“I thought maybe just a—”
“Follow me,” she mumbled.
We walked down a short hallway to a waiting room. On the walls were photographs of the interior of some of the buildings that housed the inmates.
“This is as close as you’re gonna get. They’re called roundhouses, by the way.”
Hundreds of cells, four stories high, lined the walls inside each of the roundhouses. In the center of the floor was a three-story watchtower where someone inside had a clear view inside all the cells. It was impressive.
“Seen enough?” she asked.
“Yes, thank you.”
She directed us from behind until we got back to the guardhouse, where we picked up our IDs and signed out.
“Nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there,” Tymon said with a smirk.
Joliet Correctional Center was a much older prison and not at all like Stateville—no concrete wall surrounding it and just one building on a much smaller piece of property. An armed guard greeted us inside the main door. We went through the same drill and were ushered into a waiting room.
After waiting a full hour, the young man came back with the piece of paper I had given him with Berghorn’s name and possible years as an inmate. On it he had written JULY 5, 1943 TO FEBRUARY 2, 1958.
We were led back to the reception area where we picked up our IDs, signed out, and exited the building.
I skipped down the walk leading to the parking lot. I could hear Tymon behind me laughing.
Elmer Edward Berghorn had spent fourteen-plus years in prison for tax evasion, embezzlement, money laundering, and bribery. Looked to me like the Joliet Correctional Center deserved a failing grade in rehabilitation.
THIRTY-THREE
The No. 54 Bus
The first thing I did when I got home from our prison road trip was add some dates to my timeline to make sure everything fit.
Nov 10, 1939
Anna buys the boardinghouse
Jun 14, 1940
Berghorn gets his law license
Jan 4, 1942
Fern is born
Fe 14, 1942
Berghorn marries Hazel Osgood
June, 1942
Berghorn’s son Warren is born
Jun 28, 1942
I am born
Jan 23, 1943
Anna is murdered
Jan 24, 1943
Al leaves the boardinghouse
May 29, 1943
Minnie buys the boardinghouse
May/Jun, 1943
Henry and Elmer plot to rob O’Gowan
June 6, 1943
O’Gowan dies
June 6, 1943
Henry leaves the boardinghouse
Jul 5, 1943
Berghorn goes to prison
Feb 2, 1958
Berghorn gets out of prison
Mar 18, 1960
My parents die Elmer kills my parents!
Aug 10, 1964
I start working out of Elmer’s office
One possible scenario I envisioned was that Berghorn had been desperate for money after his son was born with a condition that was expensive to treat, so he embezzled money and didn’t pay his taxes. If he went to prison in July of 1943, that meant the Feds had probably been close to nailing him in the preceding months, and Berghorn knew it. That must have been when he got desperate enough to plan to rob O’Gowan.
I struggled with the ambivalence I felt toward Elmer—his doing bad things for a good reason. I couldn’t condone any of his wrongdoings, but I understood why he did them. Not only did I understand why, but I admired him for it. Somewhere along the line, he must have lost sight of the consequences of his actions.
I felt a moral obligation to turn him in for practicing law without a license, and I had all the information I needed to report him to the State’s Attorney’s office. But with most of his clients having been illegal immigrants with little to no rights, the consequences of his actions would likely have been greatly diminished. And I kept thinking about his son, who was better off with Elmer home to care for him than behind bars. My finger was on the trigger, but I was reluctant to squeeze it.
There were obstacles to consider with respect to getting him on other things. It would have been nice if Elmer’s fingerprints had been all over that photo he’d crumpled up and left behind when he broke into Minnie’s house. And as for my parents, so much time had passed, and the only strong evidence against him would be testimony from Henry—and how likely was he to make a statement against his own cousin?
I wasn’t sure what to do, and it wasn’t something I felt comfortable discussing with anyone else. My mind kept drifting to a place where I didn’t want it to go—doing something underhanded to make sure Elmer paid for what he’d done. Had I been certain of not getting caught, I might have given in to that temptation.
* * *
When Tymon came down to steal some coffee, I told him I was going to stake out the Baird & Warner real estate office for a couple of hours a day until I spotted Essie. It had been over three weeks since Essie had disappeared, and I was afraid if I let any more time pass, I’d never find her. He didn’t like the idea.
“I thought you said she doesn’t work there anymore.”
“Apparently, she doesn’t work at that location, but she could still work for them, and she still has old clients.”
“That’s a long shot don’t you think?”
“Maybe.”
“And you’ll be a sitting duck.”
“For who?”
“Berghorn.”
“I think he’s lost interest in me. As far as he knows, O’Gowan’s money is long gone.”
“And what if he’s after more than just the money?”
“Like what?”
“Wasn’t it you who decided there may be a secret room in the basement of your old house? And then when he busted in here that day and demanded you give him something, he didn’t say what, did he?”
