Failure to appear

CHAPTER 19

Fraymore and I sat in his Mercury outside Oak Hill B amp; B while I told him in considerable detail everything I knew-or thought I knew-about Guy and Daphne Lewis. And about the fact that there was a good chance the woman everyone in Ashland knew as Marjorie Connors was, in actuality, the original, cast-off version of Mrs. Guy Lewis.

I wasn't sure how or when it happened, but somehow, in the course of revealing this new information, Fraymore and I moved away from our former mutual antagonism into a spirit of grudging cooperation. He listened carefully to everything I said, nodding occasionally.

"Could this friend of yours in Seattle send down the original of that picture so I could have a look at it?"

"I'm sure he'd be happy to," I answered. "If he shipped it counter-to-counter, we'd have it by midmorning."

I looked down at the seat, instinctively searching for the presence of a cellular phone. The Montego didn't have one. "That's all right," Fraymore said, starting the engine. "We'll call from my office."

When Fraymore had arrived at Oak Hill, I had expected to talk to him for several minutes and then go right back inside. I assumed that once I gave him the information, it would be up to him to take action. Fraymore, however, seemed disinclined to let me loose. I certainly hadn't planned on going along with him, but as we drove toward his office, I still expected I'd return in plenty of time to keep my dinner date with Alex.

After calling Ron Peters and making arrangements for him to ship the photo, I again expected to head back home. Nothing doing. Instead, Fraymore picked up the phone and made a series of offhand, almost casual calls. In Seattle, the first one would have been an official inquiry to the Department of Motor Vehicles. Then, armed with the suspect's vehicle license number, an all-points bulletin would have been issued.

This, however, was Ashland, a place where people knew their neighbors. Without having to consult Motor Vehicles, Gordon Fraymore already knew the kind of car Marjorie Connors drove. He directed his officers to be on the outlook for an '85 brown-and-tan Suburban with a permanently dinged right front-door panel and a rearview mirror that was attached to the frame of the car by massive amounts of duct tape.

Within minutes of passing along this somewhat folksy description, Fraymore's small-town law-enforcement grapevine located the vehicle in question. A downtown church-the same one where the N.A. meeting had been held the previous Saturday-was hosting a hastily organized emergency potluck dinner to feed and collect donations for the burned-out victims of the Live Oak Farm fire. According to Gordon Fraymore's informant, Marjorie Connors was believed to be in attendance.

The detective assimilated the information and stood up abruptly. "It figures she would be," he said, nodding in satisfaction. "It would call too much attention to her if she wasn't. Let's go." He headed out of his office, and I followed.

"Where to? The potluck?"

"Not just yet. We'll start with the hospital. I want to talk to Tanya Dunseth one more time."

"Tanya," I echoed. "Why her? She's never told the truth, not once in her life."

"Maybe she's been telling some of the truth all along," Gordon Fraymore said with a thoughtful frown. "Maybe we just weren't smart enough to pick up on it."

We? There was that fateful word "we" again. I let the questionable usage pass. Obviously, I was included in whatever was going down, but Fraymore said almost nothing on the way to the hospital. When we reached Tanya Dunseth's room, he motioned for me to follow him inside.

Tanya, wearing a hospital-issue gown, lay on her raised bed watching a mute television set.

"Hi there, Tanya," Gordon Fraymore said easily when she glanced in our direction. "Mind if we ask you a couple of questions?"

"What kind of questions?" she asked.

Strictly speaking, Tanya should have thrown us out without giving us the time of day. Most homicide suspects, from casual killers to perpetrators of fatal domestic violence, know the drill all too well. Few of them are first-time offenders. They've been picked up before for something, although their previous offenses may not have been murder. Some of them know more about their rights than the cops who arrest them. Habitual offenders can and do recite the Miranda warning without the necessity of any prompting.

Since she didn't send us packing, it crossed my mind that maybe Tanya didn't know all that much about the process, at least not from personal experience. I was sure Ralph Ames had given her strict orders not to answer questions without his being present. But then he wasn't charging her for his services. Free advice is always easy to ignore.

"Do you know why we're here?" Fraymore asked.

Tanya shrugged. "I suppose it's the same as this afternoon. You think I killed Guy Lewis. You seem to think I killed everybody."

Her direct reference to the investigation was an answer in itself. It's the kind of forthright response that usually comes from suspects who are actually innocent. Guilty ones generally affect an air of total mystification. They can't think of a single reason why an investigator might possibly come to them asking questions. They have zero idea what has happened or what the investigation might concern.

