by Greg Iles
Wheaton’s face tightens. This was clearly the last thing he expected to hear.
“Did Frank tell you that?”
Lenz does not respond directly. “We’re also told that you argued vehemently with him on these occasions. We’d very much like to know the reason for these visits, and for the arguments.”
Wheaton shakes his head and looks away, his desire to help apparently gone, or at least tempered by disgust. “I can’t help you with that.”
John and Lenz look at each other.
“All I can do is assure you that those visits have nothing whatever to do with the crimes you’re investigating. You’ll have to trust me that far.”
I’m sure suspects must frequently refuse to answer FBI questions, but it’s hard to imagine them doing it with such sincerity and gentility. I’d feel almost embarrassed to insist at this point. But Lenz doesn’t.
“I’m afraid in these circumstances,” he says, “your word as a gentleman will not be enough.”
Wheaton gives Lenz a look hard enough to validate his history as a combat soldier. “I understand the urgency,” he says quietly. “But I can’t answer your question.”
John glances at me as though seeking help, but I don’t see any way to spur the artist into further revelations.
“Mr. Wheaton,” says Lenz, “I personally dislike having to bother a man of your stature with intrusive questions. However, the situation is grave. And I can assure you that all answers you give will be held in the strictest confidence.”
This, of course, is a bald-faced lie. Wheaton doesn’t respond.
“I am a psychiatrist,” Lenz says, with apparent faith that this assertion should win the day. “I also don’t believe what you’re hiding is anything to be ashamed of.”
The artist looks at me with his clear eyes and says, “Why are you really here?”
“I am a photographer, Mr. Wheaton, but I don’t work for the FBI. And my name isn’t Travis. My sister was one of the victims of whoever is taking these women. She disappeared last year, and I’ve been hunting for her ever since.”
Wheaton’s lips part in amazement. “I’m so sorry. What is your name?”
“Jordan Glass.”
“Jordan Glass. Well, let me assure you, Ms. Glass, before I ask these men to leave, that if I had information which could possibly help those women, I wouldn’t hesitate to give it to you. I hope you believe that.”
I do believe him, and I tell him so.
John gives me a dark look. “Mr. Wheaton,” he says, “I appreciate your desire for privacy. But it might be that you have information you aren’t qualified to judge the importance of.”
Wheaton looks at the ceiling and lets his gloved hands fall beside the chair. “You’re saying I might possess information that proves Frank Smith is behind these disappearances and not know it?”
“It’s possible.”
“It’s not possible. Frank couldn’t have anything to do with these crimes.” Wheaton’s face is red now, and he fixes John with his deep-set eyes. “However, because Ms. Glass has made me acutely aware of the stakes in this case, I will tell you something that’s been bothering me since we last spoke. I hesitated before, because Leon makes such an easy target. He’s often unpleasant, but I think he had a tough childhood, and sometimes that’s the result.”
Lenz is practically licking his chops.
“On the few occasions when I brought my graduate students together,” says Wheaton, “both at the university and here at this house, I observed Leon making inappropriate remarks to Thalia. He also touches her without any sort of permission.”
“What kind of remarks?” asks John.
“Overt sexual remarks. Things like, ‘You look like you know your way around a Cajun hot link, Mama.’ It sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? But that’s the kind of thing Leon says. I’ve seen him say similar things to female undergrads. But with Thalia, it was something more. Once I saw him wait for her by her car. It was several weeks ago, around dusk.”
“What happened?”
“She handled him with the firmness she always used. Thalia is a beautiful girl, and she seemed accustomed to putting off that kind of attention.”
“She drove away alone on that occasion?”
“Yes. I think Leon kept at her because he knew she posed nude for a graduate painting class. He took this as some sort of sexual advertising.”
He would, I think.
“Do you recall anything else between the two of them?” asks John. “Something odd or awkward?”
Wheaton looks reluctant to continue. “On a couple of occasions, as I left the art center, I saw Leon following Thalia across the quad.”
