The Undertaker's Widow (24 page)

While Quinn ate he mulled over Yoshida's testimony. Loud and repeated knocking on the outer door interrupted Quinn's chain of thought. He did not want
company, but the knocking was insistent. Quinn went into the reception room. There was a peephole in the door to the hall. Quinn looked through it. The blood drained from his face and he felt dizzy. The woman in the corridor was the woman who had passed by the courtroom door. Quinn stared harder through the peephole. The glass distorted the woman's image but there was no getting around her resemblance to Andrea Chapman. Quinn opened the door.

The woman was Andrea and she was not. Andrea had long black hair. The woman in the hall was blonde and her hair was cut short to frame her face. She also wore glasses. Beneath her raincoat, her clothing was conservative and cheap: a drab, colorless dress, no jewelry and very little makeup.

“Are you Judge Quinn? Richard Quinn?”

“Yes. Can I help you?”

“My … my name is Claire Reston. I need to talk to you. It's very important.”

Quinn saw none of Andrea's breezy self-confidence in the woman. They were almost the same height, but Claire Reston slouched and her shoulders were hunched and folded in as if she were trying to hide behind them. She also had trouble looking Quinn in the eye.

“Why don't you come into my chambers?” suggested Quinn, who was anxious that no one see him with the woman.

Reston took one of the chairs across the desk from Quinn. She folded her hands in her lap.

“I … I know about you and Andrea,” Reston said without conviction.

“Who?”

Reston looked up. The lenses in her glasses were thick and made her eyes look large. Quinn felt terrible about lying to the woman, but he had no choice.

“Andrea Chapman is my sister. The … the day before she disappeared, she told me about you.”

“Okay. Now I understand. Look, Miss Reston, a police detective called me about your sister's disappearance. I'll tell you what I told him. I sat next to her on the flight to St. Jerome, but I didn't see her after we landed.”

Reston looked down. She seemed on the verge of tears.

“That's not true.” Reston's voice quivered as if the effort to disagree with Quinn was monumental. “She told me your name. She was upset. She didn't want to do it. I want you to know that.”

“Do what, Miss Reston? I don't understand.”

“They wanted her to seduce you. They were going to blackmail you.”

“Who was going to blackmail me? What are you talking about?”

“She didn't tell me anything else. Just that she had been hired to seduce a judge. She told me your name. She was very nervous, very tense.”

“Miss Reston, I assure you that I did not see your sister after we left the plane. If she was hired to do something to me, maybe she changed her mind. I only talked to her during the flight. She was friendly, but she made no attempt to seduce me. I'm married.”

Reston looked confused.

“Have you told the police that I had something to do with your sister's disappearance?”

“No. I … Andrea and I … we're not close. I don't even see her that much. In fact, the call from St. Jerome surprised me. I didn't even know that she had disappeared until the detective called to ask about her. I … Well, I didn't know anything but your name and that you were a judge, so I didn't tell the detective what Andrea said.” Reston looked down at her lap. She seemed embarrassed by her lack of courage. “Then I
read about Senator Crease's trial and the story gave the name of the judge …”

Reston trailed off. She looked very unsure of herself and Quinn believed his bluff would work.

“Miss Reston, I am sorry that your sister has disappeared. She seemed very nice. But I really can't help you. I talked to her a little on the plane. That's all. I probably mentioned where I was staying, but she never called my hotel. If she did, she didn't leave a message.”

Reston sat up a little straighter. She studied Quinn.

“I … I don't believe you. I think you do know something about Andrea's disappearance.”

Quinn heard the hall door open and close. Reston looked over her shoulder toward the sound. She stood up quickly and opened the door between Quinn's chambers and the reception area. Quinn saw Fran Stuart over Reston's shoulder.

“I'm staying at the Heathman Hotel in room 325. You … you have to be honest with me. If you know something …” Reston was on the verge of tears. “I'll give you until tomorrow.”

Reston saw Stuart. She ran out of courage and bolted past the secretary.

“Who was that?” Stuart asked.

Quinn shook his head. “Forget about her. She's confused. It wasn't anything important.”

Stuart started to say something, then thought better of it. Quinn closed the door to his chambers.

The offices of Oregon Forensic Investigations were located in an industrial park a few blocks from the Columbia River. Quinn had to wind through narrow streets flanked by warehouses to find the entrance to the parking lot. After parking in a space reserved for visitors, Quinn walked up a concrete ramp, then followed a walkway that led past several businesses. A door with the company name opened into a small anteroom. There were two chairs on either side of an end table that held a lamp and several copies of
Scientific American
and
Time.
In one wall of the reception area was a door and a sliding glass window. Quinn looked through the window and saw a receptionist's desk with a telephone and a second door in the back wall. The door to the receptionist's area was locked. A sign above a button on the wall instructed Quinn to ring for assistance. He pressed the button and heard a muted buzzing somewhere in the building. Moments later, the doors opened and Paul Baylor greeted Quinn.

Baylor was a slender, bookish African American with a B.S. in forensic science and criminal justice from Michigan State who had worked in the Oregon State Crime Lab for ten years before opening his own forensic consulting firm with another OSP forensic expert. Quinn had been impressed by the slow, thoughtful manner with which Baylor handled the prosecutor's questions
when he testified in his courtroom. He did not appear to be taking sides and had answered truthfully, even when the answers were not favorable to the defense. Baylor was wearing a brown tweed sports jacket, a white shirt, a forest-green tie and tan slacks. After shaking hands with Quinn, Baylor brought him into a cramped office outfitted with inexpensive furniture.

