Gone, but not forgotten

THE DEVIL'S BARGAIN.
Chapter Fourteen.

Gary Telford had the smile and bright eyes of a young man, but his flabby body and receding hairline made him look middle-aged. He shared a suite of offices with six other lawyers in one of the thirty-story glass boxes that had sprung up in downtown Portland during the past twenty years. Telford's office had a view of the Willamette River. On clear days he could see several mountains in the Cascade range, including majestic Mount Hood and Mount St. Helens, an active volcano that had erupted in the early eighties. Today, low-lying clouds owned the sky and it was hard to see the east side of the river in the fog.

"Thanks for seeing me," Betsy said as they shook hands.

"It's been too long," Gary said warmly. "Besides, I'm dying to know how I'm connected with this Darius business.

"When you represented Peggy Fulton in her divorce, did you use a p.i. named Sam Oberhurst?"

Telford stopped smiling. "Why do you want to know?"

"Lisa Darius suspected her husband was having an affair. She asked your client for advice and Peggy gave her Oberhurst's name. He was tailing Darius. I was hoping Oberhurst was conducting surveillance when one of the women disappeared and can give Darius an alibi."

"If Lisa Darius employed Oberhurst, why do you need to talk to me?"

"She doesn't have his address. just a phone number.

I've called it several times, but all I get is an answering machine. He hasn't returned my calls. I was hoping you'd have his office address."

Telford considered this information for a moment.

He looked uncomfortable. "I don't think Oberhurst has an office."

"What's he do, work out of his home?"

"I guess. We always met here."

"What about bills? Where did you send his checks?"

"Cash. He wanted cash. Up front."

"Sounds a little unusual."

"yeah. Well, he's a little unusual." Telford paused.

"Look, I'll try to help you find Oberhurst, but there's something you need to know. Some of the stuff he does isn't on the up-and-up. You follow me?"

"I'm not sure I do."

Telford leaned forward conspiratorially. "Say you want to find out what someone says when they think the conversation is private, you hire Oberhurst. See what I mean?"

"Electronics?"

Telford nodded. "Phones, rooms. He hinted he's not above a little b. and e. And the guy's got a record for it. I think he did penitentiary time down south somewhere for burglary."

Sounds pretty unsavory."

"Yeah. I didn't like him. I only used him that one time and I'm sorry I did."

"Why?" Telford tapped his fingers on his desk. Betsy let him decide what he wanted to say.

"Can we keep this confidential?"

Betsy nodded.

"what Peg wanted… Well, she was a little hysterical. Didn't take the divorce well. Anyway, I was sort of like a middleman with this. She said she wanted someone to do something, a private investigator who wouldn't ask too many questions. I hooked them up and paid him his money. I never really used him to work on the case.

"Anyway, someone beat up Mark Fulton about a week or so after I introduced Oberhurst to Peg. It was pretty bad from what I hear. The police thought it was a robbery."

"Why do you think different?"

"Oberhurst tried to shake me down. He came to my office a week after the beating. Showed me a newspaper article about it. He said he could keep me out of it for two thousand bucks.

"I told him to take a hike. I didn't know a goddamn thing about it. For all I knew, he could have been making the whole thing up. I mean, he reads the article, figures he can touch me for two grand and I won't squawk because the amount's not worth the risk."

"Weren't you afraid?"

"Damn straight. He's a big guy. He even looks like a gangster. He has a broken nose, talks tough. The whole bit. Only, I figured he was testing me. If I'd given in, he would have kept coming back. Besides, I didn't do anything wrong. Like I said, I only hooked them up."

"How do I get to Oberhurst?" Betsy asked.

"I got his name from Steve Wong at a party. Try him Say I told you to call."

Telford thumbed through a lawyer's directory and wrote Wong's number on the back of a business card.

"Thanks."

"Glad I could help. And be careful with Oberhurst, he's bad news."

Betsy ate lunch at Zen, then shopped at Saks Fifth Avenue for a suit. It was one-fifteen when she returned to her office. There were several phone messages in her slot and two dozen red roses on her desk. Her first thought was that they were from Rick, and the idea made her heart pound. Rick sent her flowers when they were dating and on Valentine's Day. It was something he would do if he wanted to come home.

