Serpentine

Chapter 43

Basia Lopatinski worked heroically but it still took three weeks.

“And that,” she informed us, “is a record.”

During that time, Milo had paid a visit to Ellie and informed her that the case was going well but he had nothing definitive to report. Yet.

She didn’t object but she did call him two days later wondering if anything had changed, and four days after that. He’d managed to put her off with ambiguous optimism and a request to be patient. She hung up sounding irritated. If she’d chosen at that point to complain to Martz or Andy Bauer or one of the political contacts, it could’ve gotten complicated.

She didn’t.

No threats to Deirdre Seeger remained so she could’ve moved back to her house. But kept ignorant by Milo, she remained in Ellie Barker’s rented house and the two of them, accompanied by an equally uninformed Mel Boudreaux, filled their days with outings.

Huntington Gardens, the Arboretum, Descanso Gardens, a three-day excursion to San Diego where they took in the wild animal park and SeaWorld. Then a detour on the trip back for a night at the Disneyland Hotel and an all-day pass at the park.

VIP pass, Ellie’s money allowing them to jump lines. Deirdre revealed a lust for the Matterhorn and rode it three times.

Boudreaux: “Man, I felt like puking just watching her.”

On the twenty-first day, at eleven a.m., everything was in place and Milo phoned Ellie.

Sounding subdued, she said, “We’re at the art museum.” She lowered her voice: “Special exhibit on contemporary German paintings. Deirdre says it’s kindergarten garbage.”

He laughed. “Everyone’s a critic. When can we meet?”

“Meet as in...”

“Solving your case.”

“Oh... can Deirdre be included?”

“Not a good idea.”

“I’m kind of used to her and she’s got nowhere to go.”

“We could talk at the station,” said Milo. “Whatever suits you.”

“This really is it, Lieutenant?”

“It is.”

“Am I going to be happy?”

“You’ll know the facts.”

“That sounds ominous.”

“I wouldn’t call it that.”

“What would you call it?”

“Ellie, it’s best we sit down and talk.”

“Is it?” A beat. “Fine, let’s do it at the house. I’ll tell Mel to take Deirdre to lunch and I’ll Uber back. If that’s safe.”

“It is.”

“So this really is it.”

We were parked in front of the house on Curley Court when a dented white Celica in need of a muffler dropped Ellie off. VIP tickets for Deirdre, but no Uber Black for the woman with the credit card.

That fit with her understated approach to clothes and demeanor. Nothing wrong with that but I wondered if she held back due to feelings of unworthiness. I’ve seen that in patients with complicated childhoods. What I think of as Eternal Lent.

Sometimes they let you ease them out of it, sometimes not.

She said nothing to us and hurried to her front door. We caught up.

“Hi, Ellie.”

She mumbled something well short of a greeting. Her hands shook hard enough to rattle her keys and she missed the keyhole a couple of times before unlocking the door. Deactivating the alarm, she stood in the entry hall with a frozen look on her face.

Milo guided her by the elbow to the same living room chair she’d occupied the first time we met. Her hands continued to vibrate. She rounded her back, laced her fingers, and pressed her knees together as if warding off assault.

Milo said, “It really isn’t ominous, Ellie.”

“Let’s just get on with it, I’m ready to jump out of my skin.”

Milo placed his attaché case on the sofa between us.

Ellie said, “What’s in there, terrible police stuff?”

Milo ignored the question. “Okay, let’s get into it. The woman you’ve believed was your mother, wasn’t. DNA proves it. Her given name wasn’t Dorothy Swoboda, it was Martha Maude Hopple. Swoboda was a stolen identity, one of several used by Martha Hopple. She was a career criminal.”

Ellie’s mouth dropped open. “Oh, God. So you have no idea who my mother was.”

“We do. Her name was Benicia Cairn and she grew up near Tyler, Texas, where she met Martha Hopple. She was barely twenty, Hopple was twenty-four. The two of them left town and traveled for a couple of years before they settled in L.A. You were born during that time and we figure Hopple convinced your mom she wasn’t equipped to take care of a baby.”

“You figure,” she said.

