Gone Forever

by Diane Fanning

  “Okay.”

  “They were grilling me hard . . .”

  “Yeah. Okay.”

  “And, uh, they wanted to know when you picked it up and who all knew about it and stuff like that.”

  “Uh huh.”

  “I didn’t have the answers because I wasn’t there when you picked it up, and that’s what I told them.”

  Rick stammered and stuttered—at a loss for words, but desperate to form an alliance.

  Clemmer continued, “One of the things that they asked me about was when did you get the keys and stuff like that, and I really wasn’t sure when you got the keys, ’cause I wasn’t there.”

  “Well, okay. I got the key, uh, eventually trying to be . . . I just cleared it with you, you know, our understanding that, uh, it was like five-thirty on Saturday evening.”

  “Oh, so you picked up the keys on Saturday?”

  “Right,” Rick said. “And you remember?” The conversation continued in this vein with Rick trying to superimpose a solid memory over all of Clemmer’s vague recollections.

  “I wish you would have told somebody, you know, when you picked it up,” Clemmer said.

  “Picked up the vehicle?”

  “Yeah. Did you talk to any of the boys at the shop?”

  “Well . . .” Rick’s mind stalled out as it raced in search of a reasonable explanation.

  “Was anybody there when you, when you got it?” Clemmer pressed.

  “Well, uh, my, my wife was the one that I dropped off.”

  “Your wife dropped you off?”

  “No, I dropped her off.”

  “Oh, to pick up the vehicle?”

  “Right,” Rick said, gaining confidence in this new scenario.

  “Oh, she picked it up?”

  “She picked it up early Monday morning.”

  “Oh, so it didn’t happen on the weekend?” Clemmer asked.

  “No.”

  “Okay. ’Cause they’re asking me, they’re asking me about it . . . about you stealing it.”

  “Right, right. But that’s bullshit,” Rick insisted. “She picked it up early, fixed the vehicle early Monday morning and I got the key from you whenever it was that . . .”

  “But I don’t remember the key part. That was the part I didn’t remember,” Clemmer repeated.

  Rick then tried to pin the transfer of keys on one of the workers at the service center and attempted to convince him that there were two ignition keys on the chain.

  Clemmer did not make it easy for him. “The thing is kind of freaking me out, because I’m getting too involved in this deal, you know? I mean, with your, with your wife missing and everything. I don’t want to get that involved.”

  “Well . . .”

  “And I don’t want them calling me on the carpet every five minutes.”

  Rick worked at convincing him that if they both spouted the same details, the whole situation would blow away. But Clemmer would not commit to the scenario Rick outlined. Rick changed tactics. “I am still interested in the Jeep. Do you have a feel for when that thing might be fixed up? I’m just ready to dump this minivan.”

  “Yeah, I’m gonna have the fuel pump in tomorrow.”

  Rick then asked if Clemmer would sell his Windstar van for him. Rick thought an appeal to Clemmer’s avarice would seal the deal, but Clemmer continued to equivocate. “And then I got one other problem. When you came in, you know how we give everybody the book to sign in on? For the Jeep?”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Today, after you left, the page was missing out of that deal and there’s some other numbers on there that I need. On the message book in my office.”

  “Yeah.”

  “So, then, I’m wondering if it’s possible that you might have picked it up by mistake and so I can get it back,” Clemmer said.

  “Now what, when was this and what was . . .” Rick stalled.

  “The day when you came. You know, I had that message pad that I was working on there.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And on that message pad had the Jeep deal reference and then below it there was two other numbers on that pad. I kind of need that message sheet back, so I thought maybe you might of scribbled something on it and used it as a note or something.”

  “Oh, I’ll check,” Rick said.

  “Would you do that for me?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And see if I can’t get that back?”

  “Boy, I’m trying to, I know I wrote down something on it. I can’t, uh . . .”