"Did you?" Fraymore asked straight out. Ralph Ames would have been outraged and rightly so. Tanya answered all the same.

"No," she answered firmly. "I did not. I didn't even know the man. Why would I kill him?"

"You knew his wife," Fraymore prompted.

Tanya nodded. "I knew Daphne, but not him."

"How did you hook up with Marjorie Connors?" The abrupt change of subject stymied Tanya momentarily.

"Marjorie? Why are you asking about her, and what do you mean, ‘hook up'?"

"Just that. She didn't advertise in the paper for people to come live with her, so how did you end up out on her farm?"

"She came to me."

"When?"

"I don't remember exactly. I was pregnant with Amber at the time. I was about to be evicted because I couldn't afford my rent. I didn't know what to do or where to turn. I knew her slightly from working with her in the theaters. One day, out of the blue, she offered to help me."

"Sort of like yesterday when she showed up with enough money to post your bond?"

Tanya looked at Fraymore long and hard before she nodded. "Sort of like that, yes."

"What did she say?"

"Yesterday?"

"No. Back then, when you first met her."

"She said she was new to town, but that she was thinking of starting a co-op, an inexpensive place for young actors to live. She said she had heard I might need a place like that."

"Did she ever tell you where or how she heard about you and your predicament?"

"No. We never discussed it, but someone must have mentioned it to her."

"You and your daughter were her first tenants out at the farm?"

"Yes."

"What about the other young people who lived there-the ones who came later? Did she go looking for them the same way?"

Tanya shook her head. "Not really. I helped her find most of them. I posted notices on the bulletin boards at the Festival and at the grocery stores in town. Word gets around."

I was in the room, but I wasn't sure why. Fraymore's manner made it clear he regarded me as nothing more than a piece of furniture. Nonetheless, I paid close attention. I could more or less see where he was going with this line of questioning. The fact that Tanya claimed Marjorie had actively recruited her could have been significant, especially since all the other roomers had turned up by sheer happenstance. But whether or not that was credible depended on whether or not you believed a single word Tanya Dunseth uttered. I, for one, didn't. Not by a long shot.

"Let me ask you this," Gordon Fraymore continued. "Did she ever ask about your past?"

The whole time we had been in the room-the whole time Tanya had been answering Fraymore's questions-her manner had been casual and composed. She had carried her part of the conversation as easily as if she had been fielding questions about the changing weather. Now there was a subtle change in her demeanor. She blinked and shifted her position on the bed. In an interrogation situation, that kind of body language shift sends out a clear signal of distress on the part of the suspect. It means the questions are circling in on something important.

"No, why?" Tanya asked, feigning carelessness, but even her stage-trained voice evinced a slight tremor.

"She never asked you about what you did before you came here? Never asked about your career in the movie business?"

"Nobody knew about that!" Tanya shot back at him. She sat up in bed and glared at Gordon Fraymore while cracks spread across the surface of Tanya Dunseth's smooth veneer. The striking change in her reminded me once more of her reaction when Daphne and Guy Lewis had walked into the Members' Lounge.

Gordon Fraymore nodded in my direction, acknowledging my presence in the room for the very first time.

"I believe you know Mr. Beaumont, here," he said. "Why don't you tell Miss Dunseth about your visit with Roger Tompkins in Walla Walla last night."

Tanya's eyes panned from Fraymore's face to mine. She seemed to gather herself into a smaller package while her fingers dug into the bedclothes. "I don't want to hear," she said defiantly. "Go away."

I was on. Fraymore had turned the spotlight full on me-with no advance warning and with no cue cards to tell me what he wanted me to say.

Stalling, I cleared my throat. "I'm afraid my visit with Mr. Tompkins was very upsetting to them both, to him and to his wife," I said, "especially since their daughter died back in…"

"Get out!" Tanya interrupted. "Get out now! I don't have to talk to you without Mr. Ames here. He told me I didn't."

"But, Tanya…" Fraymore began.

With no warning, Tanya grabbed her plastic water glass off the nightstand and fired it in the general direction of Gordon Fraymore's head. He ducked out of the way. The glass missed his head, but it sprayed him with water before bouncing off the wooden door directly behind him. At the sound, the uniformed guard burst into the room, only to dodge out of the way of the next missile-the water pitcher itself-which flew on out into the hall and was followed shortly thereafter by a tissue box and the emesis basin.

