No Way to Die

by M. D. Grayson

  Lowell’s Restaurant meets both of these criteria—it’s been around since the ’50s, and it’s right downtown in Pike Place Market. The parking gods must have been smiling on me today, though, because I lucked out and found a metered parking space directly across the street from the entrance.

  On a normal day, the market is buzzing with tourists by eleven and is completely packed by lunchtime, but at 7:45 there was a different sort of buzz. Some of the storefronts were just opening; some wouldn’t open until later. Trucks were double-parked, unloading their merchandise for the shop owners. Drivers wheeled hand trucks in and out of the pedestrian traffic. Shop owners cleaned their windows and arranged their displays. The earlyrising customers who wandered about were mostly locals picking out the freshest and most complete selections of flowers, ethnic foods, fresh fish, and the other items offered in the market just as they came off the trucks. But despite the relatively uncrowded aisles, the energy level was still high.

  Toni and I picked and dodged our way through the activity and entered Lowell’s. Our hostess was a middle-aged oriental woman with her silver-black hair pulled tightly into a bun. I told her that we were meeting Charles Logan.

  “Oh, yes,” she said. “Mr. Logan is already here. He’s expecting you. We’ve put him at a private table overlooking the water.” She led us through the restaurant, and then upstairs to a table on the second floor, where my dad was waiting. Katherine Rasmussen had not yet arrived.

  “Good morning,” he said cheerfully, standing as he saw us approach. My dad is a little shorter than I am—maybe six feet even. He’s still pretty thin, even at fifty-nine years old. He has silver-blond hair that’s starting to go male-pattern-bald on top. He was turned out sharply this morning in a gray pin-striped suit and a red wine–colored power-tie. “My goodness, Toni, you look more beautiful every time I see you!” he said, smiling broadly as he leaned forward and hugged Toni.

  Toni smiled back—one of her dazzlers. There’s something about a beautiful woman looking into your eyes and blasting you with a radiant smile that can melt any man’s heart. I’ve seen Toni do it many times, but it’s always fun to watch. My dad—stiff old Irishman that he is—was not immune. In fact, his eyes were twinkling, and he looked bewitched.

  After a second, I said, “Dad, snap out of it. It’s me, your son, Danny. Remember me?”

  He laughed as he turned to me. “Good morning, Danny,” he said, as we shook hands. “Sorry, but I was mesmerized by your beautiful partner here.” He pointed to the table. “Here, let’s have a seat. Katherine should be along in a few minutes.” We sat down, and the hostess handed us menus.

  Dad turned back to Toni. “Toni, it’s been months since I’ve seen you. How are you? What’s going on in your life? You know, I feel like you’re part of the family. Bring me up to date.”

  Toni smiled. “I’m doing fine, Chuck. Working away. This guy,” she pointed to me, “keeps me busy.” No one calls Charles Logan Junior “Chuck” except Toni—not even my mom. Toni called him that the first time she met him, four years ago at our grand opening. I couldn’t believe my ears. I braced myself, getting ready to be embarrassed. I knew automatically that my dad was going to correct her, without equivocation and with even less tact, immediately. But he didn’t! Toni said it with a smile that melted him, and he had had no objection at all. Amazing. Ever since then, I think he actually looks forward to it. It’s something the two of them share—she calls him by a name she knows he ordinarily wouldn’t tolerate, and he happily accepts it. In fact, he wears it like a medal.

  “Claire’s always asking about you, you know,”Dad said to her. My mom loves Toni almost as much as my dad does.

  “Tell her I said hello and that I still remember that I owe her a lunch,” Toni said. “I will definitely give her a call.” Toni paused for a moment, and then she got serious. “Danny explained things on the way over,” she said. “It’s just tragic. It sounds like Thomas Rasmussen had everything to live for. I don’t understand it.”

