The Question of the Unfamiliar Husband

by E. J. Copperman

  “Yes.” I nodded. “Thank you.” I know it is proper to thank someone at a moment like that, but am not sure if one is expressing appreciation for the idea that the other person hopes you are feeling better—which was not stated explicitly—or for simply asking, which seems odd, given that it is an inquiry based on the situation. No one thanks me when I ask questions as part of my research. As with many items of social protocol, it is not logical.

  Hazel engaged the car’s reverse gear and backed out of the parking space. She stared straight ahead as she pulled out of the parking lot and then onto Stelton Road again.

  “So what did the guy in the black Escape tell you?” she asked. She did not look at me to gauge a reaction.

  “He said he is employed by someone who believes you to be the most likely suspect in Oliver Lewis’s murder,” I responded. There was no sense in lying to Hazel about the conversation. She had already determined that I’d spoken to the man, and I would not have been able to create a believable story that would leave out the pertinent information. Besides, Mother often says it’s easier to tell the truth because you don’t have to remember the lie.

  Hazel seemed unfazed by the information. “He didn’t say who?”

  “No. He has refused to name his employer on a number of occasions. He also does not respond when I mention Terry Lambroux.”

  Hazel shook her head slightly. “I told you, I don’t think there is a Terry Lambroux.”

  “Someone sued Oliver Lewis for breach of promise,” I pointed out. “Whoever that was used the name Terry—not Terrence or Theresa—Lambroux. Can you explain that?”

  “No. But it seems weird to me that nobody’s ever seen this person.”

  “I agree. But strange circumstances surrounding a person do not necessarily mean there is no such person.”

  Hazel seemed to consider that idea. “You must have thought I was crazy when I started driving like that. Does it make you feel better to discover we really were being followed?”

  “No.”

  She laughed. “I don’t blame you. I guess I’m asking whether you still think I’m crazy.”

  I took a deep breath; this moment is always awkward for me. “I have Asperger’s Syndrome, Hazel,” I said. “I think everyone is crazy.”

  She laughed harder but did not move to pull the car over, which made me slightly nervous. But she did manage to drive safely and controlled herself after eleven seconds.

  “You’re probably right,” Hazel said.

  She dropped me off at my home three minutes later, but we had not continued our conversation. I opened the car door, and Hazel said, “This was fun, Samuel. We should do it again sometime.”

  I thought the idea of going to dinner, driving wildly into the night, and being followed by unsavory characters was hardly something I would care to repeat. So it took me a moment to realize that Hazel meant we might like to see each other on a social basis at some other time.

  What do men say at such moments? “Yes. I will make a point to call you.” It was a variation on what I have heard in films and on television.

  I walked into the house and called to Mother, who was in the den watching television. She walked into the kitchen, where I was taking a pitcher of water out of the refrigerator (I do not use plastic bottles at home, and have considered renting a water cooler at the office, but it would not be possible to get a cooler of diet soda for Ms. Washburn). Mother wasted no time. “So?” she said.

  “I do not believe that dating is necessarily my strongest activity,” I said. “But I have gained some useful information toward answering the questions.”

  “Questions?” Mother asked. “Are there more than one?”

  I poured some water into a glass and sat down at the table after I returned the pitcher to the refrigerator. I nodded after taking a drink, which felt good. “Of course. There is Detective Dickinson’s question about the death of Oliver Lewis, and Cynthia Maholm’s question about her husband.”

  “But Cynthia is dead, poor thing,” Mother reminded me.

  “That does not absolve me of my responsibility. She asked me a question, and I am obligated to answer it, even if she is not alive to hear the answer.”

  Mother sat down opposite me and searched my face as if for the truth in some strange puzzle. “What information did you get tonight?” she asked.

  I told her about my dinner with Hazel, and how it was cut short by her odd insistence that we hurry out because there were assassins on her trail. And I told her how I had spotted the men in the black Escape and had a conversation with the one who seemed to know more than the other.

