by Ann Rule
Almost five decades later, the land he bought is well-nigh priceless, but he purchased the creaky structure, which had once housed a rug cleaning business, with relatively few funds. Somehow, he had the touch that made the weathered gray building look quaint and “interesting,” rather than junky.
Rockwell filled the first floor with all manner of collectibles—large pieces of furniture, paintings, objets d’art, rare coins, Northwest Indian icons, and his claimed special area of expertise, Ashanti weights. He traveled often to buy items for his inventory, most often to Canada, but also to Portugal and Ghana, in Africa, to buy the precious little carved bronze Ashanti weights once used by natives as counterbalances to weigh both gold dust and salt.
Rockwell often spoke of his amazing luck in being able to buy a collection of 152 such weights, more valuable each year as their number was limited. They had great religious and cultural significance to those who used them. Hundreds of the rare bronze icons were buried with those who owned them in life.
When Raoul Guy moved into the barnlike house, he brought his family with him. His second wife, Manzanita, was thirty-nine, an attractive and vivacious redhead who favored scarlet lipstick. Manzy, as she was called, had a much more ordinary job than her flamboyant husband: she worked at a bank in downtown Seattle. Although Raoul Guy and Manzy had no children together, she had a very pretty eighteen-year-old daughter from a former marriage. Dolores Mearns was a freshman at the University of Washington.
The family lived in an apartment on the second floor of the antiques gallery. How long Raoul and Manzanita had been married, no one knew. Although she seemed to understand that her husband had to have a certain persona to attract clients to his business, she often grew weary of the many women who had decided that shopping there was the thing to do. Driving up in expensive cars and wearing the latest fashions featured at Nordstrom’s flagship store and at Frederick & Nelson, the society matrons flocked not only to ask Raoul about his merchandise but also to listen to stories of his adventures.
Manzanita often got off the bus on Eastlake Avenue after a hard day at the bank, walked a few blocks to the shoreline in the omnipresent spring rain, only to find the first floor of her residence overflowing with what she considered “silly women.” Raoul kept odd hours in his shop—opening the doors at 6 P.M. For him, it was a social time, but his wife and stepdaughter would have preferred to have a family dinner and some quiet evenings.
The sounds of women’s laughter floated up the stairs, and Manzanita heard her husband’s deep, rumbling voice pontificating on one subject or another. When she saw certain women returning night after night, Manzanita felt waves of jealousy. Raoul always explained that he meant nothing by flirting with potential customers and said he didn’t have the slightest sexual interest in any of the women, but Manzy wasn’t so sure.
She had been with him long enough to know that he often exaggerated and enjoyed the attention he got from women. She had heard him exaggerate right up to the thin edge of an outright lie. More often than not, the truth wasn’t in him. When it suited Raoul, he could tell a lie as easily, perhaps more easily, than he told the truth.
Manzanita had left her ex-husband four years before, so besotted with Raoul that she lived with him without marriage for two years until her cuckolded husband threw up his hands in defeat and gave her a divorce. Bill Mearns had allowed her to take Dolores with her but kept their two younger daughters with him. Manzanita had given up a lot for Raoul; she loved him and she would do whatever she had to do to keep him.
Holding court in his shop, the big man, who stood almost six feet three inches tall, with broad shoulders and a barrel chest, was undeniably handsome and extremely masculine. Raoul Guy Rockwell often told his customers of his exotic past. In retrospect, how much of it was true is questionable.
Raoul said that he was a native of Saint-Tropez, France, and spoke of being a third-generation antiques dealer. He told his eager listeners that he had come to America in 1940, when he was seventeen. Even then, his genius was so obvious that he was accepted as a freshman at the University of California almost immediately. Although he was native to France, Raoul explained, his natural talent for languages was responsible for his fluent English. Indeed, he had no trace of a French accent by the time he moved to Seattle.
