“I don’t know. The logical explanation would be that he was a gay kid running to somewhere that he thought would be supportive.”
“He told us that,” Scott said, “but I think he may have been lying.”
“I sure have no indication that the kid is gay. Certainly, Cynthia never said anything to me about his sexual orientation. I never caught him naked with another boy.”
I asked, “Do you think Donny would have the wherewithal to get himself up here on his own, or would he have had some help?”
“I suppose in this day and age it isn’t that tough to get tickets, especially with the Internet. I think he’s a resourceful kid. He has an exaggerated sense of his own cleverness, but he’s not stupid.”
We called his parents at the Hotel Chicago. I left the room to let Scott talk to them. I nuked a few leftovers in the microwave for us to have a bite to eat. Scott joined me about ten minutes later.
He flung himself onto a kitchen chair. “They warned me about seven times to be careful. They suggested several times that we just go on our honeymoon.”
“That sounds kind of liberal of them.”
“I don’t think it means they approve of what I’m sure they don’t think about. It’s more, if we were out of town, nobody would try to harm us.”
“I couldn’t possibly leave before the funeral.”
“I reminded them about the familial connection. I think they kind of understood, but their concern for me, their kid, outweighed that.”
“But we haven’t been in particular danger.”
“Somebody broke into our hotel room in St. Louis and into our car in the parking lot of both universities.”
I asked, “Have they seen Donny or your brother and sister-in-law?”
“Hiram and Cynthia were there earlier. They were out hiring a private security firm that specializes in looking for missing kids. Nobody thinks Donny was kidnapped, so nobody’s worried about him being molested and killed. He ran. No one knows why.”
“Did you tell them about the bloody fingerprint?”
“Yep. They were real quiet after I told them that. I don’t think they wanted to believe it. That fact changes a lot of things.”
“Where the hell could the kid go?” I asked. “You can’t survive in this town by random chance. He’s got to be sleeping somewhere. How could he find those places he could afford? Why isn’t he afraid of being in those kinds of places? He grew up in rural Georgia, but very comfortable and safe rural Georgia. There can’t be a lot of crime down there.”
“As long as you were a white, male Protestant, it was generally very safe.”
“Yeah. You know we’re starting to turn into our own little crime wave.”
“Don’t start that amateur-sleuth crap again. I’m tired of hearing about how the Miss Marples of the world are oneperson death squads.”
22
First thing Wednesday morning, we were off to visit wife number three. We’d gotten her address from the Gahains the night before. She was the current repository of several of Ethan’s children. She lived in a narrow, wood-frame home on Beldon Avenue just west of Sheffield. Terra Summa answered the door. She held a nursing child in her arms. She wore what used to be called a granny dress and gold-rimmed spectacles. When she was older, I could picture her being the perfect grandmother. Her bright pink face looked well scrubbed, open, and honest. We told her why we’d come.
She invited us in. We sat in overstuffed armchairs in the living room under the boughs of a live tree framed by the picture window. The container that held it was bigger than two bathtubs. The plants in the room were well trimmed and very green. The exterior might have been from pre-1900, but the interior was modern earth-mother. The floors were new and well polished. The walls were well scrubbed and recently painted. I could smell new-sawn wood, next to the smell of burning leaves, one of the great olfactory experiences. Every doorway and window was framed in dark-stained oak. The six oil paintings on the walls depicted children at play or staring raptly at some splendor of nature. Terra Summa had not taken Ethan’s last name, not even a hyphenate.
After we sat down, I said, “We’re trying to find out details about Ethan’s life. We’re trying to figure out why anyone would want to kill him.”
She smiled. “He could be a trial to live with. He could be arrogant and a know-it-all. He wasn’t good at being domestic. I love being domestic. I love rearing children. I don’t think in terms of hatred. I think in terms of how we can help each other.”
Fine. I tried a different tack. “Who would be least likely to want to help Ethan?”
