Murder in Crepuscular Meadows
Created | Updated Nov 25, 2020
1. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: the body of Peter Peters found by passerby
It was a gray November day -- the first of November, actually. Bernard Philpin, driving south on Route 62 on some errand that we won't go into here, happened to glance at the reservoir, and noticed something that seemed out of place. It looked like Peter Peters, the man who kept a watchful eye on the reservoir, but he was in an unnatural position, lying on the grass next to the reservoir. Philpin felt a sense of dread about this. The unnatural position was bad enough, but Peters' complexion was gray, and he wasn't moving. Philpin was used to seeing people asleep, but this did not seem to be the case here.
He pulled over to the side of the road, got out of the car, and walked to the guardrail. It sure looked like Peters. Lifelike, but possibly not actually alive.
He noted the location, took out his phone, and called the Crepuscular Meadows police station.
Sergeant Friday Mundy answered the phone in a professional voice -- no growling like in the movies or TV shows. Poor guy was saddled with a name that sounded like a joke -- his parents wanted him to be a detective, apparently, and they got their wish. Philpin hoped they rotted in hell for it, but he never said this aloud. He was supposed to be a charitable man.
He gave the location of the body, reassured the detective that he had not gone beyond the guardrail so as not to disturb the crime scene -- if that's what it was.
Then he continued on his way toward Workchester, where he had a business appointment.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------
2. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: the plot thickens.
Sergeant Friday Mundy wasn't having a good day. More like a terrible one. This just made it worse. First, the coffee pot was empty. True, he could send someone to Emma's Cafe for coffee, but everyone was either out on assignment or working a case in the office. Plus, there wasn't much in the petty cash drawer. Actually, there was rarely much there. People just paid for things out of their own pockets.
From the north-facing window, he could see the Park. From the south one, he could see the reservoir dam in the distance. He thought about what Bernard Philpin had just told him on the phone. Poor Peter Peters! He had the personality of a turnip, but the tourists liked him, and people in town were used to dealing with him. His absence would be felt.
And, he had no one he could spare for investigating this case. Three staffers were on vacation, two were on leave (one was on maternity leave, something the department never used to have to worry about).
He pulled up the file of active staffers on his computer, just to be sure he wasn't forgetting anyone. Nope.
That just left him.
Well, he was qualified. He had worked his way up to a Detective First Grade, and stayed there for three years, and now was the department's top detective. Actually, he was the town's only detective, despite his rank. The town had maybe one or two murders a year, and the Sergeant spent most of his time doing routine police work.
But now he had an actual murder to solve. And, this wasn't an anonymous John Doe, but someone known personally by at least half the town's citizens, and many more from outside.
This case wasn't going to make or break his career, but the respect that he now enjoyed might be diminished if he didn't find out who killed Peter Peters.
--------------------------------------------------------
3. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Interviewing the first lead: Peters's daughter.
Sergeant Friday Mundy called the Town Clerk's office to find out where Peters lived (when he was alive), and whether he had relatives who might know about his last activities.
Peters was divorced (his ex-wife now lived in Seattle, and a quick check showed that she hadn't left that city in the last few days). His only child was a daughter, Sophie, who was married to Leonard Berkowitz and mother to two daughters. She and her husband lived in Clanville, near the Crepuscular Meadows town line, and both worked at the Drawbridge Diner.
Sergeant Friday placed a call to the diner, and waited a few minutes for his call to be put through. When Sophie answered, he could hear a lot of noise – even at 10:00 a.m., the breakfast din was overpowering. “I'm Sergeant Friday Mundy of the Crepuscular Meadow Police Department, and I have some bad news for you about your father,” he said somberly.”
“Yeah, he's dead,” Sophie said, sniffling. “Someone from the police department called me an hour ago. They wanted me to come and identify the body, though they were in doubt that it was him. I went to the reservoir, identified him, and then was late for work. I hate this!”
“Is it too soon to ask you to meet with me to find out what, if anything, you know about his last actions?” the Sergeant asked. “Relatives who live nearby can be crucial in establishing the facts, even if they didn't live with the deceased.”
“The diner closes at 2:30. Come here at 2:00, and we can talk over a nice lunch. That is, if you like hash.” Then she hung up.
As it happened, the Sergeant liked hash.
---------------------------------------------------------
4. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Murder on the menu
“I haven't eaten here in ages,” Sergeant Friday said, peering at a food-spattered menu (which was, thankfully, plastic, so it could be wiped clean, except it hadn't been).
“The menu hasn't changed in ages either,” Sophie observed. “Except when prices had to go up. And since Covid-19 came along. You'll notice that this table is six feet long, to keep us that far apart.”
“I wondered about that,” Sergeant Friday said. “technically we s
shouldn't even be allowed to eat inside.
“Don't tell the authorities. You'll notice that each table is screened off from the rest of the diner. It's like a booth.”
“What do you recommend from the menu,” Sergeant Friday asked.
“Hash is today's special, but a lot depends on whether you want a second breakfast, or a nice lunch.”
“I've heard good things about the Cuban sandwiches here.” A waitress came to take their orders, then disappeared into the kitchen.
“Aha, so this place is not off your radar, being outside Crepuscular Meadows.”
“Well, Clanville isn't in my jurisdiction, but people at the station talk about this place. And this is just over the line.”
“Not to change the subject, but do the people at the station talk about my father? You know, I'm sad to lose him, especially this way. How was he killed?”
“The medical examiner says preliminary results are that he was strangled. There are bruise marks around his neck.”
“Gack! Not over lunch.”
“Lunch hasn't been served yet.”
“And I won't feel like eating it when it comes.”
“With your father dead, I'm surprised you felt like eating today.”
“I'm helping your investigation. I last talked to my father the night before he died. He planned to go fishing with a couple of friends the next morning.”
“Do you know who these friends were?”
“No, but his next-door neighbor might have seen them come to his door.”
“Who is the neighbor?”
“Geppetto Conti.”
--------------------------------------------------------------------
5. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: The neighbor in the cuckoo house
It was time for Sergeant Friday Mundy to visit Peter Peters's neighborhood. Up on a hill overlooking the Hoohaw River after it emerged from the reservoir dam, there was a side street where Peters lived. Next to it was where a man named Geppetto Conti had built a house shaped like a cuckoo clock. A very big cuckoo clock. Not only was the house shaped like a cuckoo clock, but Conti had dozens, perhaps hundreds of actual cuckoo clocks inside.
Sergeant Friday approached the area just as the clock was striking three. Suddenly a cacophony of cuckoo calls rang out up ahead. “Yep, this is the area, all right,” Sergeant Friday muttered. He rounded the crest of the hill and turned onto the street. Officers Phelps and Dodge were just emerging from Peters's house. Friday frowned. Teamwork would dictate that the chief detective be there when the house was searched. But after all, he had just been questioning the daughter of the deceased. The other cops looked sheepish. He filled them in n what he had learned at the diner, and they told him what they had found.
Then the three of them went next door to see if Conti could identify the two men who had called on Peters early this morning. Conti had surveillance cameras so he could be alerted when real cuckoos were nearby. He cheerfully rewound the videos from the cameras, and the four of them watched as two men knocked on Peters's door. The door opened, and Peters came out.
Sergeant Friday wasn't happy with what he saw. One of the men was Orlando Salieri, a man with a long list of priors. Why was Peters associating with such a man? The other man, in his twenties, was a stranger. Neither one was likely to be interested in going fishing, plus this was November. Who went fishing in November? Conti printed out a picture of him so the department could send it out to national services for identification.
“I've never seen either man before,” said Conti. “The younger man bears a family resemblance to Peters. Did he have young nephews or cousins?”
“Sophie might know, but by now she may be tired of dealing with this,” said Sergeant Friday.”
“It's a pity there weren't surveillance cameras next to where his body was found,” Conti offered.
“Well, there was a convenience store on the other side of the street form the murder site. Maybe they would have cameras?” offered Officer Phelps.
Sergeant Friday's eyebrow went up. This was good thinking. Give the man a promotion!
------------------------------------------------------
6. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular meadows: the convenience store
The cops approached the convenience store, which was called Seven/twenty-four. A young man was tending the counter. No customers were present.
“Hi, what can I do for you?” the young man asked.
“Does your store have surveillance cameras?” Sergeant Friday asked.
“Sure, but they get erased at the end of every week.”
“Would they have enough range to see what was happening on the other side of the street?”
“Possibly, but the resolution would not be as good.”
“A man was found dead next to the reservoir, about twenty feet from the guard rail.”
“The camera would record only what was visible on this side of the guard rail. And I'm sorry to hear that anyone died, especially there.”
“Why 'especially there.'”
“That's known to be a very unlucky place for anyone to be.” the sergeant's eyebrows went up. “What I mean is that bad people sometimes hang out there.”
“Apparently some bad people did hang out there. Have you personally seen some of the bad people?”
“Occasionally.”
Sergeant Friday showed the young man pictures of the two suspects. “Have you seen either of these men? Ever?”
The young man thought a moment. “The younger man came in here one time when I was on duty.”
“Did he buy anything?”