“It was the money.”
“Maybe it wasn’t the money. Maybe it was the combination to the safe he found in that room in the basement.”
“Which I have.”
“You have what?”
“The combination to the safe.”
“Then that settles it. You’re not going.”
“And I see that neither are you.” I wanted to take back those words.
“I’ve been here this long...”
“What about the other guys?” They’d been there for three weeks. “I think it’s okay if we relieve them from their duty, don’t you?”
“C’mon. The poker games are great.”
He made me smile.
“Tell you what. I’ll do the daily stakeouts with you. We’ll bring sandwiches and eat lunch in the car every day while we watch the place.”
“A daily picnic.”
“Something like that. How will you know it’s her by the way? You’ve never even seen her, have you?”
“No, but Fern has, and she’s described her for me. And she doesn’t drive, so that’s another factor for narrowing it down.”
“Start tomorrow? Pick you up at eleven?”
“Okay.”
When Tymon left, for some reason I was close to tears.
As I sat there, I began to realize that maybe I did know why. I was twenty-three years old. I had no permanent place to live. No job. No real identity. There was an ex-con out there who might think I had something he wanted, and I had close to $125,000 in a safe deposit box and another $125,000 hidden somewhere in the house that was clearly not mine.
I had myself a good cry before tackling the laundry that had been piling up for three weeks and then looked forward to all that ironing.
* * *
Tymon and I were on our first stakeout together. We parked in a bank parking lot across from the Baird & Warner office in full view of their front door and the two nearest bus stops. Other than that, the landscape that held us captive was completely uninterestin
g.
I had packed a sandwich and bag of chips for each of us.
“What does she look like?” he asked.
“According to Fern, she’s quite plain—medium brown hair, wears modest clothes, sensible shoes, no makeup. But you must have seen her back in the day if she and Anna were friends.”
“People change. Look at me. I used to have a full head of dark, wavy hair.”
“A real Valentino then?”
“I could turn a head or two back then. Anyway…you have a receipt for this safe, and it’s dated when?”
“It was in either late 1939 or early 1940.”
“And the date on the basement build-out receipt?”
“A few months after Anna was killed. May, I think. May of 1943.”
“And when did Minnie buy the place?”
“Close to Memorial Day, 1943. What are you thinking?”
“I told you before there could have been a safe in Anna’s hidden room in the basement, and the timing would have been right that Anna bought it right after she bought the house. Your parents had the room in their basement built shortly after Anna died, and they could have moved the safe in there.”
“That makes my parents look like criminals.”
“On second thought, a floor safe couldn’t be easily maneuvered up and down a ladder. Those things are heavy.”
“How heavy?”
“I’m thinking since it was called a floor safe on the receipt, it’s got to be bigger than one you would set on a shelf or something. So it’s going to weigh at least a couple hundred pounds.”
“Could they have hoisted it up and down with a rope?”
“I suppose if they had the right equipment, but we’re talking a big deal here. That wouldn’t be something you could do without someone noticing.”
“Someone like Henry?”
“Someone like Henry.” He glanced at his watch. “It’s one-thirty, Gracie.”
“Okay. Let’s call it a day.”
* * *
Tymon and I were back in the Wells Fargo Bank parking lot at midday for the fifth day in a row, and there had been no sign of Essie. If the bank had had better security, they would have questioned what we were doing there every day by now.
On the positive side, the stakeouts had given us the chance to talk about every subject imaginable, and the more I got to know Tymon, the more I liked him. It had taken me a while, but now I was convinced he was just an all-around good guy, and it seemed such a shame he had been alone all his life.
On the drive back home, Tymon surprised me with his question.
“Do you trust me, Gracie?”
“Well, we’re living in the same house. You know more about me than anyone else on this earth. You have access to every room in the house. Yes, I think I can say I trust you.”
“Enough to tell me where you keep the combination to the safe without really telling me?”
What was he up to? We weren’t sure if there even was a safe, let alone where it was.
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why would I do that?”
“Because I asked you to.”
* * *
Early the next Saturday morning, not without hesitation, I put the combination to the safe in the cookie jar. When Tymon came down for his usual morning coffee, I told him to help himself to a cookie. He thanked me and left.
I was glad it was the weekend and that I had a break from our midday stakeouts. They took a big bite out of the day—three hours counting driving time. Still, I wanted to continue for another week, and Tymon hadn’t shown any reluctance, so that was going to be my plan.
The phone rang. I couldn’t imagine who would be calling so early—it was barely seven o’clock.
“Hello?”
It was Fern. She’d had an Essie sighting.
“I was coming into church after stupidly agreeing to manage a Saturday daycare room full of two- and three-year-olds when I saw her stepping onto a 54 bus.”
“Did you call after her?”
“She was too far away.”
“Are you sure it was her?”
“I know it was her. I recognized the dress she was wearing.”