She smiled. “I don’t have a clue.”
I agreed with that. I asked, “How many of Ethan’s children do you have here?”
“We had one together. One from his first marriage is here. I have temporary custody of two others from wife number two.”
“Those are the ones Mabel Yancey is after.”
“Yes. Ethan brought the two of them to me Friday night and asked if I would look after them. He had a court order giving me temporary custody.”
“He must have told you he was coming and that he would have such a document.”
“He would know he could trust me. He would know he would need protection from his second wife. He would take any necessary precautions. I would help him out no matter what.”
A stunningly attractive woman entered the room. We stood up. I stared for a moment. I hadn’t seen her in at least ten years. It was Ethan’s first wife, Dana. She was as attractive as I remembered. She was dressed in a gray suit jacket and matching skirt. She walked up to us and held out her hand. “Hello, Tom, and you must be Scott Carpenter.”
I said, “Dana, good to see you.”
“Congratulations,” she said. “I read about the wedding. Ethan managed to upstage it. That’s the kind of man he was. If you were doing something, he did it better or greater or had more toys than you did.”
“He was a taker,” I said.
“So true.” She offered us coffee. Dana had never struck me as a raving loony. She and Terra sat opposite. The affectionate looks they exchanged, the tenderness in looking at the child, the nearness with which they sat, certainly indicated to me that they were a couple.
“Who would want to kill him?” I asked.
“Mabel Yancey is an angry woman,” Dana said. “I hated Ethan for a few years.” She shrugged. “I got over it. Wife four made a lot of money out of the marriage.”
“The two of you didn’t have custody issues?”
“It was very complicated. Terra and I each had a child with Ethan. We have custody of them.”
“Ethan knew you were a couple.”
“Oh, yes.”
“Did you know he was gay?”
“He was never terribly demanding as a lover,” Dana said. “I thought my lack of sexual interest in him was my fault. Turns out I wasn’t interested, but for fundamentally different reasons.” She and Terra clasped hands briefly. “As for who would want to kill him, I certainly don’t know anyone specific. Wife two and her husband are nutcases, but that doesn’t mean they’re killers.”
“We were told you were always after him for things.”
“I’m sure someone described me as a ‘raving loony.’”
Since she already seemed to know this, I didn’t feel a need to confirm it.
She continued, “For a long time I guess I was. Back then my ego was caught up in what a man, what men think of me. I’ve gone through a lot of therapy. I’ve finally met someone I love.” She patted Terra’s hand. “I’m much better now. I don’t need some man to validate me.”
“What’s going to happen with custody now?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” Dana said. “I’m a lawyer, but my specialty is corporate law. We have an appointment with a family lawyer. I’m sure we’re safe with our biological children, but the ones Ethan had with wife number two, I don’t know.”
23
We drove to the Hotel Chicago. It was
nine-thirty and the meeting with the police and Scott’s family was set for ten. We wanted to get there early to talk to his parents. The suite we’d rented on the top floor for Scott’s parents was immense.
We got there before the cops, Hiram, or Cynthia arrived. We sat down with Scott’s mom and dad. He said, “Has anyone heard from Donny?”
They hadn’t.
“Did you hear that Donny hit Cynthia?”
They shook their heads.
“He attacked her when they were being questioned by the police.”
Mrs. Carpenter said, “We didn’t bring you kids up to do that kind of thing.”
Scott asked, “Does Hiram have a history of abusing Cynthia? Has he hit her before? Maybe Donny’s simply acting out what his father does.”
“Hiram isn’t that kind of man,” Mr. Carpenter said. “Donny’s older brother, Darrell, has been violent. He’s always been in fights. Hiram’s been angry since he was a kid, but he’s never shown violence toward us, and he’s never been violent in front of us.”
