Dial M for Meat Loaf (18 page)

32

Sophie sat at the Washburn’s kitchen table, doodling on a piece of notebook paper. The morning had been spent with Bernice, taste-testing what she considered to be the twelve best meat loaf recipes. Bernice had baked them all in the past few days and then reheated them for Sophie’s evaluation. She’d also prepared small sandwiches of each. A cold meat loaf sandwich was part of the necessary equation.

To make the recipe selection easier, Bernice’s assistant had typed out every single submission on a separate sheet of paper, numbering them from one to nine hundred and seventy-eight. She’d sent the typed sheets to Bernice without the person’s name or address attached, just to keep everything on the up and up. It made the selection so much easier. Bernice didn’t have to read all the personal notes attached to the recipes or decipher hard-to-read handwriting.

Sophie expected the submissions to cover the gamut of what was being served today in American homes, but even she was amazed at the variety. She and Bernice lamented the fact that they hadn’t divided the contest into Best Traditional Meat Loaf, Best Ethnic Loaf, and Best Poultry Loaf. The only point that was non-negotiable for both of them was that a meat loaf should contain meat. Vegetarian loafs could be wonderful, but they didn’t qualify for the contest. That decision eliminated a good hundred and fifty recipes from contention, which was just fine with Bernice. After an exhaustive examination of the submissions, she didn’t care if she ever looked at another meat loaf recipe again. Most were fairly derivative, so she quickly pared the list down to thirty-six, then twelve, and this morning, they’d picked the best three.

After the final decisions had been made, Bernice phoned her assistant in Minneapolis and asked her to pull the winners’ names. In a matter of seconds, they had the results. First prize went to Sally Halverson of Two Harbors, Minnesota. Second went to Ronald Kellogg of Rochester. But the third prize was the kicker. Cora Runbeck of Rose Hill, Minnesota, had won with her recipe, “No-Nonsense Meat Loaf.”

Bernice wasn’t happy. As a matter of fact, for just a moment, Sophie could see her toying with the idea of throwing third prize to someone else. But her sense of fairness—and her appreciation for the ironic—finally won out. She asked her assistant to type up letters of congratulations to the winners.

As soon as she was off the phone, Bernice begged Sophie to take over for her, handle all the events the paper had planned to help celebrate the winning recipes. Bernice said her father was too ill for her to return to work right now. Besides, she couldn’t possibly deal with Cora Runbeck personally, not after everything that had happened. The powers that be at the paper might not like it, but nobody could make her do something she didn’t want to do! Her voice rose to an emotional crescendo. Sophie assured her she wouldn’t need to come in contact with Cora, that she’d handle it. By noon, Bernice had calmed down enough to drive over to the hospital. She needed to relieve her brother by twelve-fifteen.

And that left Sophie, sitting at the Washburns’ kitchen table, wondering if she’d made a big mistake. All morning, she’d been dying to tell Bernice what she’d learned—that her father was totally innocent of any wrongdoing. That Milton was the culprit and John was just trying to protect him. Sophie was positive now that Milton was the man she’d known as Morgan Walters. The snake tattoo cinched it. She’d simply jumped to the wrong conclusion when she’d found that snapshot. Instead of John, Milton had been standing with his arm around Mary. And he still had his arms around her.

Sophie wondered how long their secret romance had been going on. She guessed that John didn’t know about it; otherwise he wouldn’t be trying to protect his brother. She assumed that John knew about Milton’s past, and yet he clearly still loved him. Maybe, thought Sophie, he didn’t know everything.

On the scratch paper in front of her, she’d written three names. Laura, Viola, and Bliss. Three of Milton’s wives. Perhaps there were others. He had another wife in St. Louis, though Sophie didn’t recall her name or when they’d married—not that it mattered. Everything bad that had happened to the Washburns in the last month all came down to Milton. He was the bad penny. The manipulator. The bigamist. The murderer. He’d not only killed Kirby Runbeck, but possibly one or more of his wives. He was an evil man and he had to be stopped.

The one big question Sophie still had was, why had Kirby Runbeck blackmailed John instead of Milton? From what Bernice had said, Milton had far more money than his brother. More to the point, why not go straight to the man who had the most to lose? Why try to squeeze money out of a relative?

“Where’d you get those women’s names?” came a voice from behind her.

