J. Jance - Long Time Gone

“I should have kept quiet,” Sister Mary Katherine said in response to my long, brooding silence. “I should have minded my own business, but I just didn’t think that a girl that young should be running off with a boy like that.”

“No,” I said. “You did exactly the right thing.”

“You really care about this girl, don’t you?”

“Yes,” I said. “I’ve known her since she was tiny.”

“Is she in trouble?” Sister Mary Katherine asked.

I didn’t know if she meant “in trouble” in the way it was used in our day, when “in trouble” and “pregnant” were used interchangeably. Or if Sister Mary Katherine meant something else entirely.

“It’s possible Heather shot her own mother,” I answered at last. “Which sounds like trouble to me.”

“Yes,” Sister Mary Katherine breathed. “I suppose it is. As soon as I get back to the convent, I’ll put her name on our prayer list,” she said. “The sisters and I will pray for her, morning, noon, and night. That’s what we do best.”

“Thank you,” I said. “I really appreciate it.”

We met up with Sister Therese and the Odyssey van in the parking lot of the Burger King north of town. I was headed back to Seattle when Ron called.

“I can’t find her,” he said.

“Are you going to call Mel, or should I?”

“You go ahead,” Ron said.

And I did. “What do you mean, she took off?” Mel Soames asked.

“Just that. She and her boyfriend disappeared.”

“The boyfriend is from Canada,” Mel responded. “Do you think they went there?”

“That would be my first guess.”

“Damn,” Mel said. “How much of a head start do they have?”

“Probably a couple of hours.” I didn’t specify how much of that head start was due to my delay in sending out an alarm.

“That’s long enough for them to have made it across the border.”

“I know,” I said. I wasn’t even sorry. No matter what I said, a part of me wanted Heather to walk. It was the reason I shouldn’t have been involved in the case to begin with-I cared too much. It’s the same reason doctors shouldn’t treat themselves-or their loved ones.

“Thanks for the heads-up, Beau,” Mel said. “I’ll get right on it.”

I might not have felt so guilty if she hadn’t thanked me. But there you are. I always have been a magnet for guilt.

The long solitary drive back to Seattle gave me plenty of time to think. In order to avoid thinking about Heather Peters, I focused on Kramer. Once you reach a certain level in the police hierarchy, newspaper headlines, not necessarily the articles themselves, become far more important to you. “Local Philanthropist Dies in Fall” was less of a hot potato than “Local Socialite Found Murdered.” And “Former Officer Commits Suicide” would be far less inflammatory than something like “Disgraced Cop Slain.” And if Kramer could convince the media to say those things long enough and loud enough, he might convince the general public they were true.

But I wasn’t the general public, and I wasn’t convinced. Wink Winkler had carried his wrongdoing around with him for fifty-plus years. Why would having it revealed now push him far enough to put a bullet through his own head? And Elvira Marchbank had fallen to her death due to stepping on a magazine? How lame was that? But if Kramer was on track for quick closures in both those cases, details on them were going to be hard to come by-especially for a Seattle PD outsider like me.

One of the good things about the attorney general’s Special Homicide Investigation Team is that it’s relatively new-so new that it hasn’t had time to develop the kind of entrenched bureaucracy that exists in many law enforcement agencies. As a result, there’s less emphasis on paperwork and more emphasis on fieldwork; less emphasis on punching the clock and more emphasis on getting the job done. That calls for people who are self-starters. Ross Connors decides on who works for him and who doesn’t. Harry I. Ball is in charge of the Bellevue branch, but Connors is the one calling the shots, and every investigator has access to the attorney general himself. We have his phone numbers, and we’re encouraged to call if necessary without being hassled about going through channels and across desks. This was one of those instances where I thought a call was in order.

Months earlier, Ross Connors’s wife had committed suicide when a witness protection scandal in Ross’s office had come to light. Instead of covering up what had happened, Ross had faced up to it in public, and voters reelected him in a statewide landslide.

I know what it feels like to lose a spouse to suicide. It hurts like hell. And I know that burying yourself in work is sometimes a substitute for dealing with the empty spot in your heart, so I wasn’t surprised to find the attorney general still in his office at eight o’clock at night.

“Hey, Beau,” Ross Connor said cordially when he heard my voice on the phone. “How’s it going with Sister Mary Katherine? Are you making progress?”

“Some progress,” I said. “And some new developments as well.” Over the next several minutes I brought him up to speed on everything that had happened.

“You’ll write all this up for me?” Connors asked when I finished.

“Yes,” I said. “I’ll have a report in Harry’s hands in the morning.”

“And you think Kramer’s going to deep-six both of the new cases?” Connors continued.

“He’s going to try. He’ll most likely do a cursory job on Wink Winkler and come up with some kind of plausible excuse for the suicide. With Elvira he’ll go for an accidental death. By ignoring Sister Mary Katherine’s allegations, he’s most likely giving Elvira and Albert a pass on their involvement in Mimi Marchbank’s homicide, which, according to him, he intends to solve by ‘traditional’ methods.”

“Meaning, of course,” Connors said, “that he’s really going to let it disappear once again. What do you think the chances are that Kramer’s conclusions are being suggested from the top down? Doing it Kramer’s way avoids the awkward possibility of besmirching the beloved memory of a local and recently departed arts patroness.”

“Are you suggesting the possibility of more police corruption?” I asked. I didn’t want to hear an affirmative answer. I didn’t want to think that some of the people I had worked with for so many years had gone over to the dark side.

“Not necessarily,” Connors said. “More like wanting to avoid bad PR. The Marchbank Foundation was and is an influential arts institution in Seattle. But you know what? I work in Olympia, and I don’t give a rat’s ass about what goes on in Seattle. So what do you need from me?”

“Access to official information,” I said at once. “If Paul Kramer’s being pressured to close these two cases as quickly and quietly as possible, he’s going to stonewall me at every turn. To do the job right I’m going to need to see the crime scenes and autopsy reports and to have a look at any and all witness interviews that have been done so far.”

Connors paused. “I’m not sure how much good seeing that material will do. After all, street cops can tell which way the wind is blowing. What they write down may have more to do with what’s expected as opposed to what is. If I were you, I’d rely on whatever information you’re able to turn up on your own.”

“Still,” I said, “it’ll be easier to have the names, addresses, and phone numbers of who has been interviewed and who hasn’t. I don’t mind going back over the same territory, but I shouldn’t have to reinvent the wheel to do it.”

“Yes,” Ross Connors agreed. “You’re right. Fortunately for you, I can apply a certain amount of pressure in all the right places.”