Archer Mayor - Bellows Falls

We paused again at the top to survey the peaceful scene. Even knowing there was no danger at the moment, I felt the threat of calamity lingering, like a growl in the throat of a restless beast.

“Fifteen years I’ve been looking at this-still knocks me out,” Davis admitted.

I picked up the thread we’d dropped several minutes ago. “If Norm’s as dirty as you think he is, doesn’t the Southern Vermont Drug Task Force have something on him?”

The other man shook his head and headed back up the embankment to the car. “Not that I’ve heard, and we’re in a position to know. Our other sergeant, the guy who normally shares the shift supervision with me, he’s on assignment with them, has been for over half a year now. We talk all the time, and he’s never said a word about it. I guess they either don’t consider Norm a big enough fish, or they just haven’t got to him yet.”

We returned downtown in the cruiser. After mulling it over a while, Davis added, “’Course, it might also have something to do with his coming from here. Could be the task force doesn’t want to waste its time.”

I glanced over at him, seeing his neutral expression. Even Greg Davis, who despite his demeanor was obviously a town enthusiast, shared the dismissive, self-deprecating, pessimistic trait that so deeply stamped the citizens of Bellows Falls.

Brattleboro was considerably larger than this town, as was its welfare population. But it was also a feisty, combative, opinionated urban hub, which took its social woes in stride. Bellows Falls, by contrast, seemed resigned to living off table scraps, wondering when someone or something from the outside would appear to make everything better.

This was interesting sociology, but I had a more pertinent motive in pondering it. It made me think about Norman Bouch, and how and why he’d chosen this particular piece of real estate on which to settle down. A contractor’s haven it was not. On the other hand, given its population, its attitude, and its proximity to one of Vermont’s two interstates, it did seem a custom fit for Norm’s other supposed source of income.

All of which made for some curious ingredients in what Emile Latour was hoping would be a cut-and-dried case.

“I’M GOING TO INTERVIEW BOUCH and his wife tomorrow,” I said. “I’d like a little more background on them. Who do you suggest I talk to? Preferably somebody without an ax to grind.”

Anne Murphy glanced up at me, a wary, beleaguered expression on her tired face. Dressed in slacks, sneakers, and a blue work shirt, she didn’t look like a typical nurse. But then she didn’t have the typical nurse’s job. Employed by Vermont’s Department of Health, she spent half her time on the road, visiting patients at their homes-generally places the police also knew all too well-trying to inform them about nutrition, child-rearing, battering, and drug abuse. It was a taxing, sometimes dirty and dangerous job, not to be performed in a tidy white uniform.

She was in her office right now-a small, bland cubicle in a Springfield building shared with other state employees-and didn’t seem in a receptive mood. “You the one who called?”

I nodded and extended a hand in greeting. “Yes-Joe Gunther.”

Ignoring me, she waved to a chair opposite hers. “I heard of you. Sit.”

I looked around quickly. The walls were white cinderblock, the lighting antiseptic, the floors easy to clean. The windows, as they always seem to be in state and federal buildings, were placed above where you could see out of them from a sitting position. She’d done her best to soften the tone-a bunch of flowers were on her desk, and several posters on the walls depicted soothing, pastoral scenes.

“What do you want?” she asked.

She sat as if recovering from a long hike up a mountain-slightly slouched, her feet planted, her forearms resting heavily in her lap. But her face spoke of a greater weariness, her eyes especially. In combat I’d seen the same look on men coming off the line after weeks of heavy action. There was resignation added to the exhaustion, which told of damage far beyond the cure of a good night’s sleep.

“I’m on delicate ground here,” I started, hoping she’d appreciate the candor. “I’m conducting an investigation that involves one of your patients, at least according to Greg Davis in Bellows Falls. I know you have confidentialities you can’t violate, but I was hoping you could give me some background material.”

“This about Jan Bouch and Brian Padget?”

I couldn’t suppress a laugh. “Boy-that didn’t take long to get out.” I placed my tape recorder on the desk next to her. “I want to make sure everything stays on the record. Do you mind?”

She looked at the machine for a long moment before saying, “I guess not. I think Norm’s giving them both a bum rap.”

I didn’t take the bait, leery of moving too fast. “Do you know what the charges are against Brian Padget?”

She smiled bitterly. “Fooling around with Jan. Everyone else does that kind of stuff, but I figure it’s against some cop rule or another.”

“How do you define ‘fooling around’?”

Her expression turned incredulous. “Her cheating on Norm. Does turning on that recorder make you a little hard to reach?”

“Just cautious,” I answered. “Did you ever see Jan and Brian together?”

“Once. It was late at night, behind some buildings, not far from her house. They didn’t see me and I left them alone.”

“He was in uniform?”

“No.”

“When was that?”

“A week or two ago.”

“And what were they doing?”

“Kissing.”

“Was she resisting in any way?”

Anne Murphy laughed shortly. “She kept her clothes on. Other than that, she was all over him.”

“Did you ever see or hear anything about Brian harassing her at any time?”

She frowned. “Harassing? She was cheating on her husband with him. Is there a law against that?”

The question seemed genuine. “Not that I know of, but it is contrary to an officer’s code of conduct. My investigation isn’t criminal in nature, Ms. Murphy. Norm Bouch has filed a sexual harassment charge against Padget.”

Her eyes narrowed and she sat forward in her chair. “That’s total bullshit. Norm Bouch would like to fuck every woman in that town, me included. The same way he shakes a man’s hand, he checks out a woman’s tits and ass, and if she gives him half a chance, he makes a grab for them just to see if he gets lucky. I’ve been waiting for him to try that with me for years, only he’s not quite that dumb. If anybody’s a harasser here, it’s not some wet-behind-the-ears, post-pube junior cop, it’s that asshole.”

I let a moment pass to clear the air, before saying, “Okay. Why is Jan Bouch a patient of yours?”

The weariness resettled on her face. “You don’t expect me to answer that, do you?”

“I didn’t think it would hurt to try. How ’bout some more general information? Can you tell me about the Bouches as a couple?”

She pointed soundlessly at the recorder. I leaned forward and turned it off. So much for the record.

“I’m not anti-cop,” she said. “The way I look at it, we do some of the same things in different ways. The best of you try to stop wife-beaters and the child abuse and the dope dealing, and those are all the things that make my job next to impossible. But I also depend on trust to get my foot in the door. I can’t be blabbing to you and expect to get anything done. I shit all over Norm just now ’cause I’ve done it to his face, but I don’t want to jeopardize the few gains I’ve made in Bellows Falls, especially not to protect some dumb cop’s reputation. He should’ve known better.”