"Get out! Get out! Get out!" Tanya shouted.

The guard started to draw his weapon, but Fraymore stopped him with a quick shake of his head. "It's okay," he said. "She's just a little upset."

Upset? I couldn't believe my ears, but Fraymore herded both the guard and me out of the room before I had a chance to object. We were met in the hallway by an irate nurse.

"What in heaven's name is going on in there?" she demanded.

"It's nothing," Fraymore said decisively. "She'll be all right once we're gone."

Nothing? I looked at him in astonishment. As far as I know, assaulting a police officer is a felony in every state of the union. Only when we were outside in the parking lot did he speak again.

"I wanted an impartial observer. What do you think?"

"I don't understand any of it."

"What don't you understand?"

"If she wasn't involved in the murders, why is she still lying through her teeth about her parents?"

Fraymore stopped beside the Mercury. "Makes you wonder, doesn't it?"

"What now?"

"You packing?" he asked casually.

Gordon Fraymore was talking guns, not suitcases. I nodded. "Why do you ask?"

Without answering, he opened the trunk of the Montego and rummaged around in it, eventually hauling out a Kevlar vest, which he handed over to me.

"We're going to stop by that potluck supper and pay a call on Mrs. Connors. You'd best put this on."

If I were anything other than a crazed homicide cop, I would have told him to put the damn thing away, that a good woman was waiting for me to take her out to dinner, and that it was his job, not mine, to pay a courtesy visit on Madam Marjorie Connors. Instead, I slipped out of my jacket and started unbuttoning my shirt.

"Lead the way," I said.

We drove through last-minute, pre-theater traffic and reached the church at ten after eight. Several cars were just then in the process of leaving the parking lot. Only a few vehicles remained, including an aging Chevrolet Suburban, brown and tan, with its mirror held on by layers of duct tape. Sunshine, her long leash attached to the front bumper, lay on the pavement directly in front of the truck. She was sound asleep.

"Are you a betting man?" Fraymore asked.

"Not particularly."

"Ten to one that thing's loaded with suitcases and boxes."

"No bet," I said.

And it's a good thing I didn't. When I hopped out of the car long enough to press my face against the darkened glass on one of the back panels, I saw that the back of the Suburban was packed to the gills. Among the suitcases and boxes was a fiberglass airline doggie crate. Both Marjorie and Sunshine were leaving town.

I returned to the Montego and leaned in the window. "You called that shot," I said.

Fraymore kept his eye on the entrance to what I knew to be the church social hall. He nodded. "Looks like we got here just in time," he said. "Get in. We'll park and wait."

By eight-fifteen traffic on the main drag had reduced appreciably as most playgoers settled into their seats. I was glad of that. For a cop, staging any kind of armed confrontation on a busy street is a terrifying proposition.

"How do you want to handle this?" I asked. Since it was inarguably Fraymore's show, I intended to take orders from him.

"First we talk," he said.

"And then?"

"If she doesn't pay attention, we punt."

Great plan. Not long on strategy, but Fraymore was in charge; I was just along for the ride. I wasn't ecstatic about being stuck in a vehicle with no possibility of radio contact. If we ran into trouble, there'd be no calling for help or backup. All those anxious thoughts drummed through my head as we sat there, but for a change I surprised myself and kept my mouth shut.

Marjorie Connors and two other women came strolling out of the church basement about twenty-five after eight. The three of them ambled to the middle of the lot, where they stopped long enough to chat briefly and exchange hugs. I'm sure Marjorie must have seen the Montego parked nearby, but she gave no indication. As soon as the other two women started toward their own car, she struck out for the front of the Suburban. She knelt beside the dog and began unfastening Sunshine's lead.

By then both Gordon Fraymore and I were out of the Montego. As we approached, Sunshine lurched to her feet. I expected another spurt of frail barking, but the dog kept quiet. Only when Fraymore was within a matter of feet did Marjorie appear to notice him, but instead of addressing him, she spoke to the dog.

"Come on, girl," she said, tugging on the leash. "Let's go for a ride."

"Evening, Marjorie," Detective Fraymore drawled. "I wanted to talk to you about the fire out at your place this afternoon. Do you have a minute?"

The woman's startling violet eyes met Fraymore's and held them without wavering. Meantime Sunshine hobbled forward. She stopped directly in front of Gordon Fraymore. Reflexively, and without bothering to look, he reached down and began to ruffle the old dog's lank ears. I should have tumbled right then, but I didn't.