Sophie turned around to find Angelo standing by the sink. For such a big man, he had the stealth of a cat. Last she’d heard, he was on his way to the bank and would be gone most of the day. She’d met him for the first time at breakfast and could tell right away that he and Bernice were an item. They were an odd couple. Then again, it was a good thing physical attraction wasn’t limited to people with movie-star looks or nobody would have a sex life.

Angelo seemed like a nice enough guy, very solicitous of Bernice. Sophie was pretty sure he was the same man she’d seen across the street from the house two weeks ago, the night that she’d spent in Rose Hill because of the storm. The fact that he could have starred in
The God-father
gave him a menacing patina, although he was probably just an average guy with nothing dangerous about him.

He cracked his knuckles and repeated his question. “Where’d you get those names?”

“I didn’t hear you come in.”

“I’m light on my feet.” He poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down at the table. “I didn’t think you knew Bernice and her family all that well.”

“I don’t.”

“Then how come—” He stopped before he finished the sentence, his gaze dropping once again to the names on the scratch sheet.

In that instant, Sophie realized his question wasn’t just idle curiosity. He must have recognized the names. That meant he knew about Milton. When he looked up, she could see by the serious frown on his face that she was right. “You know, don’t you? About the bigamy. About all the rest.”

“Does Bernice?” he asked, his tone a mixture of eagerness and worry.

She shook her head.

“God, I’m so glad.” He hesitated for a few seconds, as if he wasn’t sure he should go on, then plunged ahead anyway. “This is going to kill her.”

“How long have you known?”

“I suspected the worst ever since Runbeck died. But I didn’t learn the details until this morning. I’ve been walking around for the last hour, wondering what I should say to Bernice—wondering if I should say anything at all. How did you find out?”

“I spent a night here at the house a couple of weeks ago.

While I was sitting in the living room, I came across an old snapshot of what I thought was John and Mary on their first anniversary. Except, I knew the man in the photo by another name. Morgan Walters. He was married to a woman named Laura. I recognized his face, as well as the tattoo on his left arm.”

“Tattoo?”

“A snake with a red eye.” She paused. “How did you find out?”

“I paid off Cora Runbeck to tell me what her husband had on Washburn. She still has the letters.”

“What letters?”

“The letters that the bastard wrote to a friend in prison. It’s all there. How he and this buddy of his robbed a bank in the late fifties. The friend got caught and sent to prision, but Washburn made off with two hundred thousand dollars. Then his many wives. Maybe even a murder or two.” He filled her in on all the details. “Runbeck must have discovered the letters and used them as blackmail. Cora’s holding on to them for dear life because she thinks they’re the only thing keeping her alive. She may be right. Somebody tried to kill her the other night. If Kirby had information on Washburn’s past, whoever killed him must have figured Cora had the same information.”

This was all news to Sophie. Clearly, she and Angelo had both discovered pieces of the puzzle, but neither of them had the entire picture.

Angelo took a sip of coffee, then set his cup down and pushed it away. “Bernice is so close to her dad. Always has been. She thinks of him as a saint. Well, I mean, until the last year when he went a little nuts with the vitamin pills. But that’s small stuff.”

“But . . . we’re not talking about John Washburn here; we’re talking about Milton Washburn, right? Milton was the bigamist. The one who robbed the bank. The one who may have murdered one or more of his wives.”

Angelo narrowed his eyes. “Milton? The uncle? Hell no, I’m talking about
John
Washburn. The letters were signed J. D. Cora told me John’s middle name was Arthur, but the J’s got to stand for John.”

“But Milton’s the one with the tattoo.”

They stared at each other.

“Maybe J. D. is a nickname,” Sophie said finally.

Angelo looked off into space. “That doesn’t make sense. It has to be John. He was the one being blackmailed.”

“Let’s go over this again,” said Sophie. “Who do you think put the bomb in Runbeck’s truck?”

“Plato,” Angelo said flatly.

Now Sophie was even more confused.

“He was trying to protect his dad. And I can prove it. There was a book in John’s library, a sort of terrorist manual. Inside was a recipe for nitrogen tri-iodide.”

“The stuff that was used to blow up Runbeck’s truck.” Angelo’s eyes opened wide. “How did you know that?”

“I’ve got my sources, too.”

“You’ve really been busy since you found that snapshot.”

