Death of a Washington Madame

by Warren Adler

  "And nothing taken," the Eggplant mused, shaking his head and directing his gaze through the windows. Looking out, Fiona could see TV crews setting up their equipment and a knot of reporters forming on the street in front of the entrance to the house. The Eggplant turned and faced her.

  "No security system?"

  "Oh they have one, but they haven't activated it in years."

  "In this neighborhood?"

  "According to Roy," Fiona said shooting a glance at Gail. "They had Marshall."

  "Marshall?"

  "The dog. He apparently died last week," Fiona said.

  "Better than any security system," Gail said. "They probably got used to having him around and let the security system slide."

  "Actually," Fiona said. "According to Roy, they haven't had any trouble. Roy thinks it's because the drug dealers don't want anything to call attention to the neighborhood."

  "I don't buy that," Gail said. "More like a big house such as this is perceived as being well protected."

  "Until last night," the Eggplant said, shaking his head.

  "We're wrapping. This baby is ready for the freezer," Flanagan interrupted. He was a florid faced man with red hair starting to go gray. He had been with MPD for more than twenty-five years and was fighting the idea of retirement. Everyone knew he was a man who articulated the prejudices of the past, and since it was a given, he was tolerated affectionately, a kind of outspoken bigot whose speech carried a message of prejudice of which there was no evidence in his actions.

  The Eggplant nodded and two techies came in carrying a stretcher and prepare for the removal of the body of Mrs. Shipley.

  Fiona had already called Dr. Benson's office. He was the Medical Examiner, her closest friend in the Department. She requested a high priority autopsy.

  "Any theories?" the Eggplant asked Fiona.

  "Too early, chief," Fiona said.

  "We need this one, Sergeant," the Eggplant reminded her.

  "That's why we're not going to sing songs unless we know the lyrics." She looked at Gail who nodded her head in solidarity.

  Fiona's mind, at this point, was resisting theories. She knew it would be counter-productive to move too quickly and start down the wrong path. All they had was that a person, probably of small stature, had stabbed to death an old woman and apparently raped her and stolen her cross and, perhaps, nothing else. Motive, motive. It was already a mantra going through her thoughts.

  Suddenly they heard a commotion in front of the house. Looking out, Fiona saw William Shipley and his wife emerge from a black limousine. The Governor looked pale and somber. Madeline, in high Hollywood mourning style wore large sunglasses and a kerchief on her head. Led by a large burly black man, who performed intimidating blocking maneuvers through the crowd, the two moved silently through the knot of chirping reporters.

  "Don't put her in the bag," the Eggplant said to Flanagan. "Get her downstairs quick. I don't want him to see this mess. Tell the uniforms to clear them for downstairs only. We'll get an ID of the victim from the Governor."

  Gail barked the order into her walkie-talkie.

  "I'll be down in a minute," the Eggplant said, turning back to absorb the scene.

  The men discreetly laid out the body with a view to modesty, then put it on a stretcher and covered it with a blanket. Fiona led the way down the stairs to the hallway, an ornate area dominated by a huge Rock Crystal chandelier. Shipley and his wife, following in the wake of the huge black man, came in the door stopping as the stretcher reached the landing.

  "It's alright," Fiona said to the uniform who manned the door.

  "Him, too?" the uniform asked, meaning the large man, obviously a bodyguard for the couple. He was big, thick-necked, fierce-looking and unsmiling and tailored to hide what was undoubtedly an Uzi beneath his jacket. Probably an ex-lineman for a pro-football team, Fiona speculated, serving the Governor and his wife as a combination bodyguard, watchdog and professional intimidator.

  "Absolutely," Madeline Newton said, addressing herself to the bodyguard. "Clayton is indispensable." She looked toward the black man, whose expression was impassive, her eyes hidden behind large sunglasses. It seemed obvious that she called the shots in terms of Clayton's duties.

  Fiona nodded, despite this minor violation of the integrity of the crime scene.

  "I'm sorry Governor," Fiona said, appropriately somber. "Too bad we have to meet again under these circumstances." Shipley nodded, obviously shaken and grieving. Madeline, acknowledging Fiona, bit her lip and said nothing.