  “Nor do I,”Dad said, shaking his head. He adjusted his napkin in his lap. “But I suppose that’s the existential question, isn’t it? How does a living, breathing man come to the conclusion that the best course available to him is to suddenly stop living? Stop the clock. How do you make sense of that?”

  Toni shook her head. “I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know if you can, actually. You know the old saying: ‘Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.’”

  “I like that,”Dad said. “Who said that? Hume or Freud or Nietzsche—one of those guys?”

  “Nope,” she said. “Phil Donahue.”

  Dad laughed. “There you go, then,” he said. “Phil Donahue. A good Irishman.”

  Toni took a sip of water before she continued. “So,” she said, “Danny says you’ve had a long relationship with Katherine’s family?”

  “Yes, indeed—a long time. Her father was a client of my father’s. Then when my father retired, I took over the relationship and represented the Berg family on the sale of their business and personal matters from that point on. I’ve known Katherine since she was a toddler.”

  “How old is she now?” Toni asked.

  Dad looked up at the ceiling for a few seconds, lost in thought. “Katherine was born in the mid-seventies,” he said. “That means she’s what—thirty-seven? Thirty-eight? She was a very young child when I joined the firm. But—” he looked across the restaurant. The hostess was escorting a very tall, very pretty woman in our direction. “Well, here she comes now.”

  I watched Katherine Rasmussen approach our table. She was hard not to watch. She wore dark blue jeans and tan boots that reached almost to her knees. Her coat was cream-colored with some sort of fauxfur around the collar. She had to be six feet tall—maybe taller with the boots. She was thin, but not scrawny. She had shoulder-length blond hair that hung in loose curls. Her eyes were a vivid, deep blue. She wore what appeared to be diamond pendant earrings along with a single strand of black pearls. She looked like a Vogue model.

  Dad and I stood as she approached.

  “Am I late?” she asked when she reached the table.

  “Not at all, my dear,”Dad said, reaching to shake her hand. “You’re right on time. Excellent to see you looking so well.”

  “Thank you, Charles,” she said, smiling.

  “Katherine, allow me to introduce Antoinette Blair and my son, Danny. They head up Logan Private Investigations.”

  Toni stood and shook hands with Katherine. “Please, call me Toni,” she said.

  Katherine nodded, and then turned to me. “Danny Logan, I’ve seen you before on television, haven’t I?”

  Unfortunately, I’d been interviewed by television and newspaper reporters on our last big case. In fact, I had been practically mugged by the reporters as I left the federal building. I smiled and nodded. “Perhaps you have, but I didn’t do it,” I joked. Katherine smiled. Toni just rolled her eyes.

  “Actually, I generally try to stay out of the news,” I said, as I shook hands with Katherine.

  “A wise policy,” she agreed.

  We took our seats. After the waitress jotted down our orders, Dad got things started.

  “As you know,” he said to Toni and me, “at least ostensibly, Katherine’s husband, Thomas, committed suicide three weeks ago.”

  “On Valentine’s day,” Katherine added.

  “Yes,”Dad said, “Valentine’s Day.”

  “Toni and I are very sorry,” I said. Katherine nodded solemnly.

  “This past Saturday, Katherine phoned me and said she had some concerns,”Dad continued. “I listened to them and decided that it might make sense to have you two hear about these concerns directly from Katherine rather than have me try to paraphrase her words. Katherine agreed to meet this morning and tell you her story.”Katherine nodded again. He turned to her. “That said, Katherine, the floor is yours.”

  She didn't say anything at first. Instead, she studied Toni for
a few seconds, then me. Finally, she said, “I’ve had three weeks to think about it.”Her voice was quiet, but determined. “I’ve listened to the police, and I’ve seen the autopsy report. They say the evidence is conclusive. They’re convinced Thomas killed himself.” Tears started to form in her eyes for the first time. She reached for a water glass in a bid for time to compose herself. She took a sip,and then continued. “I’m sorry,” she said. “This kind of talk is painful. It makes me nervous and emotional.”

  Toni reached over and grabbed Katherine’s forearm.

