Gone to Dust

by Matt Goldman

  It was a cheap trick but it worked. “I know it’s a terrible time, Mr. Somerville. I just want a few minutes.”

  “All right,” he said. “A few minutes.”

  I shed my down puffer and removed my shoes, then Somerville led me toward the back of the house and into a sunroom that was more of an attached greenhouse. The walls were made of glass and covered in foggy condensation—I couldn’t see outside. Plants poured out of their pots. Lettuces, tomatoes, peppers, and onions grew in raised planting beds. A hot tub made of wood that looked like half a barrel simmered in the corner. Steam swirled off the water’s surface—the humidity suddenly made sense. Somerville sat in a wicker chair and invited me to do the same.

  “What can I help you with?” he said, not friendly, but not unfriendly either. I just seemed to be another piece of business Maggie’s death had forced him to deal with.

  “Listen,” I said. “I know this sucks. You’ve probably already been questioned and re-questioned by the police and then the insurance company, so some of this is going to be a repeat. I’m just trying to find out what happened, and I know you want that, too.”

  He nodded.

  “Do you have any idea who could have done this?”

  “No,” he said. “Maggie was friendly and likable. We had our differences, mostly on how we chose to live our lives, but she was a good person and a good mother. She was easygoing and liked everybody and everybody liked her. That’s what’s so shocking. Some people have a hardness to them, you know? They take themselves too seriously and get worked up about this or that and you can at least imagine how something could have escalated. But not with Maggie. If anything, she erred on the side of not taking enough seriously: politics, the environment, our kids’ education. She was happy going with the flow, not questioning anything. Kind of like she was along for the ride.”

  “I’m sorry to ask this, but when you’re married to someone like that, how does the marriage get strained to the point of divorce?”

  Robert Somerville looked down at his bare feet. “It got strained because I wanted something she didn’t care about.”

  “Which was?”

  “A loving marriage.” He looked back up but not at me. “I don’t tell many people this because it doesn’t make me look good, but I married a woman who didn’t love me.”

  “Did you know it when you married her?”

  “Not at the time, no. I just assumed she loved me because she said she did. I didn’t look at the relationship with a critical eye. I guess when I was twenty-two, I was so happy to be with Maggie I didn’t want to see the facts right in front of my face.”

  “Which were?”

  “What I said. Maggie wasn’t in love with me. She never called me. I always called her. She never wrote me a note. She never initiated sex. She never bought me a serious gift. I didn’t give a shit in a materialistic way, but, you know, it is the thought that counts. And she expressed her thoughts by buying me gag gifts.”

  “That’s strange.”

  “Right? A ridiculous sweater I’d never wear or an incredibly ugly painting I’d never hang up.”

  “Like a velvet Elvis?”

  “Close. A velvet clown. And a velvet dog wearing a tuxedo. And stupid desk accessories like a mug that said ‘You don’t have to be crazy to work here but it helps!’ I own a fucking company—there is no scenario where that mug’s going on my desk.”

  Robert Somerville wanted to talk. I wasn’t about to get in his way.

  “And the real kicker was when the kids were born. That’s when it hit me because then I saw Maggie love someone. You know, real love. And even though romantic love and how you love your kids is different, it shouldn’t be that different. When she was away from the kids, Maggie thought about them. They were in her heart. When she was away from me, it was like I didn’t exist. And once I realized that, I guess I just stopped trying. And got resentful. And then it was like every other shitty marriage where you choose to see the bad in the relationship instead of the good.”

  “Yeah, I know,” I said, even though I didn’t. That wasn’t my marriage or anything close to it. My marriage ended like Romeo and Juliet’s but with self-preservation and independence substituting for the poison and rapier.

  “I thought Maggie might not be capable of romantic love—it just wasn’t in her DNA,” he said. “Maybe I was rationalizing—I don’t know.… But I think she fell pretty hard for that guy she was seeing.”

  “Andrew Fine?”

  “Yeah. She was in love with him. Or his money. But she was in love. The kids definitely felt it. They were like, ‘What’s up with Mom? She’s all happy and doesn’t listen to us anymore.’”

  “Do you think her love for Fine was really about money?”

  “Maggie liked nice things. Things I’ve never cared about. Not that I don’t spend money, I just care more about how energy-efficient my house is rather than who designed the fucking couch.”

