DECKER, WE CAN’T just barge into the man’s house while he’s here. We don’t have a warrant.”
She was hustling after Decker and caught up to him after he cleared the tree line and the mansion and other buildings came into view once more.
“I just want to look around the grounds and maybe in some of the outbuildings.”
“We still need a warrant to do that.”
“Do we?”
“You damn well know we do.”
Ignoring this, he kept walking until he reached the garage, which was not attached to the house but was separated by a lumpy brick courtyard. The garage had six bays, and all six were wide open, allowing them to see clearly inside.
“Just the one Suburban,” observed Decker. “Looks pretty old.”
The truck sat a bit crooked in the bay closest to the house.
“I don’t see anything that jumps out,” said Jamison.
Decker stepped into the garage and examined one of the walls.
“Look at this, Alex.”
She drew up next to him and looked at the hole in the wall.
“It’s a hole, so what?”
Decker pointed around. “There’re holes over there and over there. And I noticed some in the house when we were passing down the hall. And they were in his study too.”
Jamison’s face screwed up. “That’s weird. Do you think he has rats? And they opened the walls to check for that? Or mold?”
“That might be it. I would imagine a place like this is overrun with vermin and mold.”
“Great, and we’ve been breathing it all this time.”
“Well, he’s been breathing it all his life.” Decker glanced over her shoulder. “Maybe we’ll have better luck with that building over there.” He headed off to a structure set about a hundred yards away.
Jamison hurried after him, glancing back at the house to see if perhaps Baron was watching them.
Decker reached the building.
It had stone walls, a tin roof, and a thick wooden door, with a pair of windows bracketing the front portal.
“What do you think this is?” asked Jamison.
“One way to find out.”
Decker opened the door and stepped inside.
Jamison scooted in after him, looking uncomfortable at this illegal intrusion.
Inside were shelves with clay pots, an old copper sink, stacks of wooden boxes with faded writing on the sides, and hooks on the wall from which a variety of gardening tools and instruments hung. On the countertops were old seed packets and long, shallow wooden boxes with metal mesh over them. Next to that were some old leather-bound journals.
Jamison opened one and looked down at the spidery writing that included plant references, weather, soil conditions, and lists of supplies and materials.
“It’s a potting shed,” she concluded. “I haven’t seen one of them since, well, I never have except on HGTV. Some of the entries in this journal are dated eighty years ago.”
“They probably had a full-time outdoor staff way back when. Maybe a flower and kitchen garden.”
Decker tried the tap and water came out.
“Really smells in here,” said Jamison. “And look, there are holes in the wall here too. I bet there are whole colonies of critters living inside there.”
Decker opened some drawers. “And you have rotting soil and mulch and maybe decaying plants, plus mold and mildew collected over the decades. Not a nice mixture, but—”
He stopped talking when he opened what looked to be a closet door and peered inside.
“Check this out.”
Inside the space was a pillow, a thin rolled-up mattress, a blanket, and a small duffel.
Jamison peered over his shoulder. “Do you think someone was staying here?”
“Maybe.” Decker pulled out the duffel, set it on the counter, and opened it. Inside were a couple of threadbare shirts, a dirty pair of men’s dungarees, sneakers, and a rolled-up canvas fanny pack.
When Decker unrolled it, Jamison said, “Damn.”
They looked down at a trio of syringes, three needles with corks on the tips, a few vials of liquid, a spoon, a crack pipe, a length of elasticized rubber, some plastic baggies containing white powder, a Bic lighter, four joints, and a clasp knife.
“Basically, your classic druggie’s survival pack,” said Decker.
“You think this belongs to Baron?”
Decker held up the pants to his legs.
“Baron is about two inches shorter than me. These pants are for a guy under six feet, so no, I don’t think so.”
“Some squatter, then?”
“That’s more likely.”
“Do you think Baron knows about it?”
Decker stared out the window at the main house. “I don’t know. There’s a direct sightline from here to there. Unless whoever it was came and went at night.”
“Well, they probably would if they were here illegally.”
“But why pick this place when we’ve been told that there are lots of empty homes in Baronville where people squat? Why come all the way up here to a crappy old potting shed? It’s not like you could come and go so easily. And if the guy is squatting, it’s not like he can drive a car right up here and not expect to be seen. He can get water from the tap, but I don’t see any food around. How does he eat? And there’s no bathroom here.”
Jamison said, “So maybe Baron does know about it. Maybe he feeds him and lets him use the facilities in the house.”
“So he’s feeding a druggie and allowing the guy to stay in the old potting shed. Why?”
“Baron is sort of down and out too. Maybe he feels sorry for the guy.”
Decker shook his head. “I could better understand that if Baron were rolling in dough, which he’s not. And apparently everybody in town hates him.”
“Maybe this guy isn’t from Baronville.”
“If so, how did he come to be here? You wouldn’t look at this place from a distance and be able to see that it was run-down. And how could he know only one person lived here? Or that there were outbuildings where he could stay?”
“He might have talked to some people in Baronville and learned all that.”
“I wonder where this guy is now?” He looked at the drugs and the accompanying paraphernalia. “And why leave this here? Most druggies I ran into when I was a cop would never leave their stash behind.”
He picked up one of the plastic baggies. “Nickel bag of coke. About a gram’s worth. These vials are probably heroin. Three to four bucks a pop in a metro area. Maybe more in a place like this. The elastic band is used to pulse the vein for the injection site. The lighter and the spoon are to make crack from the cocaine. Water and a pinch of baking soda. You stir off the residue, then you smoke the liquid coke in the pipe.” He looked closely at the three syringes. “Never seen three needles for one druggie, though.”
“Maybe he’s trying to avoid infections.”
“You mostly get that if you’re sharing needles with someone else.”
After a thorough search they turned up a few more items: a bottle of antiseptic wipes, two cell phones, a list of phone numbers written out on paper. And, cleverly hidden behind a cut-out panel under the sink where the pipes went into the wall, they found the pot of gold.
Or drugs, rather.
Fifty baggies of powdered coke, twenty vials of liquid heroin, and ten rocks of crack, along with a roll of cash rubber-banded together, and a loaded Sig Sauer nine-millimeter with the serial numbers filed off.
“Decker, this guy’s not a user. He’s a dealer.”
Decker didn’t answer because he was staring at something on the floor.
Jamison looked at the spot. “It’s a narrow line in the dust,” she said. “Like something was dragged over it.”
Decker got down on his knees to examine the mark more closely.
He stood and looked at Jamison. “What do you want to bet the person staying here won’t be coming back?”
“What do you mean?”
“That mark isn’t from something being dragged over the floor. It’s from a bike tire. I think we just found Michael Swanson’s final place of residence.”