As the Crow Dies Read online

  The Wedge

  By the time Segal returned to the ground floor of the Grove Arcade, his phone was buzzing. He looked at the screen and saw a picture of a T. rex outlined against a sky of pink and gray. “Miss Dinosaur Rudisill,” he mumbled.

  “Better get over here,” she said when he answered.

  He checked the time. He could probably make it before his appointment. “On my way,” he said, and hung up.

  He started toward the door when he noticed the security guard who helped him before. He approached close enough to lean in and speak in confidence. “Hey, do me a favor. Give me a call if you see anything strange going on with the Elahs, anyone snooping around or acting suspicious.” He handed the guy his card.

  By “over here,” Dinah meant the Wedge Building, one of the tallest of the old industrial buildings in what was now called the River Arts District. When Segal got there, she was waiting on the loading dock, trying to brush some dust off her white blouse and jeans without much success.

  “This place is a maze,” she said as she led him through the narrow halls, up a number of stairways, past art studios of every size and description. She had told Segal she was going there to check out a hunch.

  When they reached the top floor, his leg was hurting, and he was still in a weird mood from seeing the little girl in the wheelchair. But he was determined to give no sign of distress, even to Dinah. She took out a pair of gloves and handed them to him. She put another pair on herself before she gently knocked on an old wooden door. Inside, a crime-scene tech was busy dusting the doorknob for fingerprints. He pulled the door open for them and they squeezed by.

  “No luck, sergeant,” he said. “Some smudges from gloves, but no useful fingerprints.”

  “Let’s keep looking,” Dinah said.

  The room appeared to be a small studio not currently in use and not particularly clean. Segal saw a desk and a bookcase with some papers and a couple of magazines. A few sketches in sanguine and charcoal were tacked to the wall. They looked like quick studies, not finished work.

  Dinah stood behind him. “Do you smell it?” she asked.

  He took a deep breath through his nose. “There is something,” he said. “Very faint.”

  “Some kind of gunpowder or propellant,” she said, and immediately he knew she was right. “Like someone fired a gun in here.” She went on. “This was my hunch. There was something familiar about that scene this morning. It reminded me of sniper victims I saw overseas.”

  Segal knew Dinah had served in both Afghanistan and Iraq, but she rarely said anything about the experience except for specific references like this, and only when it was of immediate practical importance.

  “Over there, when we were moving into a new area, especially in a city, our snipers found high vantage points to cover the area ahead of our movements, scanning for anyone who might be a threat. At the scene this morning, I saw two places that would work like that: this building and the overpass. I figured the overpass would be too public. But in here, a guy could set up and wait.”

  Segal appraised the room with renewed interest. It was private, all right—not exactly homey, but private. He walked over to the window, which faced southwest—great view of the river, the street, the railroad tracks, and, farther on, 12 Bones and the place where the body was found that morning. “Be a hell of a shot from here,” he said.

  “Not for a military sniper,” she said. “Those guys are good. It starts with their eyesight, which has to be outstanding. Then the training is legendary. Those guys have to be some of the toughest just to survive it.”

  Segal gauged it again. It was a hell of a distance in his eyes, but he trusted Dinah knew what she was talking about.

  Dinah continued. “Look where the dust has been disturbed. Here, on the window sill. Here, on the floor in front of the window, where the guy would have knelt. Here, where the chair was moved closer to the window, then scraped backward.” As she spoke, she moved around the room pointing and acting out the movements she described.

  Segal saw what she meant, including the marks on the floor made by the legs of the wooden chair with a seat woven from cane.

  Dinah flipped open a small pocket-sized notebook. “I talked to some of the people who work here when I came in. A couple of them did see a guy in the hallway last night who they didn’t recognize, a guy with a backpack. But people are in and out of here all the time, and they didn’t think too much about it.”

  The theory made sense to Segal but didn’t exactly take them a giant leap forward without some hard evidence. He tried to imagine himself sitting there in the dim light of the evening. He sat on the chair as the man might have, the window a few feet in front of him. He saw the two marks on the sill where the supports for a sniper’s rifle might sit. He imagined seeing a person over by 12 Bones. He moved to a kneeling position, as he imagined the sniper might have done. It felt right. It made sense. Still kneeling, he let his gaze fall downward and across the floor. And there, under the bookcase, a glint of metal caught his eye. He leaned over and with a pen coaxed the object out. It was a bullet, but not like any he had seen before. It was long and tapered and had odd marks on the end. The large brass shell suggested a powerful charge. Dinah came over and let out a low whistle.

  “I was just thinking it would be good to find an empty shell casing,” Segal said.

  “If he fired from here, he would have been aware of the shell casing and would have picked it up to leave no evidence,” she said. “I think maybe that bullet fell out of his pocket or his pack and he didn’t realize it was gone. He didn’t realize he was leaving it behind.”

  Segal dropped the bullet into the plastic evidence bag Dinah held out, then while he was still kneeling, he decided to check out more of the room from that low perspective. Near the feet of the chair, he saw a piece of drawing paper. It was folded into the shape of some kind of bird. Segal picked it up. “What’s this?”

  “This was an artist’s studio,” Dinah said. She took the folded paper from Segal with great care. “Looks like an origami swan.” She returned it to him.

  “A swan,” Segal said.

  He delicately unfolded the paper. It appeared to have the same kind of abbreviated sketches as the other pages tacked to the wall, and it was clearly the same type of paper. He imagined the guy sitting there in the chair, waiting, passing the time, maybe picking up a scrap of paper and folding it to keep his hands busy. Segal understood that impulse. He refolded the paper and studied the shape again.

  “Cormorant,” the evidence tech said. He came up behind Segal and looked over his shoulder.

  “What?” Segal asked.

  “I used to be into origami. That’s a cormorant, not a swan. A swan has a longer neck and it doesn’t hold its wings out like that.”

  “Good to know,” Segal said, struggling to stand. He knew these guys were all about detail, but sometimes it became tedious. “So, we’re looking at a sniper’s nest, you think.” He managed to get vertical, wiping his hands on his pants as he turned to Dinah.

  “The bullet looks like the ones I saw snipers use overseas,” she said. “I mean, the size and shape and the way the point is made so the bullet will fragment when it hits its target. And I’m saying this is the kind of place they are trained to seek out.”

  “So, we’re going from accidental death to murder to military-style assassination all in three easy leaps,” Segal said. “We’re moving right along.”

  “Yeah, and not in a good direction,” Dinah said.

  Segal noticed her downcast eyes. It was an unusually pessimistic comment for her to make.

  “These snipers are some of the most dangerous people in the world, Segal. If we’re right about this we’re going to have to hunt one down and capture him and I don’t think he’s going to like it.”

  Segal stood with his hands on his hips. All the while, he was hearing Emily Elah’s voice in his head, asking, What part of the government are you from?

  CHAPTER 7
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br />   Dr. Gold

  Segal trudged up the stairs of the building where Dr. Gold kept her office. The building was an Art Deco classic with lots of white and black tile inside and frosted windows on the office doors. When he got to the top of the stairs, he realized his thoughts were totally on the case, trying to put the pieces together. The effort of the climb had not entered his mind. He did feel some discomfort in his bad leg, but that was something apart from his core now, not part of his definition of himself.

  He also realized he was not thinking much about his appointment. Dr. Gold was a psychologist who specialized in PTSD. From time to time, Segal would tell her he didn’t think he had PTSD, and she would say, “Good.”

  Her door was closed, indicating that she was with another patient or was otherwise occupied and not ready to see him yet. A chair was by the door, but he chose not to collapse into it as he had on earlier visits. An oil painting hung on the wall. He had seen it before but never really examined it closely. Now, he found it inviting. The warmth and the unusual contrasts of the colors reminded him of Vincent Van Gogh. And the subject resonated with Van Gogh as well.

