The Question of the Unfamiliar Husband (25 page)

“I'm already staying with the company, Samuel,” she reminded me. “You don't have to butter me up.”

That phrase conjured up such a disgusting image that I chose to think about the next point immediately. “It is worth a try, detective,” I said.

“Maybe.” Detective Esteban stood. “I've got to get back. Dickinson will be asking me where I was so long, and you don't seem to want him to know you came to see me. I certainly don't want him to know you gave me some ideas about the case.”

I nodded. “It is in both our better interests to keep any consultations to ourselves for the time being,” I said. “Thank you for the help, Detective Esteban.”

She nodded slightly. “Thank you, Mr. Hoenig. Ms. Washburn.” And with that she turned on her heel and left the building.

Ms. Washburn looked at her cellular phone, which displays the time. “We have to get you back home for lunch,” she said, picking up her purse.

I followed after her, leaving a tip on the table.

“Was that much help?” Ms. Washburn asked me as we left.

“It was certainly a step in the right direction,” I answered. “We are getting closer to answering the question.”

“Yeah, but Detective Dickinson is our client,” she reminded me. We walked toward her Kia Spectra. “Isn't this a little devious, going behind his back?”

“Our client has been very clear about not wanting to do the research himself,” I said. “We are gaining information without asking him to do so, just as he would have approved.”

“I don't know how I feel about working for him, Samuel.”

“You are not working for him. You are working for me.”

I got into the car and sat in the passenger seat as Ms. Washburn took her place behind the steering wheel. “What I mean is, I feel bad about working to give Dickinson the collar when his partner is doing so much of the work,” she said as she started the engine.

“That would be unfortunate,” I admitted.

“So what's our next move?”

“I believe we should call a meeting of WOOL.”

twenty-nine

It was not as
easy as it sounded.

In order to get all the surviving ex-wives of Oliver Lewis in one room together, it was necessary to plan carefully. As far as we knew, a full meeting of all the ex-wives had never taken place before, and the invitation coming from outside the group would easily have been considered suspicious by the guilty party we were trying to unmask.

“There are a number of suspects in this crime that must be investigated if we are to answer the question,” I said to Mother and Ms. Washburn. Mother had served herself and me turkey sandwiches, and had expressed her displeasure with Ms. Washburn for paying for lunch when she could have eaten with us. (“Just consider yourself invited for lunch every day, Janet.”) As it was, Ms. Washburn sat with us at the kitchen table and simply watched as Mother and I had lunch.

“Yeah,” she said. “And most of them are Hazel Montrose.”

Mother looked concerned. “Isn't that the young woman you were out with last night, Samuel?”

“It was a business dinner, Mother,” I explained. Again.

I chose to phrase the last sentence in a way that seemed to express some consternation, but it was for comic effect. I was not upset with my mother.

“Nonetheless, the WOOL members are only some of the people who might have had a hand in Oliver Lewis's murder,” I said, attempting to change the subject. “There is also Roger Siplowitz, who claims to have known Mr. Lewis only slightly, but whose name shows up on Terry Lambroux's civil suit against Mr. Lewis. He is clearly hiding something.”

We had called Siplowitz's office again, twice, and had not been granted access to him. Another visit would undoubtedly have resulted in the same outcome and would have used up valuable time.

“And if Terry Lambroux really is Hazel Montrose, he might know something about the whole crazy setup,” Ms. Washburn suggested. “I see where you're going, Samuel.”

“It might not be necessary to have Mr. Siplowitz in the same room as the ex-wives for this meeting,” I theorized. “That would seem too coincidental; perhaps we should see him separately after we see the WOOL members.”

“It's a silly club name,” Mother said.

“They've never all met before at the same time,” Ms. Washburn reminded me. “How do we get them all to show up without rousing their suspicion?”

“We need only worry about one of them,” I said. “Hazel Montrose.”

“That's three of them,” Ms. Washburn noted.

There was no reasonable response, so I went on: “While there is no direct evidence linking Hazel to either murder, she is the only one of the ex-wives who has said she never met any of the others.”

“Do you believe her?” Mother asked.

“I do not have enough proof to form an opinion, but she does have a rather varied history of lying to us, so I am wary. Still, there is some reason to question each of the ex-wives again.”

I had finished the sandwich I was eating and told Mother I would clear the table myself. She has some issues with her knees and had prepared the meal, so I felt it was the least I could do to save her the time and effort to clean up.

Ms. Washburn offered to help, but since she had not partaken in the meal, it seemed unfair to accept the offer.

