Chasing a Blond Moon Page 10

  “August 22.”

  “How big an animal?”

  “Dandy size, four hundred, I’d say. Four hundred easy.”

  “First time this has happened to you?”

  “Won’t happen again,” Griff Stinson said with a determined nod. “I gotta trap another one, I’ll move it at night and be done with it. Vernelia will just have to wait.”

  Another passing truck sounded its horn with three long, loud hoots and Griff grinned. “That’s six. You best be movin’ along, Grady.”

  “Why would somebody steal a bear from a trap?” Service asked.

  “Griff, honey, I got some sweets waitin’ for you inside,” Vernelia called from the side of the cabin.

  “Got some for Service?” the bear guide yelled back.

  “Sorry, hon. Just enough for one today.”

  Stinson grinned at Service and winked. “Who knows why somebody’d steal an animal? Not like they can make ’im a house pet. Some mysteries ain’t to be figured out, like why somebody steals a bear, or a woman like Vernelia gets wet between the legs from the horns of logging trucks. Is what it is, eh?”

  Service watched Stinson duck to get through the low door of the cabin, got into his truck, and headed west.

  Treebone called in on the cell phone as Service stopped in McMillan, getting ready to drive west on M-28. “There’s a woman in Grand Rapids—Kentwood. She’s an ex-Chicago cop, a real pro.”

  “She expensive?” Service asked.

  “Dawg, don’t you people have budget for anything?”

  “Only for smoke and mirrors.”

  “Shit. I’ll have her give you a bump.”

  “You got all my numbers?” Service asked his friend.

  “Cell, office, and home, dawg. Later.”

  7

  He tried to call the Ketchums again, but they were still unfindable. East of Munising he called Candace McCants on her cell phone. “You on something right now?” he asked.

  “If that’s a professional question, the answer’s no. If it’s personal, the answer’s, I wish,” she said.

  “Meet me in Trenary, forty minutes at SBT?”

  “See you there,” she said.

  Andy Ecles, a retired businessman from downstate South Haven, had moved to Trenary the previous summer, bought an old cafe, spiffed it up, and renamed it the Star & Bucks Toastatorium—which locals called SBT. The village was famous for Trenary toast, which had the consistency of hardtack and was edible only when dipped in hot liquid, preferably hot black coffee.

  McCants was already seated when Service arrived.

  She waved a cigarette at him and smiled. “How’s wifey?”

  “We’re not married,” Service said.

  “On paper,” McCants said. The Korean-born officer was in her fifth year of duty, five-six and one hundred sixty pounds of muscle. She wasn’t afraid of anything and had an inordinate amount of common sense. She had been adopted by a family in Detroit when she was twelve and joined the DNR after finishing a police academy at Kalamazoo Valley Community College.

  “What up?” she asked.

  Service gave her the plastic sleeve containing the photograph.

  “Who’s this?”

  “Was. He’s dead,” Service said.

  “That prof over to Houghton?”

  “How’d you guess?”

  “Not a lot of Koreans living in the Yoop. Even fewer dying. Why the heck are you carrying the photo of a suicide?”

  “It’s a homicide, which hasn’t been announced. There’s a sign behind the guy. Can you read it?”

  “Can’t you?” she asked playfully.

  Service rolled his eyes.

  McCants held the photo in front of her. “The characters are Korean. The sign says Jung Gahn, which means Righteous Room. This is integral to traditional Korean archery. Archers always meet at a place called a jung, which in Korea is an elaborate building, a sort of cross between a temple and a country club. When they arrive, they bow toward the entry sign. In this country, it’s usually just an elaborate sign.”

  “In this country?”

  “There are a few jungs around.”

  “In Michigan?”

  She shook her head. “Closest is in Wisconsin, I think. You dogging another homicide?”

  Service ignored her. “Why righteous room?”

  “Korean archery is intertwined in the country’s history. It’s serious business and very formal. To be an accomplished archer you’re expected to be a righteous person. If you’re righteous, your arrows fly true. It’s all about discipline and living correctly. See the flower on the bow cover? That’s Moogoonghwa—Rose of Sharon. Each level of archery is called a don. The highest level is ninth don, but few people ever get that far, maybe two or three in the world at a given time.”

  “This guy is ninth don?”

  She smiled. “What’s his name?”

  “Pung Juju Kang.”

  “Not ninth,” she said with a grin. “There are only two at that level right now and everybody of Korean descent knows their names. It would be like a Canadian not knowing Mario Lemieux or Wayne Gretzky. How old was the guy?”

  “Fiftyish.”

  “He could be fourth through sixth don. Each level is unbelievably demanding and you can only advance two levels a year, which in itself is rare. Most people take five to seven years to move up one.”

  “How do you know all this?”

  “In Korea, archery is the sport—for men and women. We all learn to shoot early in school.”

  “What’s with the weird bow?”

  “It’s traditional, handmade, designed to be shot from horseback. Only a few people in Korea are qualified and licensed by the government to make the bows or the arrows. They make the bow from a composite of water buffalo horn, bamboo, oak, mulberry, or acacia. Everything is joined by a special glue made from some kind of saltwater fish, and the back of the bow is covered with a special birch bark from China to make it waterproof. It takes four to six months to make one bow.”