The young man shrugged. “I have no secrets. It happened yesterday afternoon. He wanted cigarettes, some soda pop, and a fishing rod. I figured he planned on fishing.”
Yes, that would be a logical conclusion.
“Did he pay by cash or card?”
“Cash.”
“Too bad. A credit card would have had his name on it.”
“If it was really his,” commented Phelps.
Again, a sharp mind! Sergeant Friday nodded.
-----------------------------------------------------------
7.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: A thick plot gets thicker
They were back at the station. “Orlando Salieri has not, as far as I can deduce, ever gone fishing,” Sergeant Friday said.
“We have a possible I.D. For the younger man,” said Officer Dodge.
“Really? Who might he be?”
“Arnold Peters. Peter's uncle's grandson.”
“More mystery. He might like fishing, but why involve Salieri?”
“There's an answer. Salieri's his father-in-law.”
“Not a nice family to marry into,” observed Officer Dodge.
“Judging by Orlando Salieri, yes, but his wife was the daughter of a very fine judge,” said Phelps with a shrug of his shoulders. “An aunt was a professor of anthropology at Workchester State College, and had a bit of influence. The apple could just as well have fallen from the right side of the tree.”
“Um, did you know her by any chance?” Friday asked.
“I took a course from her.”
“So, I don't know what to think,” Sergeant Friday said.
“It's possible that neither of the men had anything to do with Peters's death,” said Phelps.
“That's possible.”
“But he's still dead,” said Dodge.”
--------------------------------------------------
8.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: The Crime Lab's report
The Crime lab in Narmady produced its preliminary report two days later. Time of death? Probably around 6:00 a.m. On the morning of November 1. This did not seem like a case of being killed while fishing or approaching the reservoir in preparation. True, one could go to the reservoir at 6:00 in July or August, but why so early in November? Why not wait for air temps to warm up into the forties at least?
Also, it appeared that Peters was not killed in the spot where he was found. The lab had various arcane explanations for this deduction, but basically the ground was not disturbed at all, as it would have been had Peters struggled against his murderer.
Also, a very recent cigarette butt was just six feet away, and there was a scuffed path where the body was apparently dragged to the edge of the reservoir from a location next to the guardrail. There were recent faint tire tracks in the breakdown lane next to the rail. Aha! They seemed to have been made by a Jeep.
Not many people had jeeps these days.
------------------------------------------------------
9..Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Gaia, the witness from above.
“Um, I hear that you are looking for information that might lead to the identification of the killers of Peter Peters.” Sergeant Friday looked up from his desk, where half of a tuna fish sandwich still lay untouched. Lunch had had to yield to pressing work. But the young lady who stood in front of his desk might have something to hep with that work.
“Gaia Philpin,” Sergeant Friday breathed softly. “The last time you were in here, a wild turkey had wandered into the middle of High Street, and you wanted us to protect it from traffic.”
“Yes, and my mission was successful,” Gaia said proudly. Gaia, the niece of Bernard Philpin, the town's wealthiest and most philanthropic citizen, believed that she could understand what trees were saying. She formed friendships with bats and cuckoos and any number of other creatures. If anyone loved the world's creatures more than she, that person didn't live in Crepuscular Meadows.
“I'd like to file a report on what I saw on the morning of Mr. Peters's death,” Gaia said.
She now had Sergeant Friday's full attention. He grabbed a witness statement form from the corner of his desk, and took a pen in his hand. “I'm ready when you are,” he said. “Just tell me what you saw.”
“I was on top of Monument Hill, in the botanic garden, speaking soothing words to the trees that were afraid to dial down their activities for the cold season,” she said. “Some trees are like that.”
Sergeant Friday knew about Gaia's tendency to ramble, so he said, “Please tell us what you witnessed relative to the murder.”
“It was about 6:00 in the morning, and still rather dark, but out of the corner of my eye I noticed a pair of bright headlights down on the road. I turned toward it, and saw a jeep which was pulling over into the breakdown lane. It stopped. Two men got out. They opened the back and picked up a man, and carried him over the guardrail and down the grassy slope toward the edge of the water. They dropped the man on the ground, then came back to the jeep, got in, and left.”
Sergeant Friday whistled. “Can you describe the jeep in any way? Particularly if you noticed its license plates as it was leaving?”
Gaia pulled out a pair of binoculars. “As I said, it was dark, but I squinted my eyes and used these to try and get the license plate number. I got the first three digits: MU5”
Sergeant Friday was getting very excited now. “Very resourceful! There are aren't many jeeps in this area, and having the first half of a license plate number may be the break we need.”
--------------------------------------------------------------
10.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: What's a jeep from
the other side of the country doing in Crepuscular Meadows?
It took a while to narrow down the possibilities of the license plate number because MU5 did not show up in any statewide register of jeeps. This meant tapping into a national database, which ran slower because of exponentially larger amounts of data to search. After a few hours, the results came back: the jeep was registered to Freesia Cooperman, an unemployed actress who lived in one of the lower-income sections of Los Angeles.
Ms. Cooperman was 27 years old, not unattractive, and unable to find both acting jobs and waitressing jobs, thanks to devastation wrought by Covid-19. It was anybody's guess where she had gotten to since the time of the murder, assuming that she was even aware that her car was being used to transport the victim.
Sergeant Friday placed a call to the Los Angeles Police department, explained the situation, and tried to instill a sense of urgency in the person on the other end of the line.
“They say they lack sufficient manpower to make contacting this person a high-priority task,” Sergeant Friday said wearily. “Does this have to be rocket surgery? You find her number, pick up the phone and call her. If she doesn't answer, get numbers for the neighbors, and keep calling until you reach someone who might have noticed whether she has been around lately. If her jeep is on this side of the country while the owner is in L.A., that's a little weird, but if she says it was stolen, we would have to give her the benefit of the doubt as long as h doubt lasts.”
Officer Phelps asked what Freesia's address was. “Ah, my sister lives just across the street. Maybe she could ask around.”
Sergeant Friday frowned. “That would be meddling in police business, officer.”
“She doesn't need to do police business. She writes news stories on a freelance basis. If she thinks there's a good story in this – and I don't see why there wouldn't be – she can ask the sort of questions that a good reporter would ask.”
“If you can get her on the phone, I could talk to her and steer her away from behavior that would amount to obstruction of justice,” Sergeant Friday said.
“You mean it wouldn't be an interesting story that the lady's jeep has mysteriously gone all the way across the country?” Officer Phelps asked. “She has no known reason to know any of the people involved in our case, but does she have a boy friend who borrowed it for a few weeks to visit his sick grandmother in this area? Sort of like Little Red Riding Hood but without the wolf...”
'That we know of," said Officer Dodge with a wink.
----------------------------------------------
11.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows:
As it turned out, Freesia Cooperman was sleeping peacefully in her
house when a reluctant L.A.P.D. Officer called her.
“The Jeep?” she said groggily. “You want to know why my jeep is on the East Coast in a place called Crepuscular Meadows? Well, that's where my nephew lives. He needed a car, so I loaned it to him.”
“May we ask the name of your nephew?”
“Yes, you may ask, but why do you care? It's not as if he killed someone, is it?” She gasped. “I bet he's in trouble. I hope it's not murder. Tell me he held up a 7-24 or something like that.”
“A murder has apparently been committed, and your jeep was seen leaving the scene where the body was found.”
“Ouch! I'm in shock!”
“We aren't saying you had anything to do with it, but we'd like to know who your nephew is.”
“Skronton Weembly. He washes dishes at Caledonian Grove Restaurant. It's hard to get around without a car, so I let him borrow it until he saves enough to get a car of his own. “
There was silence on the other end of the phone.
Half an hour later, Sergeant Friday had been apprised of Skronton Weembly's involvement in the case. Twenty minutes after that, a phone call to the restaurant established that Weembly had not been seen for three days.
“We're back to square one,” Sergeant Friday said.
--------------------------------------------------------
12.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Another murder, another need for a crime lab report.
It was even worse than Sergeant Friday had suspected. When the police showed up at Skronton Weembly's apartment, he was in fact at home, but no longer breathing. The same strangulation marks were around his throat as had been observed in Peters's case.
The Medical Examiner seemed t think that Skronton Weembly had been dead about as long as Peter Peters. The jeep was parked in front of his apartment building.
Two more days went by. The usual minor dust-ups and squabbles occurred that a police department concerns itself with. Missing cats. Bag ladies (or men) urinating in Mrs. Worthington's roses. Officer Phelps observed that the salt in urine is not good for roses, but the nitrogen is. A trade-off. No one listened to him.
Then there was a break in the case: a surveillance camera showed
Orlando Salieri with his hands around Weembly's neck. Would this be good enough evidence to hold up in court? The bad news? The scene caught by the camera played out the day before the murder. Time would tell. The big question was how to find Salieri, now that there was evidence of his involvement in at least one murder.
The fates smiled on the police department later that day. Salieri was caught red-handed stealing apples in Nobility, a small town next to Crepuscular Meadows. Officer Dodge wondered why he would bother to steal them, when they were lying around for the taking in the orchards was anyone's guess.