"I don't have much time, or anything to say, either," she answered with casual unconcern. "As you know, I wasn't home when the fire started." She tugged on the leash again. "It's late, girl. Come on. It's a long drive."

Leading the dog, she walked around the Suburban and opened the door on the rider's side. Sunshine made one feeble attempt to crawl in by herself, but then she settled back on her haunches and waited patiently for help. Marjorie Connors leaned over, picked up the dog, and bodily boosted her up onto the bench seat. Then she closed the door and started around to the other side.

"We know all about you, Marjorie," Fraymore said, speaking slowly and deliberately. "Including the fact that you were once married to Guy Lewis."

Had I been Marjorie, that single all-encompassing revelation would have stopped me cold, but she didn't even break her stride. Straightening her shoulders, she thrust one hand determinedly into the pocket of her leather jacket and kept walking. Pure survival instinct, years of working the streets, warned me she had a gun.

"Please, Marjorie," Gordon Fraymore said haltingly, and with far more gentleness than I would have thought possible. "Please don't make me do this."

She stopped, turned around, and looked at him then. There was a moment-a vivid, electric, breathtaking moment-when everything I didn't understand suddenly whirred into focus like a scene in the viewfinder on one of those new electronic cameras. It happened when I finally allowed my senses to make the obvious connections-to see the abject way Gordon Fraymore was looking at her. When I let myself hear the heartbreak and desperate pleading in his voice.

Marjorie Connors and Gordon Fraymore were lovers.

And in that moment, when I realized the truth, I finally understood why Fraymore had dragged me along to the hospital, why he had issued me the bullet-proof vest.

For several seconds, no one moved. We all three stood there, frozen in place like life-sized pieces of art in public places. Marjorie's right hand never left her pocket. She kept her gaze focused on Fraymore's face, but she seemed impervious to the look of stark entreaty that was written there.

"I'm leaving now, Gordon," she said firmly, the way a mother speaks to a recalcitrant child. "We all have to do what we have to do. If you want to stop me, you'll have to shoot."

With that, she climbed into the Suburban, shut and locked the door behind her, and started the engine. She jammed the gearshift into reverse and peeled out of the parking place, then she sent the truck barreling forward. Fraymore and I were left standing in a shower of gravel and a cloud of dust.

For another moment, Gordon Fraymore still didn't move. Ashen-faced, he stared after the fleeing truck, then slowly he let out his breath.

He sighed. "We'd better go get her and bring her back," he said grimly.

Several blocks away a fanfare of pealing trumpets from the Elizabethan announced the beginning of the outdoor show. Onstage there would be plenty of action and fighting. Fake blood would flow during well-choreographed swordplay, but no one would die. After the performance, all the players-the ones who survived the plot as well as those who didn't-would appear onstage for curtain calls and much-deserved applause.

Down here in the church parking lot, real lives were on the line. None of us would be using fake bullets. Ours were all too real. When the action was over, there was a better-than-even chance that one or more of us would be either badly hurt or dead. But we weren't worthy of pealing trumpets. And when the action was over, I doubted we'd be rewarded with a round of applause, either. It didn't seem fair.

"Why'd you let her go, for God's sake?" I demanded as we headed for the Montego. "Why didn't you try to stop her?"

Gordon Fraymore shook his head. "You saw it. She had a gun. I couldn't risk it, not here on the street in the middle of town. It's too dangerous. Someone else might get hurt."

That may sound like a lame excuse, but he was right. When you're confronted by that kind of situation, the safety of innocent bystanders takes precedence over every other consideration.

Back in the car, we tore across the parking lot toward the street, only to see Marjorie Connors' Suburban a good three blocks away, speeding south. Without benefit of either lights or siren, hot pursuit was out of the question.

After checking oncoming traffic, Fraymore turned carefully onto the street and followed the Suburban at a speed that gave little hope of our ever catching up. We were in the detective's lovingly maintained Montego. He drove the aging Mercury as if it were made of spun glass that would shatter at the slightest jar. Had we been in Fraymore's city-owned Lumina, it would have been a different story. Cop cars are disposable items, meant to be rode hard and put up wet.

While Fraymore drove, there was nothing for me to do but worry. "How dangerous is she?" I asked.

Fraymore didn't answer right away. "Three people are dead so far," he returned gloomily. "You tell me."