Kennedy boy got into trouble, wasn't it?"

  "Yes, it is, but I have instruments and many flying hours. Don't worry."

  Chapter Thirty

  Moments later they were flying, again south of the mountains, and west into a glorious red-gold and violet sunset. Anne had drifted off to sleep when a heart-stopping drop jolted her awake, and she clutched at Thomas.

  "Sorry, dear heart, but we've run into a bit of unannounced weather."

  Flashes of lightning illuminated mountains of black clouds and brief glimpses of fields and forests, swinging in and out of sight as the plane fought against the winds. Thomas shouted to her above the noise of the engine and the wind.

  "I'll put down if I can. Watch on your side for anything that looks like a landing strip. We should be near an abandoned airfield at St. Johnsbury."

  "Near a town?"

  "Yes."

  "No lights. Are we more or less on course?"

  "I'm not sure. What with the wind and the lightning, we may be a little off. No mountains?"

  "Not over here." Anne peered at the ground as the lightning flared.

  "There's a long field to the right."

  "Which way does it run?"

  "From my right to your left."

  The plane swung in a dizzying arc, and he shouted, "I see it. I'll put down if I can."

  The radio crackled with static as he tried to Mayday. No response.

  "Hang on."

  The plane careered wildly in the crosswinds, then hit the ground, wing down on the left, but upright.

  "Thomas?" Anne whispered, reaching for him in the darkness.

  "I'm okay except for my head. You?"

  "Okay."

  "We have to get out. Smell the gas?"

  He tugged at Anne's seat belt and released her.

  "No."

  Anne grabbed her backpack and followed him out and over the wing. Thomas lifted her off the wing and away from the plane.

  "Run."

  Then, she smelled it too and heard the faint crackle of flames somewhere behind them. The field around them was rutted from the recent rains. If it had been an airfield, it had been a long time ago. They stumbled, and Anne fell heavily to her knees. Thomas reached for her and pulled her to his feet.

  "Come on."

  The flames behind were high enough now to light the scene ahead with a faint orange. An explosion of sound and then the winds from the blast knocked them to the ground. Thomas covered Anne as debris fell around them.

  When the thuds and sizzle of burning debris had stopped, they sat up, still clutching each other and stared back at the burning mass of metal.

  "Luck, pure dumb luck," said Thomas, holding Anne tighter.

  "Give yourself some credit. We could still be in there. Did you send a Mayday before we went down?"

  "I don't think so. The storm was interfering with the transmission. Also, I'm not sure where we are."

  "St. Johnsbury, I think you said."

  "There should have been light
s from the town. I'm not sure how far off-course the wind took us."

  "Do you know which way is west?"

  "No. What do you have that we can use? I haven't anything except a small knife and my wallet."

  Anne inventoried her backpack: one cell-phone (out of range), one computer (no wireless ditto) a small flashlight, two granola bars and a bottle of water (half empty) and a Swiss army knife.

  "This thing has a compass, I think."

  She handed the knife to him.

  "Yes. Northwest is that way."

  He pointed to a path along the edge of the pasture. The faint glow from the burning plane faded out as the flames died under the onslaught of heavy rain. Lightning lit the fields, and then thunder roared and echoed around them.

  "Thomas, we have to stay right here until this storm is over. We're far enough from the trees, and if we stay down, we won't be a target for the lightning."

  Anne wiggled out of her soaking trench coat and spread it over them as they huddled together. What seemed like hours later, the rain abated, and the lightning moved off to the east.

  "Let's move," Thomas said. "I think it's over."

  "Yes. I'm freezing,"

  Anne's teeth chattered as she took Thomas's hand and levered herself out of the mud.

  The wind pushed the clouds away, and light from the emerging moon began to reveal the path ahead. Cows or something had made a trail along the side of the pasture. Anne hoped they were following it to the farmhouse, not away. When she said so, Thomas told her not to be too hopeful that the path had been made by barn-seeking cows.

  "There are walking trails all over Vermont, and we could be on this one for miles before we came to a farmhouse."

  "I'm hoping for cows."

  All this for a little information on people long dead, Anne thought. Every time she got involved in these things she ended up in trouble. At least this time she hadn't gotten a concussion.

  "How does your head feel?" she asked.

  "Sore."

  Anne aimed her light at him. Blood had oozed from a cut over his left eyebrow, mixed with mud from the field and caked on his face. He looked pale in the glare from the flashlight.

  "If we find any water, I should wash some of that mud off you."

  "Any left in the bottle? I'm getting thirsty."

  The path they were following widened, and the walking became a little easier. When they paused again for a rest, Thomas said, "Listen, do you hear something?"

  The wind had died, but no morning sounds of birds or animals filled the silence. What was he listening for? And then she heard it, the bubbling, rushing sound of water falling happily over stones.

  "In here, I think."

  He pushed aside some bushes, and Anne followed with the weak light from her failing flashlight. The path lay at the base of a long hill. Partway up, water dribbled down a rock face, gathered in a depression, and, over-full, splashed in a miniature waterfall before it gathered itself to form a stream. Thomas scrambled up to the little basin, cupped his hands and drank.

  "Throw me the bottle," he called, turning to find Anne at his elbow.

  "Let me get a little of that blood and muck off you."

  She wiped his face and head with the tail of her shirt. "Not that there's much less mud on this shirt."

  "I'm so sorry."

  He held her tightly against him.

  "Not your fault. I was thinking a while ago that every time I do some research in one of these cases I end up in an accident of some sort. It's my bad luck, not yours."

  "I should have checked the weather again before we took off."

