A Denial of Death

by Gin Jones

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Helen turned to see how Ralph was reacting. He was staring at his hands, seemingly oblivious to what was going on in his yard. Just as well. He shouldn't have to watch this.

  "Ralph," she said. "Jack needs to use the bathroom. Would you show him where it is?"

  Jack immediately followed her lead and went over to stand in front of Ralph, blocking the view of the gazebo. "Sorry to be a bother, but I really need to go."

  "Sure, sure," Ralph said. "Come with me."

  Pointing at the house, Helen mouthed "keep him there," and Jack nodded.

  Once the two men were safely inside, Helen turned back to the activity at the gazebo. The dirt was being removed carefully from what was, even from this distance, recognizable as a body.

  Peterson looked in her direction and seemed startled, probably realizing belatedly that he should have had someone keeping an eye on Ralph. Apparently even the detective hadn't really believed Ralph might have killed his wife. That had changed with the discovery of the sparkly sneaker. Peterson was going to arrest Ralph, and even Tate couldn't have prevented it.

  Helen nodded at the house. "He didn't run. He's inside with Jack."

  Peterson said something to the uniformed officer who wasn't uncovering the body. The man disconnected his handcuffs from his belt, collected another officer to go with him, and headed for the house's side door.

  Peterson followed, but Helen stopped him when he reached the patio. "Ralph didn't do it, you know."

  "I'd like to believe that, but it's hard to explain how else his wife's body could have ended up in the hole he admitted to digging."

  For once, she had to agree with Detective Peterson. Ralph was in trouble unless Tate was as good an attorney as he claimed to be, and Helen could convince him to come out of retirement for one last case.

  * * *

  Helen stayed with Ralph until the police took him away an hour later. Then Detective Peterson insisted Helen leave too. It was too late to go back to the nursing home to talk to Betty and Josie. She'd have to visit them tomorrow after she'd tracked down Tate and convinced him to represent Ralph.

  Jack dropped her at the cottage and left to return the Bentley.

  After a restless night, Helen was impatiently waiting on the front porch for Jack to pick her up at 9:30 so they could be at the car lot when it opened. Tate arrived earlier than usual and parked where Jack usually did.

  Tate rolled down his window. "I ran into Jack at breakfast, and he asked if I'd bring you to the car lot. I'm supposed to tell you he's got a line on someone named Barry, and he didn't want to risk losing him. Jack's going to bring him to the car lot so you can talk to him. I didn't get a chance to ask if the two of you have added kidnapping to your repertoire. It's better if I don't know."

  "Barry is the cabbie who drove Angie to her sister's house," Helen said as she climbed into the front passenger seat. It was a little too high for her, but at least she didn't need a ladder to get in or a crane to get out. "I assume you've heard that Angie's body was found under the gazebo and Ralph was arrested."

  Tate nodded. He waited for her to buckle her seatbelt and shut the passenger side door before saying, "I thought I'd seen everything in my career, and there was nothing a defendant could do to surprise me, but I never would have pegged Ralph as a killer."

  "That's because he's not a killer. It doesn't look good for him, though. That's why you need to defend him."

  "I'm retired."

  "Ralph is worth coming out of retirement for. You've got to admit, it's not a run of the mill case."

  "I don't know about that," Tate said as he pulled out of the driveway. "It's surprising because I thought I knew Ralph, but in terms of legal issues, it's a pretty typical homicide. Spouses are always the prime suspect, and the evidence against Ralph is pretty solid if they found her body in their back yard where he's been working all alone since she disappeared."

  "He had some help with the foundation."

  "So he stashed the body for a few hours while his helper was there," Tate said. "Then he waited until he was alone, dumped her, and covered up the evidence. It wouldn't have taken long to bury her, once the ground was opened up for the foundation."

  "It's all circumstantial."

  "Most cases are," Tate said. "It doesn't help that Ralph delayed reporting Angie's disappearance for three weeks. The prosecutor can use that to erase any reasonable doubt, assuming there is any after the jury hears where the body was found."

  "I'm still not convinced."

  "Hardly surprising," Tate said. "No one would ever call you a reasonable person. If you've got anything solid to exonerate him, you should tell Detective Peterson. It's not like he wants to arrest the wrong person and then be shown up by you."

  "Maybe Barry can tell us something useful," Helen said. "I wish I knew exactly what the police found in the hole with the body. They made me leave before they were done, but I'm pretty sure they didn't find her luggage. According to Francesca, she left with a sizeable suitcase and an old, clunky laptop. They didn't take anything like that out of the house, and I don't think they found them underneath the gazebo either. The laptop would have tripped the metal detectors a lot more intensely than anything Angie was wearing, so if it was there, they'd have found it before the body."

  "Perhaps."

  "If Ralph buried her under the gazebo, don't you think he'd have put her luggage there too? Why risk having it show up later, causing people to ask difficult questions, if he could make it disappear completely and claim she'd taken it with her?"

  "You're assuming Ralph was rational at the time," Tate said. "Legal theory works on the principle that people always act rationally, but in reality, it's just not true. People do lots of stupid things, and you'll only drive yourself crazy trying to make sense of their actions."