After he graduated from the University of California, Raoul said, he had spent a six-year tour of duty in the U.S. Army as a second lieutenant, engaging in battles on many fronts. This didn’t quite mesh with the dates he gave: World War II had ended shortly after he graduated, and the Korean War hadn’t yet begun. But it was technically possible for him to have participated in the last days of the Second World War.
Where he really was between 1945 and 1958 remained shrouded in the mists of time and Raoul’s expansive imagination. Some who asked enough questions or who had a suspicious mind hinted that Raoul might have attributes that suggested he was a poseur and a flimflam man. But there was no question at all that he was brilliant, knowledgeable in his field, and a captivating storyteller. And he seemed harmless enough as he enjoyed his small kingdom on the shores of Lake Union in the center of Seattle.
Those who bought his antiques believed they had scored extremely valuable treasures and took great pride in them. His long-suffering wife put up with his flirtations, and his stepdaughter spent most of her time on the University of Washington campus, already moving away from her life with her mother and Raoul, looking forward to being on her own.
Dolores herself was quite beautiful, becoming more so as she matured. She apparently got along well with her stepfather, and she didn’t date or stay out late at night.
If she disapproved of the women who clustered around Rockwell, Dolores kept it to herself. She was very close to her mother, and so far in her life, her fate had been entwined with Manzy’s.
And that was Dolores’s tragedy.
By March 1960 the Rockwells’ marriage seemed to have fallen apart. Neighbors could not help but notice a lovely middle-aged blond who arrived at the antiques shop close to midnight several evenings each week. She drove a long Cadillac convertible and often wore expensive furs. When she slipped into the antiques shop, she left a cloud of Chanel No. 5 in her wake.
This woman may have been the final insult to Manzanita, who must have realized that a lot more than conversation about antiques was going on. Quite suddenly, Manzanita abandoned her home and husband. The manager of the bank where she worked was puzzled that such a dependable employee would quit without so much as giving notice. But Manzy Rockwell had. At the same time, Dolores Mearns stopped going to her classes at the university.
A couple who lived next door to the Rockwells had formed close ties with them. They were sure that Manzy would have talked with them before she left, but she never mentioned that she was about to leave “Rocky.” They were hurt at first and then worried. They knew Manzy was often annoyed by Raoul’s flirtations and his tendency to spend more energy on his antiques than he did on her, but they had believed the two of them were in love. Sometimes they had laughed about it—who but Manzy would have put up with Raoul’s pomposity and pretense? They often said he needed her. Manzy grounded him and was the voice of reason in their marriage.
Their neighbors suspected that there were even times when Raoul would have gotten into financial trouble without his wife’s bookkeeping and steady salary. As much fun as Manzy Rockwell was, she was the one who paid the bills, took Raoul’s clothes to the cleaners, helped out in the antiques shop, and generally held things together.
And suddenly she was gone. Simply gone. And so was Dolores.
The couple next door asked Raoul where Manzanita and Dolores were, and he said they had gone to Vancouver, British Columbia—some 150 miles north of Seattle—to visit relatives. But weeks passed and the two women didn’t come back.
Finally, Raoul told them that he had made up an excuse for Manzanita’s departure to hide the fact that she had left him. He was humiliated. He seemed almost heartbroke
n as he explained he’d hoped for weeks that they would reconcile, but he had finally realized that she wasn’t coming back.
“She doesn’t love me anymore,” he said bleakly. “And Manzy closed out our joint bank account. She took every penny I’ve saved for the shop and to buy more antiques. She even burned all my business records before she left! I’m having a terrible time trying to figure out my income tax return.”
Their neighbors saw that Raoul was really depressed. He was drinking heavily, and he didn’t seem to care about the shop anymore, letting days go by without opening his doors for business. They were surprised; they’d always believed that if either Rocky or Manzy deserted the marriage, he would have been the one to leave. But he seemed to be the classic betrayed husband, bereft and anchorless. The late-night visits from the beautiful blond continued, but even they didn’t seem to cheer him up.