I turned toward Ms. Washburn. “Is there some need in women—obviously not all women, but enough that it would be considered unremarkable—to have a protector, a man who is meant to stand guard or deal with imposing danger?”

Mother and Ms. Washburn exchanged a look that I could not decipher. “It's a really old instinct,” Ms. Washburn said after a moment (two seconds). “The stereotype is that women are helpless physically and need men to serve as a … buffer, I guess, against dangers. It's a view that's changing, but it's still there. How did we get to this?”

“It occurs to me that both Cynthia Maholm and Hazel Montrose have attempted to cast me as the male protector, and I think I have failed to play the part both times,” I said. I noticed Ms. Washburn had put the plates and utensils into the dishwasher and decided not to bring it up, assuming she had not forgotten my declining her offer and simply did what she had decided she would do. Ms. Washburn often acts in ways I don't understand intellectually, but comprehend on an almost instinctual level. “I wonder if it was meant to distract me from the facts surrounding the question we are attempting to answer.”

“Distract you?” Mother said. “When you called me from jail, I got the impression you thought the whole ruse was a means to get you out of the way.”

I began cleaning the table with an antiseptic wipe. “Yes. And perhaps that was Hazel's intention last night as well, to remove me and herself from the Applebee's, but somehow I think my intended response was supposed to have been to see myself as her hero, her protector, and therefore not suspect her in the murders.”

Ms. Washburn looked at me and exhaled. “You took her to an Applebee's?”

“It is possible dating is not one of my stronger skills.”

“It will be when you find the right girl,” Mother suggested. Mother is something of an optimist where I am concerned.

“Nonetheless, our focus now should be on assembling the members of WOOL without them knowing we have done so.” I took Cynthia Maholm's cellular phone from my pocket, getting a knowing smile from Ms. Washburn in the process. “Perhaps Ms. Maholm can lend some assistance. Please show me how one sends a text message with this phone.”

Ms. Washburn took the phone from my hand gingerly, as if afraid she would damage it or contaminate its ability to operate as evidence through touching it. “Are you sure it's already been fingerprinted and everything?” she asked.

“Quite sure. Don't worry.” I gestured toward the phone. “How is it done?”

“It's really easy.” Ms. Washburn showed me the proper sequence of movements that would identify the person receiving the message, and then how to compose and send it. The technology was, as she had said, quite simple. “I could just do it for you.”

“Perhaps I should learn how to do these things myself,” I said, and identified Jennifer LeBlanc's cellular phone number among Cynthia's list of contacts. I began composing a message.

“You already have the phone numbers,” Mother pointed out. “Couldn't you just send these from Janet's phone?”

“I believe the message will have more impact if it comes from beyond the grave,” I said.

I sent the first text message to Ms. LeBlanc, then started composing one for Amy Stanhope. Ms. Washburn sat next to me at the table and looked puzzled.

“Why aren't you sending them all at once?” she asked.

I stopped what I was typing. “How does one do that?”

It took only two minutes for Ms. Washburn to instruct me in the proper way to create a list of contacts and then send them all the same text message, but in that time, a reply had come back from Jennifer LeBlanc.

Who is this?

Ms. Washburn smiled. “It's working the way you want. Should you answer her?”

“In a moment. Let me send the message to the other women. Ms. LeBlanc can wonder for a little while longer.”

“This seems cruel, somehow,” Mother suggested.

“Do you think I should stop?”

“No.”

Amy Stanhope, Hazel Montrose, and Rachel Vandross each received the text I had sent, which read:

Emergency meeting of WOOL. Tonight 6 p.m. OLimited offices.
Then, before the others could reply, I sent a second message to each and added Jennifer LeBlanc's cellular phone number to the list. The second message read:
I'm not dead
.
That was true, as I was not dead. But the message was intended to seem like it had come from Cynthia Maholm.

Within seconds, Cynthia's cellular telephone began to ring, but Ms. Washburn and I had agreed we would not answer, as that would immediately spoil the illusion. We would respond to text messages if it would help expedite an agreement to attend the meeting. If it were simply an inquiry into the sender, the message would receive no response.

Mother was right; it did seem cruel. I confess there was a certain satisfaction to that, as one of these women had probably been responsible for the difficulty this question had posed since the beginning, and at least one death. The others, I'm afraid, were to be classified, as the military would deem them, “collateral damage.”

Why at the office?
Ms. Stanhope texted back after a number of pleas for the sender's identity had been ignored.

