by Jan Burke
I looked at Max. He shrugged. “It’s the only explanation I’ve been able to come up with myself. To be honest, if that’s the case, it’s kind of insulting. It’s as if she’s saying she stood by me and took me under her wing when she had no real proof that we were related — if anything, proof that we weren’t. But I’m supposedly so shallow, I’ll stop caring for her if she’s not my biological grandmother.”
“No other Linworth or Ducane relatives?” Frank asked.
“Warren Ducane,” I said. “If you can find him.”
“Warren may show up someday,” Max said, “but he chose to make himself scarce more than twenty years ago.”
“You haven’t heard from him since then?” I asked.
He shifted uneasily in his chair, then said, “I haven’t seen Warren since the day he disappeared from Las Piernas.” He anticipated my next question and said, “Please don’t put me in the awkward position of lying to you, Irene — I’d hate that. I’ll just say that I don’t know where he is right now, and even if I could locate him, odds aren’t good that he’ll come out of hiding while Mitch Yeager is alive.”
So Warren was alive, and he had contacted Max at some point. A letter or an e-mail, or a call, perhaps. I was curious, but respected Max’s request.
“Does Lillian have any siblings?” Frank asked him.
“Lillian was the only child of two only children. I suppose I could look for distant cousins, but why do that, when the people whose DNA would tell the true story once and for all are buried not far from here?”
“Katy and Todd Ducane.” Frank thought for a moment, then said, “I’m not saying it’s a sure thing, but in the interest of investigating a kidnapping and murder case, I suppose we could exhume one or both of their bodies. I hope we can talk Lillian Linworth into cooperating before we reach that point. I’d also want to be sure there are no samples that might already tell the story — that way, there’s less trauma for the families involved. And lower cost for the department, too.”
“What do you mean?”
“If we can find enough DNA in a sample frozen in 1978, and it won’t compromise the other cases involved to process them — in other words, we won’t use up some tiny fragment that’s all we have — then we may not need to go to the trouble of an exhumation.”
“That’s great!”
“I don’t think there will be a problem, but I also don’t want you to look at this as a sure thing yet. I’m going to have to talk this over with my lieutenant, and I’m sure it will go to the captain as well. If I get approval from the department, I’ll have to look for the simplest way to get the tests done. That would mean talking to Lillian and trying to get her to change her mind.”
“Maybe you’ll have better luck than I did,” Max said.
After Max left, I asked Frank if he had met Ethan up at Folsom.
“You think he’s in the slammer?”
“Deserves to be, but no. He left today, telling me that he was on his way to Folsom to interview Harmon.”
Frank shook his head. “I know there are reporters up there, hoping to talk to him, but not many are going to get a chance. Harmon had knee surgery last week, and he ended up with some sort of complication — an infection. The doctors tell me that in a few days, he’ll be up to longer conversations, but right now, he tires quickly. I can vouch for that — I was able to talk to him for about two hours, but he drifted off and dozed every few minutes.”
“I wonder why the Express is going to the expense of sending Ethan up there now?”
“I don’t know. You ought to be glad he’ll be gone.”
“True.”
“I mean, a trip to Folsom — is that really such a big prize?”
I laughed, but in truth it was something of a prize. I saw it the way the others in the newsroom would see it — that Ethan was being trusted with the kind of assignment few young reporters would be given. A fledging out of the nest. Why Lydia — or whoever else had been involved in the decision — thought he was ready for something like that was more than I could say.
Maybe, I thought, Lydia’s little Icarus would be tempted to fly too near the sun.
Though I scolded myself for actually wishing that one of my colleagues would fail, it didn’t change the wish.
56
BY MONDAY, I WAS READY TO CONCEDE THAT MY WISH HAD NOT COME true. Ethan somehow managed to get in to talk to Harmon, and when I saw his story, which would run in Tuesday’s paper, I had to admit he had done a fine job with it. Word was, Wrigley went bananas over it, and decided to give it big play. Lydia assigned supporting pieces to several other staff members. She didn’t make eye contact with me during that process.
