A Cop's Haunting Memory Comes to
Life
I retired from law enforcement in
2013, after 31 years of service; I'd been a street cop, narcotics
investigator, worked in the Special
Investigative Unit and then been promoted to Sergeant...which put
me back in uniform. It had been the
most glorious, depressing, exciting and terrifying time of my life,
and left me with physical as well as
emotional scars that bear witness to my service. Because of the job, I now have a titanium knee, rods and
pedicle screws in my lower back and had my right ankle
reconstructed in 1996, all to go along
with various broken bones, sprains, strains and dislocations.
The emotional scars... no one but my
wife sees; the first time she saw me break down was 2007, when she brought a basket of laundry
upstairs and found me in the living room, bawling like a baby, on a Sunday afternoon. I'd had a recurrence
of a bad memory, of a winter night in 1991 when my partner and I had responded to a medical assist
call. We'd been right around the corner when we monitored radio traffic on the fire department
frequency, of a person choking inside a residence. As we pulled up in
front of the house at 0330 hours, the call
was updated as being a child choking. I stormed up onto the porch as the front door flew open, and a
hysterical, middle-aged woman thrust an infant, wrapped in a baby blanket, into my arms. The woman was
screaming for me to do something, tears streaming down her face. I looked down at the baby's form,
knowing immediately that he was dead by the gray pallor of his skin. She continued screaming while I
went through the motions of infant CPR, more for her benefit than anything else, and was greatly relieved
when the paramedics arrived. Bosko, my partner, took the report information from the woman, who turned
out to be the baby's grandmother. The baby, who'd been bottle fed by his drunken mother after
she'd gotten home from a bar, had aspirated on his formula after his mother had failed to
burp him after his feeding, and laid the baby on its back in the crib.
Me? I went back out to the cruiser,
sat down and cried.
I cried because I had an infant son
at home who was the same age as the dead baby. When I got home
that morning, I went straight to little
Tyler's room and picked up his slumbering form, carried him to the living room and rocked him for an hour,
tears streaming down my face.
I will remember that call until the
day I die.
That memory comes upon me at various
times, although now, some 25 years later, it has become less
frequent. I still think of that little,
innocent baby from time to time, wondering what would have
become of him had he lived.
After being medically forced to
leave law enforcement, I had too much time on my hands; too much
time to think about all the bad calls
I'd handled, the death notifications made to loved ones after tragic
accidents, the shooting I had been
involved in that took the life of an intoxicated nineteen-year-old.
He'd decided to fire a round into the
air and then point his weapon at my partner as we responded to
a fight call the young man had been
involved in outside a bowling alley. I could go on an endless string
of tales, but the point is, I needed to
find something to do with my days, something to occupy my mind.
My wife, Stacy, had been concerned;
she'd made me promise I wouldn't sit in the recliner in front of
the television all day, but that is
what had happened. My salvation, however, came four months later in the form of her brother, who'd stopped
by one afternoon to visit. He had recently taken up the hobby of metal detecting, recounting the finds
he had made and the exercise he was getting. Steve suggested I try it; what could it hurt? As I'd always
been mildly interested in history, I decided to give it a shot and ordered a machine. A couple weeks after
my Garrett AT Pro arrived, I made my first cool find: an old railroad switch lock along a rail bed
that had been abandoned thirty years before. Internet research revealed that it had been manufactured
in 1930 in Brooklyn, New York, and I ended up calling the company for more information. It turned
out that they'd relocated their facility to a town about 40 miles from me, and were very interested in
having the lock included in a lobby display at their home office. I declined, wanting it for my own
display.
Since that first significant ( for
me ) find, I have developed a passion for the hobby, and now go 'dirt
fishing' every chance I get. My wife is
elated that I'm getting out and doing something...which brings me to the story I'm about to tell:
About ten miles from my house
there’s a decent-sized lake; huge camping area, two marinas, horse
trails and a
beach. This particular facility is maintained by a conservancy
district…not state-owned, but still regulated, which means they have
their own park rangers. Having become a big fan of beach and water hunting, I stopped in one June
afternoon and asked the Chief what their regulations were for metal detecting. He replied that, for a
$5 permit, I could hunt the whole park. Outstanding….or so I thought.
“We don’t permit metal detecting
from Memorial Day to Labor Day”, he said, “but any other time
you’ll be good to go.” We engaged
in further conversation, and I ended up telling him I was a retired
police officer…which sparked a
‘war’-story filled exchange, as he'd formerly been a police
officer in
Pittsburgh. Being Chief of the park's
rangers was his retirement job. When I left I told him I’d see him
the day after Labor Day, and he replied
he’d be looking for me.
Three days before the anticipated
date I traveled back to the park office and paid for my permit, which expressly stated that the park was open
to visitors from 8 AM to 9PM; when Tuesday came around I arrived at the beach area at 7:55,
raring to go…I’d been up since five AM and had checked and packed my gear after finishing my morning
coffee. The weather-guessers had forecast sunny skies with temperatures in the low 90's. THIS was
gonna be a good day!