She shrugged. “I had to find out if I was right about the man in the photo.”

“Well, I caught Plato searching for that book just the other day. I’ll bet you he left it in his father’s bookcase thinking nobody would ever look for it there. But after his dad confessed, Plato remembered where he’d left it and wanted to get rid of it. Except, I’d come across the title before. I grabbed it off the shelf the day before the police arrived with their search warrant. Thank God I did or they would have nailed John’s hide to the wall.”

Maybe Plato made a mistake, thought Sophie, just like she did. Jumped to the wrong conclusion about his father. After all, John did pay Runbeck the blackmail money. The fact that he’d withdrawn one hundred thousand dollars from his bank accounts proved it. He couldn’t look any more guilty if he tried. But he wasn’t the one with the tattoo.

“Who do you think murdered Runbeck?” Angelo asked.

“Milton,” said Sophie, every bit as unreservedly. “He’s the one with the past. If he robbed a bank, he probably used the money to start his business in St. Louis. It all fits.”

“But in the letters, this J. D.—whoever he is—said he didn’t even like being in the same room with the money, so he dumped it in the nearest gutter.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Angelo scratched his head.

“Look,” said Sophie, “in these letters, he did admit to having more than one wife, right?”

“Not exactly. But he talked about several women, and he was married to all of them. You could gather that much from the dates. See, this Gilbert Struthers got religion in prison. He’d saved some of the letters so he sent them back to J. D. and basically told him to repent before it was too late.”

“Did he talk about Laura’s death? Or Bliss?”

“Yeah, but again, he never admitted to killing anybody.”

“Well, he wouldn’t. But maybe he used those letters as a kind of confessional.”

“Yeah, I thought about that, too.”

“What are we supposed to do?” said Sophie, tossing her pen on the table. “We don’t have absolute proof of anything, not even the bigamy. And we disagree on who murdered Runbeck.”

Angelo leaned forward and rested his arms on his knees. “Somebody should pay for what happened to Runbeck.”

“And Laura and Bliss.”

“You think that tattoo’s pretty conclusive, huh?”

“In my opinion, it’s proof positive. Milton’s our man.”

“I’d be thrilled if that turned out to be the case. Bernice loves her uncle, but it’s nothing like the way she feels about her dad. You know, Sophie, I used to have this idea that small towns were where the salt of the earth lived. In some ways, I still believe that. When I pay for something in a store here, people look me in the eye. Maybe they even smile. In New York, shopkeepers look at your hands. It’s a different world. In Rose Hill, you don’t get a lot of attitude.”

“Scandinavians don’t know how to give attitude. It’s genetic.”

He smiled. “Yeah, I’ve noticed. But if you ask me, Scandinavians could use a little Italy in their souls. The thing is, after I see what’s happening around here, I’m beginning to think people are basically the same wherever you look.”

“You’re probably right.” Sophie wrote her cell phone number on the edge of the scratch paper, then ripped it off. “I have to drive home this afternoon. Can we agree that if we learn anything new, we’ll let each other know?”

“You got a deal.” He shook her hand, then took out his own card and wrote his number on the back.

“I have a couple of leads that I think might be promising.”

“And I’ve got an idea, something that might help protect Cora Runbeck.” He took a final sip of coffee, then got up and dumped the rest in the sink. “An associate of mine used to call it the ‘indirect direct’ approach. I’ll let you know if it works.”

33

About half an hour out of the Cities, Sophie answered her cell phone. Laura Walters’s friend, Rebecca Scoville, was on the line. She’d finally arrived home from her business trip and said she’d be happy to meet with Sophie. They made a date for three at Rebecca’s office.

Sophie spent a few minutes gathering her thoughts. This was her one shot, and she didn’t want to blow it. Shortly before three, she entered the Lamar Building. Northstar Investigations was on the third floor. A receptionist buzzed Rebecca’s office and several seconds later, a white-haired woman dressed in jeans, a sweatshirt and running shoes appeared.

“I came into work today, but just for a couple hours,” Rebecca said over her shoulder as she led Sophie down a long hallway to her corner office. She sat down quickly behind a large mahogany desk piled high with files. Behind her was an antique credenza filled with books. “I’ve been out of town, so I’m pretty backed up. But you piqued my curiosity, Ms. Greenway. Please,” she said, extending her hand to a chair, “make yourself comfortable.”

