Failure to appear

CHAPTER 7

Other people went to see Shrew in the Elizabethan that night. Alex and I didn't. Instead, we accompanied Dinky Holloway and spent most of the early evening closeted in Ashland's surprisingly modern city hall along with Detective Gordon Fraymore. He listened to what Dinky had to say in total silence. When she finished, he used a handkerchief to preserve fingerprints when he picked up the tape.

"Right back," he said. "I'm going to take this down the hall and have a look-see." He was gone a long time-half an hour or more. Back in the office again, he placed the tape in the middle of his cluttered desk.

"Looks like Shore all right," he muttered. "I thought there might be somebody else in the film as well, maybe another male we might have seen before or possibly even another kid. They sometimes do that-use more than one, but not this time."

"You watched the whole thing, didn't you?" Dinky said accusingly. "That's disgusting." Alex nodded in grim agreement, her lips pursed into a thin line of protest.

The expressions on both their faces said neither one of the women was buying Fraymore's excuse for watching the movie. I think they thought he was down the hall getting his rocks off. I wasn't fond of Gordon Fraymore, but I knew what he was up to. I didn't fault him for watching whatever was in that video because, unlike Dinky and Alex, I knew why he was doing it-because it was his job.

I think the general public has come to accept the idea that objects equal evidence. The video case, the letter, the envelope, all might possibly contain trace evidence or latent prints that could prove valuable. What is less apparent is the importance of the tape itself and what information might possibly be gleaned from it.

It's a lesson I learned the hard way back in the mid-seventies when I was a new guy to Homicide and there was no such thing as videotape. Vice brought in an especially ugly 16-mm snuff film that featured a twelve-year-old Seattle girl who had disappeared on her way home from school. I barfed my guts out the first time I saw it. My partner, a world-weary old guy named Bert Claggerhorn, sat us down in the film room, and we watched that damn movie over and over, hour after hour.

Finally, I raised hell and said I'd be damned if I'd watch it one more time, and I didn't. But Bert went right on ahead without me. The amateurs who specialize in pornographic films are just exactly that-amateurs. They're not overly concerned about production values. After watching the film enough times, Bert finally noticed that an overlooked television set was playing in the background. Either the cameraman forgot to turn it off, or, more likely, he was using the volume to help mask the sounds of what he and his pal were doing.

After spotting that one telling detail, Bert ordered blowups made, one from every foot or so of film. When the blowups came back, some of them showed soaps and afternoon game shows that can be seen on television sets anywhere in the country. But filming must have run long, with occasional pauses in the action. Toward the end, the programming carried on over into the evening news, and that's how Bert nailed those bastards.

Studying the blowups, he was able to identify several newscasters and a weatherman who appeared only on the local Bellingham station. Armed with that knowledge, we zeroed in on the Bellingham area. Once we narrowed down the locale and trained the full focus of our investigation there, it didn't take long to flush out our two "movie-mogul" creeps. A bloodstained mattress, the same torn one that was clearly visible in Bert's blowups, was still on the bed. Eventually, those bloodstains were traced to the victim. Thanks to Bert's detailed study of that film, the killers were found and put away for good.

Fraymore seemed bemused by the intensity of Dinky's reaction. "I'm conducting an investigation here, Ms. Holloway," he said. "I understand your abhorrence toward this particular film, but we have to be thorough. That movie gives us something we didn't have before-motive."

In view of the first skirmish in Fraymore's and my little turf war, I should have kept my mouth shut altogether, but keeping my mouth shut has never been one of my strong suits.

"What are you going to do about Tanya Dunseth?" I asked the question straight out, recognizing my blunder as soon as Fraymore turned his narrowed gaze in my direction.

"What business is that of yours?" he demanded.

With Alex looking on, I didn't want to back down. I shrugged noncommittally. "I just want to know, that's all."

Fraymore's thick neck bulged over his eighteen-inch collar. "Did I miss something here?" he asked. "Did I turn my back and all of a sudden you hired on as an investigator with the Ashland Police Department?"

The sarcasm wasn't lost on me. There was no humor in his delivery. Fraymore was the local chief dog, and I was a mangy, out-of-town cur encroaching on previously marked territory.

"I don't believe I have to remind you that you have no legal standing whatsoever in this jurisdiction, Mister Beaumont," Gordon Fraymore continued. "The City of Ashland has no letter of mutual aid on file with the City of Seattle. In other words, butt out. That badge of yours is no good here. Furthermore, I don't appreciate interference from visiting firemen. You just go on about your business-see some plays, get your daughter married off, do whatever it is you want to do while you're down here, but leave the law enforcement end of things to me."