Finally, though, Raoul pulled himself together. He filed for divorce from Manzanita on grounds of “cruelty and desertion.” In Washington State, an uncontested divorce was final in three months. Raoul would be a single man by late July 1960. Manzanita didn’t come forward, and the Rockwells’ divorce proceedings moved ahead.
Once more, Raoul grew enthusiastic about his business, and he proudly announced to his friends and patrons that he had been awarded a Fulbright scholarship that would enable him to travel to Portugal and Africa to study the religious significance of Ashanti weights. Current theory was that the prized objects had been hand carved and then finished with a lost wax process introduced by Portuguese sailors.
“I don’t agree with that,” he submitted confidently. “My research thus far suggests that the weights were used as native charms long before Portuguese ships arrived on the African Gold Coast, and I intend to prove that.”
Photos of Raoul Guy Rockwell holding some of his Ashanti weights appeared in several newspapers, accompanying feature articles on the fascinating collector. Rockwell had a very impressive résumé and he never hesitated to share it with reporters. He was a natural as far as the media was concerned, and he reveled in the publicity, posing patiently.
But Raoul Guy Rockwell’s fame had only begun.
On July 26, the decree of divorce—unopposed by Manzanita—was granted. She and Dolores were thought to be somewhere in Canada, having cut their ties to Raoul and Seattle completely. According to him, they had plenty of money, since Manzanita had wiped out all his savings. But he was rebuilding his life.
Actually, he had rebuilt it far more rapidly than anyone expected. The day his divorce was final, Raoul announced that he was engaged to marry a most attractive fellow antiques dealer: Mrs. Evelyn Emerson, forty. Evelyn was petite and blond and, like Raoul, divorced. She had fallen in love with him very quickly, thrilled with his intellect, his exciting future, and his sheer masculine appeal.
She was not, however, the woman in the Cadillac convertible. She was younger, slimmer, and her hair was much shorter, cut and permed into a cap that surrounded her petite features. And Raoul had chosen Evelyn to face the future with him.
Although they had originally planned to marry on September 1, the couple was so smitten with each other that they had a marriage ceremony on July 29 in Evelyn’s family’s living room only three days after the divorce went through. Raoul had been single for just seventy-two hours.
Evelyn came from a socially prominent and wealthy Seattle family. Her mother and stepfather, Germaine and Clifford Winkler, were delighted that she had found love again with Raoul Guy Rockwell. They were impressed with his cosmopolitan air and his business sense, and he was wonderfully considerate of Evelyn. The couple had many interests in common, and Evelyn was looking forward to traveling with him to Portugal and Africa as he pursued the project funded by his Fulbright scholarship.
It would be a honeymoon trip as well as a research trip that would add luster to Raoul’s reputation as an antiques dealer.
To make their trip even more perfect, Raoul told Evelyn, friends had financed his purchase of a yacht, the Ibsen, and it was seaworthy enough to allow them to sail to Portugal and Africa. When they returned, he would sell the yacht and repay his wealthy benefactors.
Evelyn quickly sold her antiques shop and placed her remaining inventory in an auction house, planning to give all of her proceeds to her bridegroom as they started their life together.
The Winklers were honored a few days later when Raoul approached them about joining him in a business venture. He had located a treasure load of rare Indian artifacts and antiques in Canada. He had immediately put down a $500 deposit with the person who let him in on the deal, and he assured his new in-laws that he already had commitments from two Seattle art collectors who were anxious to pay him more than $16,000 for the rare Indian paintings and carvings.
But Raoul’s funds were temporarily tied up, and he didn’t have the $8,000 he needed to close the sale in British Columbia. His missing ex-wife had taken all of his liquid assets, and, although he had his own inventory of antiques set to be auctioned off by Seattle’s top auction house, he said they hadn’t sold yet.
(In 2007, the amounts involved would be hundreds of thousands of dollars—but $16,000 was a big chunk of money in 1960.)
Germaine Winkler assured her new son-in-law that she had the cash to help him. He demurred at first, and finally agreed to accept a loan from her only if she and Evelyn would let him give them each a $2,000 bonus when he sold the Indian objects to the collectors who were waiting anxiously to buy them.
