49
We agreed to take two cars into town. The nanny would watch the triplets for an hour or two. Grace would stay with me. I ended up parking in the spot behind the small building where Hannah’s pristine Passat had been parked the night that Diane and I had found Hannah’s body.
Mary’s car, a Honda minivan with temporary plates-her new triplet-mobile, I assumed-was already in the other parking slot.
The back door of the old house was unlocked. Gracie and I found Mary standing in the hallway, her hands hanging limp by her upper thighs. The narrow passage was dimly lit and she was silhouetted by the distant front windows. I thought she seemed disoriented. As Grace and I approached she said, “I don’t like being here anymore. It’s so strange. I never thought I’d feel that way. I used to love being in this space,” she said. “Hannah and I were perfect together here. Perfect.”
“I can only imagine what it’s like for you,” I said. “Mary, I need to get Grace settled with a book or something. I’ll be right back.”
I showed Grace where I’d be talking with Mary, and then led her to the waiting room where I made space on the coffee table for her books and for some paper and crayons. She chose to sit on the same location on the green velvet sofa that the Cheetos lady had chosen on the day that Hannah died. Grace settled right in, picking the crayons and paper over the books. Her cooperation didn’t surprise me; I was already confident that one of my daughter’s enduring skills in life would be her capacity to ride whatever wave rolled her way.
Mary had unlocked her office door and was standing a couple of feet inside. I squeezed in behind her. The leather cube was gone from the room, as was the stained dhurrie. The pine floors looked naked and ancient. The room appeared as cold as it felt.
I spotted the recessed handles for the lateral files that had been built into the rear wall. The three long file cabinets did indeed appear to be part of the beadboard wainscoting.
“I’ve only been back once, with the police and my attorney. The detectives wanted to know if anything was missing. I looked around and told them I didn’t think so. Nothing appeared disturbed to me at the time, but I didn’t do an inventory.”
I recalled how hard it was to return to my own office years before after Diane had been attacked by a patient’s husband. I touched Mary on the arm. She put her hand on my fingers.
“You know where… her body was, don’t you? I mean, exactly?” she asked.
“Yes, I do. Do you want me to…”
“No. Not yet. I’ll tell you if I do.” She stepped away.
“Okay,” I said. “She was wearing a blouse that day, Mary. Button-front, collar, silk, I think. A basic thing.”
“So?”
“The front tail on the left side was tucked up underneath her bra when I found her, exposing her abdomen. I’ve never seen a woman do that before.”
“The police didn’t tell me that. You’re sure?”
“I am.”
“That’s interesting. Hannah was a Type 1 diabetic-she was insulin dependent. She usually injected into her abdomen. Rather than unbuttoning her shirt, she had this habit of just tucking it up under the front of her bra to get it out of the way. Did the police find a syringe close by? Had she just taken insulin?”
“I didn’t see a syringe, but I suppose it could have been beneath her body.”
“Have you seen the results of the autopsy? How was her sugar?” Mary asked.
“I assume it was within normal limits; nobody mentioned it as an anomaly.”
“If her shirt was tucked under her bra, then she was preparing to take insulin. There’s no other explanation.”
“But in your office?”
“That part doesn’t make any sense. She kept the insulin in back, in the kitchen. She would load the syringe back there. But she injected herself in her own office. Hannah was modest, and she was very private about her illness.”
“Always?”
“Always.”
After a poignant pause-I suspected she was still debating whether or not she really wanted to know precisely where Hannah had died-Mary stepped toward the built-ins. “The file is in here.”
The key was secreted on the shelves above the cabinets in a ceramic jar, something small and celadon. Mary retrieved the key and unlocked the middle cabinet. She chose a pillow from the sofa and threw it on the floor before she kneeled down, slid out the top drawer, and began searching for the file. She fingered the brightly colored tabs sequentially, her middle, ring, and index fingers running after each other as though they were skipping over hurdles. After one time through the area that marked the center of the alphabet, she retraced her work.
That’s when she found it.
In a calm voice she announced, “It’s here. I almost missed it, but it’s here.” She pulled the dusky red folder and held it up for me to see.
My voice every bit as level as hers-we were both therapists, after all-I suggested, “Why don’t you take a few minutes and make sure that it hasn’t been… I don’t know, tampered with.”
She crossed her legs and sat on the pillow on the floor. Slowly, she made her way through the inch-and-a-half-thick pile of pages of scrawled notes and medication records and hospital admission papers and discharge summaries.
“It all seems to be here, Alan. I can’t be a hundred percent sure, but everything seems to be here. It looks just the way I left it.”
I sighed involuntarily. Relief? Disappointment? I wasn’t sure.
She gazed up at me. “You thought someone stole it, didn’t you? That someone was in my office that day, that Hannah heard them in here, came in to see what was going on. And that’s why she was killed.”
“It was one thought. It all depended on what was in that file.”
She closed the file and stood. “I can’t tell you what’s in it. You know how this works.”
“If it’s a consultation you can.”
“What good will that do? You can’t tell anyone what I tell you. It won’t help.”
