The Dowser

Thanks to my ring tone, Def Leppard jerked me out of a jasmine-scented dream where I’d been comfortable, lying next to my sweet departed wife Rainee, and into the lonely and harsh one a.m. tang of two-day-stale coffee that languished inches from my face in the half-empty cup I’d abandoned on the nightstand.

My tongue is thick with morning mouth, but I snatch up the phone and answer. “Maroon, here.”

“Captain Plunket here. We need your help locating a body. SR 12, three miles east from Telegraph.”

I would dearly rather return to my dream, but duty calls. I rise, dress, chug down a leftover cup of cold coffee sitting on the kitchen counter, and, as I head out the door, snatch my ‘Y’ shaped rosewood wand from the coat rack just inside the front door. Outside the early morning is bitter with moist cold, it stings my face and hands during the short walk to the garage. Small patches of ice crunch between the concrete and my shoes, and mesquite smoke from wood stoves warming cold houses hangs thick in the air.

The skin of my left hand sticks to the shiny surface of the door handle like I’ve licked a metal fence post. The cold from the steering wheel wheedles its way into my bones.

Just to reassure myself it is still there in the dark, I reach out and caress the wand on the seat next to me. The rosewood is smooth, and emanates the stored warmth from the house. The rough idling car spews exhaust that hangs in the enclosed garage like a cloud, and invades the passenger compartment with its stench. The door rolls up with a touch of the remote, and I back out, leaving the fumes trapped inside.

Headlights and streetlights illuminate a six foot thick icy fog suspended in the darkness at hood height. It swirls around the car as I plow through the morning.

The police call it a scene, as if the victim plays out the last moments of her life in some final movie act. But they don’t call me to judge or criticize their operation, they call me to help them find the lost. Victims mostly, and sometimes criminals. I am the Huntington Police Department’s official dowser.

I know the location of the crime scene because there are four marked police cars festooned with yellow, “Police Line Do Not Cross,” tape parked across the entrance to a dry riverbed. A wary officer stationed between the vehicles watches me as I approach. He nonchalantly moves his right hand to rest it on the butt of his holstered weapon, his fingers lightly curl around the hand grips. I’ve been involved with the department long enough not to be offended. Perpetrators often return to the scene of the crime.

“Devlin Maroon,” I mutter. The drive over hasn’t done much to make me more lucid. He extends the clipboard for my signature. After I sign in, he points to a point farther up the riverbed where a clump of three officers huddle in a small clearing.

“Good morning, gentlemen,” I say as I walk up.

All three turn and look at me. “Hi’ya, Mr. Maroon,” one of the older men responds. He looks too chipper for the time, place, and occasion of our meeting. But then, two in the morning is probably the middle of his workday, and he’s grown acquainted with such tragedy and accustomed to the hours.

“Why is it we’re waiting for this guy,” the youngest of the three pipes up as he jabs his finger my direction, “out here at o’dark-thirty?”

The older officer, Harris, nudges him with enough force the young man stumbles away from the group, his grunt of surprise sends a cloud of steam billowing from his mouth into the pine scented moonlight.

“So what? We’re out here for like, some kind of full-moon, witchy kind of thing?” he says, but now he’s far enough from his senior officer that he doesn’t receive another nudge, but Harris glares at him with enough force to shut his mouth.

“Not quite,” I say. “The combined negative thoughts of too many conscious people interfere with psychic vibrations. So this time of the morning, when fewer people are awake, means fewer negative vibes.”

“So, you’re some kinda psychic?” the young one says. As he speaks, he glances down at the wand hanging limply at my side.

“Sort of,” I say. I concentrate, and breathe in the iced air, tasting wood smoke, pine, alcohol, blood, and...Death? “Did you find the alcohol beverage?”

Harris illuminates a shiny aluminum clipboard with a flashlight he holds under his arm and glances through pages of forms. “No booze.”

“Then we’ll be looking for at least two items. What about a weapon?”