I thought I ought to mend fences with her, so I invited her to go to lunch with me. She gave me a look that made me uneasy, but accepted. We didn’t talk much on the way out of the building, or even as we made our way to a café that was currently known as Lucky Dragon Burger, but which changed names a lot. The food was consistently good, though. “Think dragons have been the secret ingredient all along?” I asked her.
It was a weak joke and it won a weak smile.
We ordered, and I said, “Congratulations on being able to see that Ethan could handle that story. I guess that’s why you’re such a great city editor. You know the staff and what they are capable of.”
She studied me for a moment. While she did this, she crossed her arms — a signal of fury that few others would recognize for what it was, but which startled me. Lydia’s maiden name is Pastorini. A good Italian Catholic girl. She needs her hands to talk. If she confined her hands, I knew she felt the need to exercise control over what she had to say. I was trying to figure out what I could have done to make her so angry, when she said, “You believe that I am the one who sent Ethan up to Folsom?”
“Didn’t you?”
“No. I never would have sent him up there. That was Wrigley’s decision.”
“Oh.” I suddenly recalled Ethan’s words. He never mentioned Lydia. “I jumped to a conclusion, Lydia. I was wrong. I’m sorry.”
She shook her head.
“Look, I can see why that makes you angry, but—”
“Can you?”
“Yes. I thought you were championing him, and now that I think back on it, you didn’t actually do that.”
“That’s the symptom. Not the problem. I may not treat a first-year reporter the way you and the Old Boys Club do, but I can see his faults. I’m not completely stupid just because I’m not on the street, you know. I am not incapable of seeing when a twenty-two-year-old is full of himself.”
This was so close to what I had thought of her, I turned red. Worse, she had known me so long, I knew she was reading that blush for the guilt signal it was. “Like I said, I’m sorry. Really sorry. I mean it.”
Silence. The food arrived. Nobody made a move to touch it. As the minutes passed, I went from feeling contrite to feeling injured by her refusal to at least give some token acknowledgment of my apology. Did she want me to grovel?
“Lydia, please. Let’s not let a little creep fuck up our friendship, okay?”
She looked me right in the eye and said, “He’s not the one messing it up.”
“You know what? You’re right about that.”
I stood up, threw a twenty on the table — much more than I owed, but I wasn’t going to be accused of sticking her with the bill on top of everything else — and though I knew I was letting my Irish temper get the best of me, I left.
I needed to cool off, and sitting in the newsroom with Lydia would not accomplish that. I glanced at my watch. I thought of my options, used my cell phone to call John Walters and tell him where I’d be, and walked around the block to the newspaper’s parking lot. I got into the Jeep and drove home.
Cody and the dogs were delighted. The friend and neighbor who usually spent time with them during the day was out of town, so I got an especially enthusiastic welcome. My mood of righteous indignation couldn’t withstand that. I
played with them for a while — tossing a catnip toy for Cody, stuffed squeaky toys for the dogs. That worked off some tension for everyone involved.
I went back to reading O’Connor’s stories and diary. One of the best stories was from April 1936 and was called “What I Saw in the Court.” He told about sneaking into a courtroom to watch Mitch Yeager’s trial, and later telling Corrigan about what amounted to jury tampering.
Mitch Yeager had been on trial for something? O’Connor, boy reporter, hadn’t provided details. I made a note to look it up.
Max might know about it. I called him and had the good fortune to catch him at home. “I’m leaving to go see Lillian in a little while,” he said. “Do you have my cell phone number?” He gave it to me.
“Are you in a rush? I could call you back later.”
“I can talk now for a few minutes. What can I do for you?”
“I hope you won’t mind my asking, but do you know if Mitch Yeager was ever arrested?”
“Mitch? Not that I know of. He wouldn’t have told me about it if he was, though — he was really hung up on being thought of as respectable. Which, come to think of it, argues for a shady past, doesn’t it?”
“Maybe.”
“Oh, wait — are you sure you heard something about Mitch and not Adam Yeager?”
“Adam Yeager … why is that name familiar?”
“He was Mitch’s brother. Ian’s and Eric’s dad. In fact, my former name — Kyle — was his middle name.”
“Did you know him?”
“No, he was dead long before I was born. My mom always said Eric and Ian were going to grow up to be just like their father — jailbirds.”
He suddenly broke off, then started laughing.
“What’s so funny?”
“I was just thinking that she was right.”
“Yes, although she probably didn’t predict the part about life on a tropical island.”
“No. I wouldn’t mind that, if they’d stay there.”
“So you’ve heard the rumors, too.”
“Oh, it isn’t rumor. They come back to the States on a fairly regular basis.”
“What? Are you sure?”
“Absolutely certain. I have them watched, Irene. If I thought for a moment that they were going to harm you, I’d … I’d make sure it didn’t happen.”
I was stunned.
“You’re angry,” he said.
“No — not angry. It’s just weird. I mean, I wish you had told me sooner.”
“I’ve thought about it, even came close to telling you a couple of times. But two things stopped me. One was that you’ve been through some horrible experiences in the time since they’ve been released, and it just happened that whenever I’d come back into town, certain that I was going to tell you, the timing was always wrong — I didn’t want to upset you with talk of people who might not ever come near either one of us again.”
“What was the other reason you didn’t tell me? That they’re too old?”
“No. Evil does not retire.”
“No pension plan.”
He laughed. “I guess that’s it. Besides, they both keep in good shape, so I wouldn’t feel safer from them because of age. No, the other reason I didn’t tell you was Frank. If I told you, you might tell him, and … I didn’t want Frank to feel obligated to mention my surveillance of them to his department.”
“I understand,” I said. “But it won’t be a problem.”
“Good.”
“I know you’re running out of time, but can you give me a little more information about Adam Yeager, the jailbird uncle?”
“Oh — not much, really. Mom was upset that she always had to say that he died in the war, because he died during the Depression, in prison. She said something about how he didn’t live more than a year in prison. That’s why Eric and Ian were raised by Mitch. I remember Mitch always kept a photo of him on his desk. I know that’s not much information, but you might say that by the time I was old enough to ask about him, I had learned not to ask about him.”
“What do you mean?”
He took so long to answer, I thought we might have lost the connection. But then he said, “Not long after Mom told me that Adam had died in prison, I asked Mitch to tell me the truth about him, since I had to go around with his name. A mistake I’ll never forgive myself for. That’s when I got packed off to military school. Mitch told me my mom wasn’t feeling well, so she couldn’t say good-bye.”
“Oh, Max…”
“I never saw her alive again. She died two years later. She fell down some stairs.” After another silence, in a much quieter voice, he added, “Or so I was told.”
57
HE ENDED THE CALL JUST AFTER THAT, BUT I WAS UNEASY. A MINUTE OR two later I called his cell and told him that I just wanted to make sure he was all right. He said he’d be fine, thanked me for my concern, and promised to call me again later.
Adam Yeager’s death would be worth looking into. I hooked up my laptop and tried to find him in the Social Security Death Index, but he wasn’t in it. That index began in 1937. Since he wasn’t in it, it was possible he was dead before 1937. Or at least not earning wages. I supposed prisoners might not have had Social Security numbers at that point.
I decided to do more research when I got back to the paper.
Thinking about Max made me think about the days when we first met. Here we were, two decades later, and he still didn’t know if his parents were the people who had been found in the trunk of that car. That in turn made me think of all the other unanswered questions I had about the night Corrigan had been attacked and the Ducanes murdered. I decided I’d go through the notes O’Connor had made. Maybe after all this time, giving it a fresh look, I’d see something we had missed before.
Opening the box marked “Jack” brought a flood of memories. At first, it was difficult to concentrate on the task of studying the contents rather than to sit reminiscing about those early days of working with O’Connor.
I came across the photo of Betty Bradford, she of the pink underwear, owner of the buried Buick. Jack Corrigan had been set up by her, and nearly died as a result. “I wonder if you’re still around,” I said aloud. She looked to me now as she had the first time I had seen this photo — pretty woman, young but hard-edged — although now thought I perceived a little insecurity beneath the cool.
I kept searching. I came across a set of O’Connor’s notebooks I hadn’t seen before. They ranged over a number of years. I smiled to myself. If I had seen them in 1978, I probably wouldn’t have known enough of his shorthand and code to figure them out. I glanced through the first few and saw that they were devoted to one story: the events connected to that night in January 1958.
They began not with Corrigan’s beating, as I had thought they might, but with O’Connor meeting Dan Norton at the home of Katy and Todd Ducane. His notes brought to mind the day we had toured the house with Max, and I wondered if Lillian still kept it as a museum.
I glanced at my watch and decided I needed to get my ass back to the paper. I’d have to live with Ethan and his gloating over the Harmon story, with Lydia and her anger. I had work to do.
I fed the dogs and Cody and hurried out. Overhead, gray clouds thickened, and darkened the sky. I went back in and grabbed an umbrella.
As I drove, O’Connor’s voice echoed in my thoughts. I missed that old man as much as I missed my own father. Perhaps because of Ethan’s story, a memory came to me — of the night he told me about his missing sister.
I slowed the car a little, but kept driving.
By the time I reached the paper, rain was falling. I hurried inside.
My plans were twofold: to spend some time reading up on the Ducanes, and to look back at the articles O’Connor wrote about Harmon.
The presses were already running, sending their pulse through the building. As I climbed the stairs, I half-hoped Lydia would be gone for the day, then decided that was not only extremely unlikely, but showed a
sad lack of courage on my part.
When I got up to the newsroom, she was arranging furniture, helping Ethan move his desk nearer to her own. She saw me right away. She ignored me after that.
I went down to the morgue, as much to get away from the newsroom again as to do some homework. Hailey was there, but she was focused so intently on whatever she was reading, I didn’t disturb her. The rumble of the presses was a little louder here. I found it soothing.
I asked the librarian to get microfilm for specific dates in 1936, 1958, and1978.
“The 1978 reels — I’ve got them right here. Haven’t had a chance to file them again.”
“Again?”
He sighed. “That asshole Ethan — you know him?”
“Yes.”
“He’s in here looking through back issues all the time. Pesters the hell out of me.”
“He was probably doing background work on the Harmon story.”
The librarian shrugged. “Maybe. Seems to be an old news epidemic. Hailey has the reels for 1936 over there,” he said.
Hailey looked up at that, apparently only then noticing my presence. “I’m working on the story about Helen Swan,” she said. “I’ve already called her to set up a time for an interview. I’m going over to her house on Monday night.”
“Good. She was married to Jack Corrigan, you know. She used to teach journalism at the university.”
She knew nothing of her, I realized, other than what she had just read — but at least she already had an admiration for Helen from the stories she found in the old issues of the News. I gave her a quick rundown of the News Express staff, at least what I knew of it. “I didn’t get to know many of the people who worked here before I came to the paper in 1978,” I said.
“What happened to Wildman?” she asked.
“Killed in a car accident,” I said. “He was drunk. Family in the other car didn’t make it, either.”
“That really sucks.”
“Yes.”
She let me have the reels for April 1936, near the date of O’Connor’s childhood story “What I Saw in the Court.” I looked back a few weeks before the beginning of his first diary and came forward. It didn’t take long to find it, big and bold across the front page. An A-1 headline, as befit a story written by Jack Corrigan, the star reporter of the Express. I imagined an eight-year-old Irish kid shouting the headline from a street corner:
