White Ghost Ridge Read online

  “Then I guess it will be your prints on the knife stuck in Alec Holton’s neck?”

  Carter nodded again.

  “Did you do it, Lee? Did you kill Holton?”

  Carter shook his head, loosening the tears that had grown even bigger in his bright-blue, innocent-looking eyes.

  “Of course not.”

  “Well, then you better tell me what happened.”

  Chapter 2

  Locklear flicked to a blank page in his notebook and picked up his pen. He looked at his watch and jotted down the time.

  Carter cleared his throat and moved forward on his seat, slanting his body awkwardly towards the tape recorder.

  “Relax,” Locklear said, raising his hands in a calming manner towards Carter who was now visibly shaking.

  “Shouldn’t I wait for my lawyer?”

  Locklear stared hard at the ex-trooper.

  “You can, if you want to waste my time. As soon as Benson realises I know you, he’ll take me off the case and he’ll probably decide this interview isn’t worth a damn. So, the sooner you tell me what happened the sooner I figure out who’s framing you for this murder and why.”

  Carter nodded.

  Locklear switched the tape on and checked his watch again.

  “Interview with suspect Lee Carter – murder of Professor Alec Holton. June 10th, 2018. Time 12.46am.”

  Carter cleared his throat. “I worked with Alec,” he said. “At least I did until about a month ago. He was researching Native American artefacts in South Dakota.”

  Locklear looked up from his notebook. He felt his heart skip a beat but he didn’t know why.

  “We had a falling-out. Alec had –” Carter stopped abruptly, as though he just realised that what he had said might amount to motive.

  “About?”

  “Alec got funding from the university to bring an anthropologist onto his project. My own research project was coming to an end, so I applied and got the job. We got on well, at first anyway.”

  “What happened?”

  “What’s going to happen to me?” Carter asked.

  Locklear, unsure if his ex-colleague was stalling for time or was only beginning to realise how much trouble he was in, put down his pen and stopped the tape.

  “It depends, Lee.”

  “On?”

  “First and foremost, on whether you are guilty or not.”

  “I already told you I didn’t do it!”

  “And, secondly, on how much time you are going to continue wasting here. Wasted time is putting distance between me and the person who did this. Right now, the station’s money is on you being the killer.”

  “I want to call Virginia. She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know about any of this.” Carter was referring to his wife.

  “You can do that later, after you tell me what happened.”

  Carter looked deflated and lowered his head towards the table, assuming much the same position as when Locklear had first entered the interrogation room.

  “You can also pray later!” Locklear barked.

  Carter shot a hard look at his ex-boss.

  “Lee – I’m trying to help you. Now, talk. From the beginning.”

  “OK.”

  Locklear pressed record, re-announced the interview, and Lee once more cleared his throat.

  “I was working with Alec Holton until about a month ago. He was researching Native American artefacts in South Dakota. He got funding from the university to study artefacts that had been uncovered during a routine building project out west. He also had access to artefacts on loan from USD –”

  “USD?”

  “University of South Dakota. He had teamed up with a research project there.”

  “Go on.”

  “He’d been working on a number of similar projects since then. I’d been involved in one or two of them in a small way. For this one, he needed me to build up a picture around the artefacts, about the people who used them, how they lived, etc. We did a further dig about four miles from the site with the USD team. It was interesting work … while it lasted.”

  “Why did it end?”

  “There was a falling-out between the research teams on the dig.”

  “Because?”

  “Some of the artefacts were unaccounted for.”

  Locklear tapped his notebook with the end of his pen. “Stolen?”

  Carter shrugged. “I don’t really know what happened. I was on leave for a week but that Saturday Virginia went to Harrisonburg with the kids to visit her folks …”

  The mention of the small Virginian town where he had first met Carter brought Locklear back to his strange and complex investigation in the Mennonite community there. He wondered briefly how they were doing and hoped they had put their unfortunate past behind them.

  “I was at a loose end so I decided to go to the lab and catch up on some work. When I got there nothing seemed out of place but when I went to the safe to retrieve some of the artefacts I noticed that some were missing.”

  “Who else had access to the lab?”

  “Just me and Alec. He had one or two grad students doing some PhD research for him, but they didn’t have access to the lab unless either Alec or I were there.”

  “What did you do then?”

  “Well, Alec was on vacation so I did what I thought I should do and rang the Dean but he didn’t seem worried at all. It was odd. He kept saying Alec must have misplaced them – but I knew something was wrong. When I got back to the lab I did what I thought Alec would have wanted me to do and called the police. But when he got back, Alec was really angry with me. I had never heard him yell like that before. After that, he didn’t speak to me for days. As far as I know, the police are still investigating the matter.”

  “What specifically did he say to you?”

  “He wanted to know why I had been there and what the hell I thought I was doing going to the cops. That I shouldn’t have gone in, what the hell had I gone in for, something like that.”

  “Why do you suppose he reacted that way?”

  Carter shrugged. “I really don’t know. You’d have thought he’d have been as anxious as I was about the artefacts. Especially with what happened on the dig.”