“We can’t know for sure, Ellie, but everything we know about Benicia tells us she was a caring person.”

“Oh, really. A caring person just gives up her baby.”

Not an unexpected question. Milo didn’t need to cue me.

I said, “Martha Hopple was a manipulative psychopath and Benicia Cairn was young, impressionable, and, from what we’ve learned, extremely submissive.”

“Submissive? So what? She just allows a criminal to take me and dump me on Dad? Are you going to tell me he was a criminal, too?”

“No, he was a victim. One of the many men Martha Hopple seduced and took money from.”

And pushed off a cliff years later when she showed up unexpectedly and he wouldn’t pony up more cash.

Ellie shuddered. “She sounds like a monster.”

I said, “She was but your mother wasn’t. From everything we’ve learned, she was kind.”

“Not so kind she didn’t abandon her baby.”

“We believe she had regrets.”

“You believe.”

Milo said, “Her regrets may be the reason — and this is going to be another tough thing to hear, Ellie — Martha murdered her.”

“Murdered... the body in the car?”

We nodded.

She clutched her belly. “God, I think I’m going to be sick... why would she do that? Kill a friend. What was the point?”

“Martha had just robbed the man she was living with and wanted to disappear and assume a new identity. She used Benicia to fake her own death.”

“How can you know that?” she said. “And, wait a minute, how can you even presume to know this Benicia was my mother? You told me the body was burned up. And there was no DNA back then, anyway. You’re just guessing, aren’t you?”

“We’re not,” said Milo. “I matched your DNA to one of Benicia’s relatives. She’s your second cousin, her mom and Benicia were sisters. She still lives in Texas. You’ve got an extended family there.”

“My DNA? I never gave you a sample!”

“Remember the time I came to see you a couple of weeks ago?”

“Yes, when you told me nothing.” She set her lips grimly.

“True,” said Milo. “I was putting you off until we had proof, not just theory. While you were in the bathroom, I went into the kitchen and swiped a juice glass you’d just used. We had your sample tested at the same time we express-shipped a DNA kit to your relative — her name is Nancy. She expressed it right back to us and we zipped everything to a private lab. The results came in yesterday and they’re clear. Benicia Cairn was your mother.”

She slumped. “This is insane... what about my father?”

“That’s still unknown, Ellie. To us and to your Texas family. They were never aware Benni — that was her nickname — was pregnant. It may be the reason she left with Martha Hopple, or she could’ve met a man shortly after, we just don’t know. In terms of paternity, there are ancestral geneticists who work with the big public DNA sites and sometimes they can get results. We figured this was enough information for you to take in.”

“My Texas family... my real mom...” Bitter laugh. “Guess I’m no worse off, same story, murdered. Hello, world, I’m still an orphan.”

She flashed a sick smile that crumpled. Let out a sob, beat her knees with her fists and wailed.

Out came Milo’s fresh hankie.

Ellie Barker shook her head violently, then she snatched it and pressed it to her eyes. It took a while for her to catch her breath. “This is... I don’t even know how to define it, my world is fucking spinning!”

“It’s a lot to deal with,” said Milo. “Wish there could’ve been a storybook ending. But your goal was to solve the mystery and that’s been accomplished.”

She lowered the handkerchief. Glared. “Congratulations on your big old detective success. For me it’s not exactly a celebra... oh, crap, I’m taking my messed-up life out on you and all you’ve done is exactly what I asked. And frankly, what I thought was impossible. So you did an amazing job. Even though... I’m sorry, I should be grateful. But I’m feeling totally out of control. It’s not like I had expectations of sugar plum fairies. You took on the challenge, came through, and I have no right to be anything but grateful. And I’ll get there, I promise. It’s just...”

“It’s okay,” I said. “How could you not be disoriented?”

She stared at me. Tottered to her feet, walked around the coffee table to Milo, bowed and kissed his cheek. Looking over at me, she laughed. “All this time, you haven’t gotten half a gold star from me. Sorry for that, too. It’s not your fault I had some crap shrinks.”

Dry lips brushed my cheek lightly. She returned to her chair and sat with both feet on the floor. “Should I contact her — Nancy? Does she want me to contact her?”