  It was a field of wheat in midsummer, golden yellow against the green of the grass and the cedar trees. In the foreground, a peasant girl lounged on the grass beneath a tree. She reclined, slightly, and her dress was pulled up, exposing one of her legs from the knee to the bare foot. She watched several figures in the background harvesting the wheat with scythes. All pretty standard fare, but something pulled him closer. Something triggered the idea that there was more here to learn.

  He leaned in. The first thing he noticed was that the peasant girl was no peasant, she was Jackie Kennedy, and what he had taken for a scarf tied around her head was really a pillbox hat. Then he noticed the figures swinging the scythes in the wheat field; metallic robots right off the cover of a 1950’s science fiction magazine.

  “It’s by an artist down in Hendersonville named Colebrook,” said a voice beside him.

  He’d been too focused to notice Dr. Gold had opened the door. “Why do you think he painted it?” Segal said. “And for whom?”

  She gave him a generous smile. “I’ve been wondering how long it would take you to notice that painting.” She held the office door open, and he stepped inside. “You seem different today.”

  The comment surprised him. She usually concentrated on questions rather than observations, especially at the beginning of their sessions.

  “We got a case this morning. The death of a man,” he said.

  Dr. Gold said nothing. She sat down behind her desk, looking like a proper if elderly school girl with her salt and pepper hair turned up neatly on each side and her navy-blue sweater. She picked up a pen and poised it over a yellow pad of paper. Segal took this as a sign for him to continue, which he did.

  He left out the part about the suspected sniper, but he did talk about Francis Elah and what little he knew about the animals he trained. He paused. Dr. Gold clicked her pen and wrote. After a moment, he continued. “I met his wife and daughter. It seems like they really need him.”

  Dr. Gold lifted her pen. Her eyes were bright blue. “And you’re the primary investigator on this case?”

  Segal understood the concern behind the question. Dr. Gold had explained to him many times about triggers. In his case, the threat of violence or the perceived threat had the potential to shut him down.

  Segal gave a long exhalation and slouched in his seat. “I don’t know. They didn’t know it was a murder when they assigned it to me. I’m not on record as the principal yet. It’s a decision I have to make, and I have to make it pretty soon.”

  “And you want to know what I think.” Dr. Gold smiled. Her lower lip went crooked in a goofy kind of girl way. “You asked me two questions about that painting in the hall. You asked for whom it was painted. The short answer is the artist painted it for me. He’s an old friend from long ago. Another way to answer that question is that he painted it for you, or at least people in situations like yours.”

  Segal mind went a hundred directions.

  “That painting has been hanging there all the time you’ve been coming to see me, and this is the first time you really looked at it. Until now, you’ve been too tied up with your more immediate problems to notice.” Segal started to say something defensive.

  Dr. Gold held her hand up. “I’m not being critical. It’s a perfectly natural response. But something made today different. Something called you forth.”

  Segal sank in his chair and thought.

  Dr. Gold continued. “The other thing you asked me was why he painted it.” She paused and smiled. “He never told me. In fact, he never says anything anymore. In the days when he was talking, he did answer it in a more general way. He told me that in ways we don’t understand, we don’t pick our paintings, our paintings pick us.”

  Scratching. More scratching. Segal followed her pen. He worked on what Dr. Gold had said to him about the paintings.

  She clicked the pen a few times. “I would say sometimes things reach out and take us by the hand to get our attention. If you feel something reaching out it could be a sign that you’re ready.”

  Segal thought of the little girl’s hand wrapped around his fingers, a detail he had not included in his account to the good doctor. This was not the first time he looked at Dr. Gold and wondered if she was not at least a little psychic.

  He stood. “Thanks, doctor. I need to get to the station.”

