The Matter of the “Poof and Gone” Diamonds

The Matter of the “Poof and Gone” Diamonds

Captain Noonan, the ‘Bearded Holmes’ of the Sandersonville Police Department, was busy contemplating the hereafter. This, however, was not the ‘hereafter’ as in what happens when one leaves this mortal coil but, rather, when one ventures from one’s office into the living room and then ponders, “What did I come here after?” This was neither early onset Alzheimer’s nor dementia. It was — also — not a symptom of advancing age or momentary insanity. It was simply brain freeze, a condition which is prevalent in all races, ages, religions, sexes and college education levels. It does not ameliorate with advanced age or more college degrees. That being said, there is a direct relationship between the number of brain freezes one has and the number of in-laws with which one must associate.

When it comes the former “hereafter,” Noonan had a gracious view of the unknown. He gave it no account. In his world, belief was based on evidence. In most cases, evidence which was both — and it must be both — forensic and admissible in court. Gut feelings were fine and dandy in the field but District Attorneys wanted more than “I felt he was guilty” when it came time to face a jury.

But the hereafter does have a place, just not in a court room. That had been Noonan’s general opinion of “ghoulies and ghosties and long-leggedy beasties and things that go bump in the night.” The ‘had been’ ended when Joshua Sabine of the Pamlico City Police gave Noonan a call. It seems a jewel thief had secreted himself inside the Cape Hatteras lighthouse with his booty but when the miscreant finally left the structure the gems were missing.

“They were ‘poof and gone,’ like a card in a magician’s hand,” Sabine told Noonan. “We poked into every nook and cranny of the 198.5 feet of the lighthouse and came up empty.” Sabine had told Noonan. “We searched from basement to lamp and found nothing. Those gems were as gone as the ghost cat of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse. The perp went in with the gems and came out clean as a whistle.” He paused for a moment and then said softly, “Just in case he swallowed the gems . . .”

“I get the picture,” Noonan said before Sabine finished the sentence.

* * *

Noonan, a long-term resident of the Outer Banks of North Carolina and a steadfast believer in the here-and-now as opposed to the ‘hereafter,’ was well aware of the myths and legends of the Outer Banks. Such were rock solid gold to sell T-shirts and Martini coasters to tourists but when it came to scientific, forensic proof, a lot was lacking. There were only two genuine “ghosties” with any physical presence on the Outer Banks. One was the CARROL A. DEERING, the so-called “Ghost Ship of the Outer Banks.” It had been a five-masted schooner which ran aground on Diamond Shoals in January of 1921. There was not a person on board and its lifeboats were missing. No one knew what had become of the crew. But everyone in the Outer Banks knew what became of the CARROL A. DEERING: it was cannibalized for lumber by a host of residents and became part of the homes and outbuildings of the day.

The other myth and/or legend of the Outer Banks which had a physical remnant — allegedly — was the disappearance and supposed appearance of the daughter of infamous American and duel survivor Aaron Burr. The daughter, Theodosia, was married to Joseph Alston who became Governor of South Carolina on December 10, 1812. Theodosia was on her way to New York to see her father when the ship on which she was sailing, the PATRIOT, disappeared in January of 1813. There were no survivors.

Allegedly.

Over the years a number of alternative scenarios were brought forward. The War of 1812 was raging so the PATRIOT could have been sunk by the British Navy. Other possibilities included the ship being seized by pirates and the passengers held for ransom. This has been discounted as Aaron Burr never paid for the release of his daughter. It has also been suggested Outer Bankers had lured the ship onto shoals where it was subsequently looted.

Then there was the story/theory/supposition of the painting of Theodosia. In 1869, 56 years after the PATRIOT went missing, Nags Head physician, William G. Pool, was treating an elderly woman when he noticed an expensive oil painting in her home. The woman, Polly Manncaring, stated her first husband had pulled it from a wreck during the War of 1812.

Then the story became murky.

Legend has it that in 1813, a young woman in a rowboat with the painting and suffering from amnesia came ashore somewhere along the coast of the Outer Banks. She was rescued by a fisherman who nursed her back to health.

Sort of.

Again, according to the legend, when the fisherman who was nursing the woman tried to pay for the doctor with the painting, she yelled, “It is mine! You shall not have it! I am on my way to visit my father in New York, and I am taking this picture of his darling Theodosia!” She grabbed the painting and ran into the sea. A day later the painting floated ashore. The young woman was never heard from again. No one has ever positively identified the woman in the painting as Theodosia Burr Alston. Today the painting in in the Lewis Walpole Library in Farmington, Connecticut.