-------------------------------------------
13.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: But Salieri has an alibi
“I admit that I was mad at Weembly, but I did not kill him. I gave up and left him alone. He was still alive then,” Salieri said.
The medical examiner found this plausible. The camera footage was old. Weembly had done a shift of work at the restaurant since the footage was taken.
Could Arnold Peters have been involved? Well, his grandfather said that he had come home by 8:00 on the morning of Peter's murder, and had been accounted for ever since. The police questioned him, but he maintained that he had thought better of fishing so early, so he had gone back home without accompanying the other men.
“Technically, we know that “two men” carried the body to the spot where it was found,” Officer Phelps said. “We don't know who they were. The evidence doesn't place any particular individuals at the scene.”
“Salieri and Arnold Peters might have showed up at Peter's door, but we can't establish what they did after that,” Officer Dodge added.
Sergeant Friday cocked an eyebrow. “We can't question the fish, you know. They're the only ones close enough to the scene to know.”
“Unless they were asleep,” Phelps said. “Trout and bass feed at night, but they would have been winding down by 6:00.”
------------------------------------------------------
14.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: another witness, but how credible?
You can call them hobos, bums, derelicts, winos, or whatever, but there always seem to be some of them around. One of them came into the police station while the sleeping habits of fish were being discussed.
He didn't seem to have washed in months, he was ragged, and one hoped that he could find some place warmer than the outdoors before long.
His appearance was a mixed blessing at best. He had been sifting through the dumpster behind the store when the jeep arrived, and had crept to the edge of the parking lot to see what was happening – little chance of being seen, as he was well camouflaged with grime.
The police asked him to describe the two men – he said there were two, no more and no less. One older, one younger. One difference in his testimony, though, was that he thought he saw Peters writhing.
So, was Peters killed at the reservoir after all? Or had the witness been drinking and imagining things or making things up completely?
A clerk named Zelda came through with coffee and donuts – it was midmorning. She offered some to the witness, who eagerly wolfed it down.
“Where can we find you if we have further questions?” Sergeant Friday asked the witness.
“Here and there” was the vague reply.
“We'd check the dumpsters behind stores and cafes,” Officer Phelps
observed. The witness nodded. There were convenience stores and coffee shops not far from the 7/24, as well as cafes like Emma's on the edge of downtown. He'd probably not travel much further into town, but he wouldn't need to. Unless he was really hungry.
----------------------------------------------------------------
15.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: yet another witness.
The reservoir was a busier place than the police had imagined on that fateful first day of November. Naomi Fenster, a young woman who had run away from home, was living in a makeshift tent not 50 feet from the spot where Peters was found.
The bad news? Her testimony diverged from that given by Gaia and the derelict. “It was dark, like. I only saw one man. He was big and burly, with a tattoo on his right bicep. He hopped over the guard rail, dumped something on the ground, and then left in a hurry. Oh, and he dropped this in his haste to get away.” She produced a phone that had fallen out of his pocket.
Sergeant Friday feared that it was an anonymous burner phone, but it was upscale enough to have sensitive info on it. A techno geek could probably decrypt it.
Sergeant Friday sighed. Technically, camping near the reservoir was illegal, but her testimony, if useful enough, would be enough to let her not face any charges. And useful it turned out to be!
“Gus Grommet!” Sergeant Friday exclaimed later that afternoon when the phone's owner was identified. There were texts to Salieri about Grommet's waiting in the shrubbery down the street from Peters's house to ambush him. Salieri sent no answers to the texts, which left doubt as to whether he really wanted to be involved.
“Some welcoming committee!” Zelda exclaimed, breezing through the room with the afternoon coffee and pastries.
“Why didn't we notice Naomi's tent?” Sergeant Friday exclaimed.
“Because she saw us coming and removed it?” Officer Dodge said.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
16.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows:
Establishing that someone was at the scene was only part of the battle. Motive counted for plenty, too. Why would Gus Grommet want to harm Peter Peters? And where might Grommet be lurking? Also, why would he be driving Weembly's jeep if Weembly himself wasn't there?
Grommet had a checkered work history consisting of odd jobs. He frequented the pool tables at the Freedom Saloon and seemed to be out late at night in seedier sections of town.
But his residence was known, at least: The Meadows Rooming House. He'd been there three years. The rooming house had not been an upscale place, but the residents now included some down-on-their luck show business people thrown out of work by the Coronavirus. A call to Pat Schneider, the manager, established that grommet had not been seen in two days.
“Oh, Lord, I hope he hasn't been murdered too,” Officer Phelps exclaimed.
No, as it turned out, Grommet was passed out drunk in a secluded spot in the back of the Community Garden on High Street. The Zucchini still had some huge leaves, and he was well hidden by them. Bear in mind that this was across the street form the rooming house. But if he was that near to his room, why not just cross the street and sleep in his own bed?
Phelps and Dodge were sent out to retrieve Grommet and question him.....
--------------------------------------------------------------
17.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Grommet calls for his lawyer
“You ain't getting diddly from me unless my lawyer is present,” Grommet protested. And where was his lawyer? Seneca Salmon, the scourge of policemen everywhere! This was going to be quite some show.
“We didn't get the lawyer bit with any of our witnesses, or with Salieri,” Sergeant Friday grumbled.
“Salieri knew there would be evidence exonerating him. He probably talked with Skronton Weembly after the fight, and knew he was all right,” Officer Phelps said.
Sergeant Friday sighed. All right, he as a hardened veteran of many struggles, but he did sigh every so often. Seneca Salmon arrived twenty minutes later, grumbling about being pulled from a party for his nephew. Not everyone knew he had a nephew.
“I hope the nephew isn't going to go into the legal profession,” Officer Dodge said.
“Well, there are worse things he could do,” Sergeant Friday observed. This was met by raised eyebrows. “You only run into lawyers in police stations and courtrooms. And law offices, of course.” More raised eyebrows. “Unless he runs for office, which would be annoying, but non-lawyers do that, too.”
The others resumed what they had been doing. No one won or lost these discussions, and they all knew it.
When Salmon did arrive, he was a sight to behold, with a three-piece dark gray vested suit, a pristine white shirt, and a power tie.
The questioning started.
“Mr. Grommet, a witness placed a man resembling you at the scene where the victim was found. She found a cell phone on the ground shortly after, which was traced to you,” Sergeant Friday said.
“My client has nothing to say,” Salmon said.
“I suppose we would get nowhere if we asked him to show his right bicep,” Officer Phelps whispered to Officer Dodge, and was met with an icy stare form Sergeant Friday.
“If this were August, he'd be wearing a short-sleeved shirt,” Officer Dodge whispered back. This time, Salmon fixed him with an icy stare.
----------------------------------------
18.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Breakthrough or dead end?
The questioning continued for another half hour. He was asked if he had a cell phone.
“My client is not saying, one way or the other,” Salmon said.
“Oh, for Pete's sake, Salmon!” Grommet exclaimed. “I'd be nowhere without that phone! I want it back,” he told Sergeant Friday. “It's my property.”
“It's a piece of evidence,” Sergeant Friday shot back. “Your lawyer just said you might or might not have one. Now, which is it?”
This put Grommet and Salmon in a bad mood. “Let's say that my client does have a cell phone. That's not a crime,” Salmon said. “What would be a crime would be planting a phone that's been engineered to make him look guilty at the scene.”
This was exasperating. The same techies who had decrypted the phone could also have put things into it that weren't there before. Or could they? They'd have to be too brilliant for their pay grade. Sergeant Friday gave a mean smile. “We can see how that plays out in a hearing,” he said. “In any event, it's in our possession now, and
the ball is in your court.”
---------------------------------------------------
19.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: DNA evidence
What had not been mentioned yet was that the crime lab had found DNA under Skronton Weembly's fingernails as he tried to gouge the hands of his attackers. Grommet blew his nose before he left the station, and Officer Phelps noticed a speck of blood on the tissue. He saved it for DNA testing.
Three days passed with no more witnesses coming forward. Then the DNA lab called to say there was a match between the material under Weembly's fingernails and the blood on Grommet's tissue.
“We're partway there, exulted Sergeant Friday.
“But only one murder,”Officer Dodge said.
“No, both murders,” Sergeant Friday corrected him. “There was stuff under Peters's fingernails too. That matched Grommet, too.”
20.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Probable cause, but the suspect has vanished.
Dear reader, you probably thought the case was about wrapped up, didn't you? Eleven days early, at that! But no, fate held more surprises up its sleeve.
No one could be certain, really, if Peters was killed by the reservoir, or merely moved there after his death. The least reliable witness was the only one who thought he might have been “writhing.”
No one could be certain how many men were involved – or even if any of the “men” were women. The witness who was closest to the scene only saw one man. The others saw two men, but from a different vantage point. They all might have been correct, but who knew?
Was Peters already on the ground before Grommet arrived? Naomi said that a burly man “dumped something on the ground,” but was the something necessarily Peters?
Grommet was the best suspect by far, compared to the others. But when Phelps and Dodge showed up at his door to bring him back in, no one answered the door. Manager Pat Schneider revealed that Grommet had taken all his things and left the premises within hours after the questioning.
