partial wall that served as the bed's headboard. I couldn't help but
notice that the lip balm on the nightstand was the same brand as my
own, the paperback novel one I'd read last year.
The back of the suite contained a marble-rich bathroom adjoining a
dressing area roughly the size of Memphis. Town-send wasn't kidding
about his wife's wardrobe.
Tara started flipping through the piles of folded clothes stacked
neatly into maple cubes. The hanging items looked work-related.
After she'd gone through the top two rows, Tara blew her bangs out of
her face again. "She tends to wear the same few things when she's
around the house, but the ones I can remember are all here. I just
don't know."
Townsend stood in the corner of the closet, seemingly distracted by a
pair of Animal Cracker print pajamas that hung from a hook. Tara was
unfazed by the moment's poignancy, or at least she did not let it halt
her determination. She was examining rows of shoes stacked neatly on a
rack built into the side of the closet. "Well, it looks like her
favorite black loafers are gone. Cole Haans, I think. But I can't
tell what clothes are missing; she's just got too much stuff."
She walked over to a Nordstrom shopping bag on the floor next to the
dressing table. She pulled out a red sweater, set it on the table, and
then reached back in and removed some loose price tags and a receipt.
"These are from yesterday," she said, looking at the receipt. "Town,
these are Clarissas, right?"
She had to repeat the question before he responded. "Oh, right, she
did mention something about that last night, I think."
"Can you tell anything from the tags?" Walker asked.
"No," Tara said. "Well, the brand name, but then it's just those
meaningless style names and numbers."
"Did anyone go shopping with her? We could find out what she bought
from them," I suggested. I knew I told Johnson I'd leave the questions
to them, but I couldn't help myself.
Townsend seemed to wake up for a moment. "I believe she went with
Susan, but "
"I'm sorry." Walker interrupted, holding up his pen and pad. "What's
Susans last name?"
Tara looked disappointed. "Susan Kerr, a friend of my sister. I've
already tried calling her, and all I got was the machine."
A store clerk would be able to determine from the item numbers what
clothes Clarissa purchased Saturday. It wouldn't be easy to get that
information at eleven o'clock on a Sunday night, but it was worth
trying.
"We'll track someone down from the store," I suggested, looking toward
Ray and Jack. "Can't we pull a number for someone at Nordstrom out of
PPDS?" The Portland Police Data System compiled information from every
city police report and was the handiest source for accessing an
individual's contact information.
Within a few minutes, Walker had the home telephone number of a store
manager mentioned in a recent theft case. A manager would not be
involved in your average shoplifting case, but this one had been
unusual. An employee at one of the local thrift stores had bilked
Nordstrom out of thousands of dollars in cash by taking advantage of
its famously tolerant return policy. The bureau estimated that every
Nordstrom brand dress shirt donated to the thrift store during the last
two years had been returned to Nordstrom stores for cash by either the
employee or one of her friends.
Hopefully the manager would be sufficiently grateful to the bureau for
cracking the case that he'd forgive us for calling him after ten
o'clock at night. Walker made the call on his cell to leave the
Easterbrooks' line open, just in case.
As it turned out, the Easterbrook phone rang just a few minutes later.
I found myself watching Townsend to see how he responded. Did he
really expect the caller to be Clarissa? Or did he act like a man who
already knew we wouldn't be hearing from her? So far he seemed legit,
if dazed. He hadn't made any of the obvious slipups, the ones you see
on Court TV: using the past tense, buying diamonds for another woman,
selling the wife's stuff, things like that.
Whoever was calling, it wasn't Clarissa. Listening to one side of the
conversation was frustrating. "I see.... Where was he? ... No, in
fact, she's ... missing" Townsend's voice cracked on that one. "The
police are here now.. .. Yes, that's terribly kind of you, if you
don't mind." Some more earnest thank-yous and a goodbye, and Townsend
set the phone back on its base.
"That was a fellow who lives a few streets down. He works with me at
the hospital. He and his wife were leaving the Chart House and found a
dog running in the parking lot with its leash on. It's Griffey."
Walker had reached the Nordstrom manager, who generously offered to
meet him at the store to track down what Clarissa Easterbrook had
purchased yesterday and was we hoped still wearing.
About fifteen minutes after Walker left, a voice similar to the one
that announces my e-mails at home declared, "Good evening. You have a
visitor." Ray was right. Creepy George Jetson house.
I looked out the living room window to see a man in his fifties
struggling to keep up with an excited yellow Lab dashing up the slope
to the front door, straining against the leash. A woman of roughly the
same age followed.
