The pond was part of an overflow of the Calumet River. It wasn’t very deep, but its murky waters covered a vast expanse of the marsh. Close up I read conflicting signs tacked to the trees, one proclaiming the area a federal clean-water project, the other warning trespassers of hazardous wastes. Some oversighted agency had made a haphazard attempt to enclose the pond, but the low wire fence had fallen down in a number of places, making it easy to breach. Gathering my skirt in one hand, I stepped over one of these collapsed sections to the water’s edge.
Dead Stick Pond used to be a great feeding area for migrating birds. Now the water was a dull black, with stark tree stumps poking surreal fingers through its surface. Fish have been returning to the Calumet River and its tributaries since the passage of the Clean Water Act, but the ones that make their way into the pond show up with massive tumors and rotted fins. Even so I passed a fishing couple trying to find dinner in the dirty water. The two were shapeless, ageless, sexless in their layers of worn garments. I could feel them watching me until I disappeared around a curve in the marsh grasses.
I followed a track to the south end of the pond, where the papers said Nancy had died. I found the spot easily enough —it was still marked with yellow police tape and the big yellow signs declaring the area off limits as the site of a police investigation. They hadn’t bothered to leave a patrolman—who would have agreed to such a posting? Anyway, the rain had doubtless washed away anything the evidence team hadn’t picked up last night. I ducked under the yellow tape.
The killers had parked where I left my car. Or near there. They had dragged her along the path I had just traversed. In broad daylight. They’d gone past the fishing couple, or past the place where the two stood. Just lucky that no one had seen them? Or relying on the furtive lives of those who frequent the swamps to protect them from idle curiosity?
The rain had washed away any signs of Nancy’s body, but the police had marked an outline with stones. I squatted next to them. She had been dumped from the blanket and landed on her right side, head partly in the water. And had lain there in the oily water until she drowned.
I shivered in the damp air and finally pushed myself back to my feet. There was nothing to be seen here, no trace of life or death. I headed slowly back down the path, stopping every few feet to inspect the bushes and grasses. It was a futile gesture. Sherlock Holmes would no doubt have spotted the telltale cigarette butt, the gravel from another county that didn’t belong here, the fragment of a missing envelope. All I saw was the endless array of bottles, potato-chip bags, old shoes, coats, proving that Nancy was only one of many discarded bundles in the swamp.
The fishing couple were standing exactly as they had on my way in. On impulse I started toward them to see if they’d been here yesterday, if they’d noticed anything. But when I stepped off the path a gaunt German shepherd got to its feet, glaring at me with wild red eyes. It braced its forelegs and bared its teeth. I muttered, “Nice doggie,” and returned to the trail. Let the police interrogate the couple—they were being paid for the work and I wasn’t.
Back at the road, I hunted around for the place where the killers had carried her over the fence. I finally found a few green threads snagged on the wire about twenty feet from where I’d left the car. I could see where last year’s grasses still lay broken under the weight of her assailants’ feet. The area was relatively untrampled, though, so I didn’t think the police had bothered with a search at this end.
I moved carefully through the undergrowth, inspecting every piece of litter. I cut my hands parting the dead grasses. The skirt of my black dress grew stiff with mud and my fingers and toes were frozen when I finally decided there was nothing I could accomplish here. I turned the Chevy around and headed north to try to find Nancy’s man in the state’s attorney’s office.
With my bedraggled dress and mud-streaked legs, I wasn’t dressed for success, or even for making a good impression on public servants. It was getting close to three, though; if I went home to change, I’d never get back to Twenty-sixth and California before the end of the business day.
I’d spent my years on the county payroll as a public defender. Not only did that put me on the other side of the bench from the state’s attorneys, it left me with a permanent suspicion of them. We all worked for the Cook County Board, but they earned fifty percent more than we did. And if a hot case made it to the papers, the prosecutors always got mentioned by name. We never did, even if our brilliant defense made them look like dog food. Of course I’d cultivated my share of prosecutors, working out plea bargains and other deals. But there wasn’t anyone on Richie Daley’s staff who’d be glad to give me information for old times’ sake. I’d have to do my Dick Butkus imitation and bull my way through the middle of the line.