“This is terrible,” Mrs. Carpenter said. “Hiram is a good father, but his kids have been a handful. I don’t think he tells us much of what happens. I suppose he thinks he’s sheltering us. It’s a small town we live in so people know each other’s business, but we never heard anything this bad. Mostly the violence was connected with Darrell. He got picked up for drunk-and-disorderly conduct several times before he even got his driver’s license. He got drunk and crashed a car when he was fourteen.”
Mr. Carpenter said, “Donny sure did admire his older brother. We tried to tell him he shouldn’t. He wouldn’t listen to us.”
Scott said, “Finding Donny’s fingerprint inside the bathroom stall in the hotel is very bad. It also means it is possible that if Donny had called for help, they might have been able to save Mr. Gahain.”
Mrs. Carpenter put her hand to her mouth. “Oh, dear. That’s terrible.”
Mr. Carpenter shook his head and tsk-tsked.
The cops arrived a few minutes before Donny’s parents. When Hiram walked in the door, he was in full tirade: “I want to know what the hell is going on.”
Cynthia looked ready either for tears or a tantrum or maybe both. Her left ear was bright red.
Scott said, “Hiram, you’re not in charge. I’m not sure why you continue to think angry blustering is going to get us closer to finding Donny. I suppose it must accomplish something in your daily life in Georgia. You’re here now. You’re not in charge. He ran to us. He didn’t contact you. Doesn’t that tell you something? We don’t know where he is. Your continued anger is a very poor cliché, a senseless way of dealing with the world. I suggest you give rationality and logic a chance.”
“You done?” Hiram demanded.
“I’m done speaking directly to you. What I want to do now is figure out where your kid is. My hunch is that the kid has been staying with one of his cousins right here in this hotel. It’s the only logical assumption.”
Scott’s dad said, “We figured that, too. We’ve checked with all of our grandkids. They say they haven’t seen him.”
“Can you believe all of them?” I asked.
Mrs. Carpenter said, “I think there are several of the older ones who might be inclined to help him out. I’m not sure which ones.”
Detective Rohter said, “We’ll question all of them again.”
Scott said, “Maybe someone from the family talking to them would be more likely to get information out of them.”
“Believe me, they’ll talk to me,” Hiram said.
“I already tried,” Mrs. Carpenter said. “If they won’t be honest with their grandmother, I’m not sure they’d be honest with anyone.”
“Mama,” Scott said, “I’d sure like to believe they wouldn’t lie to you, but you’re two generations from their age. I don’t know who they’d tell the truth to.”
Hiram said, “Why isn’t the killer one of these men this Ethan person took pictures of?”
Rohter said, “The real question here is about the kid. He’s involved in a murder investigation. I want to talk to everybody who is in town connected with the family.”
“We’ll get the truth,” Scott’s dad said.
I asked, “Is there any significance to the scorpion tattoo just below Donny’s navel?”
“What?” Cynthia Carpenter asked.
“He doesn’t have a tattoo,” Hiram said.
“We weren’t hallucinating,” Scott said.
“I’ve never seen it,” Hiram said. “How did you?”
Scott said, “We hid his clothes to try to get him to talk to us. It didn’t work.”
“He was naked?” Hiram asked.
“He paraded around for a few minutes in his boxer shorts,” Scott said. “He was not traumatized. The police were there at almost exactly the same time.”
Cynthia said, “I don’t know of any significance to such a tattoo. Isn’t it illegal to get a tattoo if you’re under twenty-one?”
I had no idea if that was true.
Scott and I stayed in the background as the Carpenters assembled all of the clan who’d come up for the wedding. Only three of Donny’s cousins were left in town. The rest had had to get back to various commitments in Georgia. The three cousins were in their late teens. One was a junior in college in Michigan, the other was spending an extra week in Chicago to check on job possibilities in construction. A third was staying with her parents for a vacation. None admitted to having seen Donny.
I conveniently found my way to the hallway while Scott’s nephews were being interviewed by the police. I asked Scott’s favorite niece, Connie, “Did you ever see Donny hit his mother?”
