Death of a Washington Madame (7 page)

The fact was that Gail had pushed a button that had gotten
Fiona riled far beyond the issue itself. There was more to it than met the eye.
For her own reasons Gloria was not being cooperative, obviously withholding
information for her own secretive purposes. This seemed obvious. Normally,
Fiona would have expected Gail and her to share the same observations.
Information, after all, was the heart's blood of investigation. Information
withheld was obstruction.

The truth was that, so far, Fiona's detective instincts
leaned toward the obvious, that Mrs. Shipley's murder was, most likely, a crime
perpetrated by a drug crazed amateur looking for cash or something that could
be easily converted into cash. Building on that assumption, Fiona speculated
that the perpetrator knew that works of art and mementos were not easily
fenced, were probably traceable and, therefore, valueless. There was also
little to be found in the way of media equipment, stereos, recent model televisions
or other electronic gadgets that could be easily disposed of for quick cash.

Having no experience of this kind of household or
lifestyle, the perpetrator might have been frustrated by the lack of these
items, compounded by the fact that he was unable to find cash in the woman's
pocketbook. He probably raped her in anger, killed her in outrage, then took
off. It was, Fiona knew, a clichéd theory, but, more often than not, a
reasonable assumption.

"I'm trying to be cooperative, Miz FitzGerald,"
Gloria said, having seen the friction between Fiona and her partner.

"I have to cover all the bases, Gloria. Perhaps you
need time to think about this. I'd suggest you do and we'll certainly talk
again."

Gloria nodded.

Fiona studied the woman's face. At that moment, her
formidable air of protection of her late employer seemed impregnable.

"I'll be right here Miz FitzGerald."

"Here?"

She was almost militantly emphatic, which was puzzling.
Fiona hadn't thought about where Gloria and Roy would live now that Mrs. Shipley
was gone. She had simply assumed the house would revert to Mrs. Shipley's
estate and be disposed of according to her official behest.

Perhaps, Fiona speculated, the murdered woman had made
arrangements for the two to stay on and provided them with the income for
maintenance. It was a matter that seemed too delicate to be brought up at the
present time.

"Well then Gloria," Fiona said as she and Gail
prepared to leave the room. "We'll know where to find you."

Flanagan's boys had discovered plenty of latent fingerprints
and Fiona speculated that these clues might lead to a fingerprinted juvenile
with a long rap sheet who would be easily identified, with an arrest sure to
follow. Unfortunately, this was a high profile case, as Madeline Newton had
contended, sure to be spread over the media and interpreted as a manifestation
of the crime epidemic that the police were, allegedly, powerless to stop.

"Ragtime?" Fiona asked Gail, trying, with a spin
of gender joking, to jolt her out of her long pout as they drove back to
headquarters.

"Must you?" Gail muttered.

"Considering the wild eruption, it does have a certain
logic."

"With you it's either hormonal or political,
Fiona."

"And with you Gail? What the devil is going on?"

"I think you were a little patronizing with Gloria
Carpenter," Gail said.

The comment took Fiona by surprise. She cut a puzzling
glance at Gail.

"Patronizing?"

"Like you were talking to a darkie on the old
plantation," Gail said.

"Are you serious Gail?" Fiona asked, knowing she
was, but hoping she wasn't.

"That's the way it struck me," Gail said. Then
after a long pause with unmistakable intent: "Sergeant."

"Sergeant?"

"You couldn't possibly understand," Gail
murmured.

Fiona turned away before answering, going over in her mind
the full impact of her intent. It was unmistakably racial. The dreaded dragon
rises from the mud, Fiona thought, hating the implication and fearing its
consequences to their relationship.

"Sorry," Fiona said, hoping she might deflect the
obvious. "I don't see it that way. I see no violation in method, protocol
or sensitivity. Frankly your attitude is puzzling ... officer."

Gail shrugged.

There was an undercurrent here that she had best avoid. Let
it ride, she decided. Maybe the dreaded dragon would return to the slime and go
back into hibernation.

They drove to headquarters in silence.

