Chapter 19
I’d been to Duncan’s station before to observe suspect interviews, but on the other occasions I’d stayed inside an observation room that let me see and listen in to the interrogation without the room’s occupants being the wiser. This time, things would be more nerve-racking because I would be in the room with the suspect, though I reassured myself some by remembering Chandler wasn’t a suspect at this point. He was what Duncan and the other cops often referred to as a person of interest.
“Want a cup of coffee or some water to take into the room with you?” Duncan asked me as I shucked my coat and handed it to him so he could hang it on a hook in the station break room.
“I’ve heard about the coffee you have here and I think I’ll pass,” I said sardonically.
“Wise choice. Water? It’s bottled, so we haven’t had a chance to ruin it.”
“Sure. Thanks.”
Duncan bought two bottles of water from a vending machine, handed me one of them, and then led the way to the interview room. “You can have a seat here,” he said, pointing to a chair in one corner of the room. There was a table with three other chairs positioned around it, and I knew from my past observations that Mr. Chandler would be directed to the one at the end farthest from the door. That would put him opposite me, with a healthy distance between us and the door nearest to me, which helped my rattled nerves a bit.
“I need to go set up some things to make sure this is recorded,” he told me. “Make yourself comfortable and I’ll be right back.”
I settled into the chair, which was clearly not designed for comfort—I wondered if this was intentional—and sat with my water bottle between my legs and my hands primly folded in my lap. The walls in the room were bare, and the table and chairs were plain wood, scarred in places, and cheap in design. From a synesthetic point of view, it was a calming place. There was no sound other than that of my breathing, little visual stimulation, and no overwhelming smells for me to pick up. Then I remembered Duncan was very likely watching me at this very moment from the observation room. I looked at the mirrored window and gave a tentative smile. Not knowing who was back there watching me didn’t do much to further settle my jangling nerves.
Fortunately, I didn’t have to wait long. Minutes after he left, Duncan returned. I felt relief at his presence until I realized Norman Chandler was right behind him, or at least some man I assumed was Norman Chandler. My brain barely had time to register the incongruence of Duncan letting a potential suspect walk behind him when I saw there was a third person: Chief Holland.
The presence of the chief unsettled me even more. I shot Duncan a look, but he ignored me.
The chief gave me a cursory nod and a smile. “Ms. Dalton,” he said. He then summarily dismissed me, shifting his attention to Norman Chandler, so I did the same.
Chandler’s face was leathery and weathered, befitting someone who had spent a lot of time working outdoors in all seasons. His build was lean and sinewy; his hands looked like thick slabs of meat and his fingers bore the many scars of his work. His eyes were a pale blue—almost watery—and his nose bore a road-map of superficial and burst blood vessels that I had seen hundreds of times in people who worshipped alcohol a little too much and a little too often. As he walked past me, I caught a whiff of him and was surprised not to smell any alcohol. But there was a lingering scent of old sweat that emanated from his blue jeans and his wool winter jacket, which looked like it had seen better years. Stains blotted the front of it, there was a button missing from both the top and the bottom, and the material looked threadbare. His feet were clad in work boots that were creased and discolored, and the soles appeared to be unevenly worn. On his head was a knit cap, dirty-blond hair escaping from the sides and back.
Duncan directed Chandler to the seat at the far end of the table, and he walked over and plopped down like someone who was exhausted and could barely stand. Duncan took the seat closest to him, while the chief took the remaining chair at the opposite end of the table, close to me.
Before starting any questioning, Duncan pulled a small notebook from his shirt pocket, opened it, and flipped to a page. He then stated the date, the time, the people present, and the fact that we were talking with Mr. Chandler regarding the Sheldon Janssen homicide case. When he was done with that, he shifted his gaze to Chandler and informed him that our talk was being recorded. He did not recite the Miranda to him. Chandler said nothing, did nothing in response to all this.
“Mr. Chandler, thank you again for coming down here to talk with us,” Duncan went on. “As I explained to you on the phone, one of your coworkers and someone I’ve been told was a personal friend of yours, Sheldon Janssen, was found murdered on Friday. We’re trying to establish some background and history on the man in hopes of getting a better idea about why someone would want to kill him.”
Chandler eyed Duncan with casual indifference. If he was nervous, it didn’t show. “Damned shame, what happened to him,” he mumbled. His voice was gravelly, and it tasted like bland barbecue sauce. “Hope you catch the bastard what did it.”
Duncan made some brief introductions, introducing the chief with the caveat that he was Duncan’s boss and there to observe him in action, and introducing me as Ms. Dalton and stating I was his assistant. Chandler barely spared the chief or me a glance.
“I would like to ask you some questions about Mr. Janssen,” Duncan went on once the introductions were done, “starting with how long you’ve known him.”
