Nome

It’s been a difficult day. The chief is exhausted. Too tired to spell patience. After the previous day’s trials, the night was interrupted by a snarling puzzle that stretched well into the next day. He’s been 28 hours without sleep. Chief Wilson has little left of himself to offer. He’s on his way out, leaving Jesse and Noah to clean up loose ends when he opens the door, and Emily rushes past him.

With his hand on the doorknob and his eyes on the floor, Lester listens as Emily excitedly spits out something about Charley, Aaron, and Elmer’s involvement in the murder.

It’s no use. Emily is talking far too fast for the chief to hear. Or maybe he hears but doesn’t want to listen to the demands this news might make, or how it will affect the rest of a day too long to measure.

“Alright!” he shouts, and the office is still. The chief’s hand is raised while he looks down to the floor closing his eyes. “First, and maybe the most important part of this story that you don’t know is that the guy may have drowned. At least, it seems pretty obvious to me.”

“But that’s not what Elmer said ….”

“Don’t interrupt, please!” the chief shouts. Lester takes a breath and starts again in a more conversive tone. “The Doc did say it’s possible he hit his head, but that’s not confirmed. So, let’s recap.” Wilson is calmer but still annoyed. “You want me to believe a drunk who just spent the night here; who never said a word about any of this to anyone; shows up—after drying out, I should add—shows up at the Polaris with some idiotic story about a plot to kill …” He stops. “Aw, come on, Emily.”

The chief is turning toward the door once more. He has never let go of the doorknob, and now, he intends to use it to leave. “I’ve been up all night, plus some—near as I can figure, too long. I’m tired. I’m pissed. And even if I were in my right mind right now, I’d still think this is bullshit. The guy’s telling you stories to get a beer. How many beers did it take to have him come up with this story?”

Emily doesn’t answer right away. She is surprised by the reaction she’s just seen from this usually mild-mannered man. She speaks in a lower, more relaxed voice. “None. He walked in and started talking.”

Lester pulls the door open wider to leave.

Emily looks down at Jesse’s desk and notices a clear plastic bag with a rawhide necklace inside.

“Hey, where’d you get the necklace?”

Surprised, Wilson stops, turns, and looks at Emily. “You know what that is?”

“Yeah, it’s a walrus tooth,” she says casually. “It’s Charley Matthews’ necklace. He’s always wearing it and playing with it. Kind of a nervous habit.”

From the look on the men’s faces, Emily can see this is a puzzle piece. She realizes it but doesn’t know what puzzle it belongs to. She says again, very matter-of-factly, “It’s Charley Matthews’. Where’d you get it?”

Lester walks outside. He turns to Emily, “Never mind right now,” he says. “I’ll tell you later.” The chief is, once more, in action mode. “Jesse, get her statement. Noah, get over to the Polaris and pick up Elmer if he’s still there.”

The long night is going to get longer. Emily's added information about Elmer will keep—at least for an hour or two long enough for Lester to close his eyes and let his mind drift into more pleasant thoughts. But that’s not going to happen. The necklace is damning evidence that could verify Elmer’s story. If the man was dead before hitting the water, he held onto that necklace until the water left him drying out on the cold Nome beach.

The chief walks to his car. He slumps into the front seat, grabbing the steering wheel with two hands, angrily slamming his hands against the hard surface before pausing to reach for his phone.

“Doc, it’s Lester. You been able to come to any conclusions about the body? Good. We gotta talk. You at the hospital? The morgue. Yeah, of course, I know where it is. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

In five minutes, Lester is walking through the hospital halls toward the morgue. As he enters, he sees Doc leaning over the naked corpse.

“There are a couple of things happening here,” Doc says as he sees Lester approach.

“Yeah, go ahead.” Lester will wait to see if Mitch has found anything other than what he initially suspected before sharing Emily’s story.

“Well, first, there was some water in the lungs but not enough to be the cause of death. It looks like his last breath was very shallow. That could be because his hyoid was shattered along with his crushed trachea.”

“Stepped on?”

“Yeah, that’s a good bet.” Doc likes that explanation. “Also, there was a severe blow to the head. Could have been a fall or a heavy blunt object. I’m leaning toward the former,” he says as he moves his hand toward the left side of the body’s face. “Here’s another interesting thing, this side of his face has the zygomatic process of the temporal bone fractured with enough force to separate the mandible from the rest of the skull.”

“OK. I think I know what that means, but . . .”

“He was kicked pretty hard,” Doc says. “Broke the side of his face and his jaw.”

“So, we have a murder, not an accident.”

“Yes. Pretty vicious one too.”