Hard Case Crime: Witness To Myself

by Shubin, Seymour

  “Yes, that’s right. I’m from New Jersey and when I retired from the force my wife and I moved to Cape Cod, right near South Minton. That was about two years after her body was found. I’ve never been officially involved in the investigation but it’s one of the cases — and I do hate to call these tragedies ‘cases’ — it’s one of the cases our foundation and I strongly support.”

  “What about the motive for the murder? There has been some speculation about this, I understand.”

  “Well, not really. It’s believed the intent was sexual assault, but that the killer ran away when her father came looking for her and calling her name.”

  “It’s fifteen years now. Have the police made any progress toward solving it?”

  “Let’s put it this way. It’s still an active case. And now and then leads do come in and every one of them is followed. For instance...”

  And then he told of a “stranger” — tall, white, dark hair, perhaps between thirty-two and thirty-five — who had showed up recently in the South Minton public library.

  “He asked to see old newspapers. He seemed quite nervous and even dropped some, and after he left, the librarian saw that the latest papers he asked for carried the first stories of the murder. So she very alertly called the police...”

  McKinney was going on but for a few moments Alan was still caught up in what he’d just said, that it was only after he returned the papers, not before, that she’d called the police.

  “Now this fellow might have absolutely nothing to do with it,” McKinney was saying, “but he would be doing the investigation a big favor if he contacted the police and cleared his name.”

  McKinney then gave a telephone number, which was printed out on the screen.

  And then, following this, and as large as the screen itself, was a composite sketch of Alan’s face.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  He stared at it in shock, then tried telling himself it didn’t look like him, not at all, that this was too long and that too wide. Then he went to a mirror and stared at himself, turning his face in different ways, telling himself the nose in the picture was all wrong, he didn’t have that kind of chin, that wasn’t the way he combed his hair; and yet he didn’t know, he didn’t know. And the age wasn’t exact; he jumped on the fact that he was thirty, not thirty-two to thirty-five, trying to look on it as all the difference in the world.

  He went back to his computer. That morning he had checked with the Breeze and had seen nothing about the crime. Now he went back to scour it again. But still nothing. The following morning, though, was different.

  First, there was a two-column headline: library visitor sought in kapasi murder. And then, underneath, was the sketch.

  He read on through wavering vision.

  It repeated what McKinney had said about the librarian noticing his “unusual behavior” and “nervousness” and then seeing that the last newspapers he’d been given were from a few days after the murder. The police hadn’t revealed at the time that they were interested in speaking to the “stranger,” in the hope that he would return. The story emphasized that he still might have a perfectly good explanation for wanting to see the papers.

  Alan printed out the sketch and went with it to the mirror, hoping to confirm close up that it didn’t really look like him. He kept looking back and forth from the mirror to the picture, from the picture to the mirror, and it did seem to him, with drumming heart, that there was really no similarity. Still, he began playing with the idea of going up to South Minton and saying yes I was here, here I am, I was looking through those papers for this, that. How could they prove otherwise? After all, no one had seen him with her, no one knew that their motor home had been parked a half-mile or so away: That part of the beach had been empty. But he knew almost instantly that he would fall apart under the first questioning, blurt it all out in tears.

  And then something else struck him with full force.

  The Philly papers! Would they carry the sketch? Would his friends, relatives — Anna! — see it? And even though he thought it didn’t look like him, was he wrong? Would they know?

  He still hadn’t picked up his morning paper from outside the door. He went for it, close to panic, placed its various sections on the kitchen table and began going through them.

  No.

  No, but for how long?

  He didn’t notice the sidebar column in the Breeze until he sat down again at the computer. The column, running alongside the story about the library, carried the small headline no dispute between us, and it had the local captain of detectives denying “rumors and more rumors” that McKinney was “interfering” with the investigation.

  “We welcome,” the captain was quoted as saying, “whatever help he — or anyone — can give us.”

  The story then went on to tell again, with a few details that were new for Alan, of the murder of McKinney’s daughter: How he, his wife and two children — Sharon had been the youngest — had been supposed to leave for a week’s vacation in Wildwood the day after she was killed, how she was involved in church charities and had often talked of wanting to be a nun.

  Later that morning, in his office, he had the strangest thought about the Sharon McKinney Foundation. And what was even more inexplicable was that he didn’t think it was strange, at least for a little while. So when he met with Elsa Tomlinson later on some matter, he said to her before leaving her office, and almost without planning to, “Do we ever help fund police work?”

  “No. But tell me, such as?”

  “I mean, like giving grants to help fund investigations into old cases, particularly involving children?”

  “No. But do you have anything specific in mind?”

  “Well, it’s all vague at the moment.”

  “Well, when you think it out let me know.”

  By the time he got back to his office he was lashing himself. What was he trying to do?

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  It struck me as strange, after almost two weeks, that I still hadn’t heard from Alan after I’d left a message on his answering machine congratulating him on his new position and asking him to call me back. When I called him one evening at his apartment he apologized, saying he’d been so busy that he kept putting it off. Please forgive him, he said.