Chandler narrowed his eyes and glanced at the ceiling for a moment. “About six years, maybe seven.” He sniffed, swiped at his nose with the back of his hand, and shrugged. “Met him when I started on with Klein.”
“Did the two of you work together often?” Duncan asked.
“Pretty much every day the place had work,” Chandler said. He undid the remaining buttons on his coat but didn’t take it off.
“And did the two of you become friends right away?”
“I s’pose,” Chandler said, sticking out his lower lip. His remaining teeth—many of them were missing—were stained brown, and I suspected he was a user of chew. This supposition was supported by the round shape worn into the pocket of his shirt, which was the same size and shape as a can of chewing tobacco, a threadbare ring of white on the otherwise blue shirt.
“Did the two of you do things together outside of work?” Duncan asked.
“Sometimes. Wasn’t always just us, though. The whole crew would go out after work for drinks from time to time.”
“Did you and Mr. Janssen go out for drinks without the rest of the crew?”
Chandler narrowed his eyes at Duncan. “You suggestin’ sump’in?” he said in a suspicious tone. “We wasn’t secret lovers or nothing like that. I ain’t no pervert.”
Duncan smiled and shook his head. “No, sir,” he said. “I’m just trying to get a feel for how well you knew Mr. Janssen.”
“We was friends. That’s all.”
“Okay. Did Mr. Janssen talk to you about his private life at all?”
“Yeah, some.”
“What about his family? Did he talk about them at all?”
Chandler shifted in his chair. I didn’t need my synesthesia to tell me he was starting to feel a bit anxious. “He wasn’t close with his family,” he said, looking away. “Said they all lived back in New York and they didn’t talk much.”
“How about his wife, his ex-wife?” Duncan asked.
Chandler looked at Duncan briefly, then away again.
“Did he ever talk about her?” Duncan pushed.
“Mighta mentioned her once or twice,” Chandler said. He looked back at Duncan, his steely reserve back in place. “But she’s dead, so I’m pretty sure she didn’t kill Sheldon.”
“Did his wife have any family in the area?”
“How the hell would I know that?” Chandler said, punctuating the question with a little harrumph.
“I thought perhaps Sheldon might have mentioned them,” Duncan said, and I noticed he had switched from the more formal “Mr. Janssen” to the use of his first name.
Chandler frowned and reached up to scratch his head, and when he was done, the knit cap was tilted sideways. “Now that you mention it, he did say sump’in one time about a sista who lived in Waukesha. Name was something weird, one of those hippie-dippie names parents liked to use back in the sixties, ya know? Freedom or Happy or some crap like that.”
Duncan scribbled something in his notebook. I wondered if he did it out of habit, because all this was being recorded, or if he did it to create a pause of uncomfortable silence to see if Chandler offered up anything more. If it was the latter, it worked.
Chandler let out a long, deep sigh and leaned forward, elbows on knees. “I know you know about the kid ’cause she ain’t there no more.”
This surprised me, and judging from the look on Duncan’s face, it surprised him, too. “What kid?” Duncan asked after a few seconds of stunned silence.
“Sheldon’s daughter,” Chandler said with huge impatience, as if Duncan had asked the dumbest question possible. “I know she ain’t there ’cause I checked to make sure she’s okay. And she was gone.”
“What do you mean, you checked?” Duncan asked, frowning.
“I went by Sheldon’s place last night and let myself in. He gave me a key a long time ago. Said if anything ever happened to him, I was s’posed to take care of his girl.”
“You went into Sheldon’s house last night?” Duncan asked, his irritation obvious both in his tone and his rapidly reddening face. He didn’t give Chandler time to answer. “Didn’t you see those big yellow tapes on the door that said not to enter? His house is a crime scene. Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
Duncan’s high ire startled Chandler. The man was leaning as far back into his chair as he could go, and if he could have melted into it, I think he would have. He stared at Duncan with wide eyes, one arm folded over his chest, the fist on that arm propping the elbow of his other arm, the hand of which was clamped over his mouth, as if he was trying to keep any more damaging information from escaping. I was sure the chief’s presence during this revelation didn’t help Duncan’s mood any.
Duncan paused, sputtering for a few seconds. Then he closed his eyes and took a few more seconds to gather himself.
“Let’s all take a breath, shall we?” Chief Holland said in a calm voice. “Mr. Chandler, what time last night did you go to Mr. Janssen’s house?”
Chandler eyed the chief warily, and appeared to be debating whether it was safe for him to answer. Apparently, he decided it was. “Round about nine or so, I think.” He hesitated, his eyes darting from the chief to Duncan and back to the chief. “I didn’t damage your tape or nothin’,” he said. “I used my key, unlocked the door, and stepped between the strips.”
I covered my mouth with my hand because I couldn’t help but smile at Chandler’s naïveté. He thought it was the integrity of the tape that had Duncan upset.
“And what did you do once you were inside the house?” the chief asked.
