A Circle of Wives

by Alice LaPlante

So get to work, I think, but don’t say. Instead I ask, “So how’s it going?” and despite my best efforts there’s an edge in my voice.

  Peter shrugs and ignores my question. Typical. Then, as is also typical, he goes into attack mode. His way of doing this is to push me into a corner with questions.

  “Tell me who you think did it,” Peter says. “Tell me what you’re going to do next.”

  He’s put his finger right on my vulnerable spot. “I don’t know,” I confess. “I suppose I could interview the wives again. Try and get a better sense of the lay of the land there.” I am suddenly unhappy.

  Peter then drops his attack mode, and turns into the comforter.

  “You don’t have to have all the answers now,” he says in a soothing voice, and helps me to more wine. This is also quite typical. As soon as he suspects he might have hurt me, or really that I’m hurting for any reason, he turns gentle. It’s as if he doesn’t believe I can take it.

  “People do crazy things for love,” I tell him. “Or for what they think is love.” I’m thinking of Helen Richter, speaking of her passion for John Taylor in that flat, professional voice, yet somehow making you believe in it. Like that C. S. Lewis book we read in an undergraduate English class on romantic love. Surprised by Joy. That was definitely Dr. Richter.

  “Do they, now? And how would you know?” Peter isn’t smiling as he says this. He is staring at the pile of shells on his plate. This is getting perilously close to the discussion we agreed not to have.

  I lay my hand on Peter’s hand. “Good mussels,” I say, and he looks up and smiles.

  “I’m useful in the kitchen,” he says. “Whatever else you might think of me.”

  18

  Samantha

  LOOKING AT SOMEONE’S CELL PHONE records and emails is like looking in their underwear drawer. Their whole life is laid out in front of your eyes. John Taylor mostly made calls to his voicemail, and mostly received calls from his office. There were a lot of outgoing calls to different numbers that belonged to patients’ families. Dr. Taylor apparently took the trouble to personally follow up after his young patients left the clinic. There were fairly frequent incoming calls from Deborah. Just as she’d said, she organized his life, paid his credit card bills, booked his trips to LA and other places. He even depended on her to make restaurant reservations for him and the other wives.

  Occasional calls from MJ, but not as many as I would have expected. Then there was a call every night to Helen’s cell phone. At exactly nine like clockwork. She never called him, but emailed every day to his jtaylor3@taylorinstitute.com account. Deborah emailed jtaylor1@taylorinstitute.com, and MJ emailed jtaylor2@taylorinstitute.com. No subtlety there.

  But nothing suspicious in any of the content itself. Nothing at all. No anger or hostility expressed. Most of the email communiqués to and from the wives were brief logistical notes: when he’d be home, when he’d be out of town. Deborah gave me access to John Taylor’s Google calendar, which was a virtual map of his life to the quarter hour. Small wonder this guy had trouble being spontaneous—he was locked into a lifestyle that gave him little room to maneuver.

  Still, I hit pay dirt when I check John Taylor’s cell phone records for the forty-eight hours before he was found dead at the Westin. Everything just as the wives had said—almost. A call to MJ Thursday morning that lasted about ten minutes—likely enough time to chat with her about domestic items and explain that he had to go down to LA. Deborah began calling his cell phone frequently starting Friday morning at around 6 AM. Calls of short duration—just one or two seconds. Clearly she’d failed to reach him or have a real conversation. That, I calculate, would be when John Taylor failed to show up for his usual early morning shower and breakfast. Man, that woman was tenacious. She kept calling, emailing, and texting—multiple times per hour all day Friday and Saturday until 3 PM. That would have been approximately when Mollie appeared at her door with the news. It all fit.

