Off the Beaten Path. John Schlarbaum
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I read during stakeouts. Like the infamous S.S. Minnow trip, the tour lasts three hours aboard a snazzy bus and on foot. There’s even a Master of Ceremonies to guide us down the true crime memory lane of the mid-sized metropolis known as Dannenberg. A short jaunt from our own City of Darrien, it’s far enough away to constitute a mini-vacation and close enough not to waste much time driving, which could be more wisely used in our hotel room.
“What’s the deal with Dannenberg anyway?” Dawn asked as she replaced my Springsteen disc with her Sex At Seven CD in the van’s stereo. “Is it like the murder capital of the region or just a really poor choice to call home?”
“A bit of both,” I answered as the first guitar chords of Dawn’s new favourite song, The Trouble With Lies, kicked in. “It’s always been a rough industrial city, full of factories, especially during wartime, making tanks, planes and ammunition.”
“There isn’t much need for that today.”
“Exactly, at least not on that scale. When the last two recessions hit, the first casualties were manufacturing plants. Now instead of producing cars or clothing or canned goods, Dannenberg produces the unemployed, and as witnessed with Broker Boy Corwin, anger is the number one by-product.”
“Followed by crime. I gotcha.” Dawn sang along to the chorus before saying, “I’m surprised there’s even a tour like this. Who thinks this stuff up? A couple of drunks sitting around the bar trying to find a get-rich-quick scheme?”
“You’re close. Two Dannenberg police detectives got bored and thought they could use all their experience to make a buck or two.”
“Still . . . ”
“It does seem a bit macabre, but it’s really no different from the Criminal Hall of Fame wax museum we visited in Niagara Falls.”
“I guess. That was kinda cool.”
“Plus, at the end of this we won’t have to exit through the gift shop,” I said with a smile.
“What, no I Almost Died on The Tour of True Terror t-shirt or keychain or magnet?”
“Sad but true.”
We checked into our hotel suite and spent the afternoon sightseeing a few of Dannenberg’s attractions, albeit only through our bedroom’s bay windows overlooking the city square.
“You really are fun in bed,” I said with a satisfied grin, “although I need to get into better shape ’cause I feel like I’m about to have a heart attack.”
“My dad used to say the same thing and then he’d pop a nitroglycerine pill.” I slowly turned my head to be able to look Dawn in the face. “What?” she asked innocently, adjusting her head on the pillow.
“I need to clarify something. When I said you were a fun lover and I felt like I was about to have a heart attack, then you said, ‘My dad used to say the same thing,’ you were talking about having a heart attack, not making love to you, right? Because, you know, that would be a really awkward situation we’d have to further discuss.”
Dawn didn’t immediately react to what I hoped was a funny joke.
“Did I say dad? Sorry, I meant step-brother,” she deadpanned, before we both broke out in laughter, an occurrence that almost always happens before, during, and definitely after a lovemaking session.
“Why do I keep you around?”
I smiled. “I have no idea.”
We arrived 15 minutes early at the tour kiosk where the bus was parked on the street. It was more of a people-mover type vehicle, the kind used by wedding parties to get to and from the church. “Comfortable and equipped with a bar. I like it,” Dawn said. “I hope the walking parts are short distances.”
“From the curb to the front door of a murder scene?” I asked.
“Something like that.”
“Don’t worry, the walking is minimal. I walked the beat for years. I’m too old for that kind of thing now,” a gruff voice declared from behind us.
We turned and were greeted by an extremely fit, silver-haired man, who was the size of a small car.
“Rodney Dutton. Are you here for our tour or to cause trouble?”
“Both, maybe,” Dawn replied as she placed her tiny hand into Rodney’s huge mitt-like grip. “We tend to behave ourselves until we get bored and decide it’s time everyone around us needs to lighten up.”
I offered my hand to our host and calmly said, “My name is Steve Cassidy and I have no idea who this woman is or why she keeps following me around. So far, she hasn’t become violent, but who knows when she might become a stop on your tour.”
Rodney let go of my hand and assessed the petite firecracker in front of him. “I’m thinking along with the other passengers, we can deal with any trouble that comes our way.” He paused and then asked, “Isn’t that right, Miss . . . ”
“Dawn.”
“Miss Dawn and Mr. Cassidy, I believe we’re going to have a lot of fun tonight.”
We nodded in agreement with Dawn lightly hitting my chest with her hand as Rodney left us to attend to new arrivals.
“Are we even now?”
“Even how?” I replied.
“For my insignificant other intro at the stockbrokers’ dysfunctional social gathering last night.”
“That old line? Do I look like someone who holds a grudge until I see the perfect opportunity, like just now, to get my revenge?”
“You totally do.”
“Then there’s your answer.”
“I’m sorry I called you insignificant,” Dawn ‘fessed up.
“Sorry you said it out loud or because it was a complete and bold-faced lie?”
“Yes.”
“I knew it!”
“If you two are done, they said we can board the bus now.”
Dawn and I pivoted toward this new voice that belonged to a kindly-looking woman in her early sixties who wore a wry grin. “I was young and in love once,” she stated grumpily as she walked past and entered the bus.
“Ah, she thinks we’re in love,” Dawn said softly. “What do you think?”
“Two things,” I began, having had this non-starter conversation with Dawn a few times. “One, I think l-o-v-e is a grown up term that should only be used by responsible adults, which obviously excludes us.”
“And two?” Dawn asked as we made our way up the bus stairs.
“Did you catch a whiff of her coat? I firmly believe she said the same exact thing to her 17 cats before leaving the house tonight.”
***
These types of tours attract a very eclectic group of people, from basic mystery fans to serious scholars of true crime, to those bored with what’s playing at the multiplex to lonely widowers, and, of course, a few wanna-be killers looking for pointers. Our group consisted of four university students on a double date, two female friends in their forties, a couple in their fifties who were married (although not necessarily to each other), the cat woman I’d nicknamed Ms. Vittles, and two solo thrill seekers, both in their early thirties. The driver was a kid I assumed to be the son or nephew of tonight’s guide Rodney, who now stood at the front of the bus talking into a microphone.
“The cases you’re going to hear about are real. They all happened during the past 100 years. People died. Their killers were tried and sentenced for their special crime. Most went to prison for very long periods of time, while a few were executed—an eye for an eye and all that. Some escaped to kill again or vanished into thin