When Germaine acquiesced to this, Raoul Guy accepted her check for $10,000. She made it for $2,000 more than he needed because she wanted to be sure he had enough when he went to Canada.
It would be a dicey deal in many ways. He didn’t want to go through customs with the Indian artifacts; there would be too many questions, taxes levied, and some laws might actually forbid the removal of certain tribal icons from Canada. For those reasons, he said, he hesitated to fly or to drive between the two countries. He planned to rent a fishing boat for his return trip, bringing back his purchases by way of the open sea.
He wasn’t worried at all about American customs agents; he assured Germaine and Evelyn that he counted many of them among his close personal friends. But he just couldn’t envision what the Canadian customs officers might do.
It was August 3 when the newlyweds ate dinner at the Winklers’ Magnolia home. They enjoyed a wonderful meal and it was a happy night. However, Raoul was concerned about the extra $2,000 Germaine Winkler had added to her check to him. He wanted to sign a check right there giving that money back to her; he needed only the $8,000. But he patted his shirt pocket and found it empty; since he didn’t have his checkbook with him, he said, he would give her a promissory note later.
His new mother-in-law assured him that wasn’t necessary.
Raoul confessed that he was worried about leaving Evelyn alone while he was away in Canada. They had been staying at an upscale hotel since their marriage, but he was still uneasy about leaving her. “Would it be presumptuous of me if I asked you to have her stay with you while I’m gone?” he asked Germaine and Clifford. “She isn’t feeling that well, and I wouldn’t worry if I knew she was here with you.”
“Of course she can,” Clifford Winkler said. “We would love to have her stay with us.”
Raoul promised his new bride that he would be back in Seattle by August 6—or August 7 at the very latest.
She hated to have him leave, even for that long. They’d been married for only six days, and she was completely in love with him. She had begged to go with him to Canada, but he told her he wouldn’t even consider risking her life; there was the possibility of danger not only in negotiating the purchase of the rare Indian treasures, but in getting them back across the U.S. border. She was much too precious to him to risk harming even one hair on her head.
Reluctantly, she agreed once again that it would be wiser for her to stay with her family. Soon enough, they would be on their honeymoon in their new yacht. The Ibs
en was currently moored in a marina in San Francisco, Raoul explained, and they would fly there, pick it up, and be off on the greatest adventure of their lives.
Raoul excused himself after dessert and brandy, saying he had to go to his office to work on some details for the September cruise to Portugal. He called a few hours later, though, saying it was imperative that he leave for Canada at once. “I’ve just learned that there is another bidder on the Indian artifacts,” he told Evelyn hurriedly. “They’re prepared to offer twice the agreed-upon price: $16,000! I have to get up there to complete the deal I’ve been promised.”
“Of course, darling,” Evelyn said. “Go. I’ll be fine here with my parents.”
Raoul reiterated his promise to his new bride that he would be back in Seattle in four days at the most.
Evelyn waited for Raoul’s return with some concern, knowing that there might be trouble with the other buyers who had suddenly surfaced. Raoul had even hinted at “pirate types” who might waylay him when he was out at sea.
That made her anxious, but she grew really frantic when six days passed with no word from him.
She realized that she didn’t know any of her groom’s intimate friends, but she did know that Raoul’s attorney was Jeffrey Heiman—he had handled the divorce from Manzanita. She called Heiman, fighting to hold back tears as she told him that her husband was missing. “I don’t know anyone else to call,” she said softly. ”I’m so sorry to trouble you.”
Heiman thought she was overreacting, and he attempted to reassure Evelyn when she told him that Raoul had been gone since Wednesday, August 3. It was now August 9. He hadn’t even called her to let her know that the deal had gone as planned and that he was okay.
When Evelyn confided that Raoul had over $10,000 that he had changed into Canadian currency before his flight out of Seattle-Tacoma Airport, Heiman, too, wondered if he had been the victim of foul play. The next day, the lawyer made a missing persons report to the Seattle Police Department.