As Fiona had expected, the television news and the
newspapers were filled with the story of the murder. As if in revenge for the
manner in which Madeline Newton treated him, the Eggplant was quoted as saying
that Mrs. Shipley was probably raped. The headlines in the press were, as
Madeline Newton predicted, lurid and sensational.

Old pictures of Mrs. Shipley at the height of her glory
were displayed. There she was with Presidents and royalty, just as Roy had described it. There was an irony, too, in the fact that there were more pictures
of her more famous daughter-in-law in the coverage than of victim.

The stories filled in more details of Mrs. Shipley's
earlier background. Her father had been in the auto parts business in Ohio, had sold his business after his wife had died and come to Washington as a Roosevelt appointee in the NRA. He had bought the house on 16th Street and died sometime
after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. Mrs. Shipley had married young William
soon after. He was subsequently sent overseas and reported missing and presumed
dead in 1944.

Mrs. Shipley stayed on in Washington and eventually
established herself as one of Capital's prime hostesses in the fifties, sixties
and seventies after which, she began to fade into obscurity until her son
William, jr. became interested in politics, serving first as a Congressman from
Northern Virginia for three terms, then as Governor of Virginia.

Even in citing Mrs. Shipley's background, the media was
less than expansive. They seemed far more interested in the life of her
daughter-in-law, Madeline Newton, her marriages, her movies, even her political
views.

In the next few weeks, Fiona expected, the tabloid press
would have a heyday and the speculation about Mrs. Shipley's murderer would, as
Madeline predicted, reach accelerating levels of absurdity.

The day after the murder, Hal Perry woke her early. He was
calling from Indonesia.

"You're famous," he said. "Your boss was
quoted in the Post as saying he had his best team on the case. Named
names."

"News sure travels fast."

"Over modems, Fi. The globe has shrunk to the size of
a pea."

"Did they spell my name right?"

"On the money," he said. "By the way I love
you."

"And me you."

"This is crazy, me being so far away."

"And me in bed here. This is where you should be.
Locked in my arms."

"That's where I want to be. You can make it happen,
Fi. Say the word. I'll send the jet. We can get married in China."

"I thought you were in Indonesia."

"We just took off."

"When will you be back?"

"Can't say for sure. There's only one certainty I live
with. My love for you. We have to put it on the front burner, Fi."

She knew what that meant, the finality of resolution and it
frightened her.

"We'll certainly discuss it," she said, hoping it
would suffice to placate him temporarily.

"Will you catch the bad guy, Fi?"

"Absolutely," she said.

They talked some more, she steering the conversation to
less controversial areas than their joint future. She hung up. With a force of
will, she quickly filled her mind with speculations about Mrs. Shipley, her
brutal murder and the people who surrounded her.

"Evidence of semen," Dr. Benson said, his hands
folded in a Cathedral as he peered through them to look at Fiona with his blue
eyes. His Louisiana heritage, he called it, the result of a Frenchman passing
through the Bayou. "Rape is a logical conclusion."

They were having coffee and bagels in his office. Gail was
doing follow-up calls in the squad room.

"Before or after she was killed?" Fiona asked.

"It would be pure speculation. I believe the events
were too close together to call. The woman was stabbed only four times, but the
carotid artery in the neck was the fatal blow."

"She was seventy-seven," Fiona said.

"And well preserved," he said. She knew him well
enough to understand his delicate allusions, which sometimes told her more than
his analysis in technical terms.

"Does that mean you think she still had an active sex
life?"

"I can't speculate about her behavior. Only about the
possibility. She could, indeed."

"At seventy-seven?"

He shook his head and offered a thin smile.

"Most people have no understanding about the aging
process. The body can exercise the venery for a much longer time than young
people think." He hesitated a moment and grew reflective. "It's a
question of inspiration."

"And, for the male, Viagra."

"Ah yes, Viagra. They say it might work for women as
well." He hesitated. "Although I would speculate from a careful
analysis of the remains that Mrs. Shipley had no such need. I would say her
organs were in very good shape and capable of excellent function in that
regard."

"But you did say rape."

"I said it was a logical conclusion. I also said there
was evidence of semen. A DNA match would confirm the perpetrator."

"If found."

