“Am I under arrest?”
“No,” Detective Jones said. “Not at this point. You’re being detained for questioning. That’s all.”
I rubbed my wrists. They were still red from where the handcuffs had been moments before.
“Then what’s this all about?”
The detective pulled out a chair and sat. It was just the two of us in the interrogation chamber. A uniformed officer stood outside.
Jones produced a short unlit cigar and planted it in the corner of his mouth. “Tell me about the meeting you had earlier tonight with Talmadge Bagley,” Jones said. “What was it about?”
The question caught me off guard, and I was unsure of how to answer. Bagley was an unusual character and was well known by the police. Among other things, he fancied himself as a self-described ghost and monster hunter. He was also one of the newspaper’s best confidential sources, especially when it came to tips about unusual subjects and off-the-wall events.
When I arrived at the office for work tonight, a little after midnight, I found a note on my desk. Bagley had called earlier and requested that I meet him at Burton Park around three o’clock. Burton Park was one of a number of small parks in the oldest part of Claiborne’s downtown area, just off River Street. It was walking distance from my office at The Herald.
I left the office about five minutes to three and found Bagley sitting alone on a park bench. He looked well enough, but he seemed nervous. He kept looking around as if he thought someone was watching us.
“He said he had some information that I might be interested in,” I told the detective.
Jones nodded and pulled out a small notebook. “Go on,” he said. “What sort of information?”
“I don’t know if I should say,” I said. “I told him that I would keep it confidential, you know, between me and him.”
Jones nodded again and glanced up at the door’s small window. “Mr. McMorn, I’m going to be very honest with you. It will be in your best interest here tonight to tell me, in detail, everything that transpired between you and Mr. Bagley.”
“He wanted to show me a photo,” I said. “That’s all. He thought the paper might be interested in it for a story.”
“Did he actually show you the photo?”
I nodded. “He did.”
Jones scribbled in his notebook. “What was it a picture of?”
“It was a print of a digital photo of what he said was a dark figure with no features. I told him that I didn’t think it would be usable in the paper. It was an interesting photo, but too dark, too grainy.”
“What made it so interesting?”
“His back story about the shot.”
“Which was?”
“Well, I’m sure you know about Bagley and his hobbies.”
“What sort of hobbies?”
“He investigates the paranormal, for one.”
“Go on.”
“He said he’d been researching and tracking the subject in the photo for months. Tonight was the first time that he’d gotten close enough to take a picture of it. He said he was sitting in his car, staking out the corner of Grand Street and the Masonic Bypass, when it entered the street going toward the college. That was around 10 o’clock, he said.”
“He just took the one picture?”
“Yeah, he said it was the only one that turned out. The rest were worse than this one.”
“What else did he say about… the figure?”
“He said it just ran across the road, jumped an embankment and disappeared.”
Jones looked up from his notebook. “There’s only one embankment near that intersection.”
“Yeah, I know,” I said. “I’ve shot a lot of car wreck pics there.”
“How high would you say that embankment is?”
“Twelve to 15 feet would be my guess.”
Jones nodded and chewed on his cigar. “It’s every bit of 15 feet.”
I knew what he was getting at, and I tended to agree with him. No man, that is, no ordinary man could jump from the street to the top of that embankment, which is why I tended not to believe Bagley’s story.
“You want a cigarette or maybe a cup of water or something?” Jones asked.
“I’ll take some water.”
Jones got up, walked to the door and made a tipping motion with his hand to the officer outside. A few seconds later, I heard the gurgle of a water cooler and then the guard stepped in with a small cup of water. “Thanks, Sgt. Adams,” Jones said.
Jones handed me the water and took his seat. “What would you say if I told you that we’ve taken several informal reports this month about a man in a black coat, who has attacked at least three women? All he does is scare them, mess up their clothes a little and then he runs off.”
“I’d wonder why no formal reports were made about it.”
“And I’d say that all the victims were afraid that no one would believe them and the eventually exposure in the press would only embarrass them and their families.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because they all said that the guy had no face,” Jones said, pausing for effect. “We also have reason to believe that there have actually been other victims who’ve yet to come forward.”
I took a sip of my water and leaned forward. “What’s this got to do to with me?”
“Maybe a little, maybe a lot, maybe nothing.”
“How so?”
“We believe that you were likely the last person to see Bagley alive.”
“What?”
“We have reason to believe that Bagley is dead?”
“You don’t sound 100 percent sure.”
“We’re not.”
“What do you mean?”
“One of our beat officers found a pile of clothes on the sidewalk not far from Burton Park. They were about halfway between the park and Bagley’s car. And I mean everything, his shoes, his socks, pants, shirt, undershirt, wallet, rings, everything. All that, plus a lot of blood.”
“Did you check the ER?”
“That was our first call. They’d had a busy night, but no Bagley and no one matching his description.”
“You’re sure it was Bagley’s stuff on the sidewalk?”
“The driver’s license in the wallet was his.”
I sat back in my chair and folded my arms. “What now?”
“Just a few more questions.”
“OK, shoot.”
“How long did your meeting with Bagley last?”
“Ten or 15 minutes.”
“Are you sure?”
“As sure as I can be.”
“Did he say anything to indicate where he might be going next?”
“Not that I remember. I took it that he was headed home, but he didn’t say. He hung out at The Cotton House a lot, maybe he was headed there to grab a beer.”
Jones only nodded. Not looking up, he continued making notes with his tiny golf pencil. “Was he carrying anything?”
I had to stop and think about this one. I gotten a good look at Bagley, but I didn’t know there was going to be a test. “Nothing out of the ordinary. He did have a camera. You know, over his shoulder on a strap.”
“Anything else?”
“Nope. Nothing except the camera and the photo he wanted to show me.”
The officer paused to consider my response. “What did he do with the picture?”
“He gave it to me.”
Jones looked up. “Where’s it at now?”
“Right here.” I reached into my back pocket and removed the photo. It had been printed on heavy photo paper, and I’d folded it in half twice and stuffed it in my back pocket, assuming that it was one of several copies of the original digital image.
Jones motioned for the picture. “Let me see that.”
I handed it to him across the table, and he took it by one corner as if he wanted to keep track of where he put his prints. “Interesting,” was all he said.
I glanced at my watch. It was almost six o’clock. The sun would be up soon, and my editor will be most displeased by the fact that his nightshift reporter and photographer will have nothing to contribute to the next edition of The Herald.
“Are we about done here?” I asked.
Jones looked at me as if he was seeing me for the first time, as if he’d forgotten that I was even in the room. “Yeah, I guess so. You mind if I keep this?” he said, indicating the photo that I’d gotten from Bagley.
“You can have it,” I said. “I’m sure that Bagley will e-mail you copy of the original when he turns up.”
Five minutes later, Detective Jones stood at the third-floor window of his division’s large office. He could see McMorn down on the street. He’d just left the police station and was headed toward The Herald.
Jones turned from the window and looked at Bagley’s photograph once more before feeding it into the paper shredder beside his desk.
(All rights reserved. This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.)
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