  "You listened to it on the way to the airport. No reason to check it again. We're both alive, and except for your head and the blisters on my feet, we're okay. Let's go and see if we can find some civilization. I'd no idea that it was possible to be so far from anyone in Vermont. It looks so full of towns and villages when you fly over it at night."

  Anne stopped babbling when Thomas kissed her.

  "Now, let's go," he said and took her hand.

  The sky to the east brightened to lavender, promising dawn. Their trail had taken them into and out of the woods, and across other fields, with no sign of a light to suggest another human being. They came to a stop sign indicating the end of the path at a paved road.

  "I think we've been following a snowmobile trail."

  "Which way."

  "West."

  "There is no west. It runs north and south."

  "Then we'll go north. Burlington has to be north of our last position."

  "North it is," said Anne as she shrugged into her pack.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  "Whoever this guy is, he doesn't care who he shoots at," Pete said to Adam as they went over the events at the hotel. "He followed me, and he shot at Dylan with me standing right there. Some bodyguard I am."

  "Don't be so hard on yourself. What if he wasn't following you and found Dylan on his own? Did you find out if anyone had been asking about him at his grandma's or the hotel?"

  "I asked at the hotel, but not his grandmother. She didn't volunteer it. I'll go out and see her, tell her Dylan is safe and not to talk to anyone."

  "Okay. Brad, what do you have on today?"

  "Court. I've got a pair of fourteen-year-olds who stole the bingo cards, the teenage mother up on welfare fraud—that's a sad case—two traffic accidents over in the other court, and a DUI."

  "Why did you lay a charge in the bingo card thing? Seems minor."

  "Yeah, I warned both of them before. One of them needs to go to residential, and the mom put it off for years. I figure it's his last chance. The other one is headed for the life. He's mentally slow, and his dad's a drug dealer."

  "You'll be all day if you can get from court to court. I'm still working on Matilde and the connection between the break-in at Evan's and the theft of the pictures."

  The briefing over, Adam looked through reports from the National Crime Information Center on the individuals in the case. He had sent for anything they had on Andre, Mary, Matilde and Janice. Nothing on Andre as an adult. Mary and the other two women weren't in the NCIC system.

  Matilde and Janice weren't in any system, except for driver's license. Janice got a replacement when she moved to Vermont three years ago.

  Routine filled most of the day, and it was about eight o'clock when Adam took a call from Catherine.

  "Adam, I'm so glad I caught you. Have you seen Anne after her trip to New Hampshire?"

  "No, did you expect her back by now?"

  "Yes, she thought they would be back in time for dinner but there's been quite a storm to the east, and I'm a little worried."

  "Perhaps they decided to stay over and haven't called you yet."

  "That's not like Anne."

  "Maybe they're having dinner. Call me back if you don't hear from her by nine."

  Adam gave her his cell number to call. As he said good-night to the desk clerk who was coming on for the evening shift, the phone rang again on his line.

  "Do you want to take this, Lieutenant? Mrs. Beauchamp."

  "Yes."

  "Lieutenant, I'm worried about Anne and my son. They're overdue on their trip back from New Hampshire."

  Again, Adam tried to calm the fear, mentioning dinner, the romantic little town, etc.

  "No. Thomas left New Hampshire. I phoned the airport. He filed a flight plan and left several hours ago now. I expected him home at seven-thirty. He must be in New York on business tomorrow afternoon, and he hasn't cancelled the appointment."

  "I'm on it, Mrs. Beauchamp, and I'll call you back when I learn something."

  "Where will you start?"

  "At the airport."

  When he got off the phone, Adam told the desk clerk to call Brad and Pete back to the office. They both had long days. The defense called a medical witness in the bingo card case, and the doctor went on and on, reviewing what seemed to be every year in the life of the two boys. Brad hadn't made it to any ot
her case.

  Pete reported that the grandmother told a telephone caller where her grandson was.

  The caller was a man, she said. He didn't give a name but said he was a friend of Dylan's.

  "What's up, boss?" Brad said when he came through the door, steps ahead of Pete.

  "Anne and Thomas are missing. They left New Hampshire, but never arrived here. I called search and rescue, and I'm going out to the airport to work with them. Brad, you work the computer, looking for places they could put down between here and New Hampshire. Pete, call all the airfields, large and small between here and there."

  The two men started their jobs in grim silence. Adam watched them for a moment then left, calling Catherine on his cell as he went.

  "I'm coming to the airport," she said.

  "I'll call you."

  "No, I'm coming."

  In Vermont, all missing persons were reported to State Police whose search and rescue units work with other agencies such as the Upper Valley Wilderness Response Team.

  Adam called the State Police, who were setting up their mobile command post at the airport, preparing to move once they had a general idea of where the missing persons were. Some of their people were doing the same jobs he gave to Brad and Pete, but Brad was gifted on the computer and Pete tenacious as a pit bull at getting the information he needed.

  Adam found Lieutenant Jacqueline Dupuis, team leader, in charge. He'd worked with her before.

  "Anything you've learned that could help us narrow this search?" she said, shaking his hand.

  "No. The man's mother said he filed a flight plan and left the airport in Belknap County. I think you already have that?"

  "Yes. Could you help us with the press and the families?"

  "Sure. Anne has a sister in Bermuda. Her husband is dead, and she has no children. There may be some other relatives. Her friend will be out here soon, and I think she'll know if we should call anyone. Thomas's family knows. How does it look?"

  "If they went down uncontrolled in the storm, they didn't survive," she said.

  "He's a good pilot."