That seemed a reasonable question, and one that would help bring her to the scene when she was needed, so at Ms. Washburn's suggestion, I sent back the message:
Scene of the crime.

We could not be certain that Oliver Lewis was murdered in his offices; in fact, our inspection of the space had found no evidence at all that it was the location in question. But only the murderer would know that, and Ms. Stanhope was not at the top of my list of suspects, although she could not be ruled out entirely.

I have an appointment.
That was from Jennifer LeBlanc. Again after consultation with the two women in the room with me, she was given the (probably unsatisfying) response,
Break it.

Rachel, the least visible of the WOOL members, did not respond at all to the text, although one of the unanswered calls to Cynthia's cellular telephone was from her number. Hazel Montrose, however, did respond, and her message was probably the most disturbing to me.

I know who you are.

“She didn't mention your name,” Ms. Washburn said. “It's a bluff.”

I am aware of the term; it comes from poker, a game with which I am only passingly familiar. But I was not sure Ms. Washburn was correct. “Suppose she does know who is sending the messages?” I posited.

“Does it matter?” Mother asked. “The key is getting them to show up.”

That was true, but not the point of my concern. “If Hazel is the killer and she knows I'm the one sending the messages, she also has one vital piece of information: where I live.” I decided I would no longer respond to text messages and put Cynthia Maholm's cellular phone into my right hand pocket, where I would check on it every few minutes to be sure I had not misplaced it. I had promised Detective Esteban she would get the item back unharmed.

Ms. Washburn and Mother looked at each other for nine seconds. That is a relatively long look.

“I don't think you have to worry, Samuel,” Mother said. “She knew you were looking into the murder before, and nothing happened.”

“It is three hours until the meeting. Ms. Washburn and I should be there early, so we should leave in less than two hours. I am not comfortable leaving you here alone, Mother,” I said.

“I could come with you.”

I thought that over and shook my head negatively. “In a room that might very likely have a killer in it, my thinking about your safety as well as Ms. Washburn's would be a dangerous distraction. We have been through that before.” There was a time when Mother's life was threatened because of a question I was researching, and that was much too upsetting an experience to risk again.

“You could call your pal Mike,” Ms. Washburn suggested.

I did not have to consider that long. “That is an excellent idea,” I said, and got up to use the telephone on the wall. After all the use of Cynthia Maholm's cellular phone, it was both strange and comforting to be working on a landline again.

Mike agreed to come by and stay in the house with Mother until Ms. Washburn and I returned. I did briefly consider asking him to come with me and having Ms. Washburn stay with Mother, but the idea of leaving both of them out of sight with danger lurking was not acceptable. I could do more to ensure Ms. Washburn's safety if I could see her and not worry about Mother at the same time—Mike agreed, and said he would be at the house within an hour.

He was as good as his word, and I relaxed when he walked in, gave Mother a hug, and told me he was being careful—which meant, I knew, that he was armed in case of an emergency. I introduced Mike to Ms. Washburn, who seemed to find him interesting. She asked about his work driving the taxicab and his military background. Mike smiled and answered the questions, and I made a mental note to remind him that Ms. Washburn was, using Mother's phrase, “another man's wife.”

We left shortly thereafter in Ms. Washburn's Kia Spectra, after Mike offered me a spare firearm he carries in his taxicab and I declined. I am not licensed to carry or use a gun, and I have no desire to misuse one and endanger myself or others.

The drive was unusually devoid of conversation; apparently both Ms. Washburn and I had our own thoughts about the upcoming confrontation to keep our minds occupied. I did not want to share them with her—not because I dislike Ms. Washburn at all, but because they would not have been constructive—and she seemed to sense that. The only talk in the car was about directions provided by the Global Positioning Satellite device (although we had been to the office before) and the amount of time it would take to make the trip.

I had brought with me two large rolls of duct tape and an aerosol can of black paint, but I did not have a crowbar or other such implement, so it was a bit of a problem when Ms. Washburn and I discovered that the door to the OLimited offices was locked, which it had not been on our last visit to the building.

“Now what?” she asked. “They'll be here in a little over an hour, assuming they don't show up early.”

“The only course of action is to go to the roof,” I said. “Luckily, it is only a two-story building.” I started up the metal ladder that led to the trap door opening onto the roof of the pizzeria and office structure.

“Wait. What?” Ms. Washburn was four seconds behind me.

We reached the roof—the access door had to be kept unlocked for fire code purposes—and were standing on the flat tar paper structure shortly thereafter.