Face of Betrayal (26 page)

“My father teaches me. And we get books from Goodwill that I read.”

“Could you read something for me?”

“Yes.”

Before Allison could find her a magazine, Starshine turned and plucked a heavy law book from the shelves, opened a page at random, and began to read in a steady voice.

“Causation. Establishing that the defendant’s conduct caused the proscribed result ordinarily is not difficult. If a professional killer shoots the victim in the head and the victim dies, a pathologist can conduct an autopsy and then testify at trial that the bullet fired by the defendant brought about the victim’s death by producing massive injury to the victim’s brain.”

“That’s enough,” Allison said hastily. She and Jennifer exchanged a quick glance.

Starshine replaced the book, lining it up neatly with the others on the shelf. If she realized that the topic of the paragraph in question might possibly apply to her father, not a flicker of emotion betrayed her. She folded her hands again.

“How often do you see people around where you live?”

“Once every couple of months.” Starshine was still not meeting her eyes. “Maybe less. People hiking or running. Less often now, because it’s colder. If we don’t come out, they don’t see us. Even if we are outside, we know how to blend in and stay very still. No one knows we’re there. Father says that no one
can
know.”

One quick glance up. Her teeth pressed against her lower lip. “He says if anyone were to find out we lived in the woods, I would be taken away. I guess he was right.”

Allison said carefully, “If you answer my questions truthfully, I’ll see if we can get you back there.”

It wasn’t a lie, but it wasn’t the truth either. Even if Starshine’s father was innocent, too many people now knew that the two of them were living in the middle of what was a public park, no matter how wild it might seem. It wasn’t like everyone could look the other way and pretend it wasn’t happening.

She reached across the table and touched the girl’s folded hands. Starshine looked up, startled, and Allison pulled her hand back.

“This is an important question, Starshine, so I want you to think about it seriously. Has anything bad happened recently?”

Allison phrased it broadly enough that it could apply to Starshine’s father beating or molesting her. And it could also apply to the dead girl and how she got that way.

Starshine pressed her lips together and looked back down at her hands. “No.”

“There was a girl in the woods, Starshine. Not far from your camp. She was wearing a navy blue coat. She probably came there with a dog, a black Lab. About three weeks ago. She had blonde hair down to her shoulders. She was seventeen. Her name was Katie Converse.”

Getting up, Allison went to her desk and found the photo of Katie and Jalapeño. She held it out. After a moment’s hesitation, Starshine took it. She stared at it, expressionless.

“Have you seen her before?”

Starshine tilted her head to one side. “That photograph is stapled to most of the telephone poles when we go into town.”

“That’s not what I mean, and I think you know that. Have you seen her in real life?”

There was a long pause. Allison waited. Her face was calm, but her pulse was racing.

Finally, Starshine nodded, a nod so slight that it was nearly imperceptible.

“Where?”

“She’s dead. Her body’s under