I said, “She sure does. A lot of what we learned came from her responding to a post on a missing persons site. She and the rest of your family’s wondered for decades what happened to Benni.”

“My family,” she said. “Alien concept.” A hand poked her breast. “Hey, Lone Star folk, here’s your mystery baby.”

A few moments passed. “Benni. Cute name... you guys aren’t lying to me, are you? About her being a good person.”

“A good person and an innocent victim,” I said.

“So the bitch ruined her,” she said with sudden savagery. “You want to know something? This is starting to make me feel better. About her. How I’ve always felt about her in the back of my head and couldn’t admit. That photo of her and Dad. The look on her face, so hard. Now I know it was worse than that, it was cruelty. It always bothered me. Feeling off about her. I figured it was resentment because she abandoned me. That’s what the other shrinks said. Now I know I had an inner sense. That my judgment’s not as messed up as I thought.”

I nodded. “Good instincts, Ellie.”

“We’re not just talking cruel,” she said. “We’re talking evil. An evil, horrible, amoral slut just like Dad told me that time... okay, enough, I don’t want to waste precious breath on her.”

She stopped. “Oh, no. Is she alive?”

Milo said, “No, and she reached a very unpleasant end.”

“Such as?”

“She was terminally ill and starved to death, alone and abandoned.”

“Well that’s pretty unpleasant,” she said. “When and where?”

“No need to get into details, Ellie. Like you said, wasted breath.”

I slid a sheet from the thin stack on the couch and handed it to her. The Azalea photo, everything cropped but an enlargement of Benni Cairn’s smiling face.

“This is her?” she said, sniffing. “She’s pretty... so young... kind of pure-looking... her eyes look soft. Yes, I can see the vulnerability... look at that smile. She thinks she’s got a future.”

Rush of tears. Another study of the image.

“I don’t see a resemblance... maybe I look like my father. You think there’s a good chance I can locate him?”

Milo said, “No way to know but if you’re interested, it’s worth a try.”

“Why not, it’s come this far,” she said. “Okay, can you get me one of those ancestral geneticists? I don’t want to make the wrong decision like I did with those slicksters who wasted my money.”

I handed her another piece of paper. “This is a referral from a pathologist at the coroner’s office who’s been extremely helpful. She’s worked with him before and says he’s first-rate.”

She said, “William Wendt, Ph.D., genetic counseling and forensic geneaology... impressive sounding... I guess I could learn something I didn’t want to know but it’s better than wondering. May I keep the photo?”

“Of course.” I passed a third sheet over. “Here’s the match between your DNA and Nancy’s.”

“Strattine... the link is maternal. What’s my real name?”

“Holcroft.”

“Eleanor Holcroft.” She smiled. “Sounds like something out of Jane Austen... I think I’ll stick with Barker, Dad was my everything... maybe I’ll use Holcroft as my middle name.”

She burst out laughing. “Maybe I’ll dye my hair blond and start talking in a Texas accent and learn to ride horses and eat a lot of barbecued brisket.”

I said, “A world of opportunities.”

“Yeah, this could get interesting.” Full smile. “Thanks so much. Both of you. As long as we’re being earth-shattering is there anything else?”

Nothing you need to know.

Milo said, “Nope, that’s it, Ellie. It’s been good working on this.”

“Really? Even though you were pushed into it?”

“Like the doctor just said, opportunities. I like learning and you’ve been a peach.”

“What a lovely thing to say.”

She stood, this time gracefully. Shook her hair loose and straightened her spine and held her head high. “You’re a peach, too — both of you are.”

She laughed. “We’re a regular fruit basket. Let me see you out.”

At the door, Milo said, “Oh, yeah, Deirdre’s safe returning to her house.”

“I’ll bear that in mind,” said Ellie Barker. “Right now we’ve got some trips scheduled. Santa Barbara, tomorrow, then we’ll keep going to San Simeon. With Mel. Even though we are safe, he’s a great driver and he’s got a beautiful singing voice.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“A good plan,” she said. “Places I wanted to see, anyway.”