  "But if we could find the luggage, and it's not in a place that Ralph has control over, would that be enough for you to establish reasonable doubt?"

  "I'm not establishing anything these days," Tate said, "except a reputation for making hand-turned lamps."

  Helen huffed irritably. "What would it take to convince you to represent Ralph? Something from the exotic wood warehouse? Or do I need to get the real killer to confess?"

  "I'd settle for even a scintilla of real evidence that someone else did it. Which you don't have."

  "I'll have to keep looking then," Helen said. "Betty and Josie might have some ideas. They know everyone in town. I've already got a list of people with more credible motives than Ralph has."

  He glanced at her. "Seriously?"

  "Seriously."

  "Like who?"

  "Like the office manager who's got a crush on Ralph and might think she could have him if she got rid of Angie." Helen knew it sounded unlikely, but the others were even more far-fetched. "Charlene could have disappeared to avoid being accused. I know she lied about knowing where Angie was the first time I talked to her, and I'm pretty sure she lied when she said she'd never heard of SLP. Everyone else has asked me to repeat the initials or offered some other solution for what they might stand for. She didn't even stop to think about it, just denied knowing anything about it."

  "She was probably just trying to keep her sister's secret or even protect her own reputation if she was embarrassed by the subject matter of Angie's books," Tate said. "Is that really all you've got for suspects? A woman with a crush on her boss and a sister who told a few little white lies?"

  Helen searched for a less ridiculous theory. "Angie threatened Martha Waddell's job, and you know how dedicated Martha is to her work."

  "Still not as likely as a spouse getting tired of a wife who's widely known to be a jerk."

  Helen hated to think what Tate would say if he knew Angie had been overheard arguing with Ralph on the day she disappeared. She decided he didn't need to know about any more reasons why Ralph might be guilty. Instead, she needed to get Tate thinking more positively about his future client. "So who would be yo
ur ideal alternative suspect?"

  Tate drove in silence for a full minute. "You know, I'd rather not encourage you to keep meddling. You'll do it anyway, but if I don't give you any ideas, at least then I've got deniability for a conspiracy charge. Besides, it's a lot more interesting to see what you come up with on your own. It's never as boring as the scenarios I'd construct."

  "I'm glad I keep you entertained," Helen said, "but we're talking about Ralph's future here."

  "I forget sometimes that you're not used to legal humor," he said. "Wasn't your husband a lawyer?"

  "Technically, but he never did any actual legal work after law school. He went straight into politics."

  "That explains it then." Tate turned onto the street where the car lot was located. "Most attorneys learn to distance themselves from their cases, at least when they're not actually in court, or else they end up on the fast track to a nervous breakdown. It's not that I'm unsympathetic to Ralph. It's just that he's not my client, and I'm not trying to persuade a jury of his innocence, so I need to keep my distance emotionally."

  "I could never do that."

  "I know. It's kind of nice. It's why I don't work harder at keeping you out of the garage when you stop by to ask about the legalities of your latest escapade."

  It almost sounded like he enjoyed her interruptions. "You're just saying that to distract me. I still want you to represent Ralph, and I'm willing to pay your retainer. I'll go over your head to your nephew, if I have to."

  Tate parked in front of the car lot's sales office. "I tell you what. Promise me you won't do anything that will get you or Jack arrested, and I'll go talk to Ralph. I'm not saying I'll represent him, but I'll see if there's anything he can tell me that's useful for his defense, and then I'll refer him to someone competent. Someone who isn't retired."

  "Thank you."

  "It's not a favor," Tate said. "You'll be getting a bill from my nephew. And probably an even larger one from the exotic wood warehouse."

  * * *

  Jack's cousin came over to greet Helen as she got out of Tate's car. Ed's blue mechanic's uniform was streaked with even more grease than the last time she saw him.

  "I've never had this much trouble matching a vehicle to its prospective owner before," he said. "I'm starting to wonder if Jack's pulling my leg and you've already decided on a car, but you want to see if you can try out every single vehicle on my lot before you buy it."

  "I'm really still looking," Helen said, although if Barry gave her any useful information, she wasn't going to have time to decide on a car today. "I think I'll know it when I see it."

  "Ah, love at first sight. That's really the best way to decide. I have people coming in after they've done their internet research, and they think they know exactly what they want, and then they see something completely different, and they just have to have it. Sometimes they resist because they think they need to do the logical thing, but it never works when they go against what their heart wants." Ed waved his hand out to the side, encompassing the seemingly endless rows of cars. "If you can't fall in love here, you don't have a heart."

  "I'm not looking for a relationship, just reliable transportation."

  "Every single vehicle on my lot is reliable."

  "What about comfortable?" Helen said.

  "Jack didn't tell me you wanted comfortable." Ed urged her down the nearest aisle, stopping beside a blue mini-van with a dark interior that had to be an oven in the bright sunshine. "This is comfortable."

  Jack would hate driving the mini-van. He'd once mentioned driving something similar for the limo company, and he'd been miserable. She couldn't see any particular advantages to the big, boxy vehicle, and she would prefer something her driver didn't actively dislike. She might lose Jack to his clay-figures business eventually, but she wanted to keep him as long as she could.