“How long ago was this?”
“Not more than ten minutes ago. I came in here hoping to run into someone who could give me some information, like why she was here, but—wouldn’t you know it—no one is around right now.”
“You think she was in the church?”
“There are only two reasons you’d be at that bus stop on a Saturday: to come to this church or to come to the off-track betting parlor next door, and I’m quite sure she wasn’t betting on horses.”
“Fern, I gotta go. I have a hunch.”
“Okay.”
“What color dress was she wearing?”
“Beige with a wide black belt and black epaulets.”
“See ya!”
I jumped in my car before Tymon could catch me and headed for the Baird & Warner office, thinking she might go there next. I parked in our usual surveillance spot in the bank parking lot and waited. No sign of Essie.
After fifteen minutes of tapping my fingernails on the dashboard, I drove to Essie’s church and waited for a 54 bus to come by. When it did, I followed it so that I was familiar with the route. When the northbound bus turned east on Montrose, I figured that must have been the end of the line and it was going to turn around. According to the odometer, it had been four miles between the church where Essie had boarded the bus and the end of the line—four miles and thirteen stops.
I decided that little adventure had been a complete waste of my time. With that long of a route and that many stops, she could have gone anywhere. The only interesting thing was the route ended at Montrose Avenue, which was 4400 north. Minnie’s house was on Belle Plaine Avenue, which was 4100 north. Ha! She could have walked to my place from there.
Shit!
I drove as fast as traffic allowed, which was not fast enough. Why did all the slowpokes have to pick right now to be on the road? The giant maroon Buick in front of me was going slow enough to be in a funeral procession. Must have been an old man driving it. They get that way.
When I finally got home and drove down the driveway, I saw Tymon standing on the patio.
“She was here, wasn’t she?” I asked him after I jumped out of my car.
He nodded.
“How much did I miss her by?”
He glanced down at his watch. “Half hour.”
“Damn it!”
I ran back to my car.
“Where are you going?”
“To see if I can catch her before she gets on the bus.”
“Wait!”
I ignored his plea and barreled out of the driveway, almost sideswiping a parked car. It was five blocks to Cicero Avenue where she would get back on the bus, if that was even the bus she would take to wherever she was going. I kept my eyes peeled for her beige and black dress, but I didn’t see her anywhere. A ride around the neighborhood proved to be fruitless.
Tymon was still on the patio when I returned.
“Sit down,” he said pointing to one of the patio chairs. “I’ll tell you what happened.”
I plopped down next to him. “Lay it on me.”
“I was sitting right here when she walked up the drive, and as soon as she got within twenty feet or so, she must have recognized me, and she turned right around and ran off. I called out her name not knowing for sure it was even her. I yelled, ‘Please come back! It’s okay!’ But she was halfway down the block by the time I got to the sidewalk. I would have gone after her, but—”
“No, you did the right thing. You’d have scared her even more if you’d gone after her.”
“I’m so sorry, Gracie. I feel just awful that I—”
“Don’t feel bad. It wasn’t your fault. If I hadn’t rushed off like I did, I would have been here when she came and that wouldn’t have happened. I’m surprised she recognized you after all th
is time.”
“I am too, especially since during the three or so years I worked here, I saw her only occasionally. Why do you think she bolted like that?”
“I’m thinking she was expecting to see me here, and when she saw you, of all people, she probably couldn’t rationalize fast enough why you would be here, and she panicked.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You’ll never guess where I just was.”
“Where?”
“Fern called to tell me she just saw Essie get on a 54 bus outside of the church where Essie used to go. I thought knowing that bus route could be helpful in finding out where she is staying, so I jumped in my car to where she got on the bus and followed it.”
“And the reason she was on that bus was to come here.”
I hoped I didn’t look as foolish as I felt right then.
THIRTY-FOUR
The Floor Safe
I called Fern to tell her about the No. 54 bus escapade.
“It would be funny if it wasn’t so unfortunate. I wonder if she’s been scared off for good,” she said.
“God, I hope not. I could just kick myself. Now, even if I find out where she lives, I can’t approach her, at least not so soon after this happened. And the more time goes by, the less likely it is I’ll be able to find her. I really know how to screw things up!”
“Aw, don’t be so hard on yourself. You know, I’ve been thinking about this. When she and I had dinner that day, and she told me she had this secret that she was thinking of talking to Reverend Orman about, maybe that’s what she was doing before she got on that 54 bus. And maybe it was he who recommended she speak directly with you.”
“Makes sense, and I hope you’re right, because if you are, she may be back.”
“What’s next?” she asked.
“I don’t know. Essie is the only one I know with the answers.”
“No, she’s not. If I’m right, Reverend Orman has them too.”
“He’s not going to tell anyone, least of all me.”
“Maybe he would if he felt pressured to do so.”
Regarding Anna Page 24