  “She liked expensive furniture?”

  “Very. She asked for twenty grand for a couch. Ten for a chair. Another ten for the only painting that could possibly pull it together. It looked like regular Room & Board stuff to me. You know, good. But not over the top. It seemed to make her happy, though, so I gave her what she asked for.”

  “Do you know anything about Maggie seeing a man named Slim?”

  “No,” Robert laughed, “I’d remember that name.”

  The tear-stained woman poked her head in. “Robert. We can’t choose the flowers without you.”

  Robert said, “Be right there.”

  “I don’t want to take up any more of your time,” I said.

  “I appreciate that. We have a lot to do before the funeral on Thursday.”

  “Just a word of advice, if that’s cool.”

  “Of course.”

  “The Edina police are in way over their heads on this. Be careful around them.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t trust them. Not that they’re dirty or anything, they’re just little kids playing a big-kids’ game. They may push you hard or they may back off and watch you from afar. You know, just because of the statistics.”

  “What statistics?”

  “When a woman Maggie’s age is murdered, the murderer almost always turns out to be the husband or ex-husband or boyfriend. Edina PD is such a straightlaced actuarial bunch, you know, like stockbrokers with guns, they’re going to play the numbers rather than intuit anything intelligent.”

  “I know the type,” said Robert. “I got some of those guys on my board.”

  “If you don’t mind me saying so, you don’t seem like a business guy.”

  “I’m in the business of making the world a better place.”

  I liked Robert Somerville until he said that, but I’m glad he did. It made my job easier.

  “Well, like I said, just be careful around Edina PD.”

  “I will, thanks. I actually know one of them,” he said.

  “Which one?”

  “The chief. McGinnis.”

  “No shit. How do you know McGinnis?”

  “He’s been hitting up all the money in town for contributions.”

  “For what?” I shifted in my wicker chair. It squeaked.

  “Eleanor Nordahl. She’s going to run for governor. Wants to anyway. And she’s running as an independent so she’ll have to raise a ton of money.”

  “But she was elected Hennepin County Attorney as a democrat.”

  “And apparently she’s been a little too law-and-order. McGinnis says Nordahl doesn’t want to compromise her tough-on-crime stance to appease the DFL. That’s why she’s going to run as an independent.”

  I said, “McGinnis doesn’t seem like an independent kind of guy.”

  “No, not at all. There’s got to be something in it for him.”

  “My guess is Commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Public Safety.”

  “What is that,” said Robert, “like head of the state pa
trol?”

  “Head of all state law enforcement. Alcohol, gambling, traffic, licensing, everything. Minnesota’s top cop. It’s the governor’s most powerful appointed position. Even the state supreme court justices are elected.”

  “Sounds like McGinnis,” said Somerville, “securing himself a nice step up from Edina Chief of Police.”

  “So he’s hitting up everyone in town for money?”

  “Yeah. Really playing the independent card. Says Nordahl is a socially liberal financial conservative who’s tough on crime.”

  I smiled. “She wants to cut taxes and spend more on education, right?”

  “They’re all so full of shit,” said Robert. “Every damn one of them.”

  We shook hands, I bundled up and left Somerville’s rain forest and reentered the arctic. I jumped onto Highway 100 for a few miles, then drove east on 394. It was just after 3:30, but the afternoon sun had set low in the western sky and reflected orange and red off my rearview mirror. I snaked through Spaghetti Junction to 35W and, a few minutes later, exited on Stinson. Northeast Minneapolis is full of artists and musicians and wannabes. You can’t rent a place there without showing two forms of ID and three tattoos.

  Ansley Bell lived on the second story of a stucco upstairs-downstairs duplex on 3rd Street. I drove by it once and spotted someone sitting in a Camry with the motor idling, a huge cloud of exhaust condensing in the cold air behind him. I drove off, zig-zagged through the neighborhood, and returned fifteen minutes later. The man in the Camry was still there. Apparently, I wasn’t the only person wanting to talk to Ansley Bell.

  9

  The idiot in the Camry had no idea what he was doing. If Ansley Bell didn’t want to be found, he was helping plenty.