“How can I help you, Judge?” Baylor asked when they were seated. Quinn was carrying a box containing the transcript of Gary Yoshida's testimony, several police reports, a sketch of Yoshida's diagram of the crime scene, a complete set of the crime scene photographs, including the two that showed the blood spatter pattern on the side of the armoire, and a brown paper bag with Ellen Crease's nightgown inside. He set the box on top of Baylor's desk.

“You may have read that I'm hearing motions in
State v. Crease.
”

Baylor nodded.

“Do you know Gary Yoshida?”

“Sure. We worked together for several years when I was with OSP.”

“What's your impression of him?”

Baylor looked uncomfortable about being asked to comment on another professional, but he answered the question.

“Gary does good work and he's very honest.”

“Is he an expert on blood spatter?”

“He's knowledgeable about it.”

“How exact a science is blood spatter analysis?”

Baylor thought about the question before answering.

“Blood spatter analysis is very helpful in determining what happened at a crime scene, but it's not like fingerprint examination. There is a certain amount of subjectivity involved. A fingerprint is not open to interpretation,
if you have enough points of comparison. That's not true with blood spatter. You can't just look at an individual blood spot and draw indisputable conclusions. You have to look at the spot in the context of the whole scene. Bloodstains just tell you in general what happened.”

“So two honest experts can look at the same scene and draw different conclusions as to what happened?”

“Sure, in certain instances.”

“I would like you to look at the evidence I've brought and read Officer Yoshida's testimony. Then I would like you to tell me if there is any analysis of the evidence that would support Ellen Crease's version of how the shoot-out in her bedroom occurred.”

Baylor's brow furrowed. He looked concerned.

“Are you questioning Gary's honesty?” he asked.

“No, no. I just want to know if there is a reasonable explanation of the evidence that is different from his conclusions. There isn't any question in my mind that Officer Yoshida gave an honest opinion in court. I want to know if he could be wrong.”

“I assume Gary had the advantage of visiting the crime scene?”

Quinn nodded. “He was out there twice.”

“Can I visit it?”

“No. Besides, my information is that it has been cleaned.”

“That's going to put me at a disadvantage.”

“I realize that. Just do your best. And let me know if working on the problem without visiting the scene has a critical impact on your conclusions.”

“Okay. When do you want me to get back to you?”

“Actually, I thought I'd wait. Is this something you can do right away?”

Baylor looked surprised. “I can get to it now. It might take a while.”

“Is there someplace nearby I can eat breakfast?” Quinn asked. He did not have much of an appetite, but a restaurant would give him a place to pass the time while Baylor worked.

“Yeah. Sue's Cafe is pretty good. It's two blocks down just when you turn out of the lot on the right.”

“Okay. I'll be back in an hour.”

“I'll see what I can do by then. Uh, one other thing. Should I submit a court-appointed witness voucher for my work?”

“No. I'll be paying for this personally.”

When Quinn returned to Oregon Forensic Investigations, he found Paul Baylor in shirtsleeves with his collar open and his tie at half-mast.

“You find Sue's okay?” Baylor asked as he led Quinn through a door into a large work area. The walls were unpainted concrete blocks and there was fluorescent lighting hanging from the ceiling. The laboratory equipment that sat on several wooden tables looked new and Quinn figured that this was where Baylor and his partner had sunk their capital.

“It was a good suggestion.” Quinn noticed the papers and photographs that covered one of the worktables. “Are you through?”

“Yeah. It didn't take as long as I thought it might.”

“Were you able to draw any conclusions?” Quinn asked anxiously.

“Yes.”

“And?”

“Okay. First tiling, I can't disagree with Gary's findings.”

“You mean the evidence contradicts Ellen Crease's version of the shootings?”

“I didn't say that. Look, as I said before, blood spatter
analysis is not an exact science. People can draw different conclusions from the same evidence in some situations. Gary's conclusions are valid. However, Gary's analysis of the significance of the blood spatter patterns on the nightgown and the side of the armoire is not the only analysis one can make.”

Crease's nightgown was lying facedown on top of butcher paper on a long table. Baylor led the judge over to it.

“The spatter pattern on the back of the nightgown was the easiest to deal with.” Baylor pointed at the dried blood that had sprayed over the back of the white fabric. “In the transcript, it says that the lab concluded that the blood on the front of the nightgown and the spray on the back are Lamar Hoyt's blood, so I'm accepting that as a fact. No question that's high-velocity spatter. So far so good.

“Now, as I understand it, Crease said that she was in bed with the nightgown on, talking to her husband, when Jablonski entered the bedroom and shot him.”

“That's how I heard it.”

“Okay. Now, Gary concludes that she was lying about wearing the nightgown because the spray pattern from the high-velocity spatter is across the back of the nightgown. His conclusion is that she's in the bathroom lying in wait for Jablonski and the nightgown is flat on the bed, front side down. That's one explanation for the pattern being on the back, but there is another that's consistent with Crease's story.”

Baylor grabbed two wooden chairs and set them side by side. Then he motioned to Quinn.

“Stand over by that filing cabinet and face me.” Baylor sat in the chair that faced Quinn's left side. “You're Jablonski and I'm Crease. The filing cabinet is the armoire. I'm sitting on my side of the bed. I've got
my nightgown on. The other chair is the side of the bed closest to the bathroom. That's Lamar Hoyt's side.