  Locklear raised his eyebrows. He knew Carter was going to tell him something that was pertinent to the case, something he should have told him as soon as he had sat down. He silently thanked a God he didn’t believe in that Carter had given up police work. Carter lacked the street smarts that Mendoza had in spades.

  “What happened?”

  “Alec usually had four on a dig team but at the last minute he told me that it was just me and him.”

  “So, that was unusual?”

  “Well, yes. There was a lot of physical work to be done. A lot of hours to put in. Alec wasn’t exactly the digging kind. He usually sat under an umbrella out of the sun while his team did the physical work. He hated the heat. I wondered how he’d think I could do all that work myself, but he assured me that colleagues from USD would be helping. He also changed the plans at the last minute and arranged for us to go a day early.”

  “Did he say why?”

  “No. He could be precious at times. He was a bit miffed one time about our names appearing side by side on a research paper. He felt he should have been named as lead researcher. He sulked about it for weeks. But overall, he is – was, a good guy.”

  “So, when you got there?”

  Carter focused his eyes on the table. “It was about ten miles outside of a reservation called Pine Ridge.”

  Locklear moved his gaze from his notebook and looked at Carter. His first station as a young police officer was in Rapid City which he figured was about one hundred miles from the Native American reservation. He remembered driving through it once and recalled the miserable conditions the people were living in and how ill at ease he had been as he drove through its streets. Pine Ridge was then, and probably still was, one of the poorest places in North America.

&n
bsp; “It was almost dark by the time we arrived. Alec insisted on us setting up camp which didn’t make sense. We had no provisions. We didn’t even have water. It would have been better to book into a motel and start afresh in the morning.”

  “So, he was acting out of character even back then?”

  “Yes, he kept checking his phone but the signal was weak. He was really agitated.”

  “And you didn’t ask him what was wrong?”

  “I asked him if he was OK but he didn’t answer. He hardly said a word all evening. I knew his mother was ill in London. He’d had a call about a day or two before we left saying the old lady had pneumonia and had been moved from her care home to hospital. She’s very old. They were very close. I think he was an only child. I assumed he was waiting on news about her.”

  “So, what happened then?”

  “We settled down for the night. There was something wrong with Alec’s tent so he had to share mine. That seemed to make him even more agitated. I knew he was awake practically the whole night. I could hear him tossing and turning. The plan for the next day was that Alec would go to town to get provisions and I was going to start the dig while we waited on the rest of the team. The following morning the sun hadn’t fully risen when this guy arrives with breakfast.”

  “Who was he?”

  “Alec obviously knew him but he didn’t introduce me. He seemed shocked that he was there. Nervous. I ate the breakfast but Alec said he wasn’t hungry.”

  “Describe the man.”

  “He was white and I do mean white. His skin was so pale you could kinda see his veins. He was tall, around six four. Broad build. He had blond hair, slightly greying around the temples and really pale eyes. They were almost colourless.”

  “Age?”

  Carter frowned. He looked over Locklear’s features. “About your age.”

  “What happened then?”

  “The guy suggested he and Alec go for a walk. It was clear I wasn’t invited so I stayed but I could hear what they were saying until they got a good bit down the track. I heard him ask about me – and then Alec asking him what he was doing there at that time, that they had arranged to meet the previous night. They sort of argued but that was as much as I could hear.”

  “Do you think this man was a lover or an ex-lover?”

  Carter blushed. “Didn’t seem that way to me.”

  “What did Alec do then?”

  “I reckon he was gone for about an hour. Then he came back alone. He sat with his head in his hands and he looked so … so lost. I asked him was everything alright and he said there was nothing wrong. That evening the team from USD arrived. Three in all. A Professor Rosenberg and two grad students. We stayed two more nights. That’s when we found the artefacts.”

  “The ones that went missing?”

  Carter nodded.

  “And you never discussed the visitor with Alec after that?”

  “No. Alec was an unusual guy. He was friendly but, at the same time, he had that reserved British way about him. Even though I looked after his cat when he was away, he was distant. I can’t say I ever really got to know him.”

  “Was he seeing anyone recently?”

  Carter shrugged. “Not that I know of. He’d certainly never mention anything to me if he was.”

  “Who would he mention it to?”

  Carter thought for a moment. “There’s an old Polish lady in the apartment across from him who he was friendly with. Meara Henschel is her name. She had been a well-known pianist in her day and Alec loved music. They got along very well. If he confided in anyone, it would be her.”

  “Why didn’t he ask the old lady to feed his cat?”

  “Alec told me that she’s terrified of cats. She mightn’t have been able to manage anyway. She’s pretty housebound. Uses a wheelchair when she goes out .”

  “So he didn’t have many friends?”

  “No.”

  Locklear thought about the well-furnished apartment on the better side of town. Despite its lavishness, there had been a feeling of loneliness inside, a feeling he knew others would feel if they visited his own, less salubrious apartment.

  “Do professors get paid well?”

  Carter shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

  “How could he afford the expensive art in his apartment?”