He glances at the pages again. “Number six,” he says to the third officer, the acting evidence technician, who until this point has stood silently. He shines his flashlight into the plastic tub at his feet, fingers stiffly through several evidence bags, withdraws one, and holds it up. Inside the blood-smeared bag lay a five-inch bladed knife.

“May I?” I ask.

He walks to me, holding the bag away from his body. One of his superior officers has obviously briefed him about my method, and preferences.

I raise my right hand, holding the 'Y'-shaped rosewood wand loosely between my thumb and index finger. “Just hold it against the back of my hand.” He glances back and shines his flashlight on the senior officer’s face. Harris nods, and the evidence tech holds the bag by its top so the knife inside rests against my hand.

“Just a moment,” I say. I can feel body temperature warmth radiate into my hand and up my arm from the blood on the knife. “How long ago?” I ask.

“An hour, maybe more.”

“I feel life.”

“She’s still alive?” Harris asks.

“Maybe,” I say. “Sometimes a feeling of life means the victim is still alive, sometimes it only means they were alive when the bloodletting occurred.”

The warmth drains out, beginning at the handle end of the knife. Now only cold metal rests against my hand. “That is sufficient,” I say.

Holding the rosewood wand in both hands by the tips of my fingers, I concentrate. Fear. Hot alcohol-laden breath against cold skin. Unwashed male skin stinking of sweat, anger, and lust. Stretched fabric abrades soft skin the instant before it rips free. Ripping cloth. Pain. Fear. The wand bounces slightly in my hands. “This way.”

Harris moves closer to me as I head into the trees. We’ve worked together before on other cases, he understands my protocol. He will protect me, watch for pitfalls, animals, and dangerous people, while I focus on the task at hand – finding the victim.

He motions, and the other two officers follow us at a respectable distance. If they walk too close, their thoughts, doubts, and emotions cloud my reception and could mean the difference between finding a frightened victim, or a body.

I concentrate on the wand – and the images playing out in my mind. Screams – shouts for help – whimpering, dissolve into the dark unfeeling bulk ­­of the looming trees.

No one can hear her, but still she screams, prays, and hopes. He slaps her, I can feel her cheek burn from the blow, pain floods through her head, eyes, and neck.

The wand twitches, and I stop. Dry needles and twigs crunch under my shoes as I stand in one spot and turn. The wand slows, then speeds up, I’ve almost done a complete turn when something pulls the wand down. I point to the source of the pull within a bramble. “There.”

My companion directs the other two officers to the location with a wave of his hand and says, “Search it.”

The two rush forward, illuminate the area with their flashlights, and pick through the brush. The light, though welcome in the blackness among the trees, distracts me, and makes it more difficult to concentrate. I remain where I stand until they finish their search.

“Got somethin’,” the young officer says. He removes an evidence bag from his pocket, and using a latex glove to protect his hand and the evidence, holds up a two-inch strip of brightly flowered cloth ripped from a garment to inspect it. “Blood looks fresh. I’ll be danged, you really found something.”

I feel a twinge. The cloth looks familiar – No, it can’t be the same, just a coincidence. Must be, has to be.

The officer bags the cloth and hands it to the I.D. tech. “Where to next?” he asks.

My mind is clouded. There must be thousands of dresses made of that same material, probably a hundred girls wore that same print yesterday. Melissa can’t be the only one. Still…did she come home last night?

“Mr. Maroon?” Harris says.

His voice brings me back to the scene. “Sorry, it’s just…”

“What’s going on?”

“My daughter, Melissa, wore a dress made of that fabric when she went out last night.”

A wisp of breeze dances through the pine trees, moaning and sending their scent among us. No other sound. I can’t believe I said it aloud. As long as I hadn't given the words life in speech, the possibility we could be looking for my Melissa didn’t exist. Now it did. The officers know the fear of recognizing something personal at such a scene – driving up on a serious collision and seeing a family member’s vehicle crushed – arriving at a shots fired robbery at a spouse’s workplace – or this. Realizing a loved one could be the victim in what moments ago was a tragic scene, tragic, but impersonal.

“Boys,” Harris tells the officers, “this is personal. Keep a sharp eye out.”

“No, it’s just a coincidence,” I say.