Sophie pulled the strap of her purse off her shoulder and sat down. Rebecca’s grandmotherly features didn’t fit the image of a private investigator. Or maybe Sophie was looking at Kinsey Millhone thirty years from now.

“Would you like a cup of coffee?”

“No thanks.”

“Okay, so I understand you’ve got some questions about Laura Walters.”

“I was told the two of you were best friends.” Rebecca sighed. “That was a long time ago. But yes, we were. We lived across the street from each other when we were growing up. We even got married around the same time. Laura stayed married, but I got divorced a year later.” Her matter-of-fact speaking style reminded Sophie of the old TV show
Dragnet
.

“You knew her husband?”

“Morgan? Sure, we were good friends.”

“I talked to Laura’s sister recently. She seems to think Laura’s death wasn’t a suicide.”

“You came here to talk about Laura’s death?”

Sophie nodded.

“Why? It’s ancient history.”

“I have reason to believe that the man she married, the man you know as Morgan Walters, was an impostor. He used a number of aliases over the years, and was married to at least three other women at the same time he was married to Laura.”

“Morgan?” She gave Sophie a skeptical look. “You can’t be serious.”

“I’m completely serious. The fact that he was a bigamist—”

“Wait a minute here, Ms. Greenway. Are we talking fact or theory?”

Sophie removed the snapshot from her purse and handed it over. “Do you recognize that man?”

Rebecca slipped on her reading glasses. After gazing at it for several seconds, she said, “It’s Morgan. Who’s the woman he’s with?”

“Her name is Mary.”

“One of his other wives?”

“No, she’s married to his brother.”

“Morgan didn’t have a brother,” she said, glancing down at the picture again. “He was an only child. Look, why all the interest in him now? Laura’s been dead for what? Forty years?”

“It’s a long, complicated story,” said Sophie. “At this point, I can’t give you any more details.”

“Are you a P.I.?”

She shook her head. “Just a friend of the family.”

“Morgan’s family?”

“Something like that.”

“Maybe you should let a professional look into it.”

“We might do that, but for now, I’m hoping you can help me out.”

Rebecca shrugged. “Okay. Go ahead. Ask your questions.”

“If Morgan was a bigamist, it doesn’t automatically follow that he was a murderer. But when I learned from Laura’s sister that she was positive Morgan had killed Laura and then covered it up by making it look like a suicide, I have to wonder. Is there anything to it?”

Rebecca looked at the snapshot again. “I remember his tattoo now. It’s got to be the same man.” She glanced up. “And you’re certain he was married to other women?”

Sophie nodded. “What sort of man was he?”

“Smart,” said Rebecca, dropping the photo on her desk. “And surprisingly sweet for such a rough-and-tumble young guy. I thought he was good for Laura. She was a troubled woman, Ms. Greenway, with a lot of personal problems. Morgan told me once her problems were what had attracted him to her. He thought he could help.”

“In what way?”

“This was all such a long time ago,” she said, fingering a gold locket hanging around her neck. “Morgan and Laura met in a bar in Coleraine. You know where that is?”

“My grandparents used to live in Grand Rapids. I met Morgan and Laura when I was a teenager. He gave me a ride on his motorcycle. It’s something I’ve never forgotten.”

Rebecca smiled at the memory. “Yes, he sure loved that hunk of junk. I thought it was loud and smelly. He used to rev the motor when I was over at the house. He did it just to get a rise out of me. He was a real tease. Full of fun. Anyway, the night he and Laura met, they were both pretty drunk. Laura wouldn’t tell him her name, so he called her Blue Eyes. I guess he was pretty closed-mouthed about himself, too, so she called him Jim Stark. She thought he was the spitting image of James Dean in
East of Eden
, her favorite movie. I guess that was the name of the character Dean played. To hear Laura tell it, it was love at first sight. I’m not sure Morgan—” She stopped. “What’s Morgan’s real name? Just for the record.”

“Milton.”