  Carter seemed to need time to think about this. Then, as if he decided he had no answer, he shrugged.

  Locklear persevered. “You never thought about how well his apartment was furnished? About all the artwork?”

  Carter swallowed. He knew now where Locklear was going and the possibility that his colleague had been involved in something illegal unnerved him.

  “He mentioned one time that his father had been in banking, so I guess they were well off. He hinted once that his mother had been disappointed that he had not gone into the family business.”

  Locklear pondered this. “I guess he would have been due to inherit a lot of money on his mother’s death?”

  “I guess.” Carter shrugged.

  “Carter, do you think Alec took the artefacts and, if so, why?”

  Carter looked up. Locklear saw something in the man’s eyes. An emotion he couldn’t quite name. Carter didn’t answer.

  Locklear ran over the story he’d heard so far.

  “You said something happened on the dig. Did you mean apart from this guy arriving?”

  Carter swallowed. “Yes.”

  “And?” Locklear asked impatiently.

  “Alec didn’t know I saw this or at least I don’t think he did. I didn’t even tell the Dean or the police because it didn’t make sense. I thought there must be an explanation for it. I tried to put it out of my head. On the dig, I found pieces of what I thought was a Native American pipe bowl. Even though it was covered in dirt you could see this magnificent bright-orange paint on it. I stopped digging and called Alec, but he moved me immediately to work with one of the students about fifty yards away and started digging himself. He saw me glancing over at him while he dug. I was only interested in what the rest of it looked like, but he moved me even further down the dig site to work with Professor Rosenberg who I didn’t really like. The professor made out he was a regular friendly guy but there was something about him ... I don’t know. I just didn’t like him. Neither did Alec – I could tell. But the thing is, later that night I’m sure I saw a larger segment of the bowl in Alec’s travel bag.” He paused. “We also found a …” He looked down at his lap while he thought about his next words.

  “A what, Carter?” Locklear snapped as he rushed some more thoughts down on his notebook. The night was pushing on and he knew how precious these first few hours after a murder were. The trail was still warm but it wouldn’t be that way for long. Locklear’s cell phone lit up. He glanced at the screen. Mendoza, obviously finished at the crime scene and looking to see where he was. He rejected the call and tried to send his trooper a quick text as Carter continued.

  “A Native American fertility figure. That and the bowl, well, they’re priceless. They would have been a big find for the university. That is until they had to be returned to whatever tribe they belonged to.”

  Locklear looked up from his mobile screen. “Returned?”

  “Yes, it’s the law.”

  “Was that one of the items that went missing from the safe?”

  “No, that’s what I’m trying to tell you. I found the fertility figure. Alec and Professor Rosenberg were near me when I unearthed it and they were almost fighting over it. It was weird. I catalogued it but before we left the dig it was missing.”

  “You found it?”

  “Yes, well, myself and one of two grad students were digging in the same area.”

  “Which of the grad students?”

  “The white one. I just knew his first name – Tommy. He was a rude kind of kid.”

  Locklear raised his eyebrows. “The white one? The other was black?”

  “No – he was Native. They were a
n odd pair. They didn’t hardly speak to each other or to us even. Tommy was pale with red hair, freckles, glasses. He didn’t have sunscreen with him or even a hat. I remember that his skin burnt badly during the dig and Professor Rosenberg had to take him to a doctor in town. The other was real shy. I heard Tommy refer to him ‘The Chief’ and the kid didn’t even seem annoyed. He was slim, pretty tall. Long hair and he wore Grateful Dead T-shirts the whole time we were there. Didn’t look to me like either of them had much experience of digs.”

  “What happened when you all realised it was missing?”

  “Rosenberg was incensed. He and Alec argued. Each accused the other of taking it. The two grads and I just stood to one side. We didn’t know what else to do.”

  “Did either of the students look guilty?”

  Carter thought for a moment. “No, but the Native one looked to me like he was smiling a little. A weird sort of smile, like he was amused or something.” He shook his head. “It was the strangest dig I’ve been on. Usually there’s a bit of camaraderie. We get to know each other well. There was an atmosphere, mostly I think between the two professors, and we hardly spoke. It was uncomfortable.”

  Locklear sighed. “You didn’t answer me when I asked if you suspected that Holton might have stolen those items?”

  Carter ran his hands over his scalp. He cried out as his wound brushed off his almost shorn head.

  “No! He wouldn’t. I don’t know why he hid the bowl. Like I said, it makes no sense. Why would he do that? His position, his reputation, his –”

  “What would something like the bowl or the fertility figure be worth on the black market?” Locklear interjected.

  Carter shook his head. “He wouldn’t do that, sir. Not theft. Not Alec.”

  “I asked you a question, Carter.”

  Carter looked over Locklear’s left shoulder as though there were someone else in the room who had suddenly captured his interest.

  “Thousands of dollars,” he said then.

  “Could someone have been blackmailing him?”

  “About what? He was harmless, sir.”

  “What happened when the police interviewed you and Holton about the missing artefacts from the lab?”