So, there was no joy in Mudville. Then Officer Phelps revealed that he had surreptitiously put a tracking device in Grommet's right shoe.
“That's illegal, you know,” scolded Sergeant Friday.
“It can be just between you and me,” Phelps said. “No one else need know. If we find him because of it, we can claim superior police skills.”
Sergeant Friday smiled. “We'd better remove the device quickly, though.”
21.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Then Grommet changed shoes
The tracker in grommet's shoe led the police to a warehouse next to the Convention Center in Crepuscular Meadows. It was next to the town cemetery. What they found was two shoes, but they were not on Grommet's feet.
A bulletin was issued to police departments asking anyone who had seen Grommet to contact the authorities. It was fortunate that the surveillance cameras at he police station had captured his image, so people would know what he looked like.
“Typical needle in a haystack, though,” Sergeant Friday grumbled.
Tommy Nemo, who wrote for the Evening Sentinel, published a story about the search for him.
Grommet;s mother helped a bit, though, by showing up and revealing that he had visited her an hour ago. She had slammed the door in his face. It was a busy time of day, and a few people had seen him go by. He seemed to be on foot (Weembly's jeep was no longer available, and Grommet seemed to lack transportation of his own).
At last, in a makeshift hut on Monument Hill, near the Botanic Garden, the police cornered Grommet, read him his rights, and then brought him to a holding cell in the police station.
This time his lawyer was unavailable, and Grommet was not the sort to let someone else speak for him.
Here the terrain got trickier, though. There was enough evidence to proceed, but no one had a lcue as yet as to whether Grommet even knew Peters, let alone wanted to kill him.
22.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Peters had thrown Grommet off the Reservoir property
One of Peters's employees, rooting around in logbooks of the reservoir authority, found mention of an incident in which Peters had evicted Grommet from the reservoir lands for hassling tourists a few weeks earlier. A call to one of the tourists established that he had heard Grommet threaten Peters, who seemed unconcerned.
So, the case against Grommet was getting stronger. The police could use better evidence, though. This came in the form of a complaint from Matteo Chelone, the groundskeeper at Clematis Station (an elderly living complex), about Grommet's attempt to obtain his help in “teaching peters a lesson.” Grommet didn't know Chelone from a hole in the ground, but had heard that he was strong, and had had some issues with Peters when he was a high-spirited teenager who took liberties on reservoir property.
23.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows:
Questions were never in short supply, but these developments only seemed to make them multiply. It had been acoup0le days since the article in the sentinel. Why had Chelone waited to come forward with this? Also, Peters's death had been publicized weeks ago. Did Chelone have something to hide, or was he just not a regular reader of the paper?
The latter proved to be true. “When Grommet came to me, I thought it a ridiculous idea.,” he said. “The initial reports of Peters's death didn't include Grommet. Peters could have had many enemies, so why worry about this one?”
Why, indeed?
And why kill Peters now, if the offending eviction was weeks ago?
For that, you needed to consider that Grommet was biding his time, looking for an accomplice.
Enter Salieri's sister.
Talia Salieri, who told the police that she had seen Grommet and Salieri talking in an animated manner, mentioning Peters repeatedly. She wasn't close enough to gauge whether they were on the same page, but figured that they were. Unlike a wife, a sister was allowed to testify against a suspect. And where was Salieri now?
“He's in Pittsfield working in an auto body shop,” she said. “You're lucky the Covid-19 menace prevents people from crossing state lines.”
24.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: a brief recap
For those who are confused about all the suspects, here's a lit of them:
Arnold Peters, nephew of the deceased. Probably begged off the alleged fishing trip early. No known involvement. Under his grandfather's watchful eye since.
Orlando Salieri. Not a particularly nice man, but he was seen at Peters's door shortly before Peters's death, and lead suspect Grommet had texted him. He was capable of violence (c.f. footage of him trying strangle another suspect), but no one knew if he had a beef with Peters. Even if he would do almost anything for money, no one knew if Grommet had any to offer, or if he had an independent beef with Peters.
Skronton Weembly, who died not long after Peters, and whose only proven connection to the case was his aunt's jeep, which was apparently used to carry the body.
Gus Grommet, the leading suspect. His cell phone was found near the body. Reservoir records revealed that he resented Peters's evicting him from the area a few weeks earlier. The state of his mind was anybody's guess.
Multiple witnesses had said that two men carried Peters's body from the jeep to the land near the reservoir. Who were they for sure? How and why had they assembled for the murder of a fairly harmless and inoffensive victim? Peters was not known to have much money, and posed no threat to anyone.
-----------------------------------------------------------
25.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: The tunnel at the end of the light
There was an abandoned railway tunnel near the reservoir. Naomi Fenster, seeking warmer lodgings than a makeshift tent, foud her way to the entrance, when she smelled food cooking. She peeked around the corner of the entrance and saw a teenaged boy in ragged clothes.
He lloked at her with misery in his eyes, and said, “on November first I saw the most horrid sight in my whole life. I am in fear for my life. I saw a burly man with a tattoo on his arm strangle the beloved supervisor of the reservoir. He did it at the mouth of this tunnel, early in the morning. Why? I do not know. Probably to avoid being seen.
Then the burly man noticed me and forced me to help him carry the body to a jeep, which was driven to the edge of the reservoir, where he carried the body. I managed to get away from him, and went back to the tunnel. I even wrote it all down in my diary.”
The name on the diary was that of Jason Dandrich, who had been reported missing from his home in Lost Village three weeks ago.
Naomi brought the diary to the police.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
26.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Jason Dandrich is found barely alive, deep in a tunnel.
The police found Jason deep in the tunnel, and had him airlifted
to Memorial Hospital in Workchester. It took a few days for him to even regain consciousness. He confirmed what had been written in the diary.
The attending psychiatrist believed that he had suffered a trauma from bullying at school, and wanted some time alone. The tunnel seemed to give him that. His extended family rallied around him, but they wondered why he would write a diary and then leave it where the wrong people might find it. No good explanation was forthcoming, except that maybe he hoped the bad guys would not think to return to the tunnel, and the diary would be found by someone who could help.
27.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: more loose ends to tie up
So, that was where Peters was murdered. Dandrich had carried the body under duress, and would not be charged. This assumed that he would ever recover enough to cope.
“You took an awful risk leaving that diary there,” his mother scolded.
“I hoped that the bad guy would be on the lam,” Jason said weakly.
Which was the case. Especially with his cell phone gone, and the risk of being tracked. Which was why he slept among the zucchini rather than in his room. Dear reader, we never said he was particularly logical, especially when inebriated.
28.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows:
Salieri realized that Jason, as an eyewitness, would finger him for bring the driver, so he admitted to that, but argued that he, too, acted under duress. Grommet was too powerful to resist, and might have had some hold over him that he couldn't undo.
So, there were three men in the jeep, but only two got out. In court, a prosecution lawyer would wonder why Salieri didn't just drive off. But maybe he felt sorry for Jason, alone with Grommet. Besides, Grommet dumped the body and raced back to the jeep. There wasn't time to flee, maybe.
Jason was on a lot of meds, and was seeing a therapist. Arnold Peters dropped by to see him and offer some comfort. “I could have been involved in that sorry mess,” he said.
29.Murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Aren't you tired of this case by now?
In the weeks that followed, very little new evidence turned up. People rallied around Jason Dandrich and Arnold Peters, who were basically decent kids, if a bit stressed out.
Salieri talked to someone from the Evening Sentinel, hoping to refurbish his image. Cynics said it would take more than a newspaper article to do that.
Grommet worked on a defense that claimed Peters threatened
him. Salmon doubted that a jury would buy that, but there were slim pickings as far as credible arguments went, given the eyewitness testimony from Salieri and Dandrich.
30.Murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Wrap-up
November ended with a cold spell. The only fishing from now on would be ice fishing, which violated reservoir rules.
Sergeant Friday missed the big family get-togethers his family usually gave. The Coronavirus prevented that. Undaunted, he bought a roasted turkey for himself. On November 30, he was still bringing turkey sandwiches to work.
“I'm sick of turkey,” he told Zelda, who just smiled.
A new supervisor was named for the reservoir, though the duties would be light this time of year.
Jason was likely to return to schooling at home by Christmas.
Salieri was told not to leave town. The judge almost incarcerated him, but empty jail cells were in short supply. He was kept under the watchful eye of his wife.
Arnold Peters was free to leave town, but decided to stay. He wrote a nice article praising Peter Peters for the evening Sentinel. Public opinion seemed to be in his favor. He decided to apply to the community college and take some business courses.
Bernard Philpin passed the site of the murder on his way to a meeting in Workchester on November 1. He was happy to note that no bodies could be seen. He mused about what would have happened had he not stopped on that fateful day.
Then he reminded himself that Peters's family would have filed a missing person report, and the reservoir would be checked, because of the neighbor who reported seeing the start of a “fishing” expedition. Maybe Naomi Fenster would have felt obliged to tell the police about what she had seen. The derelict might or might not have come forward. Gaia Philpin would definitely have come forward.
Yes, the body would have been discovered, if a bit later.
Bernard Philpin smiled about doing his duty as a pillar of the community....