“I’ve been looking for Diane all week. I already know other things. Every piece helps. If I can put it all together, I may be able to find her. I’m terrified that time is running out.”
“You won’t divulge what I tell you?”
I said, “No,” and I hoped that I wasn’t lying. Was I willing to be lying if it would help Diane?
Yes. Mary had to know that.
“I wouldn’t treat her the same way today. Probably wouldn’t even diagnose her the same,” Mary said remorsefully, while giving Rachel’s file a little shake. “We know so much more now, don’t we? Take me out for coffee, Alan. I’m dying to sit down with an adult for coffee.”
I made an apologetic face. “Grace will be coming with us.” Grace would be thrilled to go out for coffee; she thought a petite espresso cup full of steamed milk foam with shaved chocolate on top was as good as life got.
Mary deflated, took a step, and slumped down on a nearby chair. “I forgot. She’s a sweet kid, but she’s not an adult.”
“Not the last time I looked, no.”
A strong wind exploded out of Sunshine Canyon ten blocks to the west. Had the Chinooks arrived? The whoosh shook the house, the naked tree branches squinted together and bent to the east. Debris and dust filled the air.
I excused myself and stepped out into the waiting room to check on Grace. She seemed oblivious to the gales; in fact she was so busy coloring that she didn’t notice my arrival in the room. A second blast put the first to shame-the century-old glass began to hum in the window at the front of the house. After one more selfish moment observing my daughter’s concentration, I returned down the hallway to Mary’s office.
She’d moved to the couch, pulled her legs up under her, and tugged a pillow to her chest. She asked, “Did Bill Miller ever mention to you that he’d done something he wasn’t proud of? Something that was eating at him?”
“No, doesn’t ring a bell. Should it?”
“I’m thinking maybe it might
be important. He never really explained it all to me, but it had something to do with a traffic accident he witnessed. A young woman died. He was torn up about it.”
I surprised myself by remembering. “She was an orthodontist,” I said.
The winds had quieted. Strange.
Mary said, “Yes.”
50
Mary had to get back to the demands of the triplets, and the clock said it was almost time to get Grace home for some lunch and a nap. But something Mary had said convinced me to risk squeezing one more errand into our outing. I didn’t even try to explain to Grace exactly what business was conducted at the office of the Boulder County coroner; all I told her was that Daddy had another short meeting.
Years before, during my brief stint as a coroner’s investigator, my supervisor was a good man named Scott Truscott. I’d always liked Scott and had felt that once I wasn’t working for him he’d grown fond of me, too. Grace and I tracked him down at his desk in the Justice Center on Canyon Boulevard. I introduced him to Grace and he and I spent a moment catching up before he asked, “So what’s up?”
“I’m hoping I can help you a little with the Hannah Grant thing.”
“Yeah?” He seemed interested, but just the slightest bit skeptical. “I’d love to get that one out of the ‘undetermined’ column.”
The words he used-genteelly chosen without overt reference to death or murder-told me that he was happy to edit his part of the conversation for Grace’s tender ears.
He added, “Why me and not the detectives handling the case?”
I could’ve finessed my answer, but with Scott it wasn’t necessary. “I have issues with Jaris Slocum.”
“Gotcha.” Scott wasn’t surprised, obviously.
“Will you answer some questions for me, too?” I asked.
“Depends what they are.”
That was fair. I said, “Hannah was a diabetic. Type 1. We both know that. How was her blood sugar when, you know?”
“Blood doesn’t actually tell us anything about sugar level during a post; natural autolysis renders the numbers meaningless. But because we knew she was insulin dependent, the coroner checked the vitreous fluid.”
“From her eye?” I asked, a shiver shooting up my spine. I didn’t know what autolysis was, natural or otherwise, but feared that asking would either tug Scott down a blind alley, or leave my daughter with nightmares.
“It’s the only way to get a reliable post mortem sugar. I don’t have it memorized, but she was within normal limits.” His hand reached for his computer mouse. “You want me to check for the exact number, I can pull the labs.”
“It’s okay. Did the detectives recover a syringe that night?”
“You mean with insulin in it? No. They found fresh supplies in the kitchen. Nothing already prepared for injection though, and nothing recently used.”
“Did you hear anything about an open roll of LifeSavers in her coat pocket?”
His shoulders dropped, and he frowned. “No, nobody mentioned LifeSavers to me. It wasn’t in any of the reports.”
“It was there; I saw it. The package was open, the wrapper was curly-cueing out of her pocket.”
Scott appeared perplexed. “She must have thought her sugar was low. Considering her normal levels, though, that’s odd.”
“It is odd. Did you collect her… that night?” I skipped a word intentionally. The omitted word could have been “body” or “remains.”
He filled in the blank and said that he had. One of the tasks of coroner’s investigators is to visit death scenes to begin collecting data, and to prepare bodies for transport to the morgue.
I said, “Her shirttail was tucked up under the front of her bra when I found her.”
“When I got there, too. Same.”
“Ever run across that before at a death scene?”
“Never,” he said.
“A good friend of hers just told me that Hannah did that when she was preparing to do an insulin injection in her abdomen. To get her shirt up out of the way.”