  I called Minneapolis PD and reported a suspicious-looking man idling in a Camry near a school bus stop. I had no idea where the school bus stop was, but I knew they were every few blocks so I couldn’t have been off by too far. Twenty minutes later, the man handed over his license to a cold and pissed off Minneapolis uniform while I walked unnoticed into the alley behind Ansley Bell’s duplex.

  I’d been in my share of prewar, two-story duplexes in this town. Most had one front door and one back door. Inside each door was a small foyer and in each foyer a door led to the downstairs unit and a staircase to the upstairs unit. I opened the rear exterior door—it was unlocked. I took off my shoes, left them in the foyer, then climbed a narrow staircase that had been retrofitted with a vinyl floor of raised dots so it appeared to be made of giant Legos. At the top, I faced Ansley Bell’s rear door. I knocked. No one answered.

  I don’t have a college degree but I’ve made up for it by studying a rare field called Useful Shit. First my police-academy training and then, during my business’s slow times, I completed my imaginary degree with courses in digital photography, emergency medical response, and the fine art of locksmithing. All useful in the course of doing my job but none more than the latter. Ansley Bell’s back door was protected by Kwikset locks, one in the door handle and one dead bolt. They should be called Kwikpick locks—I was inside in under a minute.

  The back door led into the kitchen, which was lit only by the bulb in the range hood. The place didn’t look like the home of a twenty-six-year-old. Nothing from IKEA. Nothing visibly secondhand. A Wolf four-burner range. Mauviel copper pots hanging from a rack. A full block of Wusthofs on the counter. I continued into the dining room. A solid walnut dining table with matching chairs sat under an art deco chandelier made of hanging crystal prisms, the bulbs of which were dimmed and glowed an orangish gold. In the living room, a deep leather sectional faced the fireplace and a sixty-inch flat-screen TV hung over the mantel. The area rugs were newer and expensive looking. Something felt familiar but I couldn’t peg what.

  A radiator knocked and steam pulsed inside it. I checked the thermostat: seventy-two degrees. Not the setting of someone sticking to a tight budget, especially in an old building with single-paned windows, leaky storms, and poor insulation. Seventy-two degrees meant that either Ansley Bell could afford to keep her apartment warm while she was away or she left in a hurry or she hadn’t left at all.

  I heard the front door open downstairs and then footsteps. They seemed to be coming from below me rather than heading up the stairs. The old wooden-framed building, with its winter-dried tongue-and-groove flooring, creaked when you looked at it. I walked close to the walls to minimize the sound of my own footsteps and paused when reaching the hallway. I poked my head in and looked each way. There were two bedrooms, one on each end, and a bathroom in-between. The doors were closed, and no lights were on. I stepped into the hallway when a phone rang. It sounded like a cell phone from the bedroom down to the right. It rang three times, then stopped.

  “Hello,” said a raspy feminine voice from behind the closed door. “Yeah, but that’s okay. What time is it?” Sheets and blankets ruffled. “Shit. I slept for twelve hours.” I heard a click and a creak, then a wedge of light slipped under the bedroom floor.

  I backpedaled along the wall. I was almost all the way through the living room when the voice said, “I’ll jump in the shower and meet you at six.” I hastened my pace as I neared the dining room. “No, no. That’s plenty of time. See you there.” I continued into the kitchen and heard footsteps in the hall. The footsteps stopped. The shower started then a toilet lid flipped up. Half a minute later it flushed, then I heard metal rings dragging on a metal rod. She was in the shower.

  I darted along the baseboards back through the dining room and living room and peeked into the hall. The bathroom door was open—the light from within flooded into the hallway. Water hit the tile in uneven waves and slaps. I knew I had a few minutes so I slid into the hallway and down to the bedroom. An iPhone lay on the nightstand. It hadn’t put itself to sleep so I grabbed it, opened the settings app, and went to the Phone icon and found the item “My Phone.” Using my iPhone, I took a picture of the phone number, navigated to the Facebook app, and went to the phone owner’s page.