The end
It was a gray November day -- the first of November, actually. Bernard Philpin, driving south on Route 62 on some errand that we won't go into here, happened to glance at the reservoir, and noticed something that seemed out of place. It looked like Peter Peters, the man who kept a watchful eye on the reservoir, but he was in an unnatural position, lying on the grass next to the reservoir. Philpin felt a sense of dread about this. The unnatural position was bad enough, but Peters' complexion was gray, and he wasn't moving. Philpin was used to seeing people asleep, but this did not seem to be the case here.
He pulled over to the side of the road, got out of the car, and walked to the guardrail. It sure looked like Peters. Lifelike, but possibly not actually alive.
He noted the location, took out his phone, and called the Crepuscular Meadows police station.
Sergeant Friday Mundy answered the phone in a professional voice -- no growling like in the movies or TV shows. Poor guy was saddled with a name that sounded like a joke -- his parents wanted him to be a detective, apparently, and they got their wish. Philpin hoped they rotted in hell for it, but he never said this aloud. He was supposed to be a charitable man.
He gave the location of the body, reassured the detective that he had not gone beyond the guardrail so as not to disturb the crime scene -- if that's what it was.
Then he continued on his way toward Workchester, where he had a business appointment.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------
2. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: the plot thickens.
Sergeant Friday Mundy wasn't having a good day. More like a terrible one. This just made it worse. First, the coffee pot was empty. True, he could send someone to Emma's Cafe for coffee, but everyone was either out on assignment or working a case in the office. Plus, there wasn't much in the petty cash drawer. Actually, there was rarely much there. People just paid for things out of their own pockets.
From the north-facing window, he could see the Park. From the south one, he could see the reservoir dam in the distance. He thought about what Bernard Philpin had just told him on the phone. Poor Peter Peters! He had the personality of a turnip, but the tourists liked him, and people in town were used to dealing with him. His absence would be felt.
And, he had no one he could spare for investigating this case. Three staffers were on vacation, two were on leave (one was on maternity leave, something the department never used to have to worry about).
He pulled up the file of active staffers on his computer, just to be sure he wasn't forgetting anyone. Nope.
That just left him.
Well, he was qualified. He had worked his way up to a Detective First Grade, and stayed there for three years, and now was the department's top detective. Actually, he was the town's only detective, despite his rank. The town had maybe one or two murders a year, and the Sergeant spent most of his time doing routine police work.
But now he had an actual murder to solve. And, this wasn't an anonymous John Doe, but someone known personally by at least half the town's citizens, and many more from outside.
This case wasn't going to make or break his career, but the respect that he now enjoyed might be diminished if he didn't find out who killed Peter Peters.
--------------------------------------------------------
3. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Interviewing the first lead: Peters's daughter.
Sergeant Friday Mundy called the Town Clerk's office to find out where Peters lived (when he was alive), and whether he had relatives who might know about his last activities.
Peters was divorced (his ex-wife now lived in Seattle, and a quick check showed that she hadn't left that city in the last few days). His only child was a daughter, Sophie, who was married to Leonard Berkowitz and mother to two daughters. She and her husband lived in Clanville, near the Crepuscular Meadows town line, and both worked at the Drawbridge Diner.
Sergeant Friday placed a call to the diner, and waited a few minutes for his call to be put through. When Sophie answered, he could hear a lot of noise – even at 10:00 a.m., the breakfast din was overpowering. “I'm Sergeant Friday Mundy of the Crepuscular Meadow Police Department, and I have some bad news for you about your father,” he said somberly.”
“Yeah, he's dead,” Sophie said, sniffling. “Someone from the police department called me an hour ago. They wanted me to come and identify the body, though they were in doubt that it was him. I went to the reservoir, identified him, and then was late for work. I hate this!”
“Is it too soon to ask you to meet with me to find out what, if anything, you know about his last actions?” the Sergeant asked. “Relatives who live nearby can be crucial in establishing the facts, even if they didn't live with the deceased.”
“The diner closes at 2:30. Come here at 2:00, and we can talk over a nice lunch. That is, if you like hash.” Then she hung up.
As it happened, the Sergeant liked hash.
---------------------------------------------------------
4. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Murder on the menu
“I haven't eaten here in ages,” Sergeant Friday said, peering at a food-spattered menu (which was, thankfully, plastic, so it could be wiped clean, except it hadn't been).
“The menu hasn't changed in ages either,” Sophie observed. “Except when prices had to go up. And since Covid-19 came along. You'll notice that this table is six feet long, to keep us that far apart.”
“I wondered about that,” Sergeant Friday said. “technically we s
shouldn't even be allowed to eat inside.
“Don't tell the authorities. You'll notice that each table is screened off from the rest of the diner. It's like a booth.”
“What do you recommend from the menu,” Sergeant Friday asked.
“Hash is today's special, but a lot depends on whether you want a second breakfast, or a nice lunch.”
“I've heard good things about the Cuban sandwiches here.” A waitress came to take their orders, then disappeared into the kitchen.
“Aha, so this place is not off your radar, being outside Crepuscular Meadows.”
“Well, Clanville isn't in my jurisdiction, but people at the station talk about this place. And this is just over the line.”
“Not to change the subject, but do the people at the station talk about my father? You know, I'm sad to lose him, especially this way. How was he killed?”
“The medical examiner says preliminary results are that he was strangled. There are bruise marks around his neck.”
“Gack! Not over lunch.”
“Lunch hasn't been served yet.”
“And I won't feel like eating it when it comes.”
“With your father dead, I'm surprised you felt like eating today.”
“I'm helping your investigation. I last talked to my father the night before he died. He planned to go fishing with a couple of friends the next morning.”
“Do you know who these friends were?”
“No, but his next-door neighbor might have seen them come to his door.”
“Who is the neighbor?”
“Geppetto Conti.”
--------------------------------------------------------------------
5. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: The neighbor in the cuckoo house
It was time for Sergeant Friday Mundy to visit Peter Peters's neighborhood. Up on a hill overlooking the Hoohaw River after it emerged from the reservoir dam, there was a side street where Peters lived. Next to it was where a man named Geppetto Conti had built a house shaped like a cuckoo clock. A very big cuckoo clock. Not only was the house shaped like a cuckoo clock, but Conti had dozens, perhaps hundreds of actual cuckoo clocks inside.
Sergeant Friday approached the area just as the clock was striking three. Suddenly a cacophony of cuckoo calls rang out up ahead. “Yep, this is the area, all right,” Sergeant Friday muttered. He rounded the crest of the hill and turned onto the street. Officers Phelps and Dodge were just emerging from Peters's house. Friday frowned. Teamwork would dictate that the chief detective be there when the house was searched. But after all, he had just been questioning the daughter of the deceased. The other cops looked sheepish. He filled them in n what he had learned at the diner, and they told him what they had found.
Then the three of them went next door to see if Conti could identify the two men who had called on Peters early this morning. Conti had surveillance cameras so he could be alerted when real cuckoos were nearby. He cheerfully rewound the videos from the cameras, and the four of them watched as two men knocked on Peters's door. The door opened, and Peters came out.
Sergeant Friday wasn't happy with what he saw. One of the men was Orlando Salieri, a man with a long list of priors. Why was Peters associating with such a man? The other man, in his twenties, was a stranger. Neither one was likely to be interested in going fishing, plus this was November. Who went fishing in November? Conti printed out a picture of him so the department could send it out to national services for identification.
“I've never seen either man before,” said Conti. “The younger man bears a family resemblance to Peters. Did he have young nephews or cousins?”
“Sophie might know, but by now she may be tired of dealing with this,” said Sergeant Friday.”
“It's a pity there weren't surveillance cameras next to where his body was found,” Conti offered.
“Well, there was a convenience store on the other side of the street form the murder site. Maybe they would have cameras?” offered Officer Phelps.
Sergeant Friday's eyebrow went up. This was good thinking. Give the man a promotion!
------------------------------------------------------
6. Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular meadows: the convenience store
The cops approached the convenience store, which was called Seven/twenty-four. A young man was tending the counter. No customers were present.
“Hi, what can I do for you?” the young man asked.
“Does your store have surveillance cameras?” Sergeant Friday asked.
“Sure, but they get erased at the end of every week.”
“Would they have enough range to see what was happening on the other side of the street?”
“Possibly, but the resolution would not be as good.”
“A man was found dead next to the reservoir, about twenty feet from the guard rail.”
“The camera would record only what was visible on this side of the guard rail. And I'm sorry to hear that anyone died, especially there.”
“Why 'especially there.'”
“That's known to be a very unlucky place for anyone to be.” the sergeant's eyebrows went up. “What I mean is that bad people sometimes hang out there.”
“Apparently some bad people did hang out there. Have you personally seen some of the bad people?”
“Occasionally.”
Sergeant Friday showed the young man pictures of the two suspects. “Have you seen either of these men? Ever?”
The young man thought a moment. “The younger man came in here one time when I was on duty.”
“Did he buy anything?”
The young man shrugged. “I have no secrets. It happened yesterday afternoon. He wanted cigarettes, some soda pop, and a fishing rod. I figured he planned on fishing.”