I may be slow, but I got the picture. "Right."

Fraymore's and my verbal scuffle went right over Dinky Holloway's head. "You wouldn't really arrest Tanya, would you?" Dinky asked, as though it were only a remote possibility, if that.

Listening with a cop's ear, I knew better. It wasn't just what Fraymore said, it was also how he said it. Tanya Dunseth was in deep trouble. Dinky might have regarded Tanya as a talented young actress and fine mother, as a valued cast member and fellow employee. Gordon Fraymore saw her as a suspected killer, plain and simple. In the world of homicide investigators, suspected killers become convicted ones. And that seemed the most likely outcome in this case.

Presumably, Gordon Fraymore could have sidestepped Dinky's question the same way he had avoided mine, but he didn't. Denver Holloway represented the Festival, the business entity in Ashland that, more than any other, made the detective's regular municipal paychecks possible. Having a suspected murderer onstage at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival wouldn't be good for the Festival or for Ashland.

Fraymore was smart enough to realize that if he was going to have to arrest one of the Festival's star players, if he was going to bite the hand that fed him, he had best handle everyone else from there with kid gloves-starting with Dinky Holloway.

"I might have to," he conceded uneasily, popping Tums as if they were candy. I wondered what was causing Gordon Fraymore's severe indigestion-bad food, general overeating, or Martin Shore's murder.

"How many plays is Tanya Dunseth in?" he asked.

"Three," Dinky answered. "Romeo, Shrew, and The Real Thing."

"Big roles?"

Dinky nodded. "Important ones. Substantial ones."

In the silence that followed, Gordon Fraymore gave his sprouting five o'clock shadow a thoughtful rub. "It's like this, Ms. Holloway. If I were you, I'd be out there right now preparing people to take over Tanya's parts. That is confidential information. If word about it leaks out, she'll know we're onto her and take off like a shot."

Dinky bit her lip and nodded. "I understand," she said.

By the time we finally left Fraymore's office, it was 8:20. Ashland is a small town. It would have been easy for us to drive to the theater district, park, and make it to our seats in the Elizabethan in plenty of time for an eight-thirty curtain. But somehow our hearts weren't up to seeing Taming of the Shrew. Alex and I opted for something to eat. We invited Dinky to join us, but she begged off.

"I've got to go somewhere and think," she said. She started away, then came back. "He is going to arrest her, isn't he?"

"It looks that way," I agreed. "You heard what he said."

"It'll be terrible for the Festival. Nothing like this has ever happened before. Tanya's an important part of the season. She's a great Juliet, an outstanding Kate. The understudies aren't nearly as good. How long do I have?"

"I don't know. Several days maybe. Possibly as long as several weeks, but I doubt it. Fraymore is under tremendous pressure to get this case solved in a timely manner. He's going to give it everything he's got. If things don't happen fast enough to suit him, he'll make them happen."

Dinky opened her purse and groped for a pack of cigarettes. "Do you think Tanya actually did it?" she asked. Her hands trembled as she attempted to light her cigarette. I finally lit it for her.

"You know Tanya better than I do. You tell me."

Dinky shook her head mournfully. "I don't know what to think. All I know is, I never should have told anyone about the tape. I should have just kept quiet."

"You're not the only one who knew about the tape," I reminded her. "Whoever sent it to you knew about it. Besides, the tape alone won't convict her. There's lots more to it than that. Fraymore's right. The tape does provide motive, but he has to look at opportunity, physical evidence, the availability of the weapon. Tanya certainly had access to that."

"So did lots of other people," Dinky countered, "that is, if you believe Gordon Fraymore's damn Henckels slicer is our Henckels slicer. They're not all that uncommon, you know. And ours is a prop. Killing someone with a prop knife is about like shooting someone with a cap pistol. Impossible."

I remembered the way the stage lights had glinted off the metal blade as Juliet had plunged it home. "It looked lethal enough to me," I said.

"That's the whole point," Dinky returned. "Looks are everything. From a distance, prop knives are supposed to look dangerous, but they're dull. Deliberately dull. We keep them that way so no one gets hurt."

It felt pretty damn sharp when it sliced into me, I thought. And my wrist wasn't sporting make believe stitches, either. The coincidence of two identical Henckels slicers was more than any self-respecting homicide cop could accept. That went for me as well as Gordon Fraymore.

"But couldn't someone have sharpened it?" Alex asked. "All it takes is one of those little rocks…What are they called?"