"Who are these from?" she asked Ann.

"I don't know. They were just delivered. There's a card."

Betsy put down her phone messages. A small envelope was taped to the vase. Her fingers trembled as she pried open the flap of the envelope and pulled out a small white card that said:

For man's best friend, his lawyer.

You did a bang-up job, A VERY GRATEFUL CLIENT Martin Betsy put down the card. Her excitement turned sour.

"They're from Darius," she told Ann, hoping her disappointment didn't show.

"How thoughtful."

Betsy said nothing. She had wished so hard that the flowers were from Rick. Betsy debated with herself for a moment, then dialed his number.

"Mr. Tannenbaum's office," Rick's secretary said.

"Julie, this is Betsy. Is Rick in?"

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Tannenbaum, He's out of the office all day. Should I tell him you called?"

"No, thanks. That's okay."

The line went dead. Betsy held the receiver for a moment, then hung up.

What would she have said if Rick had taken the call? Would she have risked humiliation and told him she wanted to get together-? What would Rick have said? Betsy closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths to calm her heart. To clear herself, she looked through her phone messages.

Most could be put off, but one was from Dr. Keene. When Betsy was back in control, she dialed his number.

"Sue did a good job, Betsy," the pathologist said, when they finally got down to business, "but I've got something for you."

"Let me get a pad. Okay, shoot."

"A medical examiner always collects urine samples from the body to screen for drugs. Most labs only do a d.a.u., which screens for five drugs of abuse to see if the victim used morphine, cocaine, amphetamines and so on.

That's what Sue did. I had my lab do a urine screen for other substances. We came up with strong positive barbiturate readings for the women. I retested the blood.

Every one of these ladies showed pentobarbital levels that were off scale."

"What does that mean?"

"Pentobarbital is not a common drug of abuse, which is why the lab didn't find it. It's an anesthetic."

"I don't follow."

"It's used in hospitals to anesthetize patients. This is not a drug these women would take themselves. Someone gave it to them. Now, this is where it gets strange, Betsy.

These women all had three to four milligrams percent of pentobarbital in their blood. That's a very high level. In fact, it's a fatal level."

"What are you telling me?"

"I'm telling you that the three women died from an overdose of pentobarbital, not from their wounds."

"But they were tortured."

"They were mutilated, all right. I saw burn marks that were probably from cigarettes and electrical wires, there were cuts made with razor blades, the breasts were mutilated and there's evidence that objects had been inserted into their anus. But there's a chance the women were unconscious when these injuries were inflicted. Microscopic sections from around the wounds showed an early repair process. This tells me death occurred about twelve to twenty-four hours after the wounds were inflicted."

Betsy was quiet for a moment. When she spoke she sounded confused. "That doesn't make sense, Ray. What possible benefit is there in torturing someone who's unconscious?"

"Beats me. That's your problem. I'm just a sawbones."

"What about the man?"

"Here we have a different story. First, there's no pentobarbital.

None. Second, there is evidence of repair around several wounds, indicating that he was tortured over a period of time. Death was sometime later from a gunshot wound, just like Sue said."

"How could Dr. Gregg have been fooled about the cause of death of the women?"

"Easy. You see a person cut from crotch to chest, the heart torn out, the intestines hanging out, you assume that's what killed 'em. I would have thought the same, if I hadn't found pentobarbital."

"You've given me a king-size headache, Ray."

"Take two aspirin and call me in the morning.

"Very funny."

"I'm glad I could bring some joy into your life."

They hung up, but Betsy kept staring at her notes.

She doodled on the pad. The drawings made as much sense as what Dr.

Keene had just told her.

Reggie Stewart's cross-country flight arrived late at JFK, so he had to sprint through the terminal to catch the connecting, upstate flight. He felt ragged by the time the plane landed at Albany County Airport. After checking into a motel near the airport, Stewart ate a hot meal, took a shower, and exchanged his cowboy boots, jeans and a flannel shirt for a navy blue suit, a white shirt and a tie with narrow red and yellow stripes. He was feeling human again by the time he parked his rental car in the lot of Marlin Steel's corporate headquarters, fifteen minutes before his scheduled appointment with Frank Grimsbo.