  “Do people hunt with them?”

  McCants shook her head. “Like I said, Korean archery is steeped in history. Buddha’s teachings discourage the use of the bow for killing.”

  “Even in war?”

  “Buddha doesn’t really address war, which makes for a sort of philosophical and theological loophole. In that belief system, war is to be avoided. If traditional archers used their bows to hunt animals, they’d fall off the righteous path.”

  “Seems like people would have hunted with the weapons.”

  “They did early in the country’s history, but as bow training became more formalized and regimented, it became exclusive to the military and hunting with the weapons was no longer allowed. Soldier archers were sent after animals to hone their skills before they could be formally declared qualified as soldiers, but hunting was banned for civilians.”

  “There’s no hunting in Korea?”

  “Sure, but only with firearms, and even that’s pretty limited. Even so, a lot of Koreans are interested in western bow hunting. Some Koreans believe that their ancestors were the first Native Americans and they’re very nostalgic about how American Indians lived.” She tapped the photograph of the dead man. “What’s your interest?”

  “There was bear scat in his vehicle when the body was found.”

  “You mean inside the veek?”

  “Yep.”

  “How did he die?”

  “Food poisoning.”

  McCants scrunched her face.

  “Some chocolate-covered figs he ate were laced with cyanide.”

  “In other words, you are dogging another homicide,” she chided.

  “The bear shit is my sole focus. Plus there were bear galls in with the figs. I just go where the cases take me.”


  “Who’s got the homicide?”

  “Houghton detective named Pyykkonen.”

  “The one boffing the new sheriff?”

  Service stared at his friend. “Is there some sort of central repository for Yooper gossip?”

  She laughed and said in a conspiratorial tone, “There aren’t that many women up here. We operate like the Borg,” she said, “all part of one hive.”

  He shook his head. “What do you know about the outfit in Wisconsin?”

  “Jung.”

  “Right, jung.”

  “I heard there was one between Milwaukee and Madison. The town’s called Jefferson, I think.”

  “Are these jungs organized like clubs?”

  “More like religions, and they all report back to Korea. This is deadly serious stuff. For the ninth don you have to score 39 of 39 at one hundred and forty meters.”

  Service looked at the photo and quickly converted the distance to almost four hundred and fifty yards. “With that toy bow?”

  “Don’t let the size fool you, Grady. That bow pulls more than fifty pounds and good shooters regularly plug targets with small bamboo arrows. The bow may look like something out of The Lord of the Rings, but it’s lethal as hell.”

  “How do I get in touch with the Wisconsin outfit?”

  “Why don’t you let me call them? Speaking Korean will probably make things go faster.”

  “I want to know if Pung was a member, or if he was a member in one of the outfits anywhere in the country.”

  “Or Korea?”

  “Okay, right,” Service said with a nod. “I need to know more about him.”

  “I’ll give it a try,” she said, dipping a piece of concrete toast into her coffee.

  Andy Ecles came over to the table as they were getting ready to leave. “Howdy, officers. You two looking for bad guys?”

  “Always,” McCants said.

  “You didn’t hear this from me,” Ecles said, “but if you want a bad guy, give a visit to Bryce Verse.”

  “Verse?” McCants asked.

  “He’s from over to Manistique, but he’s got a camper-trailer parked out on the back side of the Pavola farm.”

  McCants said, “Why does Mr. Verse qualify as a bad guy?”

  “I hear he just got out of Kinross,” Ecles said. Kinross was a Level II state correctional facility in Chippewa County in the eastern Upper Peninsula. “He was in here with a couple of young girls a couple of days ago. He was packing and the girls were bragging how they’d been shooting deer.”

  “You saw a weapon?”

  “The three of them were high and rowdy, but I saw enough to know what I saw.”

  When they got outside, McCants slid her 800 MHz radio out of its holster, and set Channel 20. “Station Twenty, this is Four One Twenty Three. Can you run a file?”

  “Go ahead, Four One Twenty Three.”

  “Last name is Verse: Victor, Echo, Romeo, Sierra, Echo. First name Bryce: Bravo, Romeo, Yankee, Charlie, Echo. No middle name known. Allegedly just out of Kinross. Run the name, see what we come up with.”

  “Bryce Verse,” the dispatcher in Lansing said. “Right back at you.”

  “You can go,” McCants said.

  “Think I’ll hang for a while,” Service said.

  “You missing this part of the job?” she asked.

  He nodded. “Sometimes.”

  Station Twenty called back, “Four One Twenty Three, Bryce Verse just finished three years at Kinross, paroled three weeks ago. You want his PO’s name?”

  “Go ahead.”

  “PO is Jenna Traffic, out of Manistique. You want her numbers?”

  McCants wrote down home, office, and cell phone numbers, switched to her own cell phone, and tapped in a number. “Jenna Traffic? This is Candi McCants, DNR. You got a problem child named Bryce Verse?”

  Service watched his colleague making notes on a small pad. “Okay, Jenna. We heard today that he’s got a camper set up near Trenary. He was seen in town a couple of days ago in the company of two minor females, allegedly high and packing.” McCants listened, then smiled. “I hear ya. Think I’ll head out to his camp and have a chat with your boy.”