Yes, that would be a logical conclusion.
“Did he pay by cash or card?”
“Cash.”
“Too bad. A credit card would have had his name on it.”
“If it was really his,” commented Phelps.
Again, a sharp mind! Sergeant Friday nodded.
-----------------------------------------------------------
7.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: A thick plot gets thicker
They were back at the station. “Orlando Salieri has not, as far as I can deduce, ever gone fishing,” Sergeant Friday said.
“We have a possible I.D. For the younger man,” said Officer Dodge.
“Really? Who might he be?”
“Arnold Peters. Peter's uncle's grandson.”
“More mystery. He might like fishing, but why involve Salieri?”
“There's an answer. Salieri's his father-in-law.”
“Not a nice family to marry into,” observed Officer Dodge.
“Judging by Orlando Salieri, yes, but his wife was the daughter of a very fine judge,” said Phelps with a shrug of his shoulders. “An aunt was a professor of anthropology at Workchester State College, and had a bit of influence. The apple could just as well have fallen from the right side of the tree.”
“Um, did you know her by any chance?” Friday asked.
“I took a course from her.”
“So, I don't know what to think,” Sergeant Friday said.
“It's possible that neither of the men had anything to do with Peters's death,” said Phelps.
“That's possible.”
“But he's still dead,” said Dodge.”
--------------------------------------------------
8.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: The Crime Lab's report
The Crime lab in Narmady produced its preliminary report two days later. Time of death? Probably around 6:00 a.m. On the morning of November 1. This did not seem like a case of being killed while fishing or approaching the reservoir in preparation. True, one could go to the reservoir at 6:00 in July or August, but why so early in November? Why not wait for air temps to warm up into the forties at least?
Also, it appeared that Peters was not killed in the spot where he was found. The lab had various arcane explanations for this deduction, but basically the ground was not disturbed at all, as it would have been had Peters struggled against his murderer.
Also, a very recent cigarette butt was just six feet away, and there was a scuffed path where the body was apparently dragged to the edge of the reservoir from a location next to the guardrail. There were recent faint tire tracks in the breakdown lane next to the rail. Aha! They seemed to have been made by a Jeep.
Not many people had jeeps these days.
------------------------------------------------------
9..Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Gaia, the witness from above.
“Um, I hear that you are looking for information that might lead to the identification of the killers of Peter Peters.” Sergeant Friday looked up from his desk, where half of a tuna fish sandwich still lay untouched. Lunch had had to yield to pressing work. But the young lady who stood in front of his desk might have something to hep with that work.
“Gaia Philpin,” Sergeant Friday breathed softly. “The last time you were in here, a wild turkey had wandered into the middle of High Street, and you wanted us to protect it from traffic.”
“Yes, and my mission was successful,” Gaia said proudly. Gaia, the niece of Bernard Philpin, the town's wealthiest and most philanthropic citizen, believed that she could understand what trees were saying. She formed friendships with bats and cuckoos and any number of other creatures. If anyone loved the world's creatures more than she, that person didn't live in Crepuscular Meadows.
“I'd like to file a report on what I saw on the morning of Mr. Peters's death,” Gaia said.
She now had Sergeant Friday's full attention. He grabbed a witness statement form from the corner of his desk, and took a pen in his hand. “I'm ready when you are,” he said. “Just tell me what you saw.”
“I was on top of Monument Hill, in the botanic garden, speaking soothing words to the trees that were afraid to dial down their activities for the cold season,” she said. “Some trees are like that.”
Sergeant Friday knew about Gaia's tendency to ramble, so he said, “Please tell us what you witnessed relative to the murder.”
“It was about 6:00 in the morning, and still rather dark, but out of the corner of my eye I noticed a pair of bright headlights down on the road. I turned toward it, and saw a jeep which was pulling over into the breakdown lane. It stopped. Two men got out. They opened the back and picked up a man, and carried him over the guardrail and down the grassy slope toward the edge of the water. They dropped the man on the ground, then came back to the jeep, got in, and left.”
Sergeant Friday whistled. “Can you describe the jeep in any way? Particularly if you noticed its license plates as it was leaving?”
Gaia pulled out a pair of binoculars. “As I said, it was dark, but I squinted my eyes and used these to try and get the license plate number. I got the first three digits: MU5”
Sergeant Friday was getting very excited now. “Very resourceful! There are aren't many jeeps in this area, and having the first half of a license plate number may be the break we need.”
--------------------------------------------------------------
10.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: What's a jeep from
the other side of the country doing in Crepuscular Meadows?
It took a while to narrow down the possibilities of the license plate number because MU5 did not show up in any statewide register of jeeps. This meant tapping into a national database, which ran slower because of exponentially larger amounts of data to search. After a few hours, the results came back: the jeep was registered to Freesia Cooperman, an unemployed actress who lived in one of the lower-income sections of Los Angeles.
Ms. Cooperman was 27 years old, not unattractive, and unable to find both acting jobs and waitressing jobs, thanks to devastation wrought by Covid-19. It was anybody's guess where she had gotten to since the time of the murder, assuming that she was even aware that her car was being used to transport the victim.
Sergeant Friday placed a call to the Los Angeles Police department, explained the situation, and tried to instill a sense of urgency in the person on the other end of the line.
“They say they lack sufficient manpower to make contacting this person a high-priority task,” Sergeant Friday said wearily. “Does this have to be rocket surgery? You find her number, pick up the phone and call her. If she doesn't answer, get numbers for the neighbors, and keep calling until you reach someone who might have noticed whether she has been around lately. If her jeep is on this side of the country while the owner is in L.A., that's a little weird, but if she says it was stolen, we would have to give her the benefit of the doubt as long as h doubt lasts.”
Officer Phelps asked what Freesia's address was. “Ah, my sister lives just across the street. Maybe she could ask around.”
Sergeant Friday frowned. “That would be meddling in police business, officer.”
“She doesn't need to do police business. She writes news stories on a freelance basis. If she thinks there's a good story in this – and I don't see why there wouldn't be – she can ask the sort of questions that a good reporter would ask.”
“If you can get her on the phone, I could talk to her and steer her away from behavior that would amount to obstruction of justice,” Sergeant Friday said.
“You mean it wouldn't be an interesting story that the lady's jeep has mysteriously gone all the way across the country?” Officer Phelps asked. “She has no known reason to know any of the people involved in our case, but does she have a boy friend who borrowed it for a few weeks to visit his sick grandmother in this area? Sort of like Little Red Riding Hood but without the wolf...”
'That we know of," said Officer Dodge with a wink.
----------------------------------------------
11.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows:
As it turned out, Freesia Cooperman was sleeping peacefully in her
house when a reluctant L.A.P.D. Officer called her.
“The Jeep?” she said groggily. “You want to know why my jeep is on the East Coast in a place called Crepuscular Meadows? Well, that's where my nephew lives. He needed a car, so I loaned it to him.”
“May we ask the name of your nephew?”
“Yes, you may ask, but why do you care? It's not as if he killed someone, is it?” She gasped. “I bet he's in trouble. I hope it's not murder. Tell me he held up a 7-24 or something like that.”
“A murder has apparently been committed, and your jeep was seen leaving the scene where the body was found.”
“Ouch! I'm in shock!”
“We aren't saying you had anything to do with it, but we'd like to know who your nephew is.”
“Skronton Weembly. He washes dishes at Caledonian Grove Restaurant. It's hard to get around without a car, so I let him borrow it until he saves enough to get a car of his own. “
There was silence on the other end of the phone.
Half an hour later, Sergeant Friday had been apprised of Skronton Weembly's involvement in the case. Twenty minutes after that, a phone call to the restaurant established that Weembly had not been seen for three days.
“We're back to square one,” Sergeant Friday said.
--------------------------------------------------------
12.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Another murder, another need for a crime lab report.
It was even worse than Sergeant Friday had suspected. When the police showed up at Skronton Weembly's apartment, he was in fact at home, but no longer breathing. The same strangulation marks were around his throat as had been observed in Peters's case.
The Medical Examiner seemed t think that Skronton Weembly had been dead about as long as Peter Peters. The jeep was parked in front of his apartment building.
Two more days went by. The usual minor dust-ups and squabbles occurred that a police department concerns itself with. Missing cats. Bag ladies (or men) urinating in Mrs. Worthington's roses. Officer Phelps observed that the salt in urine is not good for roses, but the nitrogen is. A trade-off. No one listened to him.
Then there was a break in the case: a surveillance camera showed
Orlando Salieri with his hands around Weembly's neck. Would this be good enough evidence to hold up in court? The bad news? The scene caught by the camera played out the day before the murder. Time would tell. The big question was how to find Salieri, now that there was evidence of his involvement in at least one murder.
The fates smiled on the police department later that day. Salieri was caught red-handed stealing apples in Nobility, a small town next to Crepuscular Meadows. Officer Dodge wondered why he would bother to steal them, when they were lying around for the taking in the orchards was anyone's guess.
-------------------------------------------
13.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: But Salieri has an alibi
“I admit that I was mad at Weembly, but I did not kill him. I gave up and left him alone. He was still alive then,” Salieri said.