  “I believe I am getting very close to answering the question for Detective Dickinson,” I told Mother after assuring her that I was perfectly all right and was not even sure that, aside from Hazel’s erratic driving, I was ever in any true danger. “Hazel’s repeated declarations that there is no such person as Terry Lambroux indicates that there must be such a person. Everyone else involved in the question insists there is, although no one can identify Lambroux or conclusively state if that person is male or female. There is no reason for anyone else to lie about it, so I must assume that Hazel has a reason to deceive me on the subject.”

  “What do you think the reason is?” Mother asked.

  “The most obvious is that Hazel is Terry Lambroux,” I suggested.

  Twenty-eight

  “Man, you go out on one date with a girl and you’re already accusing her of all sorts of deceptions.” Ms. Washburn was undoubtedly kidding with me, but I did not understand the humor of the insinuation she was making. It was not worth clarifying, but I noted it and moved on.

  “We have no physical proof,” I admitted. “That has been the problem with this question from the beginning—it has been impossible to verify, so we have had to rely on the testimony of the parties involved. That makes the question considerably more frustrating than most to answer.”

  We waited outside the Piscataway police department on Hoes Lane in the town’s municipal complex. Sitting in Ms. Washburn’s car, we were waiting for a glimpse of the officer to whom we wanted to talk, and at Ms. Washburn’s suggestion, had turned the car’s engine (and the air conditioning) off and opened the windows. That is not my favorite environment, but I do understand the importance of using less fuel for the sake of the planet’s ecosystem. I was, however, noticing some slight perspiration and itching on my right triceps.

  “If we don’t have any proof, how can you have a theory?” Ms. Washburn asked.

  “I do not have a theory. I have a series of assumptions. If they are correct, we are well on the way to answering the questions. If they are incorrect, we could be acting irresponsibly and impetuously. But I will confess I have no other ideas at this moment and would love to hear a suggestion of another plan of action if you have one.”

  “I’m sorry I don’t, Samuel.” Ms. Washburn’s voice had a slight tinge of hurt in it, so I thought over what I had said to see if it might have been misconstrued. It was possible.

  But there was no time to make my apologies and explain myself. Detective Esteban walked out of the police station, and I had one of the first lucky breaks I’d experienced since this question was first posed: She was alone.

  “Remind me to tell you something later,” I said to Ms. Washburn as we got out of the car and approached the detective. We reached her around the side of the building before she could find her car. Ms. Washburn called to her, and the detective turned. She looked surprised when she recognized us.

  “Look, I’m not in the business of answering your questions,” she said.

  “I am,” I told her. “But I don’t expect you to do all the research for us. I have only two things to ask, and I expect they will be very easy for you to answer. This will not take much of your time.”

  Detective Esteban’s eyebrows dropped a little. I could not interpret tha
t expression but she said, “What’s the first question?”

  “What is your first name?” I asked.

  There was no hesitation, as there often is when I ask a question someone is not expecting. “Alicia,” she said. “What’s the other thing you want to know?”

  “What is your favorite song by the Beatles?” I asked. I did not look at Ms. Washburn, because we had not discussed this moment. I had asked that question spontaneously.

  “‘Let It Be,’” she said, again with no moment to think about what I might want to hear rather than what she actually believed. Values stability. Believes in positive outcomes. “Is that it?” She turned to walk to her car.

  “No, detective,” I said.

  “You told me you had only two questions.” Detective Esteban did not turn back to face me, but she did stop walking.

  “I’m afraid I was mistaken about that,” I said. “There is one more thing. But first, could you go back inside and retrieve one item from your evidence locker?”

  “I still don’t understand why you didn’t go to Dickinson about this,” Detective Esteban said. “He’s the primary on this case.” She was still unaware of my association with her partner since he had insisted on secrecy, and we were honoring that promise.