"Thanks for seeing me on such short notice," Stewart said, as soon as the secretary left him alone with the chief of security.

"Curiosity got the better of me," Grimsbo answered with an easy smile.

"I couldn't figure out what a private investigator from Portland, Oregon, would want with me." Grimsbo gestured toward his wet bar. "Can I get you a drink?"

"Bourbon, neat," Stewart said, as he looked out the window at a breathtaking view of the Hudson River.

Grimsbo's office was furnished with an eight-foot rosewood desk and rosewood credenza. Old English hunting scenes hung from the walls. The couch and chairs were black leather. It was a far cry from the stuffy, converted storage area he had shared with the task force members in Hunter's Point. Like his surroundings, Grimsbo had -also changed. He drove a Mercedes instead of a beat-up Chevy and he'd long since lost his taste for polyester. His conservative, gray pinstripe suits were custom-tailored to conceal what was left of a beer belly that had been dramatically reduced by dieting and exercise. He had also lost most of his hair, but he had gained in every other way. If old acquaintances thought he missed his days as a homicide detective, they were mistaken.

"So, what brings you from Portland, Oregon, to Albany?" Grimsbo asked as he handed Stewart his drink.

"I work for a lawyer named Betsy Tannenbaum.

She's representing a prominent businessman who's been charged with murder."

"So you told my secretary when you called. What's that have to do with me?"

"You used to work for the Hunter's Point Police Department, didn't you?"

"I haven't had anything to do with Hunter's Point P.D. for nine years."

"I'm interested in discussing a case you worked on ten years ago. The rose killer."

Grimsbo had been raising his glass to his lips, but he stopped abruptly.

"Why are you interested in the rose killer? He's ancient history."

Bear with me and I'll explain in a minute."

Grimsbo shook his head. "That's a hard case to forget.

"Tell me about it."

Grimsbo tilted his head back and closed his eyes, as if he was trying to picture the events. He sipped his scotch.

"We started getting reports of missing women. No signs of a struggle, nothing missing at the crime scenes, but there was always a rose and a note that said "Gone, But Not Forgotten' left on the women's pillows.

Then a mother and her six-year-old daughter were murdered.

The husband found the bodies. There was a rose and a note next to the woman.

"A neighbor had seen a florist truck at the house of one of the victims, or maybe it was near the house. it's been some time now, so I may not have my facts exactly right. Anyway, we figured out who the deliveryman was.

It was a guy named Henry Waters. He had a sex offender record. Then an anonymous caller said he was talking to Waters at a bar and Waters told him he had a woman in his basement. Sure enough, we found one of the missing women.

Grimsbo shook his head. "Man, that was a sight. You wouldn't believe what that bastard did to her. I wanted to kill him right there, and I would have, but fate took over and the son-of-a-bitch tried to escape.

Another cop shot him and that was that."

"Was Peter Lake the husband who found the two bodies? The mother and daughter?"

"Right. Lake."

"Are you satisfied that the deliveryman was the killer?"

"Definitely. Hell, they found some of the roses and a note. And, of course, there was the body. Yeah, we got the right man."

"There was a task force assigned to investigate the case, wasn't there?"

Grimsbo nodded.

"Was Nancy Gordon a member of the task force?"

"Sure."

"Mr. Grimsbo "Frank."

"Frank, my client is Peter Lake. He moved to Portland about eight years ago and changed his name to Martin Darius. He's a very successful developer. Very respected. About three months ago, women started disappearing in Portland. Roses and notes identical to those left in the Hunter's Point case were found on the pillows of the missing women.

About two weeks ago the bodies of the missing women and a man were found buried at a Construction site owned by Martin Darius. Nancy Gordon told our district attorney that Darius-Lake-killed them."

Grimsbo shook his head. "Nancy always had a bee in her bonnet about Lake."

"But 'you don't agree with her?"

"No. Like I said, Waters was the killer. I have no doubt about that.

Now, we did think Lake might be the killer for a while. There was circumstantial evidence pointing that way, and I even had bad feelings about the guy. But it was only circumstantial evidence and the case against Waters was solid."