The medical examiner found this plausible. The camera footage was old. Weembly had done a shift of work at the restaurant since the footage was taken.
Could Arnold Peters have been involved? Well, his grandfather said that he had come home by 8:00 on the morning of Peter's murder, and had been accounted for ever since. The police questioned him, but he maintained that he had thought better of fishing so early, so he had gone back home without accompanying the other men.
“Technically, we know that “two men” carried the body to the spot where it was found,” Officer Phelps said. “We don't know who they were. The evidence doesn't place any particular individuals at the scene.”
“Salieri and Arnold Peters might have showed up at Peter's door, but we can't establish what they did after that,” Officer Dodge added.
Sergeant Friday cocked an eyebrow. “We can't question the fish, you know. They're the only ones close enough to the scene to know.”
“Unless they were asleep,” Phelps said. “Trout and bass feed at night, but they would have been winding down by 6:00.”
------------------------------------------------------
14.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: another witness, but how credible?
You can call them hobos, bums, derelicts, winos, or whatever, but there always seem to be some of them around. One of them came into the police station while the sleeping habits of fish were being discussed.
He didn't seem to have washed in months, he was ragged, and one hoped that he could find some place warmer than the outdoors before long.
His appearance was a mixed blessing at best. He had been sifting through the dumpster behind the store when the jeep arrived, and had crept to the edge of the parking lot to see what was happening – little chance of being seen, as he was well camouflaged with grime.
The police asked him to describe the two men – he said there were two, no more and no less. One older, one younger. One difference in his testimony, though, was that he thought he saw Peters writhing.
So, was Peters killed at the reservoir after all? Or had the witness been drinking and imagining things or making things up completely?
A clerk named Zelda came through with coffee and donuts – it was midmorning. She offered some to the witness, who eagerly wolfed it down.
“Where can we find you if we have further questions?” Sergeant Friday asked the witness.
“Here and there” was the vague reply.
“We'd check the dumpsters behind stores and cafes,” Officer Phelps
observed. The witness nodded. There were convenience stores and coffee shops not far from the 7/24, as well as cafes like Emma's on the edge of downtown. He'd probably not travel much further into town, but he wouldn't need to. Unless he was really hungry.
----------------------------------------------------------------
15.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: yet another witness.
The reservoir was a busier place than the police had imagined on that fateful first day of November. Naomi Fenster, a young woman who had run away from home, was living in a makeshift tent not 50 feet from the spot where Peters was found.
The bad news? Her testimony diverged from that given by Gaia and the derelict. “It was dark, like. I only saw one man. He was big and burly, with a tattoo on his right bicep. He hopped over the guard rail, dumped something on the ground, and then left in a hurry. Oh, and he dropped this in his haste to get away.” She produced a phone that had fallen out of his pocket.
Sergeant Friday feared that it was an anonymous burner phone, but it was upscale enough to have sensitive info on it. A techno geek could probably decrypt it.
Sergeant Friday sighed. Technically, camping near the reservoir was illegal, but her testimony, if useful enough, would be enough to let her not face any charges. And useful it turned out to be!
“Gus Grommet!” Sergeant Friday exclaimed later that afternoon when the phone's owner was identified. There were texts to Salieri about Grommet's waiting in the shrubbery down the street from Peters's house to ambush him. Salieri sent no answers to the texts, which left doubt as to whether he really wanted to be involved.
“Some welcoming committee!” Zelda exclaimed, breezing through the room with the afternoon coffee and pastries.
“Why didn't we notice Naomi's tent?” Sergeant Friday exclaimed.
“Because she saw us coming and removed it?” Officer Dodge said.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
16.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows:
Establishing that someone was at the scene was only part of the battle. Motive counted for plenty, too. Why would Gus Grommet want to harm Peter Peters? And where might Grommet be lurking? Also, why would he be driving Weembly's jeep if Weembly himself wasn't there?
Grommet had a checkered work history consisting of odd jobs. He frequented the pool tables at the Freedom Saloon and seemed to be out late at night in seedier sections of town.
But his residence was known, at least: The Meadows Rooming House. He'd been there three years. The rooming house had not been an upscale place, but the residents now included some down-on-their luck show business people thrown out of work by the Coronavirus. A call to Pat Schneider, the manager, established that grommet had not been seen in two days.
“Oh, Lord, I hope he hasn't been murdered too,” Officer Phelps exclaimed.
No, as it turned out, Grommet was passed out drunk in a secluded spot in the back of the Community Garden on High Street. The Zucchini still had some huge leaves, and he was well hidden by them. Bear in mind that this was across the street form the rooming house. But if he was that near to his room, why not just cross the street and sleep in his own bed?
Phelps and Dodge were sent out to retrieve Grommet and question him.....
--------------------------------------------------------------
17.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Grommet calls for his lawyer
“You ain't getting diddly from me unless my lawyer is present,” Grommet protested. And where was his lawyer? Seneca Salmon, the scourge of policemen everywhere! This was going to be quite some show.
“We didn't get the lawyer bit with any of our witnesses, or with Salieri,” Sergeant Friday grumbled.
“Salieri knew there would be evidence exonerating him. He probably talked with Skronton Weembly after the fight, and knew he was all right,” Officer Phelps said.
Sergeant Friday sighed. All right, he as a hardened veteran of many struggles, but he did sigh every so often. Seneca Salmon arrived twenty minutes later, grumbling about being pulled from a party for his nephew. Not everyone knew he had a nephew.
“I hope the nephew isn't going to go into the legal profession,” Officer Dodge said.
“Well, there are worse things he could do,” Sergeant Friday observed. This was met by raised eyebrows. “You only run into lawyers in police stations and courtrooms. And law offices, of course.” More raised eyebrows. “Unless he runs for office, which would be annoying, but non-lawyers do that, too.”
The others resumed what they had been doing. No one won or lost these discussions, and they all knew it.
When Salmon did arrive, he was a sight to behold, with a three-piece dark gray vested suit, a pristine white shirt, and a power tie.
The questioning started.
“Mr. Grommet, a witness placed a man resembling you at the scene where the victim was found. She found a cell phone on the ground shortly after, which was traced to you,” Sergeant Friday said.
“My client has nothing to say,” Salmon said.
“I suppose we would get nowhere if we asked him to show his right bicep,” Officer Phelps whispered to Officer Dodge, and was met with an icy stare form Sergeant Friday.
“If this were August, he'd be wearing a short-sleeved shirt,” Officer Dodge whispered back. This time, Salmon fixed him with an icy stare.
----------------------------------------
18.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Breakthrough or dead end?
The questioning continued for another half hour. He was asked if he had a cell phone.
“My client is not saying, one way or the other,” Salmon said.
“Oh, for Pete's sake, Salmon!” Grommet exclaimed. “I'd be nowhere without that phone! I want it back,” he told Sergeant Friday. “It's my property.”
“It's a piece of evidence,” Sergeant Friday shot back. “Your lawyer just said you might or might not have one. Now, which is it?”
This put Grommet and Salmon in a bad mood. “Let's say that my client does have a cell phone. That's not a crime,” Salmon said. “What would be a crime would be planting a phone that's been engineered to make him look guilty at the scene.”
This was exasperating. The same techies who had decrypted the phone could also have put things into it that weren't there before. Or could they? They'd have to be too brilliant for their pay grade. Sergeant Friday gave a mean smile. “We can see how that plays out in a hearing,” he said. “In any event, it's in our possession now, and
the ball is in your court.”
---------------------------------------------------
19.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: DNA evidence
What had not been mentioned yet was that the crime lab had found DNA under Skronton Weembly's fingernails as he tried to gouge the hands of his attackers. Grommet blew his nose before he left the station, and Officer Phelps noticed a speck of blood on the tissue. He saved it for DNA testing.
Three days passed with no more witnesses coming forward. Then the DNA lab called to say there was a match between the material under Weembly's fingernails and the blood on Grommet's tissue.
“We're partway there, exulted Sergeant Friday.
“But only one murder,”Officer Dodge said.
“No, both murders,” Sergeant Friday corrected him. “There was stuff under Peters's fingernails too. That matched Grommet, too.”
20.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Probable cause, but the suspect has vanished.
Dear reader, you probably thought the case was about wrapped up, didn't you? Eleven days early, at that! But no, fate held more surprises up its sleeve.
No one could be certain, really, if Peters was killed by the reservoir, or merely moved there after his death. The least reliable witness was the only one who thought he might have been “writhing.”
No one could be certain how many men were involved – or even if any of the “men” were women. The witness who was closest to the scene only saw one man. The others saw two men, but from a different vantage point. They all might have been correct, but who knew?
Was Peters already on the ground before Grommet arrived? Naomi said that a burly man “dumped something on the ground,” but was the something necessarily Peters?
Grommet was the best suspect by far, compared to the others. But when Phelps and Dodge showed up at his door to bring him back in, no one answered the door. Manager Pat Schneider revealed that Grommet had taken all his things and left the premises within hours after the questioning.
So, there was no joy in Mudville. Then Officer Phelps revealed that he had surreptitiously put a tracking device in Grommet's right shoe.