  “Well, that’s what I thought. Maybe, you know, when you were talking on the phone, and then I went outside, did that customer and I came back. I went to retrieve that number right after you left and that, that whole sheet was gone. There’s three numbers there. Your number at the top with your stuff and then there was another number and the third number was a customer. And I don’t have access to that other deal. So check your notes and see if you have it.”

  The back-and-forth about the sheet of paper continued with Rick expressing the hope that he had not thrown it out when he “purged” a bunch of papers from his pockets and placed them into a trash can at a downtown Wendy’s. Rick moved the conversation to pressuring Clemmer for a commitment to a story line.

  Clemmer did not budge. “Well, you see, the only thing that scares me about this whole deal is, I don’t want to get caught in a lie about the key thing if something happened bad to your wife. You know what I’m trying to say?”

  “Right. Sure.”

  “You know, ’cause I’m not involved in this thing and I am scared to death for you, my friend. And I’m certainly scared for me, ’cause I don’t want to be involved in something this serious. This is serious stuff.”

  “Well, you’re right. Yeah. It is.”

  “Yeah, God forbid something bad happened and they catch me in a lie about this key thing and, shit, I don’t want to go to jail over this.”

  “I don’t want you to go to jail over this either.”

  “Not like over a key.”

  Rick continued to manipulate the story line and to try to embed his version in Clemmer’s head. “It would get you in trouble if we didn’t have the same recollection of what took place.”

  “Yeah.”

  “So, what are you comfortable with or what will you say?” Rick asked.

  “I don’t know. I guess I just better think about it, hunh?”

  “Well, geez,” Rick whined, “if we could kind of square away that here and now, it would certainly make me . . .”

  “Sleep better?”

  “Sleep better.”

  “I bet you would,” Clemmer said.

  After losing the signal and reinitiating the call, a frustrated Rick begged off the phone with the excuse that his battery was going dead.

  Just before midnight, Wedding and Palmer went digging for evidence in the bags of trash the city had picked up from the curb at 351 Arcadia Place. Wedding unearthed another pair of latex gloves and an empty package of Wyler’s Authentic Italian Ices.

  On December 4, a small search team with the dogs trekked through Sue’s neighborhood checking out all the storm drains. At one, they found a wreath of flowers laid at the opening. It seemed too obvious. It was impossible to believe that someone stuffed Sue’s body into the culvert and then marked the spot. Nonetheless, the possibility had to be explored through the whole length of the pipe.

  The searchers did a reconnaissance run at John James Park on Rittiman Road. Then they took a road trip up to YMCA Camp Flaming Arrow in Hunt, Texas—a traditional residential camp located on the banks of the Guadalupe River in the Texas Hill Country. Rick and his boys had camped there with the Indian Guides.

  Rick and his children remained at the Cromacks’ five days. When they returned to their own home, it was at 3 in the morning. They came up the road without headlights and Rick turned off the engine and drifted into the driveway.

  While in the Cromack home, Rick rarely mentioned Sue’s
disappearance and did not demonstrate any sadness over her absence. When Margot asked him about the Suburban found across the street from his house, Rick said that Susan had test-driven it on Monday. She must have parked it in the Wellses’ garage, he said.

  Margot knew this was not possible. Sue would not do business at that Texaco station, since she had served on the grand jury. In fact, she’d once referred to the owner, Richard Clemmer, as a “slimeball.”

  But for many of Sue’s friends, the possibility that Rick was responsible for Sue’s disappearance seemed impossible—that he actually killed her unthinkable. Margot was a nice, considerate woman who always tried to think the best of everyone. She could have spent the rest of her life doing just that if her life had never intersected with murder.

  32

  On the eleventh floor at Southwestern Bell, the normal high pressure of closing the books for November stumbled into chaos. Sue was not there to lead the effort with her usual competence. The reason for her absence placed a layer of distress on top of the heavy workload. At moments, it seemed the center would not hold.

