Dead Angler

by Victoria Houston

  Osborne shifted his position on the sofa. He would be surprised if Lew didn’t knew exactly who Joan Wulff was—even he knew that. He found it interesting she said nothing to counter Alicia’s condescension. Having seen Alicia go after many unsuspecting, kind-hearted females in years past, Osborne found himself not unhappy that she might be picking on the wrong one this time.

  “That’s one of the reasons she moved back here. She was fanatic about fly-fishing. I warned her about fishing the Prairie at night. I told her that was very, very foolish.”

  As she spoke, Alicia had carefully arranged her gown over her knees, then propped her right elbow on one arm to rest her chin in her hand as she leaned towards them, an expression of intense concentration on her face.

  “Uh huh,” said Lew, making a note. “Why else did she move back here?”

  “What time did she drown?” Alicia ignored the question.

  Lew ignored the rudeness. “Well … at first, we thought she drowned, of course, but Dr. Osborne’s initial exam showed her head was quite battered. That and a few more details—”

  “Like what details?”

  “We found very few bruises on the rest of her body. If she had been in the current for any length of time, there should be significantly more bruising to match the head.”

  “That’s it?” Alicia’s tone was ever so slightly scornful.

  “Yes,” said Lew. “Anything you wish to add, Doctor?” Lew gave Osborne a look that indicated she did not want to share the details of the missing fillings.

  “Paul—how on earth did you get involved with this?” demanded Alicia. “You’re not a coroner.”

  “Doctor Osborne is deputized to help me with forensic dental exams when Doctor Pecore is tied up,” said Lew matter-of-factly—as if they had been working together for years, not hours.

  “Alicia, I did some forensic work during the Korean War though I’m certainly no expert,” said Osborne, “Like she said, I just help Chief Ferris on an as-need basis. But I can tell you, Alicia, this was no drowning. Chief Ferris sees at least one drowning a season out of rivers like the Prairie, and those bodies exhibit stresses on all extremities not just—”

  “Well—you’re both wrong,” said Alicia, waving her hand and a snide tone of dismissal in her voice. “Everyone knows the nightmare currents of the Prairie River. No one in their right mind fishes that river in weather like we had here tonight. Don’t you think Meredith might have slipped and fallen and hit her head on one of those submerged boulders? I mean, really. I fly-fish, Mrs. Ferris, I know how dangerous a rushing river can be.”

  Osborne caught her deliberate refusal to use Lew’s official title. Classic Alicia, he thought, still nasty after all these years.

  “There is something else,” said Lew, reluctantly. “Please keep this confidential?”

  “Absolutely,” said Alicia, leaning forward more intently and dropping her patronizing tone.

  “Meredith’s body was wedged under a log. Deliberately wedged—no question about it.”

  “I see …,” said Alicia. She sat in thoughtful silence for a long minute, then she sighed deeply and stood up. “You know, I could use a drink—can I get anyone anything? I can make up some coffee …?”

  “No, thank you,” said Lew.

  “Nothing for me,” said Osborne.

  Alicia left the room. Lew and Osborne looked at each other but said nothing. They waited. Lew doodled on her notepad.

  “You know, on second thought, I could use a glass of water,” she said, jumping up and following Alicia back to the kitchen. Five minutes later, they returned. Lew with a tall glass of ice water and Alicia with a goblet of white wine in one hand, a plate of Wisconsin cheddar and Ritz crackers in the other. She set the plate on the coffee table in front of them.

  “I’m sure you’re right,” she said rearranging herself in the chair, “I just find it so difficult to imagine anyone wanting to kill my sister.”

  Her attitude had changed markedly. Her tone, her manner, made it clear she had decided to be cooperative. Very cooperative. But if she had changed her attitude, her tension level was still tuned high. Osborne could almost see the vibration he’d felt earlier.

  He was ashamed of his next thought, but knowing Alicia as he did, he wondered what she had up her sleeve.

  “And you are sure it’s Meredith? I know that bodies can change in the water….”