“I called out for the girl, and then checked to see if she was in her special place.”
“You knew about the hiding place?” Duncan asked, resuming control.
Chandler snorted back a laugh. “Of course I knew about it. I helped Sheldon build it.”
Duncan, and the chief for that matter, seemed momentarily stymied. Finally, Duncan asked, “When was the last time you saw Sheldon?”
Chandler squinted at the ceiling. “Day before he was killed,” he said. “At work.”
“Did Sheldon indicate to you that he was worried about anything? Or afraid of anything?”
Chandler chuckled. “He was afraid of the boss. We all of us are. Klein can be a mean bastard.”
“Did he say he was afraid of Klein the last time you saw him?”
“Yup, sure did. Said he knew Klein was gonna be real ticked off because of some on-the-job shenanigans.” Chandler pronounced the word like it was gender specific: she-nanigans.
“What sort of shenanigans?” Duncan asked. He leaned a little closer, and I knew he was wondering if this might have something to do with Mal.
“Don’t know for sure,” Chandler said with a shrug. He explored the inside of one cheek with his tongue. “Said something about a spy, but that didn’t make no sense to me,” he concluded.
“Did Sheldon say who he thought the spy was?” Duncan asked.
“Nah, he kept that kind of stuff private. I know he did other things for Klein. Side jobs, ya know? But he never talked about it.”
“Do you have any ideas about who the spy might be?” Duncan asked.
Chandler squinted at the ceiling again, appearing deep in thought. After a moment, he looked at Duncan and said, “There’s this one guy, kind of new to us. He asks a lot of questions and takes a lot of pictures with his phone. And he and Klein always seem to be butting heads, ya know? And he didn’t show up for work on Friday.”
“What is this person’s name?” Duncan asked.
Chandler shook his head and chuckled. “It’s Malachi O’Reilly. That’s rich, ain’t it? He’s got one of those Israeli first names, but his last name is as Irish as they come.”
“Mr. Chandler, you can’t go back inside Sheldon’s house. In fact, I’m going to ask you to turn over the key you have.”
Chandler shrugged at this, fished in one of his pants pockets, and pulled out a key ring. He found the key in question, removed it from the ring, and handed it to Duncan. “The kid . . . she’s okay?” he said.
“She is,” Duncan said.
“What’s going to happen to her?”
“We don’t know yet,” Duncan said. “She’s with a family right now who is well equipped to take care of her and her special needs. She’s safe.”
Chandler nodded, his brow furrowed. He seemed genuinely concerned about Felicity, and despite his somewhat uncouth appearance, demeanor, and speech, I felt a twinge of affection for him and his devotion to the child.
“You mentioned Sheldon did some side jobs for Mr. Klein,” Duncan went on, changing the subject. “What sort of jobs were they?”
“I don’t know for sure,” Chandler said, wiping his nose on his sleeve. “He paid a lot of visits to people, and he always seemed to have packages to deliver.”
“What kinds of packages?”
Chandler shrugged. “Boxes, bags . . . who knows what was in ’em. I know there was money in one of the boxes he had one time because I saw it. But that was the only one I saw.”
Duncan digested this for a few seconds, and I took advantage of the moment. “Mr. Chandler, does the term little peach mean anything to you?”
“I guess. Shelly sometimes referred to the kid as his little peach. He said his wife, or ex-wife rather, started using it, and it stuck.”
“Did you kill Sheldon Janssen?” I asked.
Everyone in the room appeared surprised by my question, or perhaps the sudden segue. All three men looked at me, their expressions equally bemused.
“Hell no,” Chandler said after a slight hesitation.
The taste of his voice remained unchanged, and because he was cooperating, I decided to go a step further. “Is there anyone you know of who would have wanted Sheldon Janssen dead?”
Chandler gave the question some serious thought. “Well,” he said finally, letting out a weighty sigh, “Mr. Klein is a scary dude. I don’t know what kind of stuff he and Shelly did together, but I got the sense from Shelly that it wasn’t strictly legal at times.” He paused, winced, and eyed Duncan and the chief to see if they had reacted to this revelation. When they didn’t, he continued. “I s’pose Shelly might a gone and got himself into a sitch-ee-a-shun”—Chandler enunciated the syllables with great care and emphasis—“that got him in trouble with the wrong kind of people, ya know? Or maybe he just got on the wrong side of Klein.”
Duncan looked over at me, eyebrows raised in question. I shook my head, and Duncan turned back to Chandler and said, “Okay, sir, you are free to go. Thanks for talking to us.”
Chandler looked a little surprised, but after a moment’s hesitation where he seemed to be waiting for someone to say just kidding or something like that, he got out of his seat and headed for the door. As he opened the door, he looked over at me and said, “You should prolly look purdy close at that O’Reilly guy, too. There’s sump’in shifty about that man.”
And with that, he left.