"Whetstones," I supplied. "You're right. With a whetstone and ten minutes, a dull knife can be as good as new. A grinding wheel would take about thirty seconds. I'm sure the scenery shop has one of those."

"Oh," Dinky muttered, crushing out her cigarette stub on the sidewalk. Without another word, she stalked off toward her ancient Datsun wagon.

Alex and I drove back downtown and lucked into a parking place. As we set off walking down a virtually empty main street, a trumpet blared a brief, shrill flourish, announcing curtain time at the Elizabethan. It seemed likely that the people watching Shrew that night would be seeing one of Tanya Dunseth's last public performances.

We turned away from the theaters and walked in the opposite direction. It was Sunday evening. Most of the gift shops, stores, and businesses were locked up for the night. The restaurants were still moderately busy as locals, finished for the day and the week in their own shops, ventured out for an evening meal now that most of the out-of-town visitors were otherwise engaged.

Toward the end of June, sunset doesn't arrive in southern Oregon until well after eight-thirty. In the gathering dusk, Alex and I wandered the deserted streets. Holding hands and not talking much, we window-shopped for a good half hour before stopping at an old-fashioned ice-cream parlor complete with a genuine soda fountain. There, over root-beer floats, we finally allowed ourselves to discuss what was going on.

I knew that Alex was upset. Even though she had never met Tanya Dunseth, she was convinced that Tanya was the real victim of the piece, that as someone who had suffered appalling abuse at Martin Shore's hands, Tanya had the God-given right to dish out whatever revenge she could manage. In fact, Alex held that a quick death was far too good for him. That was a surprising statement from an authentic card-carrying liberal.

"I think we should warn her," Alex declared as she hit the bottom of her glass and noisily sucked up the dregs of her float.

"Warn her?" I repeated. "Are you crazy?"

"Don't you think we should?"

"Absolutely not," I said, shaking my head.

"Why?"

"Didn't you hear what Detective Fraymore said? Warning her is the last thing we should do."

"She should have a chance to make some kind of care arrangements for Amber," Alex declared.

I tried to be patient. "You're not listening, Alex. This is a murder investigation. Homicide. Cops don't call up their top suspects in advance and say, ‘By the way, maybe you'd like to hire a baby-sitter before we come drag your butt off to jail.' And they don't like it if other people do, either."

"She wouldn't really run away."

"What makes you think she wouldn't? And if she did and Fraymore found out about it, the two of us would end up in deep caca, to quote the Laredo Kid."

Despite the seriousness of our discussion, Alex smiled at my reference to the afternoon's play. "At least you were paying attention to the dialogue," she said.

For a minute, I thought she might drop the subject. No such luck. The lady had a one-track mind. "If Tanya goes to prison-for years, let's say-what happens to Amber then?"

I shrugged. "The state appoints a guardian, most likely a relative."

"What if there aren't any? Didn't Kelly and Jeremy say something about her folks dying in a house fire when she was little? That's how she ended up with a guardian."

"There's always Amber's father."

"Right," Alex replied caustically. "If he walked out the day Tanya found out she was pregnant, I'm sure he's great fatherhood material. There has to be something we can do."

"Alex, listen to me. There's not one thing you and I can do. It's out of our hands. It never was in our hands."

She looked at me reproachfully. "I suppose you're right," she said at last. "It's just so awful. I mean, it's bad enough that she was forced to be in that terrible movie in the first place…"

"Hold it," I said. "You're jumping to conclusions. What makes you so certain she was forced? She may have been a willing participant. Not legally, of course. But Kelly and Jeremy said she was out on her own. She probably made good money."

"At twelve?" Alex demanded. "Are you kidding? Kids that age don't make informed choices."

"Willing or not, here it is all these years later. She thinks she's put that part of her life totally behind her. Then, out of the blue, Martin Shore turns up and threatens to blow her nice, respectable new life right out of the water. I think he tried to blackmail her. When she didn't come across right away, he sent the tape to Dinky."

"How could it be blackmail?" Alex returned. "Tanya Dunseth doesn't have a dime. The actors down here aren't in it for the money. If she weren't poor as a church mouse, she wouldn't be living at Live Oak Farm."

"Maybe he wanted something besides money," I said.

"What?"

"Maybe he wanted her to work for him again, make another movie. In fact, since the tape showed up in Dinky's inter-office mail, maybe someone inside the Festival was working as Shore's accomplice. Anyway you slice it, a porno flick featuring a rising young legitimate actress would be a hot property."

"I don't like the way you're talking about this," Alex said levelly.

"How do you want me to talk? It's only a theory."