  “Alicia,” said Osborne, shifting his position on the sofa to lean forward on his elbows, hands dropped between his knees, eyes fixed on hers. “I know your sister. Remember, she grew up with my oldest daughter. I did all her dental work until she went away to college. Even in recent years, when she was visiting in the summer, she would drop by the office if she had a problem, a loose filling usually. I wish I could say otherwise, but I know the victim is Meredith.”

  “The body appears to have been in the water a very short time, plus the Prairie runs cold,” added Lew. “In spite of Doctor Osborne’s certainty, I do need you to identify the body, Mrs. Roderick. And I’ll need your permission for the autopsy.”

  “Hmm,” Alicia was thoughtful. “An autopsy? What a shame.” Then she started up from her chair, “Tonight? I better change—”

  “No, oh no,” said Lew. “In the morning will be fine. We’ll set up a time to meet at the hospital morgue.”

  Alicia settled back and took a sip of her wine. She turned to Lew and waited expectantly. “You have questions, Chief Ferris?”

  “If you can give me a few details, Mrs. Roderick, we can go over much more tomorrow. But any personal background you think is important may help me jumpstart this investigation,” said Lew. “First, some nitty gritty. Her age. Does she have children? Did she work? Daily routines? Any fishing partners?”

  “Meredith was fourteen years younger than me,” said Alicia. “So that makes her thirty-eight. We were half-sisters. My mother died when I was six, and Pop didn’t marry again until I was about twelve.”

  “Your father was John Sutliff.”

  “Yes. Pop was chairman of the mill until his retirement. He passed away about eighteen months ago, which may interest you. Our father was quite wealthy and he left everything to us—me and Meredith—we’re his only heirs.”

  “How much are we talking about?” asked Lew.

  “He left an estate of six million dollars to be shared between us.”

  “That’s a lot of money,” said Lew, jotting notes.

  “Yes it is,” said Alicia, “with her inheritance, my sister had a net worth of close to five million because she had money of her own already.”

  “Children?”

  “None. She never had time. My sister was a remarkable woman, unusual from the day she was born,” said Alicia. She took a sip of her wine. “As a child, she was absolutely beautiful. Blonde curls so thick you couldn’t get a comb through them.” Alicia smiled, “She looked like Shirley Temple. The children’s shops in Rhinelander would always ask Dorothy if she could model for them …” “Dorothy?”

  “My stepmother. She died of cancer just after Pop retired. Meredith’s mother. She always dressed Meredith like a storybook doll. I’ll never forget: I would come home from school for the weekend and there would be this picture-perfect little kid, so pretty and so sweet. I was like her second mother.”

  “So you were the big sister baby-sitter?”

  “Not really. I would show her off to all my friends, but I didn’t baby-sit. Dorothy wouldn’t leave Meredith alone with anyone.”

  “What do you mean when you say you came home on weekends. Didn’t you go to school here in Loon Lake?”

  “Heavens, no.” Something in her tone made it clear Alicia couldn’t believe Osborne had not told Lew that she was one of the favored, one of the few to attend a prestigious private school. “I went to Holy Cross, the private Catholic girls school down in Merrill. Pop sent me from first grade until I went to college. He believed in quality education.”

  Osborne let the remark go. Sometime
s he couldn’t believe this woman. Honestly. Did that mean that sending his girls to Loon Lake High School meant he and Mary Lee didn’t believe in quality education?

  “Did Meredith attend Holy Cross?”

  “Heavens, no. Dorothy wouldn’t let her out of her sight. She was an obsessive mother. Of course, that’s probably why Meredith came back. She loved Loon Lake,” said Alicia, swirling her wine glass, a slight smile on her face. “She loved her friends from here, she loved our lake house. She was Loon Lake High Homecoming Queen her senior year,” said Alicia with quiet pride.

  “She was also a National Merit scholar,” added Osborne.

  “Yes, that too.”

  “She sounds like an All-American, bright, happy young woman growing up.”

  “Then she met Ben,” said Alicia, her eyes narrowing slightly. “Ben Marshall. Big man on campus—Northwestern. Merry was a freshman, he was a senior and, boy, did he change her life.”

  “Really,” said Lew.

  “Nothing was the same after Ben.”

  “You sound … regretful?” “I think he killed her.”

  Lew looked up from her notepad. She waited. Alicia’s statement hung in the air. Her eyes shifted from Lew to Osborne and back to Lew.

  “In more ways than one, he killed her.”

  “Tell me about it.” Lew’s voice was gentle, understanding.

  “Ben’s a commodities broker on the Chicago Board of Trade. Winter wheat, pork bellies. He runs the family business. They married right after he graduated and moved into the family compound in Lake Forest. Big fancy Chicago Irish Catholic millionaires. At first, as long as Meredith took care of all his needs, it was great. That was the first five years.

  “Then they find out they can’t have children. Bored out of her mind, Meredith wants to back to school, she wants to be a biochemist, which drives Ben mad. Takes wa-a-y too much time away from filling his needs.

  “Ben, you see, is a big game hunter and a fly-fisherman only he has to go to South America, to Russia, to Africa. God forbid he ever fish in Wisconsin or Michigan. Meredith couldn’t take that kind of time off from school. So they compromised. She quit school and took up cooking.

  “Cooking?!” Lew and Osborne exclaimed simultaneously.

  “Don’t ask me where it came from,” said Alicia, “Dorothy was a lousy cook. But Meredith was a natural. French and Italian cuisine were her first loves. She went to France to study, to Italy. She became a superb chef. I’m not exaggerating. She was phenomenal. Pretty soon she was running her own catering business up and down the North Shore. She loved it.”

  “And Ben?”

  “This did not suit him. Also, by now Meredith is seeing a shrink and starting to stand on her own two feet. Then she decides she wants to open a restaurant.”

  “How long ago is this?” asked Lew.

  “About eight years ago.” Alicia set her wine glass on the table and crossed her arms over her chest. “She opens a restaurant in Evanston, then one in Winnetka. Within two years, she’s a huge success. Fortune Magazine writes her up as one of the top ten chefs in the country. And—and—she writes two cookbooks. The little wife has become big business.”

  “I think I’m getting the picture,” said Lew.

  “The magazine piece runs, the book deals come along, Meredith is thriving. She never looked better, she’s happy … when Ben drops his bomb.” The smirk on Alicia’s face was a giveaway.

  Lew sighed, “I know what’s coming … the secretary?”

  “Bull’s eye,” said Alicia pointing her finger at Lew. “The ‘personal assistant.’ Age twenty-six, blonde, honkers out to here, slimy little bitch named ‘Tiffany.’ Need I say more?

  “Meredith took it on the chin. She took responsibility for it. She did her best to put their marriage back together. That’s when she learned how to fly-fish. She didn’t just learn, of course, she became an expert. She hired Joan Wulff for two weeks of private lessons. Then she and Ben took three months off to travel. Fishing, a safari, Paris and Rome. When they got back, she sold her restaurants. She loved Ben, she wanted to stay married to him. She forgave him. She also made a couple million selling those restaurants.”

  “This is now—three years ago?”

  “Right. But it was too late. Ben was still seeing other women. The final blow came when Ben left on a business trip. The next day the airlines delivered ‘Mrs. Marshall’s lost luggage’ to their home, only they were not Meredith’s bags. She wasn’t the ‘Mrs. Marshall’ he took on that trip. That was it. She told me she’s since heard from their friends he had dozens of girls. He’s a creep. A real creep.”

  “Is Ben an attractive man?”

  Alicia looked at Lew and gave her a sly grin, “He has money …” “Tall, short?”

  “Oh, he’s good-looking,” said Alicia reluctantly, swinging her foot. “He’s a little on the beefy side these days, but tall, ruddy-faced. Real Chicago Irish with red hair, y’know? Yes, I’d say women find him attractive.”

  “Have you met him, Doc?” Lew turned to Osborne who nodded that he had not. He saw Alicia’s eyes widen at the familiarity with which Lew addressed him but she said nothing.

  “So no children, no heirs that you know of.”

  “Well—that’s the interesting part,” said Alicia. “I don’t think that Ben knows the divorce was final last week. He thinks he’s her heir.”

  “How could he not know it was final?”