  Fiona lowered the blanket and uncovered Mrs. Shipley's face. Thankfully, one of the techies had closed the terror-stricken eyes and smoothed down the hair. The dead woman's expression seemed serene. Fiona dispensed with the official jargon of identification.

  "Mama," Shipley whispered hoarsely, his eyes glistening with tears. His wife's hand gripped him under his arm, offering support. She whispered some soothing words of solace into his ear. A sob erupted in his chest. "I can't believe it. Not Mama."

  Fiona steeled herself against showing any emotion, then nodded and the men carrying the stretcher covered the victim's face and proceeded with the body, maneuvering it out the front door. She could see the flash of cameras begin as the body moved toward a waiting ambulance.

  "This way," Fiona said to the Governor and his wife, leading them into the great room. Clayton followed. It had seemed to be the logical place for them to talk. Fiona, until arriving at the crime scence, hadn't been in that room for more than twenty-five years.

  She scoped it quickly, absorbing details. There it was over the fireplace, the painting of the young soldier. And, of course, the dog paintings and sculptures, all in exactly the same places where they had remained, fixed in her memory. The photographs, too, seemed to have been frozen into place, the people depicted in them now even more old fashioned, their clothes and hairstyles quaintly out of date.

  Time had removed much of the gloss of that first impression. The furniture looked shoddy and there was a tomb-like feeling about the room and a nose tingling smell of decay. She remembered how awesome and mysterious the room had appeared to the eyes of the little girl. It was still awesome and mysterious, but in a more haunted way, as if it had aged into infirmity.

  "Can we get you anything?" Fiona asked. The Governor and his wife shook their heads in the negative. Both seemed stunned and sat down side by side on a couch like grieving robots. Clayton stood nearby, his guardian eyes in perpetual motion.

  "Why ... why would anyone want to kill mother?" Shipley asked haltingly, his expression puzzled.

  "It makes no sense," Madeline sighed.

  "We haven't come to that yet, Governor."

  "Was it...?" Shipley swallowed, as if tamping down hysteria. ".... Was it bad?"

  "I don't think she suffered," Fiona said, deliberately avoiding the revelation of possible rape, which surely would have contradicted her assertion. There was no point in speculating otherwise. "She was stabbed to death."

  "Oh my God," Madeline blurted.

  "We'll know more after the autopsy."

  "More?" Shipley asked.

  "You know," Fiona made a quick course correction. "Time of death, nature of the weapon, how quickly ... routine things."

  "Must she have an autopsy?" Shipley asked. "I hate to see her..."

  "She's dead, Governor. She is beyond pain. But the body has much to tell us." She was quoting Dr. Benson, her friend and ally, the coroner, who expounded often on the eloquence of analyzed remains.

  "We want her killer, William," Madeline said, shaking her head and sighing. "What a world we live in."

  "She should have moved from here long ago," Shipley said. "I begged her. She could have lived at our Middleburg place. It was so.... well stupid. Take a look out there...."

  "Roy said they never had any trouble. None at all. Ever."

  "Roy's an old fool," the Governor snapped with a sudden burst of anger. "She should have gotten rid of him long ago. He's senile
for crying out loud."

  "He was very devoted," Madeline said gently. "Devotion from her retainers extremely important to her. Gloria, too." Gloria was the maid's name.

  "Too much so," the Governor muttered.

  "Did you know that Marshall had died?" Fiona asked. Gail was standing nearby, watching the scene, but not participating.

  The Governor nodded.

  "Roy told me that last week. They put great faith in Marshall. As is obvious from this room, mother was always a dog person." Fiona and Gail exchanged amused glances. "Dogs, she thought, would always protect her. Fact is that no one could come into this house without Marshall, or his many predecessors, reacting vociferously."

  "Did it concern you, Governor? I mean the fact that he was gone. You did know about their security system?"

  The Governor nodded, then shook his head.

  "It was put in years ago. Frankly with Marshall gone I thought Roy would have the sense to activate it." He clicked his tongue. "I guess mother should have reminded him. Or Gloria.... "He sucked in a deep breath. "Or me."