She made a sour face. “I’ll stick with Morgan. I’m not sure Morgan felt the same way, but they hooked up pretty fast. Laura told me she didn’t remember giving him her phone number, but she must have because he called her the next time he was in town. From then on, whenever he came through Grand Rapids, which was every couple of months, they’d go out on a date. They dated a few years and then announced their engagement. Laura was the happiest I’d ever seen her. Morgan wanted to buy this rundown old shack out in the country, fix it up. He hated cities, even small towns. In some ways, he was a loner. But so was Laura. They were very much in love, I can vouch for that. They both worked on the house, but because Morgan was gone a lot, most of the work fell to Laura. She didn’t mind. It gave her a focus, kept her busy for almost two years. I remember helping her paint one of the rooms cherry red. Hideous color. They didn’t have a lot of money, so Laura worked on and off in Grand Rapids clerking at Kremer’s department store. Driving home one night, she wrecked the old beater Morgan had bought her. It was a ’51 Thunder-bird. Blue and white. Of course, it came out later that she was drunk. Her drinking got worse and worse over time until Morgan was simply beside himself. He didn’t know what to do.”

“Laura’s sister said Morgan was the one who drank.”

“I’m sure Morgan probably told her that to save face for Laura. If you want my opinion, Dotty Mulloy is an old prune. I think she was born that way. Laura loved her, but she didn’t like her. That was one big reason why she jumped at the chance to put some distance between them. That way, her sister couldn’t pop over whenever she felt like it. As time went on, Laura’s drinking got so bad she couldn’t even hold a part-time job. Staying home depressed her, so she started hitching rides with friends to bars. I’m not positive, but I think she started sleeping around. She already hated herself for so many reasons, it was just one more thing to add to the list. She was down in the dumps if Morgan was home, then back in the dumps when he left. Today, she could have gone to a therapist and gotten some help; but back then, if you suffered from depression, you were out of luck. She drank to deaden the pain, but in the end, it didn’t help.”

“So you’re saying she really did commit suicide?”

“I’m positive of it.”

“Why?”

“Let me give you a little background. First, you should know that I’ve investigated dozens of suicides over the years. Very often, families of suicides find it impossible to believe that their loved one could have done something so horrible. It makes them feel impotent, like they should have seen it coming, should have been able to prevent it. It’s especially true if the person who dies doesn’t leave a note. Laura didn’t. It becomes easier on family members if they convince themselves that their loved one was the victim of foul play. And when it comes to suicide, the family has an uphill struggle if they want the police to investigate the death.”

“But don’t all suicides have to be investigated?”

“Yes, any unnatural or unattended death, which includes suicides, homicides, and accidents. But I’m talking about investigating a death as if it were a homicide. Dotty was treated fairly by the police, although I’m sure she didn’t think so. Most suicides are just that—suicides. When there’s no evidence to the contrary, and there wasn’t in Laura’s case, then the police don’t want to waste their time investigating a dead end.”

“Sure, I understand, but—”

“Sometimes Laura would call me late at night when she was drunk and Morgan was on the road. She’d tell me she was no good, that Morgan deserved so much better. By the fourth year of their marriage, he was urging her to take classes at the local junior college. She loved to read, even wrote a little poetry, so he thought she might like to take some writing courses. I offered to drive her, show her the ropes, but she just never got around to it. Morgan was so frustrated with her. We’d talk about her sometimes, although he didn’t like to admit Laura was as sick as she was, even to himself. He desperately wanted to help, but she’d begun to shut him out. I think he wondered if she was seeing someone else when he wasn’t around, and of course, that hurt him terribly.

“One hot summer night, a few months before she took her life, Laura and I were sitting on her front porch. Somehow or other the subject of suicide came up. Laura asked me if I’d ever thought about it. I told her I hadn’t. She said she’d wanted to do it many times, but in her saner—or more sober—moments, she was glad she hadn’t gone through with it. She knew her drinking made her depression worse. That’s when she felt most like ending her life. The worst time for her was the dead of night. Everything was so painful then. I still remember the look on her face when she talked about it. In my entire life, I’ve never seen such . . . such utter desolation. But she said that she’d made herself a promise. If she was going to kill herself, it would have to be on a bright sunny morning, with the birds singing and sun shining. She couldn’t have a hangover. She’d have to be completely straight. That way she’d know her feelings were real, that it wasn’t just a passing mood, but a decision.” Leaning forward, Rebecca continued, “Laura killed herself on a bright sunny morning. She waited until she knew it was what she really wanted, that for her, there was no other way.”

The silence in the room closed in around them.

“Morgan may have been a bigamist, Ms. Greenway, but he wasn’t a murderer.”