He nodded and shrugged. His work had made him a skeptic and
sometimes cynic. From his perspective, poking around in dead humans, many of
them murder victims, he had reason for cynicism. He was in his late fifties and
had lost his wife of thirty years, the love of his life. He had lived alone in
the house they had shared. As far as she had observed, he hadn't the remotest
interest in involving himself in another relationship.

"Logical conclusion." Fiona murmured. "It
has an air of speculation."

"There were, indeed, signs of forced entry, signs of
trauma in the vaginal tissues. I'll skip all the technical jargon, Fi. She was
not a willing participant. Ergo rape."

Dr. Benson leaned back again and made his trademark
cathedral, studying Fiona through the finger slats.

"But you could have got that in one telephone call,
Fi. There's more isn't there?"

"Don't be so smug, Doctor. I've dropped clues like
flower petals at a wedding. I called you at seven a.m. Brought in breakfast for
us both, a clear tip-off that I was here for a heart to heart. And here we are
talking about sex."

"Rape isn't about sex, Fi," Dr. Benson said.

"I know. I was referring to my own situation. And it
is, at least partially, about the sex."

"I've noted the definite article, Fi."

"That part deserves the definite article, Doctor. It's
the less physical parts of the relationship that give pause. She sighed and
shook her head. "It's Hal Perry, my new friend. I told you about
him."

"With great enthusiasm, I recollect."

"You've heard all this before, I know."

"But this is different, right?"

"Don't trivialize, Doctor. I'll grant you that all
this comes from the same root ... the need to pair. Just because you were lucky
once, doesn't mean this is the fate of all."

Both knew that this was gentle sparring. His advice was
always on target, including the hardest part, a subtle suggestion that she
might be wise to ponder the long term effects of this or that proposed union.
He never pressed the point, only mused aloud modestly intoning that "he
was not as good with the living as he was with the dead".

"As you know, he's a former General and he is mounting
a massive offensive to gain my hand in marriage." She waved her hand
around his office. "He wants to take me away from all this. All this blood
and violence, chicanery, hypocrisy, deception. In that role, I would be the
chatelaine of his various houses, the powerful sucked up to corporate
wife."

"Sounds intriguing," he said, unmaking his
cathedral and sitting up. He buttered his bagel, took a bite and sipped his
coffee.

"It is."

"But is it love?"

"I think so."

"If it's love Fiona, you don't think. It's like
religion, an irrational certainty."

"Maybe I'm too cerebral. Or do I prize my independence
beyond reason?"

"Now there's an obvious rationalization, Fiona. In
love, you give up your independence willingly, gladly."

"You're a pathetic romantic, Dr. Benson. Somehow it
seems incongruous with pathology."

"Not at all. It reveals the same certainties. Bones
and tissue can't lie."

"Are you suggesting that I'm lying to myself?"

"Not you Fiona. I'd say you weren't, if you'll pardon
the expression from a medical examiner, dead certain."

A protest, Fiona knew, would be irrelevant. He knew she had
come to him for honesty and wisdom. Dead certain, she mused. Yes, she wanted
Hal Perry, wanted to be in his arms, wanted him nearby, wanted to share his
life. But she also wanted him to share hers, this life, which put her between,
as they say, a rock and a hard place.

"Have you considered split shifts?"

"I have. He hasn't. Oddly enough, it's not the work I
do. Unlike others who caught my affection, he has bought my explanation. He
truly understands the why of it. That's not the relevant issue. If I were a
cabinet minister, a rocket scientist, a lavatory attendant or even a
pathologist. It wouldn't matter. He wants me ... there. With him."

"Can you blame him?"

"That would be the last thing I could do," Fiona
sighed.

"He's right, you know," Dr. Benton said. "In
my view, marriage requires proximity."

"Why can't you read tea leaves instead of ... dead
people?"

She popped the last chunk of her bagel into her mouth and
washed it down with coffee.

"I wish I could, Fi."

At that moment, the telephone rang. He picked it up.

"Yes, Gail. It's confirmed. She's right here."

He handed her the phone.

"Weird call, Fi." So she was back on Fi, which
was encouraging. "Roy, the faithful retainer. Says he's caught the
killer."

"What?"

"I'm quoting verbatim. He has him locked in Mrs.
Shipley's wine cellar."