The Edge Of The Cemetery by Margaret Millmore Page B

outright, only works part time but had a decent income, according to her bank account. She's been getting a monthly deposit from an out-of-state corporation since she's lived in Valley Springs, but the deposits stopped a few weeks after Vokkel died.” She punctuated the last statement with raised eyebrows. “Not only that, but the vesting deed for her house shows the same corporation as the grantor…the sale price was a dollar. I was able to peel back the ownership layers of the corporation, and eventually traced it to one of Vokkel's shell companies.”
    “Right,” Pete said. “We headed back down the hill to see if the mother was home yet…she wasn't, but we did get a chance to talk to the neighbor some more. He said that the mother pulled Calvin from school after the first grade because he had trouble keeping up and he didn't play nice with the other kids. The neighbor thinks the kid has some sort of intellectual disability. Around the same time, a guy named Sam Smith moved in with the Brelongs. The mother told the neighbor he was an old family friend and she was giving him a room in exchange for tutoring the kid. He thought maybe this Sam guy and the mom had a thing, but he couldn't say for sure. Sam disappeared last year, shortly after the uncle died, but when the neighbor asked the mom about it, she just said he moved out of town. I think we need to figure out who this Sam guy is.”
    Pete paused to sip his coffee, and then said, “We waited around for another hour or so. Just as we we're getting ready to call it quits the mother arrived, but she wasn't very cooperative. She said she hasn't seen Calvin in almost a week, but that yes, he could have used her car the other day. She said she's been out of town with friends for the last several days. She did confirm that he spends most of his time at the uncle's property, and does odd jobs up on the mountain to earn money. She was sort of nervous, like she knew something was wrong. I asked her if she had a cell phone number for him…she said she's tried calling it over the last week and just got voicemail, but she gave it to me.” He looked to Carol. “Any luck tracking the phone?”
    Carol shook her head. “No go. It's either turned off or the battery is dead. I hacked into the account though. In the last several months he's only made or received calls from his mother.”
    Phil was practically bouncing out of his chair, his excitement palpable. Aris nodded at him and he dived in. “Okay,” he said, rubbing his hands together, “so we can definitely connect this Calvin kid to Vokkel. Carol, show them the picture.” She tapped on her tablet and shoved it in our direction. It was a CDL photo of Calvin Brelong, the same kid from the Tenderloin and Marin. I nodded, as did Billy and Pete.
    “As you know, I found references in Vokkel's research about a subject that fit Calvin's description, and he noted that he'd arranged for the kid's 'tutelage.' So this Sam guy that Pete mentioned might have been hired by Vokkel to keep tabs on the kid and teach him, but I haven't had a chance to see if Vokkel mentions Sam by name yet. Anyway, I did attempt to find references in Vokkel's journals.” A scowl replaced his earlier enthusiasm. “Vokkel's research notes are pretty straightforward, but the journals are a different story entirely. It's almost as if he had dissociative identity disorder…although there's no evidence he actually did have DID….” He paused to take a breath. Phil tended to talk fast and furiously, especially when he was excited. “Regardless, we do know the man was as mad as a hatter, so why not add DID into the mix? The journal entries are like a mish-mash of information jotted down in no particular order…like he had a stack of identical blank books lying around, and grabbed the closest one, filling it with random stuff. There doesn't appear to be any chronology to the entries either. The only way we can even tell that he made the entries on