"Whatever's in that video was bad enough to make Denver Holloway physically ill. Here you are talking about it as though it's the latest money-making sitcom some network is getting ready to put into syndication."

"Porn's big business," I told her. "We're talking millions of dollars."

"I refuse to think about it that way," Alex returned. "I absolutely refuse." She didn't raise her voice, but the way she said the words should have warned me. I trudged right on.

"I'm a cop, Alex. I have to think that way. It's part of who I am. I've been working the streets for a long time now. Over the years, I've seen plenty of twelve-year-old hookers, little girls-and little boys, too, for that matter. Kids who would do anything for a price, including turn an unsuspecting John into a stiff. Once you've seen that a time or two, it's hard to regain your belief in absolute innocence."

What followed was a long silence. As the gulf between us grew wider, I felt a dull ache in my gut. Alexis Downey and I were having our first major disagreement-one that couldn't be walked around or ignored or swept under a rug. It wasn't over something inconsequential like lumpy futons or man-hating cats. We were staring into the fundamental differences between us, grappling with disparities that arose out of who we were, what we did, and what we believed.

I was seven years older than Alex. I had been a cop for almost twenty years, more than half her lifetime. Cops see too damn much.

"Well," she said finally, shaking her head and steadfastly pulling us back from the edge of the cliff. "I still think for blackmail to work, Tanya would have to have money."

The thought came to me then-a sudden, clear inkling of what else Martin Shore might have wanted from Tanya Dunseth. Just thinking about it made me feel incredibly old. And dirty. And right back on the edge of the precipice.

"Not necessarily," I said. "Maybe he wanted something else."

"What?"

Alex still didn't understand, and I didn't want to tell her, didn't want her to have to know some of the things I know-the ugly things all cops learn sooner or later because they have to. Because they don't have a choice. Alex sat there, her eyes holding mine, waiting for me to say something.

"The streets aren't the only things that have deteriorated over the last few years," I said. "Other things have gotten worse as well."

She frowned. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Choosing my words carefully, I tried my best to explain it without having to come right out and draw Alexis a picture.

"Years ago, eleven- or twelve-year-olds were young enough for this kind of filth. Not anymore. In terms of perpetrators getting away with it, the best candidates for sexual abuse and exploitation are still female children under the age of three. They can't testify, can't say who did it or what they did."

As she grasped what I was saying, Alex's eyes widened in horror. She studied me searchingly for some time after I finally shut up. "You mean Shore would try to blackmail Tanya to let him use her baby the same way? To make a movie?"

"It happens," I answered miserably. "I swear to God, Alex, this kind of crap goes on all the time. You have no idea."

"You're right," she spat back at me, suddenly furious. "I guess I haven't! And I don't think I want to, either!"

Without another word, she stormed out of the shop. I made no attempt to stop her. She needed to be alone for a while. So did I. It's no wonder so many disillusioned cops end up divorced and living alone. Who can live with them? According to the suicide statistics, they can barely stand to live with themselves.

I don't know how long I sat there. Eventually, one of the kids waiting tables came over and took away the remains of both root-beer floats. When he asked me if I wanted anything else, I looked up at him stupidly. The second time around I finally managed to order coffee. He must have thought I'd gone crazy.

Beating yourself up is simple, especially when you've had as much practice at it as I have. In retrospect, I could see exactly what I'd done wrong. Of course I should have kept quiet about my suspicions. Of course I shouldn't have brought up any of it. I was a dumb-ass bum for even mentioning such a thing. But I had, and now I couldn't take it back. The damage was done, and I couldn't see any way in hell to make it better.

Unless, I thought, brightening suddenly at the prospect-unless I could somehow come up with some other theory and prove myself wrong. For people who are expert self-castigators, it's easy to recognize how being totally wrong can turn into a walk-away victory. And if, in order to prove myself sufficiently wrong, I had to bend a few rules, so what? It wouldn't be the first time.

And that's how I really ended up getting involved in Gordon Fraymore's case. Personally involved, I mean. Not because I particularly wanted to, and not, God help me, because I wanted to make his life miserable. Not at all. What I really wanted was to find some way to redeem myself in Alexis Downey's eyes.

I had trotted out only one of my pet theories. I had plenty more where that came from. The first one had been ugly enough to drive Alex away from me and out into the night. There were no guarantees that the real answer, whatever that might be, wouldn't be even worse. But if it meant not losing Alex permanently, I had to make the effort.

So I sat there all by myself and drank cup after cup of coffee. I tried to think my way into Gordon Fraymore's case the same way I'd be trying to think myself into one of my own if I were back home in Seattle and officially assigned to a new homicide investigation. Only here there was an added dimension. My only access to the killer was through what I had learned or could learn from Detective Gordon Fraymore.