  She sighed and nodded, even though he was cutting the session short. He stole one more look at the painting before he shuffled down the stairs. He pulled out his cell phone. “Dispatch,” he said, and when the no-nonsense woman answered, he said, “You can go ahead and fill out that paperwork.”

  CHAPTER 8

  Boss’s Office

  Segal picked up on a vibe right away when he got to the police station. Everybody had heard about the case. Something like this, the news traveled fast. Everybody gave him a look while trying not to give him a look. He knew they were all wondering what he was going to do with this.

  He passed the desks of Philips and Meyers, the other detectives Dinah had mentioned, the ones who would catch the case if he decided not to take it. They were solid guys, but like most in their position, they relied on people talking to solve cases. So far, in this case, no one was talking, including Richard the crow. In the old days, this was exactly the kind of case that would be handed to Segal when guys like Philips and Meyers hit a brick wall. Segal figured out how to get over, under, around, or through the brick wall. At least he had. Now, Philips and Meyers nodded to him as he walked by. He knew they were waiting for some clue about what he was going to do. Segal nodded to them and walked on to the boss’s office.

  If there had been a black typewriter on the desk instead of a computer keyboard and monitor, Segal could have convinced himself he was in the 1940s. His boss was even wearing suspenders and a tie that was substantially wider than recommended by current fashion. Generally, when Segal or anyone else came into the office, it took at least a few beats for the boss to disengage himself from the papers on his desk and acknowledge the visitor. But not today. Today, his boss crossed his arms in his chair, appearing to study Segal from head to foot as soon as he tapped on the doorframe and entered. Segal stopped in front of his desk and met his eye. His boss was one of the few people with whom he could exchange a great deal of information in such a nonverbal way. When, by mutual consent, the stare-down was finished, Segal dropped heavily into a chair and exhaled. His hand went to the paperback in his coat pocket, and he thumbed the tops of the pages.

  His boss nodded and asked, “From what book of wisdom are we drawing our inspiration today?”

  Segal tossed him the worn paperback.

  “City Primeval, by Elmore Leonard,” he read on the cover. “I suppose that could be Asheville.”

  “Feels pretty primeval today,” Segal agreed.

  “I got the paperwork on this drowning victim tur
ned murder victim you pulled this morning,” his boss said. “Lists you as the primary investigator.”

  Segal understood everything behind this short sentence. He understood that he got the assignment because it was thought to be a simple one. He understood that he was supposed to be in a period of transition—a transition between convalescence and a resumption of his normal life, if he had ever known such a thing as a normal life. He understood that his boss was concerned that the case was quickly blowing up into something much larger than a routine accidental death. He understood that his boss was asking him if he was okay. He understood that this was a genuine personal concern, combined with a concern for the department and for a timely and accurate resolution of a serious crime.

  Segal’s response to this complex and multilayered statement was a nod.

  “You’re okay with this?” his boss said. It was a question without much of an inflection at the end.

  “I’m okay with it,” Segal said, not fully meeting his eye. “I mean, I don’t think I’ll need to run any marathons or climb a mountain to solve it.”

  “You will let me know if you need any help,” his boss said, emphasis on the “will.”

  Segal knew perfectly well his boss was concerned with more than his physical fitness. The visits to Dr. Gold were part of the deal allowing him to return, a part his boss insisted on. “Dinah Rudisill is helping me. Dinah is good.”

  “Dinah Rudisill is better than good,” his boss said. He unbuttoned one of his sleeves and began rolling it up.

  Segal cleared his throat. “Yeah, she’s a lot better than good.”

  “Well, it looks like you’re getting some additional help, whether you need it or not.” His boss slid a paper across the desk.

  Segal glanced at the note, which declared without wasted words that someone named Jerome Guilford would be there later that day to discuss the search for Francis Elah. More interesting was the origin of the message.

  “Office of Naval Intelligence?” Segal said.

  From across the desk, a shrug.