  “Absolutely,” I said, “not. Anyway,” and I laughed, “let me congratulate you again. How’s it going?” “Great. It’s really going fine.”

  “Look, we haven’t seen you for a long time. How about coming over for dinner? Patty says no, but I say yes.”

  He laughed. “When do you have in mind?” “Any day I’m not here. Seriously, Saturday? Friday? Whenever’s best for you.” “Can I bring someone?”

  “Of course. So, let’s make it Saturday if that’s okay.” The following morning, at about half-past eight, I got a call from Haggerty, the editor of Detective Eye. This wasn’t an unusual time for him; it meant that he’d been thinking about something half the night.

  “Colin,” he said, “this Harmann murder you got down there. The Luder thing. From what I read here it’s sewed up.”

  “All I know is that they arrested this guy and he’s confessed.”

  “Look, talk to the cops. If they think it’s sewed up, let’s go with it. And this is important — I’ll need it in eight days. The latest.”

  “Okay.” But I almost groaned.

  I was puzzled and disturbed by this. I’d heard that in the old days, when there were many true detective magazines, some of them routinely published cases before the suspect was even tried, in order to beat the competition. But it was a dangerous practice: If you labeled someone a killer and he or she was acquitted, it could mean quite a lawsuit. I wondered why Haggerty, without all that competition, would want to do it now, except that he must be low on stories as the deadline approached.

  Patty came to the doorway of my office before leaving for work.

  “Hey, what’s with the long face?”

  I told her. “It’
s bad enough that I hate doing these goddamn things but I really don’t like being part of this one.”

  “Then just call him back and tell him how you feel.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Yeah what?”

  “Yeah, there’s a million other guys who’ll do it in a second. And that’ll be the end of me for anything else from him.”

  “So?”

  “So, it’s a problem.” I took a deep breath. “Look, I’ll think it over.”

  “You just call him. Please. You don’t have to do this.” She came over to my chair and kissed me on the cheek. “Honey, I have a job. Remember that. It doesn’t pay an awful lot but it pays. And something’s going to break for you. I know it. And I think you know it too. So you don’t have to do this.”

  I smiled at her and we kissed, this time on the lips. She looked at me from the doorway and raised her thumb. I raised mine back at her, and we both smiled.

  I kept sitting at the desk, a frown forming soon after I heard the apartment door close behind her. Then, almost without thinking, I swept up the phone. I had to at least let Haggerty know where the case stood.

  “Homicide,” a voice said.

  “Detective Murray, please.” He was one of my many contacts.

  “He’s a little busy now, can he call you back?”

  His call came through about an hour and a half later. “Colin, what can I do for you?”

  “Joe, it’s about the Harold Luder case. Do you think it’s pretty much wrapped up?”

  “Wrapped up? Oh God, man, no. It’s just starting all over again. He says he’s killed at least thirty girls up and down the East Coast before and after he went to prison. Christ, we’ve been getting calls from cops all over, from South Carolina way up to — well, way up to Cape Cod.” If Alan showed any anxiety when he and Anna came to our apartment, neither Patty nor I noticed it. I had expected Anna to be pretty but for some reason I didn’t expect her warmth. She stood with Patty in the kitchen while Patty was putting some last touches together, and after dinner helped clear the table. She had a beautiful smile and, when prodded, spoke about her work in a way that made us feel she had to be an angel. And she looked at Alan in a way that, when Patty and I spoke about it later, warmed the both of us. He was forever smiling at her.

  When they left, Patty said, “I think she’s great, I think she would be marvelous for him. He’d be mighty lucky to have her.”

  “Do you still say he has sad eyes?”

  “Oh,” she said, drawing out the word, “not tonight. And especially not when he looked at her.”

  I felt equally good for Alan. And right before going to bed I thought of something that made me feel good for myself.

  The Luder case. If it was true he killed all those girls, this could be the book I’d been hoping for.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  About a half hour after Alan came home from the office that Monday he got a call from a man with a low voice. He didn’t say hello, just, “Is this Mr. Benning?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is Anna’s father.”

  Alan was not only surprised he was calling but that he called him Mr. Benning — until he remembered vaguely that her father had never referred to him by any name during his visit.

  “This is Alan, yes. How are you?”

  He ignored the question. “I’m just calling to find out what goes with you and my daughter.”

  Alan shut his eyes for a moment. “Well, we’re, seeing each other.”

  “I know, I know that. I mean, do you intend on getting married?”

  Oh God. He managed to say, “Have you talked to Anna about it?”

  “No, I can’t always get things out of her. I’m talking to you.”

  “Well, we’re seeing each other.” Which was so damn dumb.

  “I know you’re seeing each other. Do you intend getting married?”

  “We really haven’t talked about it.”

  There was silence for a long moment. Then an angry, “I don’t want her hurt.”

  “I’m not out to hurt her, Mr. Presiac.”

  “I don’t want her hurt,” he repeated, as if he didn’t know what else to say.

  “I wouldn’t hurt her. I would never hurt her.” Oh Christ!

  “There are too many bums around. I’m sick and tired of bums. And Anna doesn’t deserve bums.”

  Alan didn’t say anything; couldn’t think of anything to say. Nor apparently could her father.

  “I just want you to know,” her father said.

  And with that he hung up, but it was a moment or two before Alan put down the phone. He couldn’t even begin to blame the guy; he’d obviously seen a few bums in her life. But what could Alan tell him? God, he loved Anna, but how could he marry her? He couldn’t tell her what he’d done; at the same time, he couldn’t make a secret murderer a part of her life. And it was with a great hollowness through him that he knew what he’d really known all along, that he had to give her up.

  Anna was coming over after work; he had said he would make dinner, and he’d bought steaks and a number of other things on his way home. But when she walked in and they kissed, she sensed something. “Is anything wrong?”

  “No.” He wasn’t going to tell her about the call. She was aggravated enough about her sister.

  “You look like you’ve had a hard day.”

  “No, it really wasn’t. It was fine.”

  He made dinner, with her standing by in the kitchen and helping out. Afterward, as they were cleaning up, the phone rang. A woman identified herself as a Mrs. Beecher.

  “I’m one of the nurses at your mother’s nursing home.” She paused and he was sure his mother was dead. But then she said, “Your mother, I wish you would do something. She’s carrying on terribly, she hit another patient, she slapped a nurse when we tried talking to her. Nothing’s working, she’s got the strength of a — of a mule. We’re afraid she’s going to fall, break something, her hip —”

  “I’ll be right over.”

  When he told Anna she asked if she could go with him. He said, “God, you have enough of nursing homes.”

  “I’d like to if you’d let me.”

  His mother was sitting on the side of her bed, her arms folded around her bosom. She was shaking slightly. A nurse was bending over her, an aide was standing by. Her roommate in the next bed was sitting up, staring straight ahead.

  “Mom.” He kneeled in front of her. “It’s me. It’s Alan.”

  She kept quivering, was looking past him.

  “Mom, it’s Alan,” he said again.

  He took one of her hands and though it was rigid at first it gradually relaxed; she let him hold it, but she was still looking away.

  “It’s all about her comb,” the nurse said to him. “She keeps saying Mary here” — the roommate —” stole it. She must have lost her comb, maybe down the toilet, and now she’s blaming —”

  “Did you look through Mary’s things?” he asked her.

  “Of course we did,” she answered, annoyed.

  “Patients,” Anna said, “sometimes hide things in the weirdest places.”

  “We’ve looked all over,” the nurse retorted. But then, as if to prove it, she started going through the roommate’s night table and bureau. And after a few minutes she said, “Oh my. We actually looked here before.” And she held up the comb, which she found in a tangle of Mary’s nightgowns.

  His mother seemed to go limp when it was handed to her.

  “Would you like to lie down now?” Alan asked her.

  She said nothing but let him ease her down on the bed and cover her with a thin blanket.

  “Mom,” he said, “I’d like you to meet a friend of mine. This is Anna.”

  She looked at Anna. And when Anna took her hand, he saw a smile — a thin one, barely perceptible but a smile. And something immediately struck him.

  In all these years, Anna was the first girlfriend of his that his mother had ever met.

  When he p
arked in front of Anna’s building, she quickly put her hand out to stop him from getting out of the car with her.

  “Honey,” she apologized, “let’s say goodnight here. I’m sorry but I’m really beat.”

  “Okay.” But it was obvious that something was troubling her, perhaps something she’d been holding in all evening.

  She just sat there for a moment, looking at her handbag on her lap. Then without looking up, “My father called you, didn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  She looked at him. “I was waiting for you to tell me. You weren’t going to, though, were you?”

  “No. I knew it would upset you.”

  She nodded quickly. Then tears formed on her eyes. “I’m so upset. I’m so angry at them, at my father, my sister.”

  “Who told you?”

  “My sister. She couldn’t wait to call and tell me. It was like ha ha. Oh Alan, I’m so sorry. I feel like such a baby, such a shit.”

  He put his arm around her but her face was turned away from him. He told himself you’re going to break up with her, you must, you will drive her crazy, you have to do it, let it start now. But instead he said, trying to bring her closer, “Honey, don’t. It’s not worth this.”

  “But I’m so angry. I feel so embarrassed.”

  “Don’t, please don’t.” And almost against his will, though he wanted this so badly, he held her even tighter, his cheek against her hair.

  “You’re not sorry,” she said, “you met me, are you?”

  “Are you kidding?”

  They walked hand in hand up the steps to the doorway. Two women, tenants, were standing there as one of them was working her key in the lock. When she had the door open, she joined the other in looking at them, and both smiled.

  “I think,” Anna whispered, smiling, as the women walked far ahead to their apartment, “they approve.”

  “I’ve been holding my breath.”

  Closing the door to her apartment, she put her arms around his neck. They kissed, his fingers under her hair, pressing her to him. She drew back soon. “Honey, do you mind if I shower?”