  I’ve never endured that kind of harassment. Peter is my only relationship, and he’s usually pretty mellow. I see that anxiety though in some of my friends’ relations, the perpetual hounding if plans aren’t followed as expected. I wonder, not for the first time, what relationships were like before email, before cell phones, hell, before answering machines. My generation cut its teeth on this technology, but earlier generations? They must have had a lot more air, and a lot more mystery. Perhaps more doubt? Although I can’t imagine doubting Peter. And it seems as though neither MJ nor Helen had any doubts about John Taylor. So far, the records reflect their stories. Were they stupid or blissed out? Some combination of the two, I decide. Whereas Peter and I are just boring.

  Then I see two unexplained outgoing communiqués from John Taylor’s phone on Friday evening, right in the window we’d identified as when he’d died. I sit up straight. At 6:47 PM he called MJ’s cell phone. It was only five seconds in duration—he must have hung up when voicemail clicked in. Certainly not enough time for a conversation or a message. Then, thirty seconds later, he texted MJ. Urgent. Come to Palo Alto Westin, room 224. Now.

  Then nothing. So John Taylor had been alive at 6:47—and had summoned MJ to his secret hotel room. This requires some serious follow-up. I pick up the phone to summon MJ myself.

  19

  MJ

  AT LEAST THEY HAVE AIR-CONDITIONING here at the station. I hate this hot weather, it reminds me of Tennessee, and of the silly things people used to say about the heat. Hot enough to make a prostitute sweat in church. As hot as a goat’s butt in a pepper patch. It’s also not good for some of the more delicate plants in the garden. Yesterday the temperature reached 99 degrees and today they’re forecasting more than 100. At ten in the morning, I’m already perspiring. Of course, it’s that time of life. And stressful situations make the flashes more frequent, and more intense. I’ve taken to wearing sleeveless shirts, even on cool days. At the office I wear short skirts (probably shorter than my figure can now bear). But the discomfort of being hot outweighs my sense of vanity. I heard a couple of the younger women snicker last week as I bent over the copier. All the sympathy and kid-glove treatment after John’s death lasted exactly two weeks. Let them. So what. I’ve got more important matters to worry about.

  This time I know why I’m sitting here in the interrogation room. I’m a suspect. In a case of wrongful death. Meaning murder. I would expect (well, would hope) anyone who knows me to laugh at that, only I haven’t been able to face anyone since the first article named me as a “person of interest.” Other published reports quickly followed, of course, along with the announcement that this was officially a murder investigation, which fired up the media circus again. Person of interest! It sounds flattering. Yet I know how serious this is. Last night I couldn’t sleep, but wandered through the dark house, so nervous even my feet were sweating.

  The door opens and that same young detective comes in. She holds out her hand and I extend mine shakily. “MJ,” she says, “good to see you again,” and I nod and say, “Detective,” but she smiles and says, “Remember? Just call me Sam.” It all feels very civil, would she be treating me like this if she truly thought I was capable of murder? I relax a bit, then recall what I’ve seen on television—the good cop/bad cop thing. Sam is the good cop? I tell myself to keep my guard up. Her next question only confirms that I should.

  “So you decided not to bring your lawyer?” she asks. She walks over to the wall, and pushes the button on a machine connected by a cable to the video camera mounted high on the wall. “Do you mind?” she asks, and points to it.

  I shake my head no, not trusting my voice. She settles back in her seat, and looks at me questioningly.

  “I don’t have a lawyer,” I say. This is true. I don’t know anyone who does. Who needs lawyers except rich people and criminals? We’d gone to a lawyer to draw up our wills, but that woman wasn’t my lawyer in any sense of the word.

  “As I told you on the phone, people usually bring their lawyer to an interview of
this kind,” she says, and her voice is gentle as she adds, “I’d really advise you to get one.”

  “I don’t have the money,” I say, and am embarrassed at how much my voice quivers.

  “Oh,” she says. And then, seemingly genuinely, “I’m sorry. I understand you’re in a difficult position. But,” she clears her throat, “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to speak to an attorney, and to have an attorney present during any questioning. If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be provided for you at government expense.”

  She says all this in such a normal voice that I only afterward grasp that she’s read me my rights.

  She stops and looks at me. “Do you want me to put you in touch with the public defender’s office? It’s your right.”