  With the help of Sue’s supervisor, Gary Long, the staff soldiered through the process, seeking emotional numbness in the intellectual preoccupation with numbers. Throughout the week, they clung firmly to their denial—they clutched the frail belief that any moment, Sue would walk through the door. Maybe she had amnesia and was wandering around lost. Maybe there was an urgent, plausible reason for her to leave without telling anyone. They did not allow themselves to consider that all would not be well in the end.

  Somehow, they made the reporting deadline. Then their focus shifted to Sue’s disappearance. Many hours of work time were consumed by employees’ volunteer efforts. They walked through Sue’s neighborhood putting up fliers on telephone poles, shop windows, anything that did not move.

  Management worked with the Heidi Search Center to coordinate groups of staff to augment search teams. After three weeks, even those in the deepest abyss of denial rose to the surface and accepted that there would not be a happy ending.

  Gary Long’s holidays jarred in his head like a symphony orchestra with all the instruments tuned to a different key. One day he was searching a basin for Sue’s body or evidence of foul play. The next he was in his car with his family singing Christmas carols as he careened down the road to visit relatives in Colorado and Utah. The celebrations wound around him and he did his best to join in the spirit of the festivities. But all the while, Sue sat perched on the edge of his smile. Out of state, he could not turn to the news for an update. He grew anxious not knowing if there were new developments—if Sue of the sunny smile and boisterous laugh had been found.

  Austin Hardeman was a close friend of William. His mother, Karen, was the same age as Sue and also had blonde hair and similar mannerisms. This resemblance gave William a high level of comfort in the Hardeman home. Sometimes, he called her “Mom” and he often spent the night there.

  One morning after his mother’s disappearance, he found Karen outside weeding around a rose bush. “I gave my mom some rose bushes once and she really liked them,” he said.

  “I like roses, too.”

  “You’re just so much like my mom, if something happens, will you adopt me?”

  “Oh, William. Don’t worry. We’ll find your mother. Everything will be all right.”

  Realtor Deborah Meyers received another call from the same number. This time she answered the phone. It was Rick McFarland and he wanted to know what time and what day the two of them had talked.

  “I’ve been asked not to discuss it with anyone,” she told him.

  “Why not?” he asked.

  “I have been advised not to discuss any details with anyone,” she repeated.

  “That is ridiculous,” he sputtered.

  Clemmer called Rick back mid-day on December 4. Rick had yet another spin on the key situation. In this scenario, Rick arrived on the Saturday before Thanksgiving and there were two sets of keys on the chain when he took the Suburban for a test drive. At that time, with the knowledge of the person working that day, he took one set to give to his wife. “So,” he concluded, “you’re right. You didn’t give me the key.”

  “Okay. Okay,” Clemmer said.

  “I noticed the other key already in the car and that’s the one I gave to my wife.”

  “Okay. Okay. Well, that makes sense.” Then Clemmer told Rick that Sergeant Wedding wanted to talk to him about some new evidence they found. “He said something about, ‘It’s more than a missing person case now.’ ”

  “It’s more of a what?” Rick asked.

  “More than a missing person case. I don’t know what that meant.”

  “Well, you know, the husband’s always the guilty one until they find another person. So, I mean, you know, I don’t know. I just don’t know anymore.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Really,” Rick said.

  “I bet you’re freaking out.”

  “Oh, yeah,” Rick affirmed.

  Clemmer once again addressed his discomfort in lying about the key to law enforcement. “I would be just as guilty as if I participated in the crime.”

  “So, don’t say anything about the key,” Rick said. “I don’t want—I mean, I’m not asking you to cooperate with me. I just wanted to, you know, touch base, like you would. It’s just to make sure what details you might recall.”

  Poor phone reception cut their call short, and they agreed to meet in ten or fifteen minutes—but not at the Texaco station. Rick was worried the station was watched and set the rendezvous for the Big Lots store up the street.