  “He was out of the country last week. Meredith was trying to reach him.”

  “But if he has money, why—”

  “First, she got a nice chunk of his assets in the divorce, then his company made a bad call in the copper markets. He told her the business was looking at Chapter Eleven. That’s why she was trying to reach him. Pop’s estate was settled a couple months ago, and Meredith had decided to take less money in the divorce. Actually, she wanted to do a trade.”

  “That sounds pretty big-hearted, given what you’ve told us.”

  “That’s Meredith. She has been so happy up here. She didn’t need the money. She told me she wanted a fresh start and no bad feelings from Ben. She was determined to set that whole chapter of her life behind her.

  “But she wanted one thing from Ben. He kept a family heirloom of ours, a diamond brooch that belonged to our grandmother. Pop gave it to Dorothy, and Dorothy gave it to Meredith. Ben had it in the bank vault and refused to return it until the divorce was settled. I want that brooch, Chief. You can tell Ben for me I consider it stolen.”

  “You don’t care much for Ben, do you?”

  “Would you?” Alicia swung her foot harder. Suddenly, from the rear of the house, they heard a light bang as if a door had swung shut.

  “What’s that?” Alicia looked startled, alarmed. She rushed from the living room. Lew and Osborne followed. They ran out of the living room, down the hallway to the kitchen and through another doorway into a rear laundry room. An inside wooden back door stood wide open exposing the outside screen door, which opened to the garden and garage.

  “The screen door is unlatched,” said Osborne pushing against the outer door frame. “Was it locked?”

  “I never lock my doors,” said Alicia. Then she looked at them, fear crossing her face. “What if it’s not Ben?” she said. “What if someone’s after both of us? Peter’s not here. I’m all alone.”

  “No one came in,” said Lew looking down at the gleaming white ceramic tile that covered the kitchen and laundry room floors. Her eyes scanned the open shelving in the room carefully.

  “With the mud and wet grass from the storm tonight, anybody trying to walk in here would leave plenty of footprints on this white floor of yours, Mrs. Roderick. This place is buffed clean. Maybe your door slammed in the breeze or blew something off one of these shelves. Maybe it was this mop that fell over.” Lew righted a sponge mop that had tipped over beside the washing machine.

  “Do you have any reason to think someone might be after you?” asked Lew, backing into the
darkened kitchen.

  “I’m … I’m not sure …,” Alicia paused, looking down and thinking. “Something odd happened earlier this week. I didn’t think much about it at the time … I thought it was one of the neighbor kids …” She looked up. “I was in the garden weeding, on my hands and knees, when I was sure I heard the front door slam. I got up and walked in—sometimes a neighbor will stop by with iced tea or to chat, y’know. But no one was here. I know I left the front door open. Someone had to shut it. Slammed it shut.”

  “The mailman?”

  “No, it was late afternoon.”

  “Where were you tonight around suppertime?” asked Lew.

  “I went up to the country club with Carlyn Sandeman and her mother-in-law for cocktails and a salad. After that, we played bridge at her house. She lives next door,” Alicia gestured towards the garden that separated the two large houses.

  “I better start locking my doors,” Alicia walked back to peer out the screen door towards the silent garden.

  “I would if I were you,” said Lew briskly. “Until we get this cleared up, you should be careful, Mrs. Roderick. Particularly if many people know the kind of money you and your sister inherited. Some of these backwoods idiots we have around here might think you keep cash in the house.”

  Alicia pushed the back door shut and slipped a deadbolt.

  “You are so right, Chief Ferris,” she said. “I’ll be very careful. Are we finished?”

  “Just another question or two,” said Lew. “I’m sorry to keep you up so late. Can we go back to the living room? I left my notes on the sofa.”

  “Right now having you two here is all that’s keeping me from having a nervous breakdown,” said Alicia, “Please, however long it takes …”

  eight

  “Did your father have enemies?” asked Lew as they walked back through the hallway.

  “I imagine,” said Alicia, “he ruled hundreds with an iron fist but Pop was retired over twenty-five years. He was ninety-two when he died. I doubt too many people from his era are still around.”