Scott crossed his arms and sat back. “I didn’t consider that, but I should have. Slocum was already thinking homicide when I arrived.” He made a sound with his tongue and the roof of his mouth. “You’ll make a statement about the LifeSavers?”
“Of course; I bet the crime-scene photos will show that wrapper.”
“I’ll take a look. Will her friend give a statement about the shirt tail?”
“Can’t see why not. Why would a diabetic be eating sugar one minute and preparing to take insulin the next?”
“It makes no sense to me. That’s one of the things I’m going to have to think about.”
We said good-bye. I bundled Grace back up. On the way out to the car she asked, “What are LifeSavers?”
We stopped at a convenience store on the way home and I bought her a roll. I guessed she was a Butter Rum kid.
It turned out that I guessed right.
When we finally weaved across the valley Viv was almost done cooking up a pot of macaroni and cheese. As the three of us were finishing lunch, Virginia Danna, the Realtor whom I’d tricked into showing me the interior of Doyle’s house, phoned me on my cell.
After reintroducing herself she proceeded without any further niceties, her tone full of conspiracy. “The rules have changed. They always seem to in situations like this, don’t they? With Mr. Chandler dead, buyers are going to come out of the hills looking for a fire sale. Act fast and you might be able to get that house for a…”
Song? What house?
I walked out of the kitchen. “Mr. Chandler is dead?” I said.
“Yes! Can you believe it? This world! Sometimes…” She sighed. “A detective called me today to find out when I’d last spoken with him. You could have knocked me over with a feather when he told me Mr. Chandler was dead, maybe even murdered. Who knows what happened to him? The poor man! Murdered? It gives me gooseflesh, right up my thighs. Now, I will admit that I’m not privy to the estate situation in this particular circumstance, but sometimes people-heirs-at times like this are truly eager to settle things after a… especially after a… So if I could persuade you to make…”
An offer?
She went on. “Even a lowball offer would be…”
Acceptable? Delectable?
I asked, “Ms. Danna, who exactly is Mr. Chandler?”
“What? The owner of the house I showed you on Twelfth. The one with the water features and that yummy media center downstairs? I’m sorry, I thought you knew.”
“Doyle?”
“Yes, Doyle Chandler.”
“He’s dead?”
She was growing impatient with me. “Mm-hmmm,” was all she said in reply to my last question. Then she waited while I caught up.
“What detective phoned you?” I asked. I was thinking Sam.
“I don’t recall exactly. Mr. Chandler’s body was found up near Allenspark. Maybe it was an Allenspark detective.”
Allenspark is a small town in the mountains about thirty minutes from Boulder by car, not far from the eastern boundaries of Rocky Mountain National Park. When not swollen with summer tourists, Allenspark’s population typically hovered-guessing-somewhere around two hundred people. The village was as likely to have its own homicide detective as it was to have its own traffic helicopter. Any investigator involved in a homicide inquiry in Allenspark would be part of the County Sheriff’s department, on loan from a bigger city, like Boulder, or someone assigned from the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.
Rather than argue the point, I said, “I’ll talk it over with my wife and get back to you. The house is still a little small for us.”
“One word: cantilever. My mobile number is on the card I gave you. Call any time. When news gets out about this… situation, there will be other offers, certainly by close of business tomorrow. You can count on it. There have been four showings of that property this week alone and I don’t have to tell you how slow the beginning of January usually is. And
that screen in the basement? Remember? Of course you do. I checked. It’s a Stewart Filmscreen. I told you, the best. Think hard-a house like that, a location like that, circumstances like…”
These.
“I understand,” I said. But, of course, I didn’t.
I called Lauren. She didn’t return my call until midafternoon during a break in her trial. She’d already heard through the law enforcement grapevine about the discovery of the body of an unidentified male in a shallow grave not far from a trail that meandered off Highway 7 in northern Boulder County. She said she thought the location was east of Allenspark, actually closer to Lyons and Hygiene. I asked her to get me whatever information she could and to call me right back.
“Why are you interested in this?” she asked, of course. The tone of her question made it clear she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear my reply.
“It might be related to Diane,” I said.
“Two minutes,” she said.
It took her four. “We don’t have much yet. Pending a post, it appears to be a homicide. Animals had gotten to the body. ID found at the scene indicates it may be a man named-”
“Doyle Chandler.”
“How did you know? Is he one of your patients?”
I could have said, probably should have said, “You know I can’t answer that.” Instead, I said, “No.” Were the answer yes I would have answered with stony silence. Lauren and I both knew that the silent yes would have been just as declarative as the spoken no had been.
“One of Diane’s patients?”
Well, that was a thought. What if Diane had treated Doyle? I didn’t think so. I said, “No.”
“But you know him?” she asked.
“Personally, I don’t. Doyle Chandler owned the house that’s next door to Mallory Miller’s house on the Hill. When she disappeared he’d already moved away and put the place on the market.”
“I don’t think the police mentioned that this afternoon. Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Is this related to Mallory’s disappearance?”
Missing Persons Page 28