  "Don't tear yourself up about this William," Madeline said. "You can't blame yourself." She took off her sunglasses, briefly showing her incredibly beautiful violet eyes, then put them back on again.

  The Eggplant came in. Fiona did the introductions.

  "We'll find out who did this, Governor," he said, glancing at Fiona. "We've got our best team on it."

  "I'm sure," Madeline said with an unmistakable trace of sarcasm. She smiled thinly at Fiona.

  "Not that it will do much good. Not for Mama." Shipley lowered his eyes and nodded his head, as if he were about to be overcome with emotion. Suddenly, he raised his eyes and turned to his wife. "I want a very private funeral. Just a few friends. We have this crypt in Virginia. More like a memorial to Dad."

  As if to underline the idea, he turned his head and looked up at the picture of the young soldier. He was incredibly handsome and self-assured in his heroic pose. "Missing in France in '44. Before I was born. Mother never remarried."

  His eyes glistened suddenly. "Gives you an idea of her sense of loyalty. When Mama was committed, she was committed." He looked briefly toward his wife who turned away leaving an unmistakable impression of contempt. It was the kind of look that set off an alert antenna. And Fiona, in her investigative mode, was alert to every nuance of gesture and expression, however minor.

  Instantly, the look provided a deep glimpse into the relationship of Madeline Newton with the murdered Mrs. Shipley. Strained, would be the operative analysis. William Shipley was the adored only child; son and clone of the immortal loved one. From where she sat, Fiona could see more pictures of Shipley, infant, boy and man.

  As the pictures in the bedroom had demonstrated, William Shipley, Jr. was clearly the dominant person in his mother's mind. That obvious fact, coupled with the evidence that there was not a single picture of the much photographed Madeline Newton, even at moments when she would be logically present, such as the ceremonies of marriage and inauguration and important social events, telescoped the undeniable message of friction between them. It was a cliché of course, possessive mother locked in a tug of war with strong-willed equally possessive, albeit famous wife. But the logic of the evidence was undeniable.

  Fiona pushed away the edge of suspicion. It was absurd, she thought. If such antagonism were a motive, the world would be strewn with corpses.

  "The autopsy will tell us more about the sexual assault," the Eggplant said. Fiona felt her stomach knot.

  "Sexual assault?" Shipley asked, puzzled, turning to his wife, then to Fiona.

  "You didn't mention that," he muttered angrily, the words barely able to pass his lips. He had been pale when he arrived. Now he was ashen.

  "I'm sorry," the Eggplant said looking at Fiona, obviously regretting his revelation. "You didn't tell him?"

  Fiona shook her head.

  "We weren't absolutely certain," Fiona replied tamping down her indignation.

  "It's a good bet, I'm afraid," the Eggplant said cutting a glance at Shipley. He felt not the slightest hesitancy in sharing this information with Shipley. "It's awful, I know. I'm sorry."

  "She was seventy-seven years old," Shipley said, his voice hoarse. He turned to Fiona, glaring. "So she didn't suffer did she?"

  "I was trying to spare you, Governor. Besides, the sequence is not confirmed."

  "Sequence?" Shipley said, his expression shocked, indignant, obviously trying to contain his rage.

  "It could have happened after...."

  "It's sick," Madeline Newton said. She appeared to be equally shaken by the revelation.

  "Very," the Eggplant agreed, glaring at Fiona. There was, after all, no way of hiding the information. Sooner or later they would know. She felt remiss, her indignation misplaced. She had let compassion intercede.

  "Must the world know this?" Madeline Newton asked looking at her husband, who glared back at her.

  "We're public servants, Mrs. Shipley," the Eggplant said self-righteously, invoking, Fiona supposed, the public's right to know, normally the media's mantra. "Anyway, it's impossible to hide these things."

  "May I remind you, Captain," Madeline said. "We.... my husband is a public servant as well."

  "No insult intended, Mrs. Shipley," the Eggplant said, feigning humility.