  All that day, officers from the Texas Department of Public Safety attempted to maintain mobile surveillance of Rick. They hoped he would lead them to Susan McFarland.

  But Rick was either aware of the presence or just flat-out paranoid. He made sudden turns. He never took the shortest route to any destination. He meandered all over town.

  If officers were going to ensure that they could track him despite his evasive moves, they needed help. Sergeant Palmer applied to the courts for permission to install a tracking device on Rick’s van.

  Steven Rogers, owner of Alamo Mini Storage, had met Rick three years ago through their sons’ participation in the Fox Tribe of the YMCA Indian Guides. On December 5, he got a page from Rick. He returned the call and said, “Rick, I read in the paper that the police searched your house.”

  “That was a courtesy search. Now there is going to be an actual search warrant. I want to store some financial records and computer stuff. It has nothing to do with the investigation, but I don’t want police to see it.”

  Steven agreed to meet Rick at Alamo storage later that afternoon. After the call, Steven had second thoughts. He really did not want Rick storing anything at his facility.

  He called back. “You know, Rick, storing items at a storage facility will not prevent police from eventually having access.”

  Rick said he’d changed his mind and hung up.

  That day, Rick paid a visit to Dr. Gregory Jackson in Alamo Heights. His chief complaint was anxiety and depression. Rick said he was having an increased inability to pay attention—not unusual in someone under stress who was also diagnosed with adult ADD.

  Rick reported difficulty in staying awake and in taking care of the three boys. He wanted a medicine that would give him more energy. Rick did not mention his wife during the interview, but did refer to the stress caused by police interviews and by angry family members and friends. He admitted that in response to his difficulty in coping, he self-medicated with ephedrine.

  Dr. Jackson advised that he stop taking that drug at once. He urged him to limit his responsibilities and not take on any additional ones at this time. He should limit his interviews and social interactions to what was absolutely necessary and to get as much rest as possible.

  The doctor recommended that Rick focus on activities that he was uniquely qualified to accomplish, like comforting his sons and managin
g basic finances. He encouraged him to get as much logistical support as possible to help him care for the children. He told Rick to get a follow-up visit with a psychologist or psychiatrist.

  Dr. Jackson also examined the little finger on Rick’s right hand where the tip of the digit was missing. He cleaned and dressed the wound. Dr. Jackson found Rick to be disturbed, tangential and struggling to stay awake. But, the doctor thought, this mental state was a typical one for Rick.

  Sue’s brother Pete was now in San Antonio and joined the search team as they covered an area by Austin Highway and Vandiver Road and a vacant lot off Stillwell Avenue. Pete, a retired homicide detective was at every search from this point on.

  Many thought that Pete, with his experience as a homicide investigator, and intimate understanding of the law enforcement process, would be better equipped to handle the situation than the typical family member of a victim. Like anyone in his position, he bore the frustration of his sister remaining missing for an extended period of time—but Pete also carried an added burden that others could not know.

  After years of investigating murder, he had an automatic checklist in his head that kept ticking off tasks that needed to be done. But law enforcement was not free to answer his probing questions while the case was still in progress. And Pete could not tell them what to do. It was not his case. He was not in control. It was an uncomfortable position for a veteran detective. He felt like a spectator stuck on the wrong side of the fence in the middle of the most important investigation of his life.

  33

  At 7 P.M. on December 5, Sue’s sister Ann pulled up at 351 Arcadia Place with Sue’s niece Kirsten Slaughter and her husband, Brandon. Sue’s brother Pete arrived in another car with his son. Neighbor Charlene Schooling spoke to them from her front gate. She pulled no punches—she told them she was convinced that Rick was involved in the disappearance of Sue.

  Ann did not want to accept that possibility—not yet—but Pete was in agreement with Charlene. Pete knew that no matter how angry Sue might have been at Rick, she would never abandon her children. The moment he’d heard about the Suburban across the street with the shovel and the gas can, he knew Rick had buried Sue, or burned her, or both.