M Sellars - Never Burn A Witch

The street immediately in front of the pool enclosure was alive with light bars atop emergency vehicles flashing in and out of sync. Each revolution temporarily stained the snow with harsh, multi-colored blotches of brilliance. The wildly flickering show was almost enough to mesmerize.

Powerful halogen lamps were mounted high on strategically placed standards around the pool area, and they now flooded it with severe blue-white illumination. Originally meant to extend the hours of swimming enjoyment deep into summer nights, they cast eerie shadows across the frozen tableau. The hard edges of obscurity served only to underscore the horror and misery that had forced its way into this place intended for happiness and pleasure.

Ben slipped his badge onto a thick cord as we walked and then hung it around his neck in plain view before we signed ourselves in on the crime scene log. The officer tending the entrance to the pool area was from the local municipality that encompassed the subdivision of condominiums and was unfamiliar with my part in the investigation. Since I lacked a badge, it took a terse and abbreviated explanation of my role by Ben in order to overcome the patrolman’s unwillingness to allow me entry. Finally, we continued past the yellow tape barrier without further challenge.

“Ben, Rowan.” Carl Deckert addressed us grimly as we skirted around taut stretches of bright, canary-colored plastic labeled with simple black letters-CRIME SCENE – DO NOT CROSS.

“Carl,” I returned with equal bleakness in my voice.

Ben just nodded and silently inspected the surroundings, all the while casting an occasional watchful eye in my direction.

“I thought Connie was comin’ with you,” Deckert remarked, cocking his head and glancing past us for the absent federal agent. He was the only person I’d ever met who could get away with calling her by the clipped version of Constance. I guess it had something to do with his grandfatherly demeanor.

“She should be here in a bit,” Ben replied. “She doesn’t live too far away, and she wanted to stop and change clothes.”

“Change clothes? What for?”

My friend just shook his head. “She was dressed a little on the formal side tonight. Somethin’ to do with an assignment.”

“Ahhh. Okay.”

A deep, recessed basin in the mantle of snow outlined the swimming pool, in and of itself. It was fairly common as private pools go-roughly kidney-shaped and not huge by any means but not the smallest I’d ever seen either. A path had been carefully cleared through the snow around the perimeter on one side. The opposite border was marred by a single row of foot traffic and appeared to be the path the killer had taken. Therefore, it had been left intact to preserve any possible evidence. Small spots of red were scattered here and there along the trail up to a small depression where they blossomed into several garish blotches. The victim had been bleeding.

We were standing in the shoveled area opposite the low brick building that housed the pumps, filters, and changing rooms. Here, the pale, crystalline blanket of snow came nearly even with the concrete deck. If the pool had been properly winterized, which considering the neighborhood I was certain it had, somewhere around two feet below the pristine white cover would be a sheet of ice. Beneath that would be murky, chemical-laden water, along with leaves and anything else that had blown or fallen in since its closure just after the Labor Day holiday.

All in all, it was a normal swimming pool that had been shut down for the winter months, with one glaring exception-tonight someone had deliberately beaten a hole through the thick crust of ice and placed another human being into the water’s chilled depths.

“Looks like he used something to chip away at the ice,” Deckert announced with a frosty sigh as he pointed across the depression to a gaping hole in the snow on the other side. “Not sure what, but he broke it up pretty good. Enough to get a body through anyway.”

“Don’t they normally put covers on pools when they close them up?” I asked.

“Most of the time, yeah,” Carl answered. “But not always. Obviously they didn’t on this one.”

“Anybody besides the security guard notice anything?” Ben asked.

“Not that we’ve heard yet, but we’re doin’ a door to door,” Deckert replied.

“Prob’ly give us a big fuckin’ zero,” my friend mused aloud.

“Yeah,” Carl agreed, “probably. But maybe we’ll get lucky. I’m guessin’ this wacko’s been here before.”

“Why is that?” I inquired.

Deckert pointed across the pool and traced the cordoned off route through the air with his finger, starting at the gate and ending at the hole in the ice.

“The whole cover thing for one, but more importantly, look at the path. We’ve isolated the rent-a-cop’s footprints and kept the area blocked off,” he explained. “The killer cut the padlock on the gate, prob’ly just used some bolt cutters. From there he followed that path straight to where he broke through the ice.”

“Yeah,” I shrugged, “I guess I’m still missing something.”

“Okay, pretend the hole’s not there,” he instructed. “Now tell me which end of the pool is the deep end.”

“Shouldn’t it be right there? Farthest from the gate?” I asked. “Isn’t that an insurance thing?”

“Exactly,” Deckert replied with a nod. “But there’re two gates, and they just kept the one at the deep end padlocked all the time rather than replace it with regular fencing. If you look at the tracks, that’s the one he came through, and the deep end is actually right there where the hole is. So, since you can’t really tell which gate is the proper entrance just by lookin’ at ‘em, that tells me our killer somehow knew right where to go.”

The moment he finished, the realization struck me full in the face. If the tracks and the hole weren’t there, the landscape would be nothing more than unspoiled snow. The symmetrical hollow of the pool’s perimeter gave no clue as to which end was which. The shallow end of the pool was closest to the main entrance, and it was also the more secluded of the two by virtue of an evergreen hedgerow. But the killer wanted to be sure the victim drowned as opposed to just death by exposure. He had purposely gone to the deep end to ensure this… And he knew exactly where the deep end was. I mutely chastised myself for missing such an obvious fact.

“Good point,” Ben whistled. “He couldn’t have known which end it was unless he’d been to this pool before. Not with all this snow.”

“That’s what I’m thinkin’.” Carl nodded.

“Well I doubt if he lives here,” I offered. “This subdivision is primarily condos, and the few houses we passed look way too modern to have the kind of basement I saw when I was channeling Kendra Miller.”

“Yeah,” Deckert nodded as he spoke. “Besides, as reckless as he’s been he’s probably too smart to do it in his own back yard. He’s been spread out all over the place so far.”

“So what’s the plan for recoverin’ the body?” Ben queried.

“Well, as soon as the CSU is finished with the tracks and such, they’re talkin’ about sendin’ a diver in. It’s either that or drain the damn thing, so they got the local muni’s fire department on standby. I think they’re pretty much waitin’ on the coroner to make the final decision,” Carl answered then shook his head. “Damn! This SOB has gotta have some freakin’ balls. I mean the hotel, the park, now this.”

“Tell me about it. He hung number three off her own friggin’ balcony,” Ben added. “Right out in plain sight.”

“Yeah, I heard,” Deckert acknowledged. “Also heard about that whole chopper thing with Street. Sheesh, ‘Ghoul Squad.’ No offense, but I’m glad I missed that one.”