Then there are the legends with no proof whatsoever. Most prominent for the Sandersonville area, there is the Gray Man of Hatteras. Purportedly the spirit of a man named Gray, his apparition appears on the seashore whenever a violent hurricane is nearing landfall. When living humans approach the ghost, it disappears without a word. And then there is the Ghost Cat, a spectral 20 pound, black and white feline which has been associated with the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse for more than 150 years. Interestingly, when the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse was relocated in 1999, the Ghost Cat came along with the structure. The Ghost Cat is memorable because it will rub up against the legs of visitors to the lighthouse. But when someone reaches down to pick up the feline, it disappears faster than a sailor’s sawbuck on a saloon counter.

These stories were all fine and good, as Noonan’s Alaskan in-laws would say, but there was not a single case of dematerializing items of value. After all, even the painting of Theodosia Burr Alston came back, so to speak.

Sabine was still on the phone when Noonan asked him to get a pen and piece of paper. “Off the top of my head, I need some answers to help you.”

“OK. I’ve got the pen and paper just in case I can’t answer something. What do you want to know?”

“How do you know the perp had any jewelry to begin with, how did you know he was in the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse, how did you communicate with him in the lighthouse, what did he say about the gems while he was in the lighthouse, how long was he in the lighthouse, how do you know he didn’t throw the gems into the bushes so he could come back and get them later, and where is the perp now?”

“Anything else?”

“No. For the moment that will do.”

“Here goes, in the order you asked. We got the robbery call from the Pamlico City Jewelry Exchange at 10:22, 22 minutes after the store was supposed to have opened. The perp, white male, 5 foot seven, wearing a — and I kid you not — a Ronald Reagan mask, locked the front door and handcuffed four clerks to some of the fixture braces. He had a .357. After they were on the floor he forced the manager to open the valuable stone drawer and he absconded with about a million dollars in diamonds. He knocked the manager around and was out the front door with a bag of gems and was gone. The manger recovered from his beating and stumbled outside after the perp. He’s the one who gave us a description of the vehicle and reported it as going north. Toward Sandersonville and Buxton. We were able to identify the getaway car as it was approaching the Cape Hatteras Seashore. We had the road blocked so the perpetrator drove into the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. We followed him to the lighthouse. In the parking lot he jumped out of his car and ran into the lighthouse. There were only a few tourists inside and he scared them out. Then he locked the doors from the inside.”

“But how do you know you had the right man?”

“He dropped a few of the gems on the outside of the lighthouse. On the steps.”

“Are you sure those gems came from the site of the robbery?”

“Probably but not for sure. The manager used some razzle dazzle microscope setup and said the gems probably came from his shop but the delivery had been so recent he had not had a chance to fingerprint them.”

“Go on.”

“Well, we locked down the lighthouse and used a bull horn to talk with the perp. He answered on a cell phone. We told him to throw down his weapon and come out with his hands up. He said he didn’t have any weapon and was scared to come out because we’d shoot him for a traffic violation. He was in the lighthouse for three hours. We saw him several times on the catwalk along the top. By the lantern. He didn’t throw anything off the lighthouse. If he had, we would have seen it. Anyway, three hours later, he suddenly opens the door and comes out with his hands up. He didn’t have the gems on him. He didn’t have a .357 and no Ronald Reagan mask.”

“And you checked his car thoroughly to make certain he didn’t hide the gun, mask and gems in the car.”

“Absolutely. And we walked the highway, both sides, from the jewelry store to the National Park. We found nothing. And we didn’t see him throw anything out of the car when we gave chase.”

“But you are sure he had the gems when he left the jewelry store?”

“Again, absolutely. We’ve got four witnesses and the manager. He forced the manager into back room. Three of the witness saw the manager put gems into a bag. Then the perp hit the manager on the head and left the jewelry shop.”

“How long after the robbery did you get the call?’

“Immediately. We were at the door to the jewelry store about two minutes after the manager called. He had recovered from the beating and had exited the store just as the perp was fleeing. That’s where the description of the car came from.”

“Where is the perp now?”

“City jail.”

“How about the people from the jewelry store?”

“They’re at the station being questioned.”

“Manager?”

“There too.”

“None of them have been anywhere but the jewelry store and the police station?”

“Correct.”

“So what is missing are the gems, the .357 and the Ronald Reagan mask. And you are sure the gems stolen were real.”

“Yes to all of that.”

“Don’t let anyone go. But call me back in an hour.”

* * *

Two days later Harriet, the office administrative assistant and common-sense maven, stormed into Noonan’s office with a copy of the Sandersonville Gazette.

She was not happy.

She slammed the Gazette on Noonan’s desk and shook her finger in anger.

But not at Noonan.

At the ceiling tiles.

Noonan casually looked up at her. “Let me guess, the Pamlico City Jewelry theft.”

“How’d you know,” she snapped. Then, looking up, she jabbed her finger. But not at Heaven, just through the ceiling to the Third Floor where his majesty, the Sandersonville Commissioner of Homeland Security, had his throne. The Commissioner, Edward Paul Lizzard III, was an absolute master at seizing every iota of credit on any and every opportunity. The larger the newsprint, the more he liked it.

“It’s as though he solved the Pamlico city Jewelry theft all by hissself.” Harriet hissed the ‘hissself.’

“Well, you know,” Noonan said. “When it comes to politics and the bureaucracy, the longer your title the less you do.”

“. . . and the more publicity you get.” She laser-beamed Noonan. “How did you solve the crime he’s taking credit for quickly?”

“A no brainer. You just had to think off the wall. There was no gun or Ronald Reagan mask in the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse or in the perp’s car. It wasn’t alongside the road either. That was the telling clue.”

“Really? There weren’t a lot of other places to hide them.”

“He only needed one. See, it wasn’t really a robbery at all. It was an insurance scam. If you read the story carefully,” Noonan pointed at the Gazette. “You will note the clerks were handcuffed to bracing inside the jewelry store. Only the manager was loose. I think he gave the perp two or three stones and the perp made it look like he was loaded.”

“But the clerks saw the bag of gems!”

“The bag, yes, but not the gems. They just assumed the bag was full of gems. You know what ‘assume’ stands for?”

“Not really.”

“’Assume’ which translates as making an ‘ass’ of ‘u’ and ‘me.’ That was the way it was supposed to work. The clerks assumed the perp had a bag of gems. All they really saw was the bag. Then perp ran out of the jewelry store and then the manager stumbled after him.”

“Right,” replied Harriet. “That’s what the paper said. That’s how the police knew the identity of the perp, his car and which way he was headed.”

“True. But do you want to know why the cops could not find the weapon and the mask?”

“Yes, actually, I would.”

“Because the perp dropped them just outside the jewelry store door. Remember, the manager went out alone. It took him just seconds to scoop up the .357 and the Ronald Reagan mask and put them in his car. No one was going to search his car. Then he ran back inside and made the call.”

“Well, that explains the mask and gun, but there’s still the bag of gems.”

“Nope. Only one or two gems. They were found on the steps leading into the lighthouse. There were no other gems. That was the plan. No gems, no gun, no mask, no robbery. His was just a case of mistaken identity. It was supposed to finish that way: police tracking down the wrong man.”

“But the manager said the gem came from his shop.”

“No, he said ‘probably.’ That’s called reasonable doubt in a courtroom. No one can prove absolutely, positively, for sure the found gems had been dropped by the perp.”

“Well, how else could they have gotten there?”

“That’s the reasonable doubt.”

“But didn’t the perp have a bag when he fled. Did he leave that with the gun and mask?”

“That stumped me for a while. He had to have the bag with him. He was given the two or three stones and he had to leave with the bag in plain sight. And the bag had to be plain sight when he went into the lighthouse. He had to have witnesses see the bag. That gave him credibility.”

“But the bag was not found. That’s what the newspaper said.”

“True. To know what happened to the bag you have to know the architecture of the lighthouse. There are a lot of very brutal winds here on the Outer Banks . . “

“Not to mention hurricanes.”

“Yes, hurricanes as well. So the tower had be made watertight. But not the outside. If you read the newspaper article carefully, you will see the police talked to the perp on the outside of the lighthouse. Why did he go on the outside of the lighthouse? Remember, he had a cell phone. Why go outside and risk getting shot?”

“I don’t know. Why’d he go outside?”

“Because the only place water will pool on the lighthouse is in the gunnels on the outside of the lamp room. He went outside and up to the outside of the lamp room to put the bag in one of the gunnels. See, it wasn’t a bag made of cloth. It was made of some kind of sugar. He dropped the diamonds on the outside of the lighthouse door and put the bag into one of the gunnels and it dissolved. Now he had no gun, no mask, no gems and no bag. I told the Pamlico Police to take samples of the water in all of the gunnels. One of them should reveal concentrations of sugar in the water. “

“So that’s the so-called evidence from the lighthouse?!” Harriet tapped the paper.

“Sugar water. It’s not solid proof but, in a court of law, it might be good enough for a conviction.”

“But the manager filed for a million in insurance loses. And the gems showed up in his car. He’s going to jail.”

“Ironic, isn’t it,” Noonan mused. “The alleged victim is the one going to jail and the so-called, believed-to-be, perp will probably walk free.”

“Nothing new,” scoffed Harriet. “The Reagan mask was appropriate. “Over 138 people in the Reagan administration went to jail and he came away clean as a whistle.”

“Ah, well, Harriet, you remember what Reagan said to the Russians about the Chernobyl incident?”

“No.”

“You’re overreacting.”

[Steven Levi’s impossible crime novels can be found at www.authormasterminds.com.]