When Easterbrook opened the door, the Lab finally pulled free from his
temporary handler, dragging his leash behind him. He leaped on
Easterbrook's chest, nearly knocking him over. He was a sticky mess
from the drizzle, but you could tell he was a well-cared-for dog.
Townsend absently convinced Griffey to lie down by the fountain, though
the panting and tail thumping revealed that he was still excited to be
home.
A dog like Griffey probably had an advanced degree from obedience
school, unlike my dropout, Vinnie. Vinnie was actually expelled. Or,
more accurately, I was. When it became clear to the teacher that,
despite her instructions, I caved to Vinnie's every demand to avoid his
strategic peeing episodes, she suggested that I re-enroll my French
bulldog when I felt more committed to the process. Two years later,
Vinnie and I have come to mutually agreeable terms. He has a doggie
door to the backyard, an automatic feeder, and a rubber Gumby doll that
he treats like his baby, but if I don't come home in time to cuddle him
and hear about his day, there's hell to pay. Griffey, on the other
hand, appeared to do whatever Easterbrook told him.
Easterbrook introduced Griffey's new friends as Dr. and Mrs. Jonathon
Fletcher. I guess you have to give up both your first and last names
when you marry a physician. Dr. Fletcher's looks said doctor more
than Townsend Easterbrook's. In contrast with the flashy Expedition
and high-tech house, I noticed that the Fletchers pulled up in a Volvo
station wagon.
Mrs. Dr. Fletcher did her best to provide comfort. "I'm certain
Clarissa's just fine, Townsend. A misunderstanding, is all. We just
ha
ve to find her, and that's that. Now, when's the last time you saw
her?"
She made it sound like we were trying to track down a lost set of
keys.
"This morning," Townsend said. "She was still in bed. I had
back-to-back surgeries, and when I got home she was gone."
"Well, dear, I'm surprised you even get a chance to operate anymore.
Jonathon tells me how busy you are, developing the new transplant unit.
Sounds like that's going extremely well."
Apparently Mrs. Dr. Fletcher was so used to her job as
conversationalist to her husband's colleagues that she was slipping
into autopilot. Understandably, Townsend cut her off.
"Who knows? Still so much to do," he said. Translation: Who the fuck
cares about the hospital right now? "I didn't even realize Griffey was
gone until a couple of hours ago. When did you find him?"
"Right around ten," Dr. Fletcher said. "A group of us were leaving
our function at the Chart House, and this feisty fellow was running
around in the parking lot. Initially, everyone assumed he escaped from
one of the neighborhood yards or something. But then someone noticed
he was dragging a leash. Our friend went after him, figuring someone
had lost hold of him. When he checked the tag, what do you know? Our
own Griffey Easterbrook."
The Chart House sat just a couple of steep miles down from the
Easterbrook home. The elegant restaurant was located on the winding,
wooded section of Taylor's Ferry Road that ran from the modest
Burlingame neighborhood in southwest Portland, up about two miles to
OHSU, and then back down again into downtown Portland. Spectacular
views of the city made the route one of the most popular spots in the
area for walks, runs, and bike rides.
It was not, however, the safest place for a woman alone at night. About
a year earlier, two guys from the DA's office were taking a run there
after work. They heard what they thought was a couple goofing around
behind the bushes, a man wrestling his squealing girlfriend to the
grass. Fortunately, the woman heard them talking as they ran past and
yelled, "Help, I don't know him."
The bad guy got away, but the ensuing publicity had called the city's
attention to the potential dangers of the area. It was no longer
common to find women alone on the path after dark.
The Fletchers' discovery of Griffey there was not a good sign.
Johnson must've been thinking the same thing, because he decided to
revisit what I thought had been our mutual decision not to search the
Easterbrook/Jetson home. He pulled me aside while Townsend continued
the conversation with the Fletchers.
"I know we're playing it safe, but finding the dog changes the picture.
We need to go through the place now while he's still playing victim. If
we wait until a body shows, he might lawyer up."
I shook my head. "I still don't like it," I said. "Look at him he's a
basket case. Later on, his state of mind might kill any consent we get
from him. If, God forbid, her body does surface, we can easily get a
warrant, since this is her house. We won't need to have probable cause
against the husband."
"And what do we do about the fact that our doctor can move whatever he
wants and start dumping evidence the minute we're out of here?"
Johnson's point was well taken, but it wasn't enough to justify a
thorough search this early in the case. Not only could Townsend try to
throw out the search down the road, we'd pretty much be killing any
chance we had of continued cooperation from him. In any event, if
Townsend was involved in his wife's disappearance, he certainly could
have disposed of any incriminating evidence before calling the
police.