Wrong.
As I parked my truck in the
beach access parking lot, I saw two guys in the water and two on
the beach…all with detectors.
Unbelievable. While gearing up, I saw my ranger pal driving his SUV
across the grass and up to where these guys
were, and some sort of verbal exchange occurred. The Chief re-entered his cruiser and drove to where
I’d parked, greeting me as he got out.
“Chief, I thought the park didn’t
open ‘til right now. What’s up with those dudes being in here
early?” I hadn’t assumed that I’d be alone
out there, but I didn’t expect early starters, either. From the
looks of it, they’d been at it awhile.
“Man, I’m sorry, Tim, but the
problem is my overnight ranger leaves at six AM and I don’t come in
until 7:30. Our maintenance guy, who comes in
at six thirty, said they were already in the water when he got here. They have their permits, too.”
“Not your fault, Chief. It’s a
big beach. Maybe they’ll let me join them, find out where they
haven’t
detected yet.”
“OK, buddy. Good luck. If you need
anything, you know how to find me.” With that, he drove off.
I ambled towards the nearest
detectorist expecting the usual friendly greeting, as most people who
engage in the hobby of metal detecting
are good folks; before I got to him, however, he called to his pals in the lake and said something I
couldn’t make out, but they came out of the water and joined him in
the sand. Then they did something I still
can’t believe: these four guys, who were making it clear to me they didn’t need any more company, lined
up abreast of each other in a staggered line, each about five yards from the other…and started hunting
the beach. I stood and watched these arrogant dudes make three passes, each pass twenty yards further
away from the water line, stopping only to investigate promising signals. They swept the entire beach in
twenty minutes. Then back in the water they went, without so much as a wave in my direction.
I walked to an area where a sand pit
for volleyball and tether ball had been constructed, busying
myself with running my machine over
that area while the group continued searching for wet treasure. I took my time, hoping that the others
would finish so I could hopefully recover whatever they’d missed; NOBODY finds everything. After I’d
finished, finding three nickles, a Roosevelt dime and two toasted Lincolns, along with seven evil ones (
also known as pull tabs from pop or beer cans ), unidentified scraps of metal and two foil juice pouches, I
sensed someone approaching me. Looking up, I found it was an elderly man walking with a cane. He’d
come from up a hill where camping trailers were sparsely parked, overlooking the entire beach area. He
was smoking the stump of a cigar.
“Havin’ any luck?” he gruffly
asked.
“Not much…seems I paid a price
for abiding by park rules.”
The old man looked towards the four
other detectorists, who were now coming out of the water.
“Them guys got here early, right
after Ranger Campano left, like they was waitin’ for him to leave.
That’s why they parked on the other side of
the beach, by the marina. I been camping here for twenty-six summers now, and those guys, they
always bend the rules. Get here really early the day after Labor Day and start with them machines. They’re
none too friendly, either.”
I chuckled. “Yeah, I found that
out. I’m hoping they missed a few scraps, though. They couldn’t
have found everything.”
“Listen…I watched them the whole
time they were here. They got pretty much the whole area. BUT…” he raised his cane towards a small
point at the near end of the beach, partially covered with
underbrush…”they didn’t go over
there. You might wanna check that place.”
“I don’t know”, I said,
wondering if this old man knew anything about the hobby. “It
doesn’t look like too many folks would spend any time
over there with that overgrowth.” I seriously doubted there would be anything but trash in the smallish
area he’d indicated.
The old man looked at me and took
the soggy stump of cigar out of his mouth, a slight smile turning up at the corners. “I got a feeling”,
he said, and gave me a wink before turning and making his way back up the hill. I watched him struggle
upwards, finally entering a small camper that had to be 30 years old, parked at the crest. He had a great
camping spot. The view had to be wonderful.
After the four-man posse left, I
spent two hours, both on the beach and in the water, working my AT
Pro and stainless steel scoop on
significant signals; no luck, and a lot of aluminum and foil. I was
hot, my back was screaming at me….and I was
frustrated. Finally I decided to cut my losses and head home, and started towards my truck…which was
parked about fifty yards from the brushy point. “What the heck”,
I said to myself, “I’m here, paid
money for my permit…might as well spend another twenty minutes checking that area.” I’d feel
slightly guilty if the old man was watching me and I didn’t take
his advice. He’d been nice enough to walk down
that hill….and then back up…just to chat and give me his tip.
When I got to the area, I found I’d
been right…lots of trash, bottle caps and pull tabs, along with the
occasional beer can. Luckily I found an
area where I could ground balance my machine and did so, but didn’t hold out much hope of finding
anything worth keeping. Signals were hard to pick out over the chatter caused by iron, steel and
aluminum rubbish; I’d just about decided to turn the machine off
and head for my air-conditioned truck, but
decided to try swinging in the water for a few minutes. I’m not kidding…literally three steps off the
beach I was in mid-thigh deep water. The bottom dropped off quickly! But on the very first swing of
the Pro I got a high-pitched ‘TING’ in my headphones, loud enough to cause me to wince. As I centered the
target I found that it wasn’t real big, and had to be on or near the surface of the sand-covered clay
bottom. Convinced I knew where it was, I dug the scoop into the muck, hoping I had the item in the
basket, and brought it to the surface after shaking the basket to
clear some of the clay out. Big chunks of the
stuff stared back at me. I moved the basket away from the spot I’d dug and checked the hole with my
machine…there was no longer a target there, meaning it had to be in my scoop.
I walked to the beach, set the scoop
down and started taking the clay chunks out, one at a time, and
checking them with my pin pointer. The
third one produced the sound we detectorists love…the
indicator of metal. As I split the
chunk with my hands, I saw a gold flash and my heart stopped!
Embedded in the clay was the most
beautiful, thick, heavy, gold man’s ring, its two large diamonds
glistening in the hot sun. I bent over
and washed it off really good in the lake water and looked on the
inside of the band….and saw that it
was stamped ‘24K’. I shouted for joy! Anyone watching probably thought I was a crazy man, but I didn’t
care. I’d made my $5 permit fee back probably 500 times over, if the diamonds were real. I had found
other rings before, but this one was the grand pappy of them all!
After shutting my machine off I
trotted back to my truck, and was in the process of putting the AT
Pro back in its protective sleeve when my
buddy the Chief pulled up. My smile was a mile wide.
“Was that you I heard hollering
back over there? I was sitting under a tree with the windows down,
and thought maybe Apaches were
attacking a wagon train.”
“It sure was! Take a look at this”
and I showed him my treasure, hoping he wouldn’t inform me of a
‘lost-and-found’ policy the park
had in place. He didn’t.
He whistled. “Wow, Tim, that’s a
really nice one! Where’d you find that?” I told him….and I also
told him the story of the old man’s tip. I
pointed up the hill to the dilapidated trailer; the Chief’s eyes
stared back at me, incredulous.
“Are you sure that’s the one?”
“YES!” I said, “the old one
with the faded red paint…”
Chief stared a hole through me.
After an uncomfortable pause, he said “Tim….no one uses that
trailer. The old guy that owned it camped here
for…well, since before I came to work here, but at least 20 years. Always rented that same spot for the
entire season….but he died two years ago.”
“Chief, are you sure? This
guy was as real as you are.”
“Absolutely sure. The old guy
didn't have any family that we know of. There used to be a wife, but
she died three years before he did. He was
an odd guy, too, always seemed to be chewing on the stump of a cigar, wild-looking beard....but he was
a good tenant. We kept the trailer on site, posted a public notice in the papers for a month, but no one
claimed it. We use it to store a few hardware items, some extra four-foot posts for the lot markers
now....that kind of stuff. I couldn't bring myself to have it
removed, so we put it to use.”
“What was his name, Chief?”
He told me. “Konves”.
The name sounded vaguely familiar,
but I couldn't place it. “Hey, would you mind writing it down for me? I'd like to find out a little more
about this 'ghost'. No kidding, Chief, you ought to go up there and check that trailer. I'm sure the man I
talked to went inside it. I don't believe in apparitions, or spirits,
or anything like that. This is kinda
creeping me out.”
The balding, portly man wearing a
badge chuckled. “Okay, if it'll make you feel any better, I'll
drive up there and look, but we keep the door
padlocked.” He was still chuckling as he drove away.
I finished putting my gear away,
strapping it down in the tonneau-covered bed of my truck. Konves.
Why does that name sound familiar? I
grabbed a cold bottle of water from the cooler in my truck and
slammed the
tailgate, luxuriating in the liquid ice running down my parched
throat.
Konves.
I
was still ruminating on the name when Chief returned.
“Nope. Still
padlocked. I even unlocked it and looked inside. No one there. You,
my friend, were visited by ol' Gordon
Konves' ghost.” Chief laughed again as he drove off.
After returning
home, recounting the tale to my wife and showing her my prize, I
started searching
local databases on
the internet, trying to find Gordon Konves. The old 'investigator' in
me had kicked in, full force.
I finally found
him. In the online death certificate files on the county's website.
Gordon
Konves had lived at 515 France Street at the time of his death in
2012. Now why did THAT
address sound familiar?
The
next thought that entered my head nearly knocked me out of my chair.
That was the
same address I'd been to in the middle of the night a little over two
decades ago. That
was the address of
the dead baby call. Gordon Konves had been the husband of the
middle-aged
woman. He'd been
working night shift at the steel mill at the time of the incident. I
vaguely remembered a car pulling up
while I was sitting in the cruiser grieving. The man that had gotten
out of it and ran to the house had been
wearing work clothes.
As I sit here typing this story,
almost twelve hours after finding the ring….I’m still in shock.
