Sam Kincaid 01 - The Commission

with a restitution bill of almost one-quarter of a million dollars.
    I found Walter Gale living at the home of his married daughter in Provo. It seemed that his wife of twenty years divorced him shortly after he entered prison, and moved back to California to begin a new life. My gut told me Gale was too good at his craft to have involved himself in creating a forged suicide note like this one. It seemed far beneath his skill level, and besides, getting caught would earn him a one-way ticket back to prison. I hoped by contacting him without advance warning, if he was involved, he might confess, or slip and say something incriminating. He didn’t do either.
    Gale was polite and cooperative. I showed him a copy of the suicide note and explained the nature of my visit. He firmly denied any involvement in the incident. “Look, Mr. Kincaid, I’ve only been out of prison for a few months. My daughter and her husband have been kind enough to let me live with them while I try to put my life back together. I work forty hours a week as a salesman at an Ultimate Electronics store in Orem. I can’t have a checking account, a credit card, or any installment debt. I’ve got a restitution bill big enough to choke a horse. And I get the impression that my PO would like nothing better than to see me screw up so he can have me sent back to prison. I’ve been there and I’m not going back. And quite frankly, this looks like a simple job, not worthy of my time or expertise. And it probably didn’t pay much either.”
    He sounded convincing. He volunteered to offer an opinion on the quality of the forgery. He examined the note and the samples of Slick Watts’ handwriting. He agreed with the document examiner’s conclusion that the suicide note was an above-average piece of work, not something done by a rank amateur.
    “Tell me,” I said. “Can you think of anybody in the business who might be responsible for the job?”
    “Sorry,” he replied. “I’m out of that life now, and I’m not about to look back. If you like, I could take a look at the list you’ve working from.”
    I declined his offer, thanked him, and got up to leave.
    As I reached the front door, Gale said, “Hey, Mr. Kincaid. Tell me why you’re limiting the search to guys out here in the community?”
    “What do you mean?” I asked.
    “Just what I said. Who’s to say the guy who wrote that note isn’t locked up at the state prison right now?”
    “Are you trying to tell me something, Walter?”
    “No, not necessarily. It was just a thought,” he replied.

Chapter Thirty-three
    I left Walter Gale, feeling ticked off and disturbed. Ticked off because I hadn’t considered the possibility the forger might be an inmate currently in prison. Disturbed by the implications of having the suicide note written by somebody currently serving time. How had I managed to overlook that possibility? Who would have asked an inmate to forge the note? Another inmate? Once written, how was it smuggled out of prison? And did Walter Gale know more than he was telling me? Was he trying to point me in the right direction without getting himself directly involved? I had an idea, two ideas actually. I decided to launch them simultaneously the next morning.
    With a little more leg-work, I eliminated the other two forgery suspects. I found Wendell Rich at the Utah State Hospital on an involuntary civil commitment for mental health problems. He’d been there almost two years. I found an empty house with a “for sale” sign in the front yard at Vaughn Gardner’s address. A neighbor told me he had died of a massive heart attack a year ago while mowing his lawn.
    ***
    Having eliminated Gardner, Rich, and Gale as suspects, I did something I rarely do—act on impulse. I’d been thinking about Kate and decided to steer the Cherokee toward her condo. A little voice in my head, which I chose to ignore, told me this was not a good plan. When I reached Kate’s complex, I drove in, parked, and knocked on her front door. Much to my surprise and chagrin, an equally surprised Tom Stoddard answered the door barefoot, wearing a pair of faded blue jeans and a tank top.
    “Kincaid, what are you doing here?”
    Recovering quickly, I said, “Hoping to catch Lieutenant McConnell. I need to chat with her for a couple of minutes about the investigation.”
    Speaking in hushed tones, Stoddard said with more irritation in his voice than surprise, “Man, this is Sunday evening. Can’t this