  "I didn't mean cover-up, Captain," Madeline said pointedly. "I'm talking about the so-called tabloids, those vicious newspapers and TV shows. It's so.... so lurid. A seventy-seven year old woman. Let her have her last moment of dignity. At one time in this town she was an institution. She had the world's most powerful people in this house." She paused, removed her sunglasses, her powerful violet eyes glance roaming the room, her thespian training kicking in. "She was celebrated."

  "I can't control what the media does, Mrs. Shipley," the Eggplant sighed, his own not unsubstantial thespian abilities activated.

  "But surely, Captain." Madeline turned to her husband. "You could evade providing the information. I mean really...."

  "I certainly will try," the Eggplant said.

  "He can, can't he William?" Madeline Newton persisted, ignoring the Eggplant's comment, treating him with the arrogance of her own perceived superiority. "I mean I'm not asking him to break any rules or suppress evidence or anything like that. I'm trying to protect your mother's reputation ... her image if you will. This is, after all, the capital of the United States of America, not Hollywood."

  Same rules, Fiona thought. The cult of celebrity. Her being on the scene only made it worse. The marriage of politics and entertainment, a perfect match. Fiona's cynicism reinterpreted Madeline Newton's plaint. She didn't want the mud to splatter over her husband, not at this critical juncture in his career. Tabloid journalism mucked everyone it touched.

  William Shipley looked trapped, helpless. Fiona sensed his ordeal. He confronted his wife with a mordant bloodshot stare of rebuke.

  "The woman's dead, Madeline."

  "I know she's dead, William," Madeline replied, her tone rising. "It's humiliation enough to have to bear it without shouting it from the rooftops. The rape of a seventy-seven year old woman. Can't you just picture the headlines? My God, William. Do something."

  "It's out of our control, darling," Shipley said, his voice wispy.

  "Don't we have any rights as relatives, William?"

  Having spent most of her adult life the butt of gossip, her protests seemed a bit ingenuous. She had been married four times, been linked with numerous men, and photographed surreptitiously in various states of undress. Her medical history was an open book. Her various illnesses and her alleged bouts with alcoholism and drug abuse were well documented. And here she was, reincarnated as Miss Prissy, a potential first lady, protesting, of all things, the media's spin, the very spin that helped provide her persona with mystery, glamour allure and enduring celebrity.

  Yet Fiona understood the woman's position, despite the heavy handed and obnoxious way she was presenting it. She
was looking at it solely from a politician's point of view, a vantage that Fiona knew well. The revelation could be far worse than an indignity to a dead woman's image. It injected the double-edged sword of ridicule, even humor, which could spill over and soil the public image of William Shipley.

  So far, to those like Fiona who eagerly observed and digested such implications, there hadn't been a single misstep. As a Presidential aspirant, Shipley was the current golden boy of American politics.

  He was invested with all the obvious equipment, good looks, a golden tongue and quick wit, a well honed track record of political success, a natural dignity and charm and the outward appearance of decency and compassion as well as the more subtle attributes, a strong libido validated by his bedding, taming one might conclude, an American sexual icon. Nor was it a secret that Madeline Newton was, after all, and had been the moment she married him, the principal asset and perceived guardian of William Shipley's political future.

  "I assure you Mrs. Shipley," the Eggplant said patiently. "That I will be as discreet with the media as is humanly possible."

  "Discretion is not the issue. It's revelation. Isn't it William?"

  "It's too late for that Madeline," Shipley shrugged.

  "No it's not," Madeline persisted." The world doesn't know, not yet. And if we can control the agenda.... "Her voice drifted off as if she suddenly realized that she was engaged in inappropriate conduct for the circumstances at hand.

  "There are reporters out there, Mrs. Shipley," the Eggplant said with some impatience.

  "Even as a favor, Captain. As a personal favor," Madeline Newton said, purring now, a switch from bitch to seducer. Apparently she had waved away any self-imposed criticism of impropriety. Fiona was amazed at her chameleon tenacity. This was a woman used to having her own way.

  She was, Fiona observed, despite the bizarre events that had occurred, actually attempting to work her very considerable woman's wiles on the Eggplant. No way, Fiona decided. He was pushed around enough at home to be compliant on the job. Besides, his agenda was to become police commissioner and there was no apparent upside for him in keeping his name out of the public eye.