Page 37 of An Evil Heart
The thing that bothers me most about the case is that I still don’t have a motive. Usually, if I can figure out the why, I can find the who. From all indications, Karn was well-liked. He was a people magnet, popular with the Amish and English alike. He worked hard, kept his nose clean, and didn’t engage in high-risk behaviors. The only conflict in his life involved Vernon Fisher over the repossessed truck—and Fisher’s obsession with the woman Karn planned to marry. As much as I dislike Fisher, I don’t think he murdered Karn.
What have I overlooked?
Was this about money? An owed debt? A repossessed truck? Or was this about something more personal? Was it about a woman? Is there a romantic relationship I don’t know about? Was Emily Byler the only female in his life?
It’s dusk by the time I leave the police station. I’m cranky and sleep-deprived, my productivity having long since played out. In the madness of the day, I managed to skip both lunch and dinner, and I taste acid from too much coffee. This is the point when a smart cop goes home to regroup. Take a shower, eat a decent meal, grab a few hours of sleep. Recharge the battery. There’s no shame in admitting you’ve hit a wall.
I tell myself I’m going to be that smart cop. But as I back out of my parking spot, the case rides me, a vicious master that’s deadweight on my shoulders, my mind, my conscience. And I know even if I go home, I won’t be able to turn it off. I’ll drag Tomasetti into it. I’ll pace or drink too much or lie sleepless, thinking of all the things I should be doing, all the things I should have done. I’ll spin my wheels and dig myself a little deeper into the hole this case has become.
Instead of heading north on Ohio 83 toward home, I make the turn onto the county road and then onto Hansbarger. I roll up to the place where Aden Karn was killed, park on the shoulder, and shut down the engine. The only indication that this spot was a crime scene is the flattened grass in the ditch, the tire ruts off the shoulder, and a single scrap of yellow caution tape discarded in the grass.
I get out, take a deep breath of evening air, and look around. It’s so quiet I can hear the buzz of insects. A mourning dove coos from the treetops in the woods. A forlorn sound that seems to echo the gravity of what transpired here. I walk to the place where Aden Karn had lain. The fire department hosed away the blood; there’s nothing left. On the gravel shoulder, someone placed a small bouquet of flowers, carnations and baby’sbreath. A teddy bear sits next to a small book of poems. The citizens of Painters Mill paying their respects. A piece of paper protrudes from the pages of the book, so I bend to it, tug it out, and find myself looking down at a smiling image of Aden Karn that’s been printed on copy paper. Oddly, someone has used a red marker to draw an arrow sticking out of his chest. At the bottom of the page someone scrawled:
Vann di meind uf flayshlichi sacha ksetzt is, sell fiaht zu’m doht.
It’s a Bible passage; Romans if I’m not mistaken. In English it means: “For to be carnally minded is death.” “What?” I mutter. Who would write that particular passage inDeitsch? What does it mean? And who would draw such a crude picture and leave it at the site of a murder? A prankster? Someone who didn’t like Karn? Someone who hated him?
I walk to the shoulder and scan the trees at the edge of the woods, but there’s no one there. Tugging a baggie from my duty belt, I slip the paper into it. Everything I know about Aden Karn churns in my brain. Not a single person I talked to had a negative thing to say about him.
So who hated him enough to ambush him on a lonely back road and end his life with a crossbow?
I look north, the direction Karn was traveling the morning he was killed. He was on his way to meet his ride to work, the man who’d driven him to and from his construction job for the last year. Who else knew Karn’s routine? Who knew he took this route? What time he met his coworker?Someone close to him,my cop’s voice whispers. My brain scrolls through the list of names. Emily Byler. Wayne Graber. Vernon Fisher. His coworkers. His parents. Someone I don’t yet know about…
For to be carnally minded is death.
The passage seems to refer to sex or lust. I recall the photos and sex toysI found in Karn’s bedroom and I wonder: Who cared about the sex life of a twenty-one-year-old male? Emily Byler? If Vernon Fisher was interested in Emily, he may have kept an eye on Karn. I recall Wayne Graber’s response when I asked him if Karn was seeing anyone else.He might’ve… you know, seen one or two over the last few months. English girls… He’d just discovered his freedom. He liked women…
Did Karn commit some perceived transgression that, in the mind of his killer, warranted murder? According to Doc Coblentz, the second bolt had been fired at close range. The intimate nature of that second shot tells me this crime was personal. The killer knew him. Hated him. Wanted him gone at any cost and he was willing to risk his freedom to do it.
I walk to the spot where the body was found. According to Doc Coblentz, the bolt entered the abdomen from the front. Turning, I look down the road. The woods are to my left. Open field to the right. In order for the bolt to penetrate from the front while Karn was riding his bike toward the pickup point, the killer would have been standing on the road or one of the shoulders or ditches. At some point, Karn likely would have spotted him. He would have noticed the crossbow. Did the killer discharge the bolt before Karn could react? Or did Karn recognize the shooter and believe he had nothing to fear?
I look down at the asphalt where the body had lain. I walk to the shoulder where the shooter may have stood. “Why did you take the bolts?” I wonder aloud.
“Because they are evidence,” I whisper.
Theswoosh!of doves taking flight startles me. I’m swinging around, wondering what disturbed them, when I hear thecrunch! crunch! crunch!of someone running through fallen leaves within the cover of the trees. I stand still, watch for movement, listening, but nothing else comes. Thereare no vehicles in sight. No place to hide a vehicle. No trailhead that I can see. No one around.
So, who’s in the woods, Kate?
Aware that the light is fading fast, I traverse the ditch, and approach the barbed-wire fence. I’m midway over the top when I hear the rustle of leaves and I know without a doubt someone is there and on the move.
I swing my leg over the top of the fence and drop to the other side. “Painters Mill Police!” I call out. “Stop and identify yourself!”
No response.
The pounding of feet against the ground breaks the silence. Twenty yards away. Too many trees to get a look. I break into a run, hit my shoulder mike as I enter the trees. “Ten-eighty-eight,” I say, using the ten code for “suspicious activity.” “I’m ten-eighty.” Giving chase. “Ten-seven-eight.” Need assistance.
I release my mike and pour on the speed. “Police! Stop!Stop!” I hear my quarry ahead and to my left, so I veer that way. I dart around a massive walnut tree, pick up the pace as fast as I dare. In the periphery of my thoughts, I hear my radio light up. Skid is on duty and en route. ETA eight minutes. A lot can happen in eight minutes.
I hurdle deadfall, miscalculate, and get slapped in the face by a branch hard enough to open the skin on my cheek. Cursing, I stop and listen, hold my breath. Over the roar of my pulse, I hear footsteps again, the crackle of leaves. Dead ahead. Closer now. I launch into a sprint, dart around a tangle of raspberry, and catch a glimpse of movement ahead.
“Stop!” I call out. “Police!”
The trees open to a narrow deer trail. It takes me down a gulley. I splash through a shallow creek. I clamber up the steep incline, slide on loose rock, end up using my hands to claw my way up. At the top, I spot a patchof blue through the trees. Just a few yards ahead. A kid, I think. White ball cap. I’m outrunning him.
Adrenaline pumping, I sprint to him, running all out. “Stop right now!”
The trail veers left around a big rock, then right. I take the curves fast, catch sight of the runner. I’m so close I can hear his labored breaths. Ten feet away. He’s small in stature. Not very fast. Six feet between us. Three…