  "My heart isn't going pitter-pat."

  "Okay, so I might have over-sold the love connection. Good, logical reasons to buy a vehicle can make for a happy match too." Ed started rattling off all the virtues of the mini-van.

  He seemed primed to go on forever with his praise, so Helen was relieved to hear Jack calling her name. She turned to see him getting out of the passenger side of a taxi. The driver's door opened, and a tall man rose slowly from the opening. His face was skeletally thin, and his dark brown hair was tied in a ponytail that reached the middle of his back. Despite the heat of the day, he wore black jeans with a plain black T-shirt and black sandals with white socks.

  Jack waved from the passenger's seat side of the cab and called out, "I found Barry."

  Impatient to question the cabbie, she cut Ed off mid-sentence. "You've convinced me to consider a mini-van. As long as this one's got air conditioning, I'd like to take it for a test ride."

  "I'll get it ready for you." Ed raised his hand and whistled. A moment later a teenaged boy in a mechanic's uniform came running out of the garage with a set of keys.

  While they got the car ready, Helen went over to talk to the cabbie. After Jack made the introductions he went over to see what vehicle he was going to be driving today.

  "Thanks for coming to talk to me," Helen said. "Did Jack tell you the police found Angie's body?"

  Barry nodded. "May she rest in peace." His voice was low and deep, and the words were chanted flatly, as if he'd repeated them tens of thousands of time in prayer, which he probably had.

  "They think Ralph Decker killed her."

  "But you do not," Barry said, still sounding vaguely as if he were part of a group chant. "You think I did it."

  His honesty freed her to be equally blunt. "I don't know who did it, but you're an obvious suspect. You were one of the last people to see her. It wouldn't be hard to make a case that she was rude to you once too often, and you lost your temper."

  He nodded solemnly. "I was not on my best behavior."

  "She had a knack for bringing out the worst in people."

  "That does not absolve me of responsibility," he said. "She did not experience wrath. I did. The sin was mine."

  "What, exactly, was your sin?"

  "I felt great anger toward her." He bent his head in contrition. "Worse, I acted on that anger."

  "Are you saying you did hurt her?"

  "I pray daily that I would never fall so low. Still, I let my anger control me. I threw her suitcase onto the sidewalk instead of carrying it to the front porch. I should have tried to understand why she was so unhappy. I could have done something to make her day better. Instead, I made it worse."

  "After you tossed her stuff, then what happened?"

  Barry shook his head and slumped even more, until he was barely taller than she was. "I left and did not think any further of her. Not until our friend Jack told me she had disappeared. Then I realized how great my sin was. If I had been more compassionate, evil might have been prevented."

  "If all you did was return her rudeness with a little rudeness of your own, you can't blame yourself for what happened to her."

  He shook his head. "I am responsible for my pride and my anger. After my shift on Sunday I cloistered myself in a silent retreat at a nearby monastery to ask for forgiveness. There is nothing more I can do except strive to be a better person going forward."

  "You can help by telling me again what you remember of the day you drove Angie to her sister's house. There might be some detail that will help find the real killer."

  "I prayed about that too. I cannot recall anything beyond what I told Jack. I picked Angie up at her house. She was wearing jeans and a bright red tank top shirt embellished with rhinestones to match her sneakers. She had one suitcase which had also been embellished with paint and glitter, obscuring the manufacturer's name. Only the laptop was unadorned." He frowned. "She kept the computer with her during the trip, and I could see the logo. Mea culpa, but it was not a brand I recognized."

  "Then what?"

  "Then we drove to her sister's house. The fare was just under eight dollars. She gave me the e
xact change and proceeded to tell me every driving mistake she believed I had made, as an explanation for denying me a gratuity."

  "And that's when you tossed her suitcase out of your cab."

  "Not quite yet," he said, drawing out the last word while he thought. "First, I went around to open the passenger side door, since she would not open it herself. Then I unloaded the suitcase. She told me to wait while she checked to see if her sister was home. She dashed up the driveway with her laptop. To my unending sorrow, I chucked the suitcase onto the sidewalk and left."

  "You never saw her again after that?"

  "To my shame, I did want to see how angry Angie was when she realized I hadn't waited for her. I found the willpower not to indulge in such sinful gloating. I did not look in the rear view mirror."

  "What about later?" Helen said. "She might have returned about a week after she left. Did you see her any time after you dropped her off at her sister's?"

  "I wish I had. Then I might have been able to make reparations directly to her. Now I can only make them to her husband and to my God." He pulled a crumpled card from his pocket, which was a little bigger than a business card and had the serenity prayer printed on the front. On the back was the name and address of a monastery that offered lodgings for devout men committed to silent contemplation and prayer. At the top was a hand-written reservation number that presumably could confirm his time spent on retreat. At the bottom, in a blank spot, Barry had written his name and a phone number. "If I can help you or Ralph in any way, please call on me. I will answer, no matter the time of day or night."

  "Thank you." Helen took the card as the mini-van pulled up next to her with a surprisingly cheerful Jack at the wheel.

  Barry glanced inside his cab. "The fare is nineteen thirty-five. Jack said you would pay it."