“All the same…Let’s get going.”

I force my mind back to the spiritual vibrations and massage the wand between my fingers. Put it out of your head. You have a job to do, especially if it's Melissa, we need to find her quickly. I clear my mind, and the images return. My daughter’s face flashes into the midst of them, but I can’t tell if it’s because she is the victim, or because my own fear conjures her up and insinuates her into the task. Deep breath. I turn, and the wand begins its dance.

“This way.” I head off in the direction the wand dictates. Harris and the other two follow without comment. We walk for ten yards at most and the wand pulls again. I stop, turn, the wand jumps. “There.”

The officers search. “Got it.” This time they find a necklace and a shoe. Any woman could have worn a shoe similar to Melissa’s, but the two silver Hebrew letters suspended from the necklace that form the word for life, chai, is not so common.

“That’s my daughter’s necklace,” I say.

“Are you sure?” Harris asks.

“As sure as I can be. The shoes, too.”

“We need to find her, especially if there’s a chance she could still be alive. You said yourself, it felt like she was alive,” Harris says.

“I said – she might be – alive.”

I grasp the wand again, but it won’t budge. It still hovers toward the spot where the officers found the necklace and shoe. “There’s more.”

They search again. Another shoe, and a blue, blood soaked, man’s shirt. “That’s a lot of blood,” the young officer says. His companion cuffs him on the back of the head with his open hand. “Sorry.”

“He’s right,” Harris says, “that is a lot of blood. Look at the ground.” He points to a dark area on the ground. In the moonlight, it’s difficult to tell, but when the young officer wipes his gloved hand over it, the latex comes away coated with blood.

Tears trickle down my cheeks. My chest aches and I waver, finding it hard to stand. I try to swallow the lump that grows in my throat, but it resists, and each breath rasps around it flavoring the intake of air with pain that flows into my lungs.

“Now what?” the evidence tech asks.

“Mark it,” Harris says. “We keep looking.”

Once the tech marks the blood soaked area, the wand shudders in my hand and we follow its lead. After only ten feet, the wand vibrates in my fingers.

“Stop.” My voice quavers and my skin crawls. No need to search. An arm lays inert on the matted ground, torn from its socket, the shoulder end bloody and trailing gore.

“God, What kind of animal is this guy?” the young officer blurts out.

“Maroon!” Harris catches me as I begin to collapse and holds me up. “Maybe you should wait here.”

“No.” I can barely speak my throat is so tight. “It’s not just my job, it’s my baby girl.”

“Mark it,” Harris says. “Fast, and let’s move.”

No need for the wand. Body parts are scattered in the open woods as the officers shine their lights around in the clearing. A hand here, missing fingers, another arm. Bites have torn flesh from some of the parts.

“Coyotes, I think,” the tech says. “Somethin’s had a meal, we must have scared ‘em off.”

The rising sun reveals the full extent of the carnage. As the scene unfolds, I stumble against a tree and slide to the ground. The rough bark snags at my coat, the fragrant sap sticks to my back and fills the air with a scent of pine.

“Coyotes nothing. Look at the size of these tracks,” the young officer says. He points to a human sized footprint on the ground where something has scattered the forest floor litter exposing the damp ground underneath.

“Careful,” Harris says. “This is too much.” He points to the tech. “Get on the radio, get me a full crime scene team out here, now.” Then he points to the young officer, “Get Mr. Maroon home.”

“No,” I croak out. “I must see this through.”

“No chance. You’re out of here, you did your job, we found the…your…you did your part. Now it’s time for us to do ours.”

The young officer grasps my arm and helps me up. I drop the wand, but he doesn’t notice.

“Wait.”

“Sir, it’s time for you to go, now let’s go. There’s nothing more you can do here.”

“My wand.” I point to the rosewood wand lying at the foot of the pine tree. He bends to retrieve it, probably a good idea since my head is so filled with cotton, if I bent over, I would probably tumble into the tree.

“What the…?” he says. “This thing is electric? It shocked me.”

“No, it’s a piece of wood.”

“Well it felt like I stuck my finger in a light socket when I touched it.”

“Rubbish,” I say. But he won’t pick it up. He holds onto my tightly and helps me bend over to retrieve it. Everything goes dark as my hand brushes over the rosewood. I close my fingers around one branch of the 'Y', and I see Melissa’s face.

“I’m sorry,” She says. “I know I shouldn’t have gone out last night. But I never meant for this to happen.”

“Maroon?… Maroon!”

The darkness disappears into the growing morning light. “I’m okay. I think.”

The young officer helps me up off the ground. “Thought we lost you there for a minute. I gotta get you out of here or Harris will have my head.”

As he walks me back along the path toward my car, I hear sirens approaching, and the sounds of officers joining the search calling out to each other.

“Found a foot.”

“Got some cloth over here.”

“I need some swabs here.”

“Finger, I got a finger.”

The forest fills with noise, and fear, and disgust. The influx of emotion dissipate the early morning vibrations of last night’s horrific events. Not just the officers in the woods, but in the neighborhoods residents awaken and add their thoughts and concerns to the mishmash of spiritual energy. It’s just as well, I’m leaving, I can be no further use here.

Part of me accepts my limitations, and views the horror of the morning as another in a long line of successful cases. But part of me is dying, a slow, screaming, agonizing death. First Rainee, now Melissa. I don’t have many parts left.

The officer puts me in the passenger seat of his police car, and I begin sobbing. My body shudders with each wracking wave of sorrow. “Melissa.”

“I’m sorry sir,” the young officer says. He drives me away from the influx of police cars, the yellow tape, and the mayhem. I imagine he is at a loss for words. What can he say to a father who just discovered his daughter’s dismembered corpse?

We drive on without speaking. The silence is broken only by the incessant radio traffic of officers arriving at the scene, the transmission of information between officers in the search, and between the scene and the dispatch center.

“One-ten, One-fourteen.” I can distinguish Harris’s voice from the other unfamiliar voices transmitting over the radio. The officer reaches for the microphone on his dashboard.

“One-fourteen, go ahead one-ten,” he says.

“Advise Mr. Maroon, we found his daughter. She is alive. Repeat Mr. Maroon’s daughter is alive,” Harris says.

I stare at the radio. The words penetrate the fog that fills my mind like honey from a refrigerated jar, but they don’t make sense. “What did he say?”

“One-fourteen, one-ten, can you confirm your last? Maroon’s daughter is alive?”

“That’s affirmative one-fourteen. Escort him back to the scene.” Then in a heartbeat, “One-ten, dispatch, I need an ambulance here, fast. Now would be better.”

My mind races. Melissa’s alive. But it sounds like she’s injured. But she’s alive. Fear, anger, sorrow, joy, relief, flood through me all at once. “Melissa’s alive!” I shout.

The officer activates the overhead lights and siren. The tires screech on the asphalt as he whips the car around and heads back to the scene. The sun has cleared the horizon and blinds me through the front window. The siren blares in through my fogged thoughts. All the things I never told Melissa. I thought I’d lost the chance. Will I have the courage to tell her now? She’s alive. She’s alive.

We weave through the maze of assembled police vehicles now crowding the entrance to the riverbed. The ambulance pulls up from the other direction at the same time. The car is still moving when I jump out and run toward the yellow tape. The officer standing guard tries to stop me, but I barely even look at him as I run past. The ambulance backs up the riverbed, and two paramedics take Melissa from Harris’s arms and lay her onto a gurney.

Harris sees me. Once the medics have her, he rushes over to me.

“Is she okay?”

“She’s wounded,” he says. “He stabbed her in the stomach, and she’s lost a lot of blood, but she’s alive.”

“Can I see her?”

“Come on.”

Harris briefly introduces me to the medics.

“Wanna ride with her?” one of them asks.

“Yes.”

“I’ll take care of your car,” Harris says.

I climb into the back of the ambulance. Melissa looks so innocent, frail, and pale, even against the white sheet that covers her. “I’m here baby.”

“Daddy?”

One of the medics gently moves me aside and hangs an IV bag. I sidle around him and take Melissa’s hand. “I’m here,” I say. “It’s over. You’re safe now.”

She sighs deeply, and relaxes. Her eyes flutter open and closed. She looks over at me, her eyes are bloodshot, her face red, and a tear rolls down her cheek and drops onto the white pillowcase under her head. “I’m sorry daddy.”

“It’s not your fault, baby.”

“It was horrible. I thought I was going to die.” She tenses up again. I can see the muscles in her neck tighten, and the smell of pine, decay, alcohol, and death clings to her like some perverted perfume. Even though the second paramedic is applying pressure to the abdominal wound, blood is still seeping out from under the dressing.

“I know. But it’s all over, you’re safe.”

“But daddy.”

“Shh, we can talk later. Rest.”

All this time the medic has been arranging an IV and slipping the needle into her arm. The solution drips steadily while he listens for her pulse, tests her blood pressure, and applies a pressure bandage over the knife wound in her abdomen. He keeps her modestly draped in a sheet while he cuts off all that remains of her dress and undergarments, shreds of pink satin and brightly flowered cotton fabric, untangling them from her body. As he removes each piece, he places it into a separate evidence bag.

He checks for additional injuries. Bandages the serious ones, and cleans all of them. She winces each time he swabs a wound. The swabs he puts into more evidence bags.

“Will she be alright?” I ask.

“Of course, just a few scrapes and nicks. You’ll be fine, won’t you young lady?”

He has to stay positive, it’s part of his job to keep the victim’s spirits up, but I want to know how she really is. I lean forward, away from Melissa and whisper to the driver, “How is she?”

He glances back, and then says, “It’s too soon to tell. That knife wound is deep, and we aren’t sure how much blood she’s lost. We’ve got her on Lactated Ringers to compensate for the lost blood, but we can’t tell what kind of internal damage there is.”

“Let’s go,” the medic working on Melissa says.

The driver flips a switch and the siren screams, drowning out any further conversation with him. We gather speed and cruise steadily toward the hospital.

When Melissa awakens from surgery, I am sitting by her bed. “Good evening sunshine.”

“Hi daddy.”

“The doctor said you’re going to be just fine. A bit of a scar, but he says a swimsuit should cover it. No damage to anything vital. He says you’ll be up and around in time for the start of winter semester.”

“Thanks, daddy. I’m sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry for.”

“I had everything under control until… I think he drugged me.”

“Bastard,” I swear under my breath. “It’s not your fault.”

“Knock, knock.”

I looked up, and Harris stood in the doorway. “May I interrupt for just a minute?”

“It’s okay dad,” Melissa said.

I waved him in. He stood by the side of the bed, holding his clipboard. “If you feel up to it, I have a couple of questions for you, Melissa.”

“Okay.”

“First of all, I want to tell you that this guy who attacked you, Gerald Unger, he’s a dirtbag. We’ve linked him to at least six rapes and three murders, all in this area, and all within the last year. So he’s no great loss to society, but that was a mess out there. Can you tell me what happened?”

“I was at Club Ten-Two, and he bought me a drink. I only had the one drink, but I started to get sleepy, so I got up to leave the bar and get some fresh air. I think I remember people in the club were laughing at me. He, Gerald, said something like, “Too much to drink, better get her home.”

“I don’t remember leaving the club, but I woke up, and it was dark, I think I might have been in a van. I tried to stand up, but the van was moving and I fell. The road got rough, and I got bumped around inside, and then it stopped. The door opened and the dome light came on. He pulled my legs and dragged me close to him, then he tried to pull my dress up – and – I kicked him in the face.”

She cringed and squeezed her eyes closed. Tears rolled down her cheeks. “He grabbed my leg – and – he stabbed me. Then he dragged me out of the van and I landed on the ground. It knocked the wind out of me… The next thing I remember, I was looking up at trees and he was ripping my dress.” She sighed deeply and shuddered, folding her arms across her chest, she hugged herself. “Oh, daddy,” she sobbed, “it was so horrible.” She stopped talking and her whole body was wracked with deep sobs.

Harris waited without speaking. Her tears slowed, and her breathing became shallower.

“And then what happened?” Harris asked.

“I don’t know. I think I passed out again, and then, the next thing I remember, you were standing over me telling me I was safe.”

Harris wrote on his clipboard for a while, glancing up at Melissa now and then. “Did you see an animal attack the man who hurt you?”

“An animal? Like what?”

“Something big, like a wolf, a bear, or a dog.”

“No. Like I said, I think I must have passed out, because I really don’t remember anything else that happened to me.”

“Is there a problem, Officer Harris?” I ask.

He scratches his head and stares at his clipboard. “It’s just that…” His forehead scrunches and he closes his eyes. “I mean, you were…” He puts his hand to his face, covers both is eyes and squeezes. Without looking at me or Melissa, he says, “Whatever attacked Mr. Unger was only a few yards from where we found you, but it didn’t attack you. Any idea why?”

Melissa looks at me, and I look at her, I can see a question in her eyes that she’s afraid to ask. “Perhaps because Melissa was unconscious, and didn’t move, and this Unger tried to fight the animal, or at least kept moving when it attacked. Who knows, maybe he brought the animal to harm Melissa, and it turned on him.”

“Perhaps. Melissa, can you think of any reason it didn’t bother you?” Harris asks.

“Not really.”

“Like I said, Unger is no loss to society,” Harris said, “and to tell you the truth, I’m glad he’s not going to hurt another girl. But all the same, I’d like to know what kind of animal is out in those woods, and whether it’s going to be a danger to the people who live in the area.”

“I’m fairly certain it won’t be,” I say, “– a danger to the residents – I mean.”

“How can you be fairly certain, Mr. Maroon? Do you know something you’re not telling me?”

“Uhm…well, the neighborhoods have been there for years, haven’t they? Has anyone reported problems before?”

“An occasional dog or cat goes missing, probably carried off by coyotes or foxes, but nothing like this before. I guess all we can do is keep an eye on the forest and see if anything happens again. Still, something out there killed a man last night. It might be new to the area, and I’d like to know what it is.”

“If that’s all,” I say, “I think Melissa could use some rest, and time to not think about what she went through.”

“Of course, sorry, I’ll leave you two alone.” Harris stopped at the door and waved. “Get better soon, Melissa.”

After Harris left, I looked down the hall both ways. Harris went into the elevator, and only hospital staff remained on the floor. I closed the door and returned to Melissa’s bed. “I’m so grateful you are safe. I love you so much, and when I thought you were… you know, I didn’t know what to do. My whole life just about ended in that forest.”

“I know daddy. I love you too.”

“What happened out there?”

“I had it under control, until that man stabbed me and pulled me from the van. I regained consciousness when he was tearing my dress, just like I said. I looked into his eyes and saw a sadistic, brutal person. Above him, the full moon rose into a clearing. I was scared, and mad, and I couldn’t control it. No, that’s not entirely true. I didn’t want to control it. I let it out, I relished the surge of power through my body, savored the change as his ferocity morphed into panic…”

 Melissa closed her eyes, paused, when she opened them again, they were deeper, clouded. I detected in them the depths of her memory.

When she continued, her jaw jutted forward, and with a noble lift of her head, she spoke with passion from deep in her throat. “My claws ripping through his stinking flesh. Watching the terror on his face where moments before he had been livid with lust and hate. Hearing him scream like a girl as I ripped off his arm, and staring into his eyes as I let his life slowly drain from his body.” – She sniffed the air. “Blood – the taste of hot fresh meat – rending my kill.”

She shuddered lightly. “When it was over, I laid down under a tree to rest. My stomach hurt where he stabbed me. The next thing I remember, Officer Harris gently shook me, the full moon had vanished, and morning lit the sky.”

“We should both be more careful during the full moon.” I say. I hug Melissa, I can’t let go. “I’m so happy you’re safe, and I’m grateful that by the time we found that man’s body, the sun had begun to rise. I don’t know what would have happened if we had found that scene earlier, before dawn extinguished the full moon, and I had thought you were dead.”