  “I can only imagine, Katherine,” she said, sincerely. Toni handed her a tissue from a pack she’d somehow pulled from her purse without me noticing. Katherine said thanks and dabbed at the corner of her eyes. “And even then, I’m sure I don’t have a good grip on what you’re going through.” Katherine nodded. Toni continued. “I can only say that we’re good listeners—we’re eager to hear your concerns. And,” Toni glanced at me, “if there’s a way for us to help, we’re on your side.”

  I nodded my agreement. At Logan PI, we make decisions on accepting a new case as a team, after discussing the facts. That said, even early on, I could see Toni was right to go ahead and speak for us. If there were something we could do to help Katherine, we’d almost certainly line up on her side.

  “Thank you,” Katherine said. She took a second to gather herself, and then she continued. “The police say Thomas killed himself. But for me, as I sit here three weeks later, I’m not at all convinced that’s what happened. I don’t have any proof or even any real suspicions, but things just don’t make sense to me.”

  “You don’t think he took his own life? You think he was murdered, then?” I asked.

  “I suppose that’s the only other choice, isn’t it?” she replied. There was the slightest hint of impatience in her voice.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I hope that didn’t come across as insensitive. I’m just trying to understand what you’re thinking.”

  “Let me tell you why—” Katherine started to say.

  “Katherine,” Toni said, cutting her off. “Before you get any further into the basis of your thoughts, can I clear up a couple of procedural-type things?”

  Katherine nodded.

  “First, do you mind if we take notes?”

  “No, please do what you need to do,” Katherine said.

  “Thanks,” Toni said. She pulled out a notepad. She looked up and saw me looking at her. She did that eye-roll thing again and pulled out another pad for me. Apparently, she’d anticipated that I’d forget mine.

  “Second thing,” she said. “Let’s work the interview this way: you go ahead and tell us what you told Mr. Logan over the weekend. We’ll try not to interrupt you. We’ll take notes and just listen. Then, we’ll probably have a bunch of questions for you. Does that work for you?”

  “Perfectly,” Katherine said, nodding. She paused to collect her thoughts. “Since Thomas died, I’ve been studying suicide on the Internet for the last couple of weeks. I’ve found that people of all ages commit suicide for all sorts of reasons. And even though the number of reasons is pretty broad and sometimes not all that visible, there always is a reason, at least something that makes sense to the person at the time. Why else would they kill themselves? They have some sort of motivation. They have a problem—some sort of trouble. Something they’re trying to escape.” Her eyes filled with tears again.

  She stared at the ceiling for a moment and regained her composure. “First thing—Thomas didn’t have any reasons like that,” she said emphatically. “He had no reason to take his own life,” she repeated. “I’ve known him—knew him—for twenty years, ever since high school. We were best friends. We shared everything. I know—here in my heart,” she tapped her fist on her chest twice for emphasis, “that Thomas had every reason not to take his own life. We had a good marriage and a good home. We have two beautiful children. We’re all healthy. We don’t have money problems. His company has developed a new product that should have high demand. After years of breathing life into it, we were about to see the payoff. He had no major problems, no concerns. There’s just no reason why he’d want to kill himself.

  “Second thing. The police say Thomas used his own gun. But Thomas didn’t own a gun. We don’t even like guns. The police say he bought the gun at a local gun store. Well, he never said a word about it to me. He’d have told me about having a gun, especially with the children around.

  “Third thing. The so-called note. The police had the handwriting analyzed, and they say it’s in Thomas’s hand. I looked at it, and I agree that the writing—the actual penmanship—looks like Thomas’s. But the words aren’t his. I know him—knew him—and it’s not what he would have said or how he would have said it. For example: something simple like the signature. Sometimes, other people called him Tom. He never corrected them. He answered to Tom around many people, just because it was easier to do that rather than having to correct people all the time. But he really preferred Thomas. Between the two of us, he was always Thomas. For twenty years, he was Thomas.”

  “But the note?” I said.

  “The note is signed Tom,” she said.

  She thought for a moment andsaid, “Those are just the three most obvious reasons why what they say happened makes no sense to me. There are others. But bottom line, I don’t believe Thomas killed himself—I’ll never believe it. So yeah, Danny, to answer your question again, I guess that means I think he was murdered.”

  It was quiet for a minute, and then Dad said, “I heard Katherine go through this over the phone when she called me Saturday. I was struck by the logic of her arguments. That said, I don’t have the experience you two do in working on these sorts of cases. I thought I’d call the two of you and have you listen to what she had to say.”

  I nodded. I had to agree that Katherine’s rational sounded logical. It sounded, at least on the surface, like her concerns could be valid. But my experience as a special agent in army CID said something pretty different. I’d conducted examinations of about a dozen suicides as a law enforcement officer in just under four years. In all but a couple of cases, there was always someone saying, “There must be some sort of mistake. He (or on a couple of occasions, she) would never take his (or her) own life.” There were always suspicions by the survivors. To admit that your loved one was messed up enough to take his own life seemed to most people an admission that the whole family was messed up—that they’d somehow missed, or ignored, the victim’s cry for help. Sometimes this was warranted, sometimes not. Yetit didn’t change the basic fact that, almost without fail, in every suicide case I examined where there was even a question as to whether it was murder or suicide, we ultimately found that the person had, in fact, killed himself.

  I think part of the problem is that people are unique. It can be really hard to reconcile conflicting sets of behavior after someone has died. Think about it. How can you tell why an irrational person did what they did? Ninety-nine percent of the time, someone who'’ll kill himself is not acting rationally. So how can a rational person look at the aftermath and try to make rational judgments?

  In addition, the textbook solutions are generally based on “averages” or “typicals.” But any individual person is neither “average” nor “typical”—like I said, they’re unique. They’re individuals and, as such, they don’t necessarily fit any profiles. Problems invariably arise when you compare a single individual’s behavior with a group profile. If the individual’s behavior doesn’t fit the “pattern” perfectly—and it seldom does—then family members who already don’t want to believe their loved one could actually kill himself become suspicious. Essentially, you have an irrational person who acted in unpredictable ways being second-guessed by people who don’t have a clue about what really happened.

  But just because they’re suspicious doesn’t mean their loved one was murdered. It does mean the wise investigator treads very carefully, though. Emotions are high and very close to the surface at
times like these.

  Breakfast arrived, and we paused as the waitress served us.

  “Thank you for filling us in,” I said, after the waitress left. “Let’s continue while we eat. Did the police interview you?”

  “Yes, quite extensively.”

  “Do you remember who did the interview? We would need to talk with this person.”

  “Katherine faxed me the detective’s card,”Dad said. He opened his briefcase and handed a photocopy of the card to me—Detective Inez Johnson, Homicide. I didn’t recognize the name.

  “Thanks,” I said. “We’ll need to talk to her.” I folded the paper and put it in my pocket before turning back to Katherine. “Katherine, I apologize,” I said, “but as we proceed this morning, it’s very likely that Toni and I will be asking some of the same questions that the police asked.”

  “That’s okay,” she said. “I think the police came to the wrong conclusion. I want to get a second opinion. That’s why I said yes when your dad suggested I talk to you.”

  “Good,” I said. “Well, let me start by getting a little background. Tell me about Thomas.”

  Katherine nodded.

  “In a nutshell, Thomas was a brilliant mathematician,” she said. “He had a PhD from Stanford. He was nationally known for his work on cryptology algorithms. He was published, and he had a huge future. He was a mathematical child prodigy who continued to push the envelope as he grew up. At the same time, at home he was a warm, caring father to our two beautiful children. He wasn’t one of those men who spent fourteen hours a day at the office and ignored his family.” She sniffed. “He was a wonderful husband. Like I said, he was my best friend.”