  She flipped the phone shut and looked at Service. “Supposed to check in with his PO within forty-eight hours, but she hasn’t heard a word from him. She says he’s a genetic dirtbag. He went up for aggravated assault, two OUILs, and statutory rape. Moody also busted him several times over in the Manistique area for fish and game before he got sent away. Apparently Moody was also the arresting officer on the aggravated assault beef.” Eddie Moody, a CO for part of Schoolcraft County, was also known as Gutpile because of his spectacular ability to find the remains of poached white-tail deer.

  “A Renaissance man,” Service said.

  McCants grinned.

  Service followed her back into the restaurant where they found Ecles behind the counter. “The girls with Verse,” she asked. “You know them?”

  “Everybody in town knows all the kids—especially Cathalina Sector and Tina Kangaho. Both of ’em are fourteen and both of ’em are trouble.”

  “One of them related to the Pavolas?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Is Verse related to the Pavolas?”

  “Doubt that,” Eccles said. “Never seen him till ten days or so ago. Old man Pavola died some years back and his wife moved downstate to live with her daughter. Pavola’s sons and son-in-law come up for deer season, but most of the year the place is empty.”

  “Posted?” Service asked.

  “Not since I lived up here,” Ecles said.

  “You said the girls are trouble,” McCants said. “What kind?”

  “Out of control. Sex and booze, out all night, skipping school, all that. They run with older men.”

  “Families?”

  “Technically, but they don’t seem to pay much attention and the girls do pretty much as they please.”

  “You mind if I tag along?” Service asked when they were outside again.

  “Ought to let your missus know.”

  “Cut that out.”

  McCants grinned. “Our boy probably won’t even be there.” She dug out her Alger County plat book, and found the location of the Pavola farm. It touched up against the Delta County line and had been part of his old territory, which was now hers.

  Service followed her in his truck.

  A mile from the farm she pulled over and ambled back to his vehicle. “Let’s hide my wheels and take your unmarked.”

  “You got a good hide in mind?”

  McCants smiled. “I learned from the best.”

  She parked off a two-track in a copse of pines, covered the grill and hood with downed branches and leaves, and the two officers drove on to the farm. As predicted, nobody appeared to be in the old house, which badly needed paint. A rutted track veered away from the house across a hay field. The two of them stood on the running board of Service’s truck using their binoculars to scan the surrounding fields.

  “Ten o’clock,” Service said. “Looks like a straight line. Something’s back there.”

  McCants said, “Let’s leave the truck behind the barn, go in on foot.”

  Service pulled behind the barn and locked the vehicle.

  The two of them headed across the field, circling so as not to telegraph their intended destination.

  At two hundred yards they could see a beat-up green trailer and a 2002 double-cab blue Ford 150 truck. “Let’s move closer, get a plate number,” McCants said.

  They moved cautiously, staying low and using natural barriers to block their approach. When they were close enough, McCants used her binoculars, got the vehicle license number, and called it in to Lansing.

  The answer came back, “2002 Ford 150, dark blue, reported stol
en.”

  “When?” McCants asked.

  “Twelve days ago.”

  “Stolen,” McCants said to Service. “Two days after Verse got out of Kinross, and from Pickford, which is pretty much right out the back gate. This is starting to get interesting.”

  They could hear music blasting from the trailer.

  “Hip-hop,” Service said.

  McCants shook her head. “Rap.”

  “Same same,” he said.

  “You are so white. Let’s get up close and personal.”

  “Want to pay a call now?”

  “No, let’s let the sun get low. He comes to the door, he’ll have to look due west. That’ll put the sun in his eyes. Let’s use what God gives us.”

  Service checked his watch. “Ninety minutes, give or take.”

  “Wifey expecting you?”

  “Knock it off, Candi. Why’re we going slow on this?”

  “Not sure,” she said. “A feeling, and not one of the nice ones, ya know?”

  He did, though he felt nothing at the moment.

  The two backed off a hundred yards and set up near some tamaracks. Service used his cell phone to call home.

  “Nantz.”

  “It’s me.”

  “Thank God,” she said excitedly. “Kate Nordquist is in the hospital in Escanaba. She and Gutpile stopped to get a snack this morning in Rapid River. She stayed in the truck while he went inside to get sandwiches and coffee. When he came out he found her on the ground. One of her legs is broken in two places, Grady. She has to have surgery. It looks like somebody nailed her with an iron bar, then drove over her. Gutpile can’t understand what got her out of the truck. I called Vince. We’re gonna meet at the hospital and talk to Kate’s doctor.” Vince was Vince Vilardo, an internist, Delta County’s medical examiner, and Service’s longtime friend.

  Kate Nordquist was a young officer who had trained with Moody and been recently assigned to Schoolcraft County with him. She was Nantz’s friend.

  “Witnesses?” he asked.

  “None. Gutpile called 911 and the city, county, and Troops are investigating. He followed Kate to the hospital. Where are you?”

  “With Candi. We’re waiting for the sun to go down to pay a call on a parolee.”