I explained my thinking to Johnson and proposed a compromise. "Why
don't you offer to take a look around to make sure there's no sign of a
break-in? I don't have a problem with you doing a general
walk-through; I just don't want a detailed search yet. If you check
for broken windows and the like, we can at least look for the obvious
and avoid any major fuckups."
"Okay with you if I ask him about it in front of his buddies?"
I gave a quick nod. If Townsend felt pressured to consent to a search
because his friends were around, so be it. Courts only care about
claims of involuntariness if the supposed coercion comes from law
enforcement.
Before Johnson walked away, I added, "We should also get people
searching up on Taylor's Ferry. Hopefully, by the time the department
has a search plan together, Walker can tell us what she might have been
wearing."
Griffey perked up when Tara came down the stairs, apparently satisfied
that nothing helpful was going to come from foraging through her
sister's closet. I'd already been positively disposed toward her based
on her obvious concern for her sister, and I warmed to her even more
when she found the energy to get down on the floor with her sister's
dog and comfort him with a bear hug.
After a few minutes spent on introductions to the Fletchers and the
inevitable words of comfort, Tara grew antsy again. "Griffey, up," she
commanded, pointing him toward the stairs. "Sorry, I can't sit still.
You mind if I throw him into the tub real quick, Town? He's a little
crunchy, and it'll give me something to do."
It was clear that Tara's nervous energy was grating on her
brother-in-law; he seemed more at ease once she'd followed Griffey to
the second floor and he could turn his attention back to the
Fletchers.
"I keep expecting the phone to ring, but I'm not sure exactly what kind
of call it would be; maybe a ransom demand or something. Obviously, I
want it to be Clarissa explaining that this is all a misunderstanding,
that she went with a friend somewhere and forgot to leave a note, and
Griffey just happened to get out.. ." He was just rambling. I didn't
point out that the leash suggested Griffey had not simply escaped from
the yard, but that someone had been walking him. Townsend would come
to the realization in his own time.
I was beginning to think that a ransom demand would be good news at
this point. At least it might indicate that Clarissa was alive.
"This lifestyle of ours," Townsend said, looking around. "Why does any
of it really matter? Maybe it just invites problems."
Johnson used the moment as his in to ask permission for the
walk-through. Consistent with everything else about the man, his
transition was smooth.
He started by asking Dr. Easterbrook if he'd ever noticed anything
that might suggest that someone was scoping out the house or following
them, perhaps planning a way to get to Clarissa by herself.
"No, nothing at all like that," Easterbrook replied. "This
neighborhood is so isolated up here. We hardly see anyone on our
street who doesn't live here."
"Can you think of anyone who has a conflict with you of some kind?
Someone who might be motivated to do something to scare you or
retaliate against you?"
"Why would
someone hurt Clarissa to get to me, detective?"
"Just exploring all possibilities, doctor. Maybe a disgruntled patient
from the hospital? A former employee?"
"No," Townsend said, slowly shaking his head. "Clarissa would
occasionally get some threats about her cases, but she always assumed
they were only blowing off steam. Never anything we considered
seriously. No one would want to hurt her. She's such a good
person."
"I was just exploring all the possibilities," Johnson repeated. "Come
to think of it, we should probably take a look around and make sure
there's no signs of a break-in, just in case. Do you mind?"
"Of course not, but I'm sure I would have noticed something earlier.
Given the security system, I don't see how anyone could have gotten
in."
"As long as you don't mind, I'll go ahead and check it out. No harm,
right?"
Johnson sidled off before anyone might want to stop him, and the
Fletchers seized the opportunity to extricate themselves from a
situation where they knew they couldn't be of much help. As they
launched into their goodbyes, feeding Townsend more premature
assurances that everything would be okay, I caught up with Ray. Truth
was, I didn't want to be alone with Townsend, struggling like the
Fletchers to avoid all those lame cliches this will all work out, only
a silly misunderstanding, and other completely useless pronouncements
suggesting the speaker had any clue as to how the night would end.
We hit the basement first. My basement is a dark, damp, dusty wreck of
concrete and cinder block that my imagination has populated with
thousands of spiders and their cobwebs. The Easterbrooks' had been
finished into a laundry room and a home gym that had better equipment
than my health club. Not only did we not find any bodies, blood, or
guts, there weren't even any windows to check. In place of the flimsy
things that are so often kicked in for basement break-ins, the
Easterbrooks had glass bricks.
Climbing back up the stairs, we could hear Townsend letting the
Fletchers out the front door, so we headed up to the second floor,
where Tara had Griffey in a bathroom off the main hallway. She was
fighting to get a dog brush through the hair on his hind leg.
Predictably, Griffey stood compliantly while Tara tried to avoid
pulling his entire coat off by the roots.
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