  “I will be completely honest with you, detective,” I said. “I trust your skills more than I do Detective Dickinson’s.”

  Ms. Washburn looked away from the blackboard displaying the menu. The Bagel Bazaar was not fancy, but it was just far enough from the police department that Detective Esteban would not be seen by her partner or her colleagues and besides, it was her lunch hour. Ms. Washburn’s expression indicated that my statement was bolder than she had expected it to be.

  “Dickinson’s just going through a slump,” his partner said. “It happens to everybody.”

  “I do not dispute that, as I have never been a police officer,” I said. “But I have never had a slump before. I do not understand the inability to answer a question, and this one baffles me. I believe you can help with some information you probably know without having to refer to notes.”

  “I’m waiting for a turkey sandwich on a seven grain bagel,” Detective Esteban said. “You said you have one more question. Ask it, because when that sandwich comes, I’m taking it back to my desk and our meeting here is over. Comprende?”

  I did not see why we might now be speaking Spanish, but Detective Esteban did not elaborate. “I understand,” I said. “Here is my question: Did the preliminary medical examiner’s report show a puncture mark, as for an injection, anywhere on Cynthia Maholm’s body?”

  “Yes,” she answered. “How did you—”

  “Someone injected her with Reglan. Do you believe it is possible that Hazel Montrose, Terry Lambroux and Sheila McInerney are all the same person?”

  Ms. Washburn, while ordering ham on a pumpernickel bagel, was watching the detective closely. I had not ordered lunch, as Mother would be expecting me in forty-five minutes. But I was carefully examining the detective’s face as well.

  Her reaction was exactly as I’d hoped: She looked angry.

  “How did you know that?” she asked.

  After a good deal of discussion, I was able to convince the detective that I had not in fact hacked her office computer (although I probably could, but had no desire to do such a thing) and had not been in touch with any other members of the Piscataway police department. She said there would have been no advantage to doing so, because even her partner, Detective Dickinson, was not aware of her findings yet.

  “The trail just kept coming back to those three names, but not one of them was like a complete person,” she said, confirming data I had already collected through Internet research. “Hazel Montrose is as close as she comes to having a whole profile, with an address, a Social Security number, and several credit cards in that name. But she doesn’t seem to have a birth certificate, she doesn’t file taxes because her income is supposedly too low, and her bank accounts have virtually no money in them.”

  “How did she manage to obtain a marriage license with Oliver Lewis?” Ms. Washburn asked. It was the next question I would have put to the detective.

  “You don’t need a birth certificate for a marriage license in Connecticut,” she said. “Just a driver’s license. And she has one of those.”

  I asked if the detective had what I had asked her to retrieve, and she said she did.

  Detective Esteban reached into her pocket and pulled out a small plastic bag. Inside the bag was a cellular phone. She took it out carefully and laid it on the counter next to me. “Why did you need this?” she asked. “I got it from the Manville police to analyze because of the possible connection to the Lewis murder.”

  “I assume it has been examined and is not needed as evidence as of yet.”

  She nodded. “That’s right, or I wouldn’t have removed it. Why should I give it to you?”

  “You are not giving it to me. You are, if you choose to do so, lending it to me because I believe it will be helpful in answering the question of Oliver Lewis’s death, and perhaps Cynthia Maholm’s as well.”

  Detective Esteban’s eyes narrowed. “Do you think it’s going to find Terry Lambroux?”

  I shook my head. “How did you tie the name Terry Lambroux to the other two?” I asked.

  “That was the most interesting one,” Detective Esteban admitted. “There seemed to be no record of such a person as Terry Lambroux, Terrence Lambroux, or Theresa Lambroux anywhere, and that’s just not possible in this day and age.”

  “Exactly,” I said. “How did you find a link when I could not?” Immediately, I heard Mother’s voice saying with a loving but ironic tone in my mind, “It’s always about you, isn’t it, Samuel?”

  “You don’t have access to police records,” the detective answered. “It’s not a public record when a juvenile is involved in a crime, particularly if the record is expunged after the offender does the time or goes on probation. So don’t feel bad, Mr. Hoenig—only a cop could have found that one.”

  I tended to disagree, but people don’t seem to like being told they’re wrong, even when it is clearly the case. Ms. Washburn rescued the silence (which lasted only five seconds) by asking, “So Terry Lambroux had a criminal record, but someone with some clout got it expunged?”

  “It was a relatively minor offense, but an interesting one,” Detective Esteban said, nodding. “I won’t tell you the charge, but suffice it to say it was not violent and involved cheating people out of money when she was only twelve years old.”

  But that was not the interesting part of the detective’s news. “Who was it who could make the charges disappear off the record?” I asked.

  The detective allowed herself the slightest smile. “Her father, Judge Henry T. McInerney.”

  “And that’s what leads to Sheila,” I said.

  She nodded again. “I believe that is her birth name. But she had it legally changed at eleven, when her mother remarried a guy named Lambroux. ‘Terry’ came later as an aka in the file, a name she was only using when she was scamming.”

  “So they are all the same person,” Ms. Washburn said, shaking her head in wonder. “But does that really lead anywhere? I mean sure, she’s shifty, but does that necessarily lead to the conclusion that she murdered her ex-husband?”

  Ms. Washburn’s sandwich was delivered and we moved from the counter to a table on the opposite side of the establishment. Detective Esteban took the seat away from the door to better conceal herself if one of her colleagues should wander in.

  “Not definitely,” she told Ms. Washburn in answer to her recent question. “But when there’s a lot of smoke, you have to figure there’s a fire someplace.”

  I had heard the idiom “Where there’s smoke there’s fire” before and had it explained to me, but this was a new configuration; I had to consider it for a
moment before grasping the meaning. I nodded. “It is always a mistake to overlook coincidences,” I told Ms. Washburn. “They are rarely what they seem. The idea that Hazel has three identities is certainly reason for concern.”

  “How did you figure it out, Samuel?” she asked.

  “Last night Hazel was acting like someone who had something to fear,” I said. “It was clearly just that—an act—but she decided to begin it just when I was asking about Oliver Lewis’s somewhat illicit businesses and how they might have benefitted her as his ex-wife. The question was innocent enough, considering there were, theoretically, four other wives and an ex-fiancée, but it seemed to alarm Hazel.

  “At first I assumed I had gotten close to some financial scheme in which she and Mr. Lewis might have been in collaboration. But I had asked about that before. It was when I grouped together the names of Sheila McInerney and Terry Lambroux that she felt most threatened and initiated the melodrama that ensued.”

  “That’s a pretty big guess,” Detective Esteban said. “You mention two names and you decide she was both of them and herself at the same time?”

  “There was the fact that no one had seen the fictional Terry Lambroux, and that Sheila McInerney was a name the other members of WOOL had clearly heard, since Cynthia Maholm had used it as her own. That was when things began to happen, which indicated to me that the name was a signal, a sore subject, for someone. Cynthia was doing the same thing I did—she used the name Sheila McInerney as a stimulus.” I sat back. “I think it worked, and somehow Oliver Lewis ended up murdered.”

  “And so did Cindy Maholm,” Detective Esteban said. “In Manville.” She sounded oddly melancholy that the crime hadn’t taken place in her jurisdiction.

  “Yes. That suggests Ms. Maholm was somehow breaking ranks. She was the one who came to me first, then set up the elaborate drama in the apartment in Edison. She went out of her way to keep Ms. Washburn and me away when Oliver Lewis was being murdered, probably in his office, then taken to mine. It is still a wild coincidence that Hazel happened to be in the Extra Safe Cleaning van. Detective, is it possible for you to see if she is indeed on that company’s payroll?” I checked my watch; Ms. Washburn would have to being driving me home in five minutes if I were to be on time for lunch with Mother.