Switchback Ch16 pt2

Carter pulled up outside the Ledger’s office at four-fifteen. He thought the place small for a newspaper’s headquarters, just two floors high and barely wider than a single-car garage. On one side was a closed barber shop and on the other a laundry service, also closed.

          The entrance door, half of which was glass, had various items stuck to it. The biggest being a flyer in the centre advertising the Leyton Falls Summer Festival, lower down someone had some pups for sale, there was a gardener looking for work, and a man with a van, what you can’t move he can, and centre top was the reason Carter was there, Printing Service Available, enquire within.

          The ground floor was office, painted blue walls; each with three canvases on them, all of which looked to be different red ink-blot tests smeared with blue and encircled by a yellow or orange egg-shaped ring. Two desks, the one on the left by the door held a PC monitor and keyboard and two wire trays, both empty. A triangular wedge in the centre of the desk said, “Clare Morgan Assistant Editor”. Clare Morgan’s chair was empty and tucked away. The second desk was in the right far corner with more or less the same items on top and an extra chair this side of it. The chair behind was occupied by a stout man in light-blue shirtsleeves and a loosened mauve tie below an unbuttoned collar. His grey hair was thinning and he wore half-moon glasses and had an extinguished half-smoked cigar sat in the corner of his mouth as his fingers danced over the keyboard like a pianist playing the minute waltz. The triangular wedge on his desk was in the left corner behind the monitor and said he was “Jack Ryland Editor”. Carter guessed him late-fifties. One of his wire trays was full, the other held only a copy of today’s Ledger.

          He motioned the chair. ‘Take a seat, son; be with you in two minutes.’ His voice croaky, but pleasant enough. ‘Deadlines, they just won’t wait,’ he added. ‘Well, s’pose that’s why they call ‘em deadlines, huh?’

          Carter sat. ‘Guess so,’ he said, and reached for the Ledger. ‘May I?’

          ‘Sure, help yourself.’

          He skipped what he’d already seen in the judge’s clipping and went to the following headline: “Tragedy at the Festival” below was a picture of a very pretty little girl. The picture looked to have been cropped from a classroom photograph, the child rigid but her smile carefree. The went on to say how six-year-old Elizabeth Ferris had drowned in two to three inches of water at yesterday’s festival.

 

“The tragedy began to unfold as Mrs Anne Morris who is the school’s principal, found Elizabeth Ferris’ body face down in Leyton’s Brook. When asked by our reporter, Mrs Morris said she had seen the girl playing on her own by the brook about five minutes before she actually discovered her body. She went on to say how she tried to resuscitate the girl but had failed to do so. Paramedics had arrived at the festival shortly after being summoned and their attempts at resuscitation had failed also. Elizabeth Ferris, a beautiful little girl who had only turned six years old that morning, was pronounced dead at the scene. At the time of the accident her parents Helen and Peter were assisting festival organisers some eighty-yards away and said they were unaware their daughter had slipped the group of friends they left her with. Mr and Mrs Ferris have since asked to be left in peace in order to come to terms with their loss.

Reporter: Jack Ryland.

 

The judge had only given him a clipping of the newspaper; did he really think he wouldn’t sooner or later find out about the Ferris girl? Okay, he wanted the murders up at the house investigated, would have wanted him to concentrate on those only. But those murders could quite possibly revolve around this little girl’s death. Someone blames someone else, someone shoots someone else. Sad, but in Carter’s expert opinion, that’s how the world seems to get by these days.

          Jack Ryland removed his glasses and put them on the desk between Carter and the keyboard and rubbed at the bridge of his nose. ‘Okay, I’m all yours,’ he said, a hand outstretched. ‘Name’s Jack Ryland.’

          Carter left his train of thought where it was and shook the offered hand. ‘Harris, Adam Harris, pleased to meet you, Mr Ryland.’

          ‘Jack, please.’

          ‘Jack.’

          ‘Now, what can I do for you, son?’

          Carter folded the Ledger to show the photograph of the fire and placed it over Ryland’s glasses.  ‘You reported on this.’

          ‘Sure did.’

          ‘Looks fierce, was it really that bad?’

          ‘Worse, way worse, picture don’t get across just how hot them flames were.’

          ‘Looks like you got kind of close if you ask me, Jack.’

          Ryland smiled. ‘Trade secret, son. Well, actually just a zoom lens if I’m honest. And they don’t call me honest Jack Ryland round here for nothin’.’

          Carter slid the Ledger off the desk, caught the glasses. ‘So you weren’t as close as the photo would suggest, then?’

          ‘Hell no, I was damn near standin’ on the front stoop of the old Evans place when I snapped that one. Flames damn near lit up the whole street.’

          ‘The old Evans place, you say?’

          ‘Yeah, the house across the street where them…’

          ‘Where them what, Jack?’

          ‘Beg pardon.’

          ‘You said, “…the house across the street where them.”’

          ‘Who are you?’

          ‘I’ve already told you who I am.’

          ‘I think you better leave. I’ve got work to do and I can’t spend all night talkin’ to you.’

          Carter took his Richmond badge and ID from his inside pocket, flicked it open. ‘Detective Adam Harris, Putnam County, homicide division.’

          Ryland looked around his desk, lifted the keyboard, looked on the floor at his feet, gave up. ‘I already spoke with you guys, not two hours ago.’

          ‘I know you did, Jack, sheriff Spooner told me. But something else is telling me honest Jack Ryland hasn’t been as honest as he makes out to be.’

          Ryland took a tissue from his trouser pocket and mopped his brow. ‘If this is about Mitch I told Spooner what I saw, everything I saw.’

          ‘I know you told him everything you saw, Jack. Like I said, he told me all about it. But what you didn’t tell him was everything you managed to take photographs of last night. Ain’t that right, Jack?’

          ‘I took pictures of the fire, that’s all.’

          Carter leaned forward. ‘You also took pictures of Mitch Cunningham lying on that front porch where the fire chief found him. You also went inside the house and took pictures of the murder scene in that bedroom. And when Spooner finds out how old honest Jack Ryland held out on him, and managed to contaminate his murder scene in the process, he’s−’

          ‘Now just hold on a minute, please, let me think.’

          ‘Okay, Jack, I’ll give you a minute to think. But if I were you I’d spend that minute either thinking about going to prison for a very long time, or printing off every photograph you took last night.’

          Ryland threw his damp tissue at the monitor. ‘Okay, okay,’ he said, and again looked for his glasses.

          Carter reached over, simulated a magic trick with Ryland’s shirt pocket. ‘Looking for these?’

          He snatched them. ‘So I give you these pictures and Spooner stays out of it, is that right?’

          ‘That’s right, Jack, and you stay out of prison.’ He looked across at the other desk. ‘Clare not working today?’

          ‘She’s on her honeymoon, not that it’s any o’ yours.’

          ‘Show me your IAPP card, Jack.’

          Ryland tossed his wallet on the desk. Inside the flap was a driver’s license on one side and a press card on the other with his photograph on the left underneath the IAPP badge logo, his name and job title and the name of the newspaper were on the right.

          ‘I need you to make me one of these, too. And should anyone ask, I’m just temporary until Clare gets back.’

          ‘That’s illegal.’

          ‘I’m sure you’re right, Jack, but leaving your DNA all over a crime scene wins hands-down, wouldn’t you say?’