“Interesting, but a lot of people went to Woodbury. It’s a big school.”
“So I looked at the property tax records, for a Fisk,” Moss said. “I found one. There was a Fisk family that lived on Hattie Lane in Woodbury back in the nineties. Not recently, as far as I can tell. That was a block from Shawnee Park.”
“Holy cats.”
“Am I good, or what?”
Lucas, laughing when he was told, said, “Another straw on the camel’s back.”
—
Virgil called Duncan,who said, “Keep pushing. We should have the DNA stuff back from Chicago on Tuesday or Wednesday. If we get Carlson’s DNA and it matches what we got outa Grandfelt, we’ll need to talk to the Ramsey County Attorney about Fisk—that we’re looking at her.”
“I don’t think we’re just looking at her, Jon,” Virgil said. “I think she killed all of them—Grandfelt, Carlson, and Wise, and I think she burned down my stable to get me off the case.”
“None of what you have is definitive. Keep piling it up. We need to catch her in a misstep.”
“She’s smart.”
“Not that smart. Instead of scrubbing everything clean in her house, she should have let us ID Carlson as the person who had sex with Grandfelt. Nothing illegal about that, they were both single adults. Scrubbing his DNA is what a guilty person would do. At least, somebody with guilty knowledge.”
“We’ll push.”
“One more thing,” Duncan said. “How old is she?”
“I don’t know.”
“Hang on…I’m going out to the DVS.” Duncan put his phone down and Virgil could hear him rattling keys on his home computer. “Okay. She’s forty-eight. What I’m wondering is, are her parents still around? If they are, we should interview them.”
“Huh. You’re right.”
“As always.”
—
Lucas agreed thatthey should interview Fisk’s parents, assuming they could find them. “We need their names. They should be on those old tax records, if that actually turns out to be Fisk’s family. Then we can check driver’s licenses…”
Virgil called Karen Moss back, got Harlan and Alma Fisk as the owners of the Hattie Lane house, but Moss said that the house hadnow been sold at least twice since the Fisks lived there. Driver’s licenses showed Harlan renewing until 1994, and not after that. Alma Fisk renewed until 2018, and then no more.
Virgil: “Are they dead?”
“One way to find out…”
An online search of death records turned up a death certificate for Alma Fisk issued in March of 2017; a check with theStar-Tribuneobituaries found a brief paid obit that listed survivors as a daughter, Amanda Fisk. There was no mention of Harlan Fisk, or death certificate or obit for Harlan.
“We got the right family—and Fisk lived a block from Shawnee Park. She’d know how to deliver Doris’s body there. We’re beyond coincidence now,” Lucas said.
“Wonder where Harlan Fisk went? Divorce?”
“That seems likely,” Lucas said.
“If Harlan Fisk is alive, then he’s gotta be in his seventies, at least. So—Medicare, Social Security,” Virgil said.
“I don’t know how you get the records, but I know somebody who can. Let me make a phone call.”
The call went to Elmer Henderson, and that was the only call Lucas needed: Henderson got back in an hour and said, “There’s a Harlan Fisk in Eau Claire getting Medicare. He’s seventy-seven. I’ve got an address, but no phone number.”
“Thank you.”
