The Pensacola Insider once included the disappearance of Celeste Daniels in a cover story on cold cases involving missing person reports. The article said that according to police reports she was last seen on May 14, 1973, leaving Pensacola Catholic High School. Celeste stood five foot three and weighed a hundred and five pounds. She had worn a yellow tank top and hip hugger slacks with a floral print when she left school that day.
Her big brother Stan was supposed to give her a ride home, but ended up having to stay late for a student council meeting. No one could remember seeing anyone pick her up from school that day or seeing her walking home. Police never found her body.
The police reports gave us little more information than that. In the seventies, Pensacola probably only had one or two missing persons cases a year. The officers weren’t the most literate people in town, mostly high school graduates and guys with GEDs. Stan refused to cooperate with our reporter, saying he didn’t want to dredge up the past. Their parents had been dead for decades. Celeste Daniels’ story was a minor part of the cold cases article.
I texted Daniels, and he agreed to meet me for coffee Wednesday morning in my office before eight. With Hines and Wittman trying to derail the park, maybe he would be more cooperative with me. The old families of Pensacola only want to talk about their accomplishments and avoided discussions of the blemishes in their pasts. Kettler’s need for the petition drive to fail might be the impetus to get Daniels to share what he remembers about his sister’s disappearance and her relationships with Hines and Wittman. If not, then it was another dead end.
After taking Big Boy for his afternoon constitutional, I headed out to find Gravy and beer, and not necessarily in that order. Before I left, I posted Yoste’s notes on the Wittman-Hines press conference to the blog with some additional commentary about the questions the reporters asked me. Feeding the blog was almost as important as feeding the dog.
At Hopjacks, Gravy asked for the details of the press conference.
“It was a disaster,” I said. “They are trying to pass off the note as some earlier tiff between Bo and Sue, and the media is lapping it up.”
While he ordered a Dead Guy ale and my Bud Light, Gravy said, “Remember what Oscar Wilde said, ‘There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.’”
I said, “Spoken like a true trial attorney.”
Over beers, Gravy told me his courier had delivered Sue Hines’ note and the analysis report to Spencer. Gravy had caught a few minutes of the press conference on the six o’clock news. The camera zoomed in on Bo crying in the background. They didn’t show me on camera and merely said the publisher of a local weekly newspaper stood behind his reporting and denied any connection with the park developers.
“The buzz around town isn’t too favorable for you,” Gravy said while eating a slice of what Hopjacks called its “Butcher Block” pizza, which fittingly had more meat than tomato sauce and cheese.
He continued, “The hospitals and banks are being pressured to pull their advertising from the paper, and the sales staffs at the Herald and the TV stations smell blood in the water.”
“I just got a new set of credit card checks, screw ’em,” I said. “There is more to all this. The Arts Council embezzlement, Sue’s suicide, the petition drive. They are all related somehow. I can feel it.”
Gravy shook his head. “You are stretching this. Maybe you need to back off some. Surely there is some environmental or public education issue you can investigate.”
He wasn’t smiling. “The state attorney’s office wants you to come in for questioning. They threatened to file obstruction of justice charges against you, but I told them that was bullshit and you did their work for them finding the note.”
“The note is real,” I said. “It is a suicide note. I don’t know who wanted me to have it. The bartender at New World Landing can verify that he handed it to me. Hell, I’ll take a lie detector.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Gravy said. “You embarrassed the state attorney when you published the note without forewarning him. People are pressuring him to not cut Hines any deals so he’s looking for any excuse to put your ass in a jail cell. Remember the scathing column you wrote about what you called his ‘selective’ prosecution of cases. You can’t count on his coaching memories to rescue you. You burned that bridge.”
He paused to watch a brunette walk by in a little red dress. “The state attorney and the judges have been waiting for you to slip. If you don’t come in voluntarily, he will issue a subpoena forcing you to appear. If you fail to appear, he will have you arrested for contempt. This could move very fast. In the next forty-eight hours, this could all explode in your face.”
I didn’t say a word. Just sat and drank my beer. Gravy gave me time to let it all soak in, but I had no intention of backing down. The “justice gene” wouldn’t allow it.
“Tell me about Stan Daniels,” I said.
“Daniels is Mr. Pensacola, former United Way chairman, former chairman of the Pensacola Bay Area Chamber of Commerce. Hell, Stan Daniels is the former chairman of everything,” Gravy started. “His firm does defense work representing corporations against guys like me.”
He grabbed another slice of pizza and said, “I don’t think he has been in the courtroom in over thirty years, but he doesn’t need to go to court. His minions handle the dirty work.”
I asked, “What do you know about his sister Celeste and her disappearance?”
“I wasn’t even born until a year after Celeste Daniels went missing,” said Gravy as he waved to the waitress for another round. “The nuns at Catholic High used her disappearance as a warning for how dangerous the world can be for teenage girls. Everyone assumed she was killed by some drifter. Why?”
“Bo Hines and Jace Wittman both dated her.”
“So?” he asked.
“Hell if I know what it means but I will soon.”
Another short skirt walked by the table. Gravy was becoming too easily distracted. Too much competition. I needed him to stay focused.
I said, “I stopped by The Green Olive before the press conference.”
“What?” Gravy asked turning away from eyeing the bar crowd. “You didn’t mention Eva Johnson, did you? Her attorney will kill me if you messed up their lawsuit.”
“No. I did have a brief conversation with Tatum, but Eva’s name was never mentioned,” I said. “But the most interesting tidbit I got was from a waitress. Bo Hines and Pandora Childs were regulars at The Green Olive.”
Gravy put down his pizza slice. I relayed what the waitress had shared.
He said, “Hines may have been cheating on his wife. So what?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “What I do know is we’ve got to make sure Hines’ trial happens. Maybe the affair was the secret.”
“Maybe, but still a stretch,” Gravy reasoned.
“Yeah, that’s right. Maybe Harden didn’t look in the right places or Hines and Childs hadn’t hooked up yet. I don’t know.”
“Without testimony from Childs, Sue’s note won’t have the impact you thought,” said Gravy.
“No shit. I feel like we have all these puzzle pieces,” I said. “But I don’t know for sure if they are part of the same puzzle.”
I took a long sip of beer and continued, “My sources tell me the shit is hitting the fan this week. It involves porn, the dark web—whatever the hell that is—underage girls, and maybe Monte Tatum.”
“Damn, Walker, the hits keep coming,” said Gravy. “Did Eva Johnson give you any worthwhile information?”
“She was very helpful. Tatum is a slimeball. How big of one? Yet to be determined.”
He took a bite of the pizza, wiped the sauce off his chin. Only Gravy would find sauce in an almost sauceless pizza. I drank my Bud Light. The staff gave us extra attention, wanting to make up for the fight last week. New beers appeared before we finished the ones on the table.
“Are you going to be able to help Bree?”
I shook my head. “Too early to tell for sure. I haven’t quite found the right pressure point, but we need to see how this week plays out.”
Gravy said, “Remember, Tatum’s a vindictive bastard. He backed off after his lawsuit was thrown out by the judge. If you take him on again, you could be creating another lifelong enemy, something you don’t need.”
“He’ll have to get in line.”
When I got back to the loft, someone had painted in blood red on the gray metal door, “Murderer.” Living downtown, doors and walls were regularly tagged. I got out the gray paint, and Big Boy watched me repaint the door. No need for the staff to see this kind of crap.
The dog stood guard while I worked. Maybe he was getting a little worried, too.