At the start of a case, I usually try to do a mental sort, drawing a picture of who all the players are and trying to see how they're interconnected. Because most people are killed by someone they know, that process often leads directly to the killer or to people who know the killer.

To that end, I grabbed a folded napkin out of the holder and began drawing little X's and O's all over it. At the center of the diagram were Tanya and Amber Dunseth. In a circle around them were Martin Shore, Jeremy, Kelly, Monica Davenport, Dinky Holloway, and me. I was about to quit when I realized there were two other people I needed to add, equal O's on the same line-Daphne and Guy Lewis.

I closed my eyes and tried to remember exactly how it had been when Daphne and Guy had stepped inside the Members' Lounge prior to the donors' party. There had been no mistaking Tanya Dunseth's intense reaction. My only problem was figuring out which of the two she'd been reacting to-Gordon or Daphne.

And then something clicked in my mind and gave me my first little glimmer of hope. Guy Lewis. Here was a man who'd already discarded one wife and was having trouble hanging on to number two. Was it possible he was in the market for yet another trophy wife, or maybe just a trophy plaything? I had thought his wave was intended for me, but I wondered now if perhaps it had been intended for Tanya. Maybe he knew more about Tanya Dunseth than just her roles on stage.

Filled with purpose now, I shoved my coffee cup aside, stuffed the napkin into my pocket, and headed for the Mark Anthony. Alex had told me the Lewises were staying there. This time I had no trouble ignoring the smoke, laughter, and pulsing music from the bar. I hurried to the nearest house phone.

"Guy Lewis, please."

"Is he a registered guest?"

"Yes."

There was a long pause. "I'm sorry, Mr. Lewis checked out this morning."

I put down the phone. Disappointed, I was conscious of the smoke and the sounds in a different way now, but I hurried back out into the street before they had a chance to ensnare me. Outside, I was momentarily undecided.

The first few playgoers were just now trickling down the hill from the theaters. Soon it would be a river of people. Seeing them, I decided to go back to Oak Hill. Alex and I had only one house key between us, and Alex had taken that one with her. If I went home now, maybe one of the other guests would take pity and let me inside the house as they returned from the plays. Maybe I could ask Florence for a duplicate. Otherwise, I'd have to go looking for someplace else to stay.

I found the Porsche where we'd left it parked. Seeing it, I was awash with guilt at the idea of Alex walking all the way home in the dark by herself. That night I was a living, breathing guilt magnet.

I drove back to the B amp; B. Except for a night-light burning in the living room, the place was dark, including the windows in the Iris Room up under the eaves. Either Alex was asleep or she hadn't come home. No other cars were parked beside the house. That meant I was the first one home.

Discouraged, I got out of the car. The weight of the world bore down on my shoulders as I walked up the steps.

"Beau? Are you all right?"

Alex spoke to me out of a gloom of shadows. I walked toward the sound of her voice. She was seated on a swing at the far end of the porch, wrapped snugly in one of the blankets from our bed.

"I waited up to let you in," she said. "I knew you didn't have a key."

"Thanks." I sat down gingerly on the far end of the swing. "I'm sorry about tonight. I never should have…"

"Don't apologize," she said. "I was shocked by what you said, but maybe you're right. Maybe Amber is what Martin Shore wanted."

That sounded very much like forgiveness. I gave myself permission to hope.

Alex continued, "So I thought to myself, if that's the case, she probably did kill him, and she's going to need a good lawyer, so I went ahead and called Ralph."

"You called Ralph Ames?"

"Who else? I hope you're not mad at me. He was the first lawyer I thought of, and I know he's good. And I happened to know where to reach him after hours."

"Oh, he's good all right," I agreed. "What did he say?"

"He said he'd be here tomorrow for the wedding, and we could talk about it then. If he can't handle it himself, I'm sure he'll recommend someone. He says he'll fly into Medford first thing. He'll be here around nine."

It was a done deal. Further comment seemed unnecessary.

"And he said for you not to worry about Karen and Dave. That's all handled. They're meeting Scott and should be getting into Medford shortly after Ralph does. They'll rent their own car. They should be here by noon."

The first of the other playgoers' cars turned into the driveway. In the sudden wash of headlights, Alex leaned over and kissed me on the side of my neck.

"What do you think?" she asked. "Is that okay? I worried I was overstepping the bounds."

"You didn't overstep anything," I answered. "And I think it's more than okay. I think it's great."

And right that minute, so was I.