"What about Lake leaving Hunter's Point?"

"Can't blame him. If my wife and kid were brutally murdered, I wouldn't want to be reminded of them every day. Leaving town, starting over-sounds like the smart thing to do."

"Did the other investigators agree that Lake was innocent?"

"Everyone but Nancy.",

"Was there any evidence that cleared Lake?"

"Like what?"

"Did he have an alibi for the time of any of the disappearances?"

"I can't recall anything like that. Of course, it's been some time. Why don't you check the file? I'm sure Hunter's Point still has it."

"The files are missing.

"How did that happen?"

"We don't know." Stewart paused. "What kind of a person is Gordon?"

Grimsbo sipped his scotch and swiveled toward the window. It was comfortable in Grimsbo's office, but there was a thin coating of snow on the ground outside the picture window and the leafless trees were swaying the attack of a chill wind.

"Nancy is a driven woman. That case got to all of us, but it 'affected her the most. It came right after she lost her fiance. Another cop.

Killed in the line of duty shortly before her wedding. Really tragic. I think that unbalanced her for a while. Then the women started disappearing and she submerged herself in the case.

"Now I'm not saying she isn't a fine detective. She is. But she lost her objectivity in that one case."

Stewart nodded and made some notes.

"How many women disappeared in Hunter's Point?"

"Four."

"And one was found in Waters's basement?"

"Right."

"What happened to the other women?" '-They were found in some old farmhouse out in the country, if I remember correctly. I wasn't involved with that. Got stuck back at the station writing reports."

"How were they found?"

"Pardon?"

"Wasn't Waters shot almost as soon as the body was found in the basement?"

Grimsbo nodded.

"So, who told you where the other women were?"

Grimsbo paused, thinking. Then he shook his head.

"You know, I honestly can't remember. It could have been his mother.

Waters was living with his mother. Or he might have written something down. I just don't recall."

"Did any of the survivors positively i.d. Waters as the killer?"

"They may have. Like I said, I didn't question any of them. They were pretty messed up, if I remember. Barely alive. Tortured. They went right to the hospital."

"Can you think of any reason why Nancy Gordon wouldn't tell our d.a. there were survivors?"

"She didn't?"

"I don't think so."

"Hell, I don't know. Why don't you ask her?"

"We can't. She's disappeared."

"What?" Grimsbo looked alarmed.

"Gordon showed up at the home of Alan Page, our d.a., late one night and told him about the Hunter's Point case. Then she checked into a motel.

When Page called her the next morning, she was gone. Her clothing was still in the room, but she wasn't there."

"Have they looked for her?" Grimsbo asked anxiously.

"Oh, yeah. She's Page's whole case. He lost the bail hearing when he couldn't produce her."

"I don't know what to say. Did she return to Hunter's Point?"

"No. They thought she was on vacation. She never told anyone she was coming to Portland, and they haven't heard from her."

"Jesus, I hope nothing serious happened. Maybe she took off somewhere.

Didn't you say Hunter's Point P.D. thought she was on vacation?"

"If she was going on vacation she wouldn't leave her clothes and makeup."

"Yeah." Grimsl)o looked solemn. He shook his head.

Stewart watched Grimsl)o. The security chief was very upset.

"Is there anything else I can do for you, Mr. Stewart? I'm afraid I have some work to do," Grimsbo asked.

"No, you've been a big help." Stewart laid his and Betsy's business cards on Grimsbo's desk. "If you remember anything about the case that might help our client, please call me."

"I will."

"Oh, there is one other thin. I want to talk with all the members of the Hunter's Point task force. Do you know where I can find Glen Michaels and Wayne Turner?"

"I haven't heard from Michaels in years, but Wayne will be easy to find in about two weeks."

"Oh?"

"All you gotta do is turn on your TV. He's Senator Colby's administrative assistant. He should be sitting right next to him during the confirmation hearings."

Stewart scribbled this information into his notebook, thanked Grimsbo and left. As soon as the door closed behind Stewart, Grimsbo went back to his desk and dialed a Washington, D.C., phone number. Wayne Turner answered on the first ring.