  “No,” I say flatly. “I have nothing to hide. I can’t say anything that can be used against me because I didn’t do anything wrong.” I hope she can’t see how tightly my hands are clutching each other under the table.

  The detective nods.

  She then begins asking me questions again, but mostly they are the ones I’ve already answered. I slowly begin to relax, even begin to feel a little bored. Some water would be nice, but she doesn’t offer me any. No two-way mirror, unlike all the cop shows I’ve watched. Just the cinder block walls. And the chair is comfy. Where did they get it, from someone’s living room via the Salvation Army? It’s so out of place here.

  And this detective is very young. I know it’s hot outside, but hair in pigtails? I’ve never seen a grown woman wear them before. But they somehow suit her. And there has been nothing ridiculous about her manner. She’s very professional. Surely, though, she already knows everything about my marriage and life with John to write her report. And I’ve missed half a day’s work. I look at my watch and take a series of deep breaths. In and out, in and out, that’s what my shrink recommends in times of stress. Or clenching my fists, then releasing them—first one hand, then the other. It does something to both sides of your brain to help you relax. I do that, but it doesn’t help.

  The detective tells me to take a break. I go to the bathroom, grab a drink of water from the fountain in the big open room filled with desks. I notice that the officers stare at me. Even to them I’m an object of curiosity. I return to the examining room before the detective does, feeling acutely the strange mixture of boredom and anxiety that has plagued me since John’s death.

  Then, “Ready?” the detective asks after coming back in and seating herself. Really, she’s young! She has a habit of fiddling with her little finger, twisting it around as though winding up her hand like some sort of child’s toy.

  “When was the last time you saw Dr. Taylor? John?”

  “I’ve told you this. Several times. It was Thursday morning. He’d gotten up early as usual to make his rounds”—I stop briefly before I’m able to go on—“and left a bit after 5 AM. All as usual. Why don’t you ask Deborah? According to her, that’s where he headed every morning, their deal was supposedly sacrosanct.” My voice betrays my bitterness. Resentful that Deborah had deprived me of the kind of lazy mornings in bed with John that I had always cherished as the sweetest part of a relationship.

  “But you heard from him later in the day.” The detective consults her notes.

  “Sometime late in the morning. Here, I’ll tell you the exact time.” I pull out my cell phone and scroll down the calls. “At 11:07 AM precisely. I was at work.”

  The detective nods. She really hadn’t needed to ask that question. She applied for—and received—a subpoena to vet my phone records and emails. I think of the dancing cats and poop jokes and other things I share with friends, and am resigned to looking like a fool in front of everyone assigned to the case.

  “Your office is in. . . . Santa Clara.”

  “Yes. At WebSys. On Tasman Drive.”

  “Tell me again what he said in that phone call.”

  I sigh impatiently. And I can feel another hot flash coming on.

  “Just that he had an emergency case in LA. That he was flying down that evening. He thought he’d be back on Friday, but he wasn’t sure.”

  “And this was unusual?”

  “Very. But not that he was going to LA, since he had an adjunct appointment at UCLA for the academic year and was there twice a month for a few days at a time.”

  “So what was unusual?”

  “The disruption to our routine. He was very regular, and hated any disorder in his schedule. I wasn’t allowed . . . well, he preferred . . . that I didn’t surprise him with social events, or spontaneously suggest outings. That sort of thing made him extraordinarily anxious. He thrived on routine. He did travel, but everything was always meticulously planned ahead of time.”

  “What did he consider spontaneous?”

  “He needed to know a full week in advance,” I tell her. “His rationale was that he needed that time to process any changes to his plans.” I realize how strange that must sound. And how foolish (and downtrodden) I must seem for catering to such unreasonable demands. I quickly elaborate. “When we first started dating, I would make the mistake of asking people over for drinks on the spur of the moment. You know, you run into friends at the grocery store, you don’t think about it, you just invite them round. But it upset John terribly.”

  “Didn’t that strike you as odd?”

  “No. Yes. Maybe.” I curse myself. “Well, John was odd.”