  Ansley Bell. An olive-skinned beauty with pronounced cheekbones, caramel eyes, twenty-eight friends, and her privacy settings cranked to invisible. A selfie of Ansley and Maggie Somerville. A picture of Ansley standing next to a red Subaru Outback with a giant green bow on the roof. I closed Facebook and opened her e-mail. ansley.bell@umn.edu. E-mails from professors and students with the same @umn.edu. Ansley appeared to be studying medicine at the University of Minnesota. The other e-mails were the usual blast of ads. Williams-Sonoma, Anthropologie, Groupon, and a deluge from the Minneapolis Star Tribune. She had several recent missed calls and voice mails, a couple from Edina PD. How come no one under thirty answers their phone? I took a picture of her Favorites in Contacts. The top name belonged to Maggie Somerville. I opened the Find My Friends app on my phone and added Ansley’s e-mail address. Her phone received the request to let me find Ansley and I accepted it. I went to the home screen, set down her phone, and crept back the way I’d come.

  A garage in the alley behind Ansley’s duplex had a service door with a joke of a lock. Ansley’s red Subaru was parked inside. It was free of snow but the garage floor was wet.

  I walked around front. The man in the Camry was still parked in the same spot where the police had questioned him. That confirmed he was a private investigator, and a lazy one at that. I didn’t know who he worked for and I didn’t really care. I just wanted him out of my way. I walked back to the Volvo, opened my glove compartment, and grabbed a little brass contraption that looked like a tire valve stem. It cost three bucks but made me feel a hell of a lot less guilty than slashing rubber. I knelt by the dick’s rear passenger tire and, hidden by the Camry’s exhaust cloud, removed the tire’s valve cap and screwed on its replacement. I returned to my car and drove around back to the alley and waited. Twenty minutes later, Ansley Bell pulled out of her garage. I tailed her out of the alley, around the corner, and down 3rd Street where she drove right in front of her duplex. The dick must have had a descripti
on of her car, because as Ansley drove by, he pulled out to follow but stopped after twenty feet. In my rearview mirror, I saw him get out of his car, run to the back passenger side, and throw his arms in the air as if he were in a comic-book panel.

  I tailed Ansley into the North Loop District downtown. She valeted her car at the Monte Carlo across from the Colonial Warehouse. I found a meter around the corner on Washington—tail jobs and valet parking don’t mix.

  The Monte Carlo is deep and narrow with a high ceiling finished with tin tiles. The bar sits in front where you enter, the dining room behind it. Behind the bar, six glass shelves filled with liquor bottles rise to the ceiling. The liquor bursts with color from a backlit glass wall. The dining room boasts red leather booths, dark floral wallpaper, and sconces. It’s the kind of place you go for an old-fashioned and chicken potpie on a cold winter night. The menu says it opened in 1906 and, over a hundred years later, the place feels old and new at the same time. It’s as if when they first decorated they bought ten of everything, and each decade, instead of remodeling, they just replaced every leather booth, light fixture, the wallpaper, and the carpet with a brand-new version identical to the last.

  The hostess grabbed two menus then walked Ansley Bell and her friend to their booth. The friend was a tiny woman, about thirty years old and four-feet-ten-inches high. She had short brown hair and wore cat-eye glasses and a short-waisted, vintage baby blue cardigan with something pearly embroidered into it. I hung up my coat and found a seat on the near corner of the bar so I faced the dining room. Until then, I hadn’t seen Ansley Bell’s face in person. I doubted my earlier assumption that she was olive skinned. From thirty feet away, she appeared half Caucasian, half African-American. She had long, curly dark hair, a narrow nose, and full lips. I only took my eyes off her to meet the bartender’s. I ordered a Redbreast neat and a New York strip with garlic mashed potatoes. My phone buzzed. It was Ellegaard.

  “Hey,” I said. “Anything new?”

  “No, but I just got a call from Gabriella.” Gabriella Núñez attended the Minneapolis Police Academy with Ellegaard and me. Now she was a big deal in the Minneapolis PD with her own office and parking spot and a golden eagle on her dress blues. “She said they got a call from a private investigator. Wouldn’t say who he was working for. He was staking out Ansley Bell’s apartment, and thought the police might want to know that someone called Minneapolis PD to harass him, and then someone else, or maybe the same person, let the air out of his tire. Said he spotted Ansley Bell’s car but couldn’t pursue because of the flat. This someone had screwed a tire deflator onto his rear passenger tire. He also mentioned that someone following Ansley in an old Volvo didn’t seem to have his troubles.”