“That's illegal, you know,” scolded Sergeant Friday.
“It can be just between you and me,” Phelps said. “No one else need know. If we find him because of it, we can claim superior police skills.”
Sergeant Friday smiled. “We'd better remove the device quickly, though.”
21.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Then Grommet changed shoes
The tracker in grommet's shoe led the police to a warehouse next to the Convention Center in Crepuscular Meadows. It was next to the town cemetery. What they found was two shoes, but they were not on Grommet's feet.
A bulletin was issued to police departments asking anyone who had seen Grommet to contact the authorities. It was fortunate that the surveillance cameras at he police station had captured his image, so people would know what he looked like.
“Typical needle in a haystack, though,” Sergeant Friday grumbled.
Tommy Nemo, who wrote for the Evening Sentinel, published a story about the search for him.
Grommet;s mother helped a bit, though, by showing up and revealing that he had visited her an hour ago. She had slammed the door in his face. It was a busy time of day, and a few people had seen him go by. He seemed to be on foot (Weembly's jeep was no longer available, and Grommet seemed to lack transportation of his own).
At last, in a makeshift hut on Monument Hill, near the Botanic Garden, the police cornered Grommet, read him his rights, and then brought him to a holding cell in the police station.
This time his lawyer was unavailable, and Grommet was not the sort to let someone else speak for him.
Here the terrain got trickier, though. There was enough evidence to proceed, but no one had a lcue as yet as to whether Grommet even knew Peters, let alone wanted to kill him.
22.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Peters had thrown Grommet off the Reservoir property
One of Peters's employees, rooting around in logbooks of the reservoir authority, found mention of an incident in which Peters had evicted Grommet from the reservoir lands for hassling tourists a few weeks earlier. A call to one of the tourists established that he had heard Grommet threaten Peters, who seemed unconcerned.
So, the case against Grommet was getting stronger. The police could use better evidence, though. This came in the form of a complaint from Matteo Chelone, the groundskeeper at Clematis Station (an elderly living complex), about Grommet's attempt to obtain his help in “teaching peters a lesson.” Grommet didn't know Chelone from a hole in the ground, but had heard that he was strong, and had had some issues with Peters when he was a high-spirited teenager who took liberties on reservoir property.
23.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows:
Questions were never in short supply, but these developments only seemed to make them multiply. It had been acoup0le days since the article in the sentinel. Why had Chelone waited to come forward with this? Also, Peters's death had been publicized weeks ago. Did Chelone have something to hide, or was he just not a regular reader of the paper?
The latter proved to be true. “When Grommet came to me, I thought it a ridiculous idea.,” he said. “The initial reports of Peters's death didn't include Grommet. Peters could have had many enemies, so why worry about this one?”
Why, indeed?
And why kill Peters now, if the offending eviction was weeks ago?
For that, you needed to consider that Grommet was biding his time, looking for an accomplice.
Enter Salieri's sister.
Talia Salieri, who told the police that she had seen Grommet and Salieri talking in an animated manner, mentioning Peters repeatedly. She wasn't close enough to gauge whether they were on the same page, but figured that they were. Unlike a wife, a sister was allowed to testify against a suspect. And where was Salieri now?
“He's in Pittsfield working in an auto body shop,” she said. “You're lucky the Covid-19 menace prevents people from crossing state lines.”
24.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: a brief recap
For those who are confused about all the suspects, here's a lit of them:
Arnold Peters, nephew of the deceased. Probably begged off the alleged fishing trip early. No known involvement. Under his grandfather's watchful eye since.
Orlando Salieri. Not a particularly nice man, but he was seen at Peters's door shortly before Peters's death, and lead suspect Grommet had texted him. He was capable of violence (c.f. footage of him trying strangle another suspect), but no one knew if he had a beef with Peters. Even if he would do almost anything for money, no one knew if Grommet had any to offer, or if he had an independent beef with Peters.
Skronton Weembly, who died not long after Peters, and whose only proven connection to the case was his aunt's jeep, which was apparently used to carry the body.
Gus Grommet, the leading suspect. His cell phone was found near the body. Reservoir records revealed that he resented Peters's evicting him from the area a few weeks earlier. The state of his mind was anybody's guess.
Multiple witnesses had said that two men carried Peters's body from the jeep to the land near the reservoir. Who were they for sure? How and why had they assembled for the murder of a fairly harmless and inoffensive victim? Peters was not known to have much money, and posed no threat to anyone.
-----------------------------------------------------------
25.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: The tunnel at the end of the light
There was an abandoned railway tunnel near the reservoir. Naomi Fenster, seeking warmer lodgings than a makeshift tent, foud her way to the entrance, when she smelled food cooking. She peeked around the corner of the entrance and saw a teenaged boy in ragged clothes.
He lloked at her with misery in his eyes, and said, “on November first I saw the most horrid sight in my whole life. I am in fear for my life. I saw a burly man with a tattoo on his arm strangle the beloved supervisor of the reservoir. He did it at the mouth of this tunnel, early in the morning. Why? I do not know. Probably to avoid being seen.
Then the burly man noticed me and forced me to help him carry the body to a jeep, which was driven to the edge of the reservoir, where he carried the body. I managed to get away from him, and went back to the tunnel. I even wrote it all down in my diary.”
The name on the diary was that of Jason Dandrich, who had been reported missing from his home in Lost Village three weeks ago.
Naomi brought the diary to the police.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
26.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Jason Dandrich is found barely alive, deep in a tunnel.
The police found Jason deep in the tunnel, and had him airlifted
to Memorial Hospital in Workchester. It took a few days for him to even regain consciousness. He confirmed what had been written in the diary.
The attending psychiatrist believed that he had suffered a trauma from bullying at school, and wanted some time alone. The tunnel seemed to give him that. His extended family rallied around him, but they wondered why he would write a diary and then leave it where the wrong people might find it. No good explanation was forthcoming, except that maybe he hoped the bad guys would not think to return to the tunnel, and the diary would be found by someone who could help.
27.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows: more loose ends to tie up
So, that was where Peters was murdered. Dandrich had carried the body under duress, and would not be charged. This assumed that he would ever recover enough to cope.
“You took an awful risk leaving that diary there,” his mother scolded.
“I hoped that the bad guy would be on the lam,” Jason said weakly.
Which was the case. Especially with his cell phone gone, and the risk of being tracked. Which was why he slept among the zucchini rather than in his room. Dear reader, we never said he was particularly logical, especially when inebriated.
28.Spotlight on murder in Crepuscular Meadows:
Salieri realized that Jason, as an eyewitness, would finger him for bring the driver, so he admitted to that, but argued that he, too, acted under duress. Grommet was too powerful to resist, and might have had some hold over him that he couldn't undo.
So, there were three men in the jeep, but only two got out. In court, a prosecution lawyer would wonder why Salieri didn't just drive off. But maybe he felt sorry for Jason, alone with Grommet. Besides, Grommet dumped the body and raced back to the jeep. There wasn't time to flee, maybe.
Jason was on a lot of meds, and was seeing a therapist. Arnold Peters dropped by to see him and offer some comfort. “I could have been involved in that sorry mess,” he said.
29.Murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Aren't you tired of this case by now?
In the weeks that followed, very little new evidence turned up. People rallied around Jason Dandrich and Arnold Peters, who were basically decent kids, if a bit stressed out.
Salieri talked to someone from the Evening Sentinel, hoping to refurbish his image. Cynics said it would take more than a newspaper article to do that.
Grommet worked on a defense that claimed Peters threatened
him. Salmon doubted that a jury would buy that, but there were slim pickings as far as credible arguments went, given the eyewitness testimony from Salieri and Dandrich.
30.Murder in Crepuscular Meadows: Wrap-up
November ended with a cold spell. The only fishing from now on would be ice fishing, which violated reservoir rules.
Sergeant Friday missed the big family get-togethers his family usually gave. The Coronavirus prevented that. Undaunted, he bought a roasted turkey for himself. On November 30, he was still bringing turkey sandwiches to work.
“I'm sick of turkey,” he told Zelda, who just smiled.
A new supervisor was named for the reservoir, though the duties would be light this time of year.
Jason was likely to return to schooling at home by Christmas.
Salieri was told not to leave town. The judge almost incarcerated him, but empty jail cells were in short supply. He was kept under the watchful eye of his wife.
Arnold Peters was free to leave town, but decided to stay. He wrote a nice article praising Peter Peters for the evening Sentinel. Public opinion seemed to be in his favor. He decided to apply to the community college and take some business courses.
Bernard Philpin passed the site of the murder on his way to a meeting in Workchester on November 1. He was happy to note that no bodies could be seen. He mused about what would have happened had he not stopped on that fateful day.
Then he reminded himself that Peters's family would have filed a missing person report, and the reservoir would be checked, because of the neighbor who reported seeing the start of a “fishing” expedition. Maybe Naomi Fenster would have felt obliged to tell the police about what she had seen. The derelict might or might not have come forward. Gaia Philpin would definitely have come forward.
Yes, the body would have been discovered, if a bit later.
Bernard Philpin smiled about doing his duty as a pillar of the community....
The end