  “What was his reasoning?”

  “The nature of his work with trauma victims was such that he led a very unpredictable professional life. He often didn’t know what was waiting for him when he showed up at work in the morning. He demanded utmost regularity in the rest of his life as a result.” I pause. “So he said.”

  The detective nods. I’ve told her all this before, why is she going over the same ground? She even has it on videotape. Did the reading of my rights make some sort of difference in how she can use what I say? I suddenly feel chilled.

  “And then you didn’t see him again,” she says.

  “No.” Despite myself, the tears well up. Those first few days after John’s death I’d been inexplicably calm. Since then, I haven’t stopped crying. My boss told me to take a week off, but what would I do with that time? Sit in the house alone? Much better I’m with my precious financials, making order out of chaos. John and I weren’t so different in some respects. We both thrived on routine.

  “And you didn’t talk to him either, after that 11:07 call on Thursday morning?”

  “No. That was unusual, too. We’d talk every night whenever he was in LA. He made a point of it. He said . . .” and here I break down again. The detective wordlessly hands me a Kleenex. “He said he didn’t want us to get in a pattern of not communicating.”

  “What did you make of that?”

  “Of course it made me wonder about his previous relationships, about whether he’d had communication problems. It made me wonder if that was why he hadn’t married. He had always explained it away by the demands of his job, by never finding the right woman. And I . . .”

  “And you wanted to believe him.” The detective smiles sympathetically. Really, she is a pretty little thing. No wedding ring. Then she is so awfully young. But it’s clear I’m the simpleminded one in the room. My naïveté must seem preposterous.

  I take another Kleenex and begin systematically shredding it into long thin strips. Another stress-reducing act. But the detective doesn’t seem to notice. Although she has a notebook and a pen on the table, she isn’t taking notes, is letting the video recorder do all the work. She is winding up her hand again. Another question is coming.

  “What about the text John Taylor sent to your cell phone Friday evening?”

  I try to keep my voice steady. “What about it?”

  “At 6:47. Perhaps the last thing John Taylor did before he died was send you that urgent text. Come to the Palo Alto Westin, room 224. But you didn�
�t respond until 7:45. Then you started calling his cell phone at frequent intervals—every twenty minutes or so well into the night and the next day. We tallied forty-three calls total between 7:45 Friday night and 11:30 Saturday night. You also called the Westin thirteen times during that same time period. Then all the calls stopped. What was going on?”

  I sit up straight. “I went out Friday evening to run errands,” I say. I am careful to be precise. “I went to both the grocery store and the drugstore. I left my cell phone at home, I frequently forget to take it with me, it drives . . . drove . . . John crazy. So I didn’t get John’s text or see that he’d tried to call until I got home. Around a quarter till eight. Then, of course, I was alarmed. What was he doing in Palo Alto? He should have been in LA! I started calling him. When I couldn’t reach him, I called the Westin, asked for room 224. No one answered. I also asked the receptionist if John was a guest there. She said no. She couldn’t tell me the name of the guest in room 224, but she could say it wasn’t John Taylor.”

  I’m wondering if it’s apparent how much I’m sweating. I can feel my shirt sticking to my back, and the drops of perspiration rolling down my sides. This girl is making me as nervous as a june bug on a string.

  “Why did you stop calling Saturday night?”

  “I went to bed, finally. And the next morning I saw the obituary in the paper,” I say.

  “Why didn’t you volunteer this information earlier?” the young detective asks. She looks genuinely puzzled rather than suspicious.

  “No one asked. I was questioned about the last time I talked to John, but not about what happened afterward.” I know this sounds lame, but what can I say? That I was frightened? I felt responsible that John had apparently reached out to me for help, and I wasn’t there for him? I wipe a damp strand of hair off my face, tuck it behind my ear.

  The young detective is silent for a moment. Then she asks, “Did it seem usual for John Taylor to do such a spontaneous thing as fly to LA at the last minute? And then suddenly surface in Palo Alto?”