“Closely, or from a distance?”
“From far enough back to avoid easy detection. As though he meant to follow her a long way. That could be an incorrect assumption on my part. They could both have simply been headed for the University Center.”
“But that wasn’t your impression,” says Lenz.
“No.”
“You were right to tell us,” says John.
“I hope so. I strongly believe in the right to privacy, as I’ve already made plain.” Wheaton leans slowly forward. Then, as though the simple act scrapes cartilage from his knee joints, he stands. “And now, gentlemen, unless you have another warrant up your sleeves, I must ask you to leave. I need to go to work.”
The artist folds his arms, and the white gloves disappear behind his biceps.
“Again, I hate to intrude,” says Lenz. “But we’re unclear on some biographical points in your life.”
Wheaton bunches his brows in consternation.
“Published interviews say very little about your background beyond a certain point, but we know, for example, that you were reared in a rural part of Vermont. Windham County. Your father was a farmer?”
Wheaton sighs with irritation. “And a trapper.”
“What did he trap?”
“Beaver, fox. He raised some mink, unsuccessfully.”
“Thalia Laveau’s father was a trapper, I believe?”
“Yes. That’s something we shared stories about.”
“Could you share some with us?”
“Not today.”
“We also know your mother left home when you were thirteen or fourteen.”
Wheaton looks ready to throw Lenz bodily from the house.
“I realize this is painful,” says the psychiatrist. “But we need to know. Why did she leave without taking her children with her?”
Wheaton swallows and looks at the floor. “I don’t know. My father believed she met a man and ran away with him. I never did. It’s certainly possible that she fell in love with another man—my father was unpleasant, to be frank, far too coarse for Mother—but she would never have left me—us—behind.”
My throat feels tight; pressed mercilessly by Lenz, Roger Wheaton is articulating my own deepest fear and hope.
“I think she put herself into a vulnerable situation,” he says, “and something bad happened to her. And either my father didn’t tell us about it, or no one knew who she really was. If she were hiding her identity to be with someone else—in New York, for example—I can see how it would happen.”
“Was your father ‘unpleasant’ to the degree that he abused your mother?” asks Lenz.
“By today’s standards? Undoubtedly. But this was the 1950s, the middle of nowhere.”
“Did he abuse you and your brothers?”
Wheaton shrugs. “Again, by today’s standards, yes. He hit us with a razor strop, birch rods, anything close to hand.”
“What about sexual abuse?”
The artist’s deep sigh conveys utter contempt for the psychiatrist. “Nothing of the kind.” Wheaton wipes his forehead with a gloved hand. “Now, I really must insist that you go.”
Lenz fires a last shot as he gets to his feet.
“Mr. Wheaton, would you simply tell us whether you’re homosexual or not? It would prevent a lot of further pr
ying into your life, bothering of your friends, et cetera.”
Wheaton seems to sag under the weight of the question. “The answer is academic, I’m afraid. My disease rendered me impotent over two years ago.” He looks at Lenz. “Do you have your pound of flesh now?”
The artist glances at me, and the wounded pride in his face makes me look at the floor.
“Thank you for your time,” I say before Lenz can press him further. I back toward the hallway. “I appreciate your honesty about Gaines. It really might help find Thalia and my sister.”
Wheaton steps forward and takes my hand between his two white gloves. “I hope so. Is there really some hope that they’re still alive?”
“Not much. But some.”
He nods. “Maybe someday I’ll find a way to explain why I couldn’t answer the other question. So you’ll know I did all I could. I care a great deal for Thalia. She’s a wounded soul. You call me if you need to talk, or if you’d like to take more photographs. I’d like to paint you. We could do an exchange.”
“I thought you only painted landscapes.”
“I was quite a portraitist in the old days.” He laughs. “It kept me in pea soup and ramen noodles.”
“How is your painting coming? The final Clearing? It looked almost finished when I saw it.”
“I’m very close. A day, maybe two. The president had to close the gallery. Word has leaked out that I’m nearly done, and all manner of people are showing up to gawk. Reporters, students, collectors. Soon I’ll attach the final canvas panel to the circle, which means you’ll have to climb scaffolding and descend a ladder to get inside. It’ll be a relief to have it done.”
“I would like you to paint me sometime. I’d like to see how you see me.”
“Frank would do a more professional job, but I might see you more honestly than he.”
John and Lenz watch Wheaton as though each word and gesture are fragments of some code.
“Well, thanks.” I gently shake his hand.
“Thank you, my dear.” Wheaton moves from the door so that John and Lenz can get into the hall. “Good-bye, gentlemen.”
Dr. Lenz tries to shake the artist’s hand, but Wheaton takes a step backward and gives him a tight smile. Then the three of us are outside again, walking toward the FBI sedan parked on the street.
“He just told us to go to hell,” says John.
“Very smoothly,” Lenz agrees. “But he certainly pointed his finger at Gaines.”
“After saying nothing yesterday. I wonder why.”
“He told you why,” I say irritably. “He doesn’t like talking about anybody’s personal business. Even an ass-hole like Gaines. He knows the FBI will turn Gaines’s life into a living hell because of what he just told you.”
“Yes,” Lenz says thoughtfully. “He does.”
“What did you think about his answers about his mother?” asks John.
Lenz adopts his professorial tone. “He doesn’t know why she left, but he can’t let it be because she loved a paramour more than her children. As for childhood abuse . . . I don’t know. Denial is classic adaptive behavior. Without more time with him . . . I’ll have to think about that one.”
John opens the front door of the car, holds it for me, and looks into my eyes. “I hope you have better luck with Frank Smith.”
“I make my own luck.”
He smiles. “I believe you. They faulted Smith’s phones, both home and cell. No warning from Wheaton this time. You still want to go in alone?”
“Absolutely.”
“Let’s get to the Quarter, then.”
THE MEDICAL TAPE holding the T-4 transmitter at the small of my back chafes as I climb the steps of the Creole cottage on Esplanade and knock at Frank Smith’s door. From the transmitter, a thin wire runs around my ribs and up to a microphone clipped to the V of my bra. This time the door isn’t answered by Juan but by the owner himself. Frank Smith smiles broadly, revealing the gleaming white teeth of an affluent childhood, and leans against the doorjamb with languid grace.
“Is this visit social? Or government business?”
“I wish I could say the former, but it’s not.”
Smith arches his perfectly plucked eyebrows. “Well, then. I don’t think I’m at home.”
His movie-star handsomeness is starting to irritate me. “Have you watched any TV this morning?”
“No.”
“Read the Times-Picayune?”
“I took a long bath and had coffee in the garden. That’s the sum of my morning. Why?”
“May I come in?”
His sea-green eyes narrow. “Don’t tell me he’s taken another one.”
“Thalia Laveau.”
Smith looks confused. “What about Thalia?”
“He took Thalia. Last night.”
This is the first time I’ve seen Frank Smith lose his perfect control.
“May I please come in?”
He steps out of my way, and I walk inside. Instead of waiting for him to lead me to the salon, I walk through the house and make my way to the garden. The fountain that filled the courtyard with sound yesterday is switched off now, and a blackbird perches on the highest tier. There’s a small wrought-iron table under the gnarled wisteria, and I take a seat there. Smith sits across the table from me. In his fine trousers and royal blue polo shirt, he looks less like an artist than a model, but there’s no denying the quick intelligence in his eyes.
“How could Thalia be kidnapped when she was under surveillance?” he asks.
“Why do you think she was under surveillance?”
“Well, I am. Where are your FBI friends today?”
“Working.”
“But they sent you here. To ask me something. Because I responded to you yesterday.”
“I asked to come alone.”
He mulls my answer. “So, I’m still a suspect. What is it you want to know?”
I quickly explain that the Bureau knows Roger Wheaton spent several evenings at this house, and also that he and Smith argued on some or all of those occasions.
“I wondered why Juan didn’t show up this morning,” Smith says. “I suppose they threatened to deport him?”
“I don’t know what they did, Frank. I’m sorry. And I don’t like butting into your personal business. But this is life or death. Thalia could still be alive, and we have to try to help her.”
“Do you really believe that?”
“That she could still be alive? Yes.”
“I’m glad. But what you’re asking has nothing to do with this case.”
“That’s what Wheaton said.”
Smith turns up his palms as if to say, Next subject.
“Look, it seems to me there could only be a couple of innocent reasons for holding out. One, Wheaton is gay, and you guys have a relationship.”
“And two?”
“I can’t think of a second. Drugs, maybe. I think the first reason is it.”
Smith is wearing a smug smile.
“And if it is, admitting it is the quicket way to get the FBI out of your life. They honestly don’t care what you or Wheaton do for sex. What worries them is other possibilities.”
“Like?”
“Like you being involved in a conspiracy to produce the Sleeping Women.”
“Ridiculous.”
“I think so too. But I don’t run the FBI. Come on, Frank. What’s the deal? Is Roger Wheaton gay?”
“Have you asked him?”
“He evaded the question.”
“Well he would, wouldn’t he?”
“Why would he?”
“Roger grew up in rural Vermont. He’s fifty-eight years old, for God’s sake. He’s another generation altogether.”
“You’re saying he’s gay?”
“Of course he is.”
Of course he is. . . .
Smith runs a manicured fingernail along the wrought-iron scrollwork in the tabletop. “He’s simply not comfortable with the kind of attention that
comes with being gay and famous.”
“Are you and he lovers?”
Smith shakes his head with what looks like regret. “No.”
“Then how do you know he’s gay? He told you?”
“Roger ran away to New York when he was seventeen or eighteen. How do you think he lived? Certainly not by selling his paintings.”
“Are you saying he sold himself?”
“We all sell ourselves, in one way or another. Here was this talented, handsome kid schlepping his derivative paintings around to all the galleries. He got noticed, but not for the paintings. Before long, the old queens were fighting to give him a place to live and work. They took care of him until he joined the Marines.”
“You seem to know more about him than anyone else.”
“Roger confided these things because he knew I would understand. And I’m telling you so that you’ll do all you can to get the FBI off his back. His life is hard enough without that.”
“I agree. And I will. But I’m not completely clear here. If the visits were about friendship, what were the arguments about? The yelling?”
Smith shakes his head again. “I can’t answer that. The FBI can’t know about that.”
“Jesus, Frank. I won’t give them details. I’ll just tell them I’m satisfied that the arguments and visits mean nothing.”
“I can’t do it.”
Filled with frustration, but also understanding Smith’s reluctance to violate Wheaton’s privacy, I lean forward, pull the tail of my blouse out of my jeans, and rip the medical tape from the skin of my back. As the transmitter falls against the iron seat of my chair, I picture Daniel Baxter panicking in the surveillance van outside. I hope he has the sense not to come charging in with his gun drawn.
“I’m switching off,” I say loudly. “Don’t come in.”
Smith gapes as I reach into my blouse and pull the tiny mike from my bra, unthread the wire, then drop the transmitter on the table between us and switch it off.
“We’re no longer live, Frank. It’s you and me.”
He looks ready to throw me out of his house.
“Listen to me,” I say with the conviction of my own pain. “My sister has two small children that she loves more than her life. She was yanked off the street by some predator, and she’s probably rotting in the swamp somewhere right now. There are eleven other women just like her, one of them a friend you say you cared for and admired. The clock is ticking down on Thalia’s life. Is it an invasion of privacy for the FBI to learn Roger Wheaton is gay? Yes. Is it a tragedy? No. If your arguments with Wheaton have nothing to do with this case, all the effort the FBI puts into investigating them is wasted. Do you want that wasted effort to cost Thalia her life?”