She was young and blond and pretty. I remembered her as being vivacious and smart. Mary’s kid. She said, “I never saw him hit her.”
“Did you hear about it?”
She took a quick look around to make sure no one was in hearing distance. She leaned close and whispered, “When we were younger, he used to play mean tricks on all of us. He never really got violent. He tried to tie me up once when we were about ten. I was bigger than him so I just walked away. Many times he’s boasted that if either of his parents tried to stop him, he’d hurt them.”
“Stop him doing what?”
“He was never very specific. It’s the influence of that older brother of his. That Darrell. He’s very violent. He always wanted to pinch, punch, or pulverize.”
“How angry or frightened would Donny have to be to hit his mother?”
“I don’t think anyone is ever angry or frightened enough to be justified in hitting their mother. Uncle Hiram is kind of a Neanderthal, but Aunt Cynthia’s actually pretty nice. We all like her. Nobody likes Donny except Darrell, and I don’t think Darrell likes him all that much. I think he tolerates him. Donny is a wanna-be. He’s the inept one in that bunch. He tries to imitate someone really being mean, and he always flubs it. I think he’d try anything to get his way. Tell any lie. Darrell’s the violent one. Two black churches burned in our county. If it wasn’t Darrell who lit the match, it was his crowd. At least that’s what everyone believes. Donny’s the kind of kid who would follow any leader.”
“Why wouldn’t he run away closer to home?”
“This was probably the biggest, most public family event ever likely to happen. Maybe he didn’t want to miss it. His grandparents were here, some cousins, uncles, and aunts. It wasn’t that daring. I doubt if he planned much beyond that. He isn’t all that bright. He made attempts at deviousness. In school he would make homophobic comments behind a teacher’s back. You know after they pass in the hallway.”
“A coward and a prick.”
“He wasn’t very nice. Maybe he went to you guys because he thought you would be easy marks.”
24
We asked to meet with the detectives in a coffee shop down the street. After we settled in, we showed them what Ernie Gahain had found in Ethan’s place in Chicago.
Rohter said, “We didn’
t know he had a condo here.”
“Neither did we,” I said. “The parents found evidence of its existence in his luggage.”
“We should have been notified,” Rohter said.
“Gee,” I said. “Here’s a possible thought process. Their son has just been murdered. They’ve gone through his luggage to try and find something for him to wear to be buried in. They find a key and some record of a place he’s been staying in Chicago. Their first thought is to call the police. I don’t think so. We called you as soon as we found out.”
“We’ll have to go over the place.”
I handed him the envelope.
Rohter opened it. He and Hoge perused the photos briefly. “This is the first we’ve seen of the porn empire.”
“I think the question has to be why were these separated from the rest of the collection?”
“Gotta be a reason,” Rohter said. “I appreciate you giving this to us.” He held up the picture of me skinny-dipping. “He had one of you.”
“I didn’t need to kill him to get that. I didn’t even know it existed. I wouldn’t be embarrassed because of it. I wouldn’t lose my job over a picture that old. There was no way he was blackmailing me with it.”
Rohter said, “We also understand there’s a history of violence in the Carpenter family. That your sister was convicted of murdering the sheriff in your little town down in Georgia.”
“Yes,” Scott said. “And that means?”
“It’s a piece of the puzzle,” Rohter said.
“What else have you learned?” I asked.
“Right now we’re stuck on your nephew as the prime suspect,” Rohter said. “The bloody fingerprint is gonna get him a trip to the station for serious questioning. It won’t take much more evidence to get him arrested.”
I asked, “How often do you do frivolous questioning?”
Nobody laughed. Sometimes my sense of humor isn’t as appropriate as I think it is.
“He’s not a killer,” Scott said.
“Doting uncle declares nephew’s innocence,” Rohter said. “As an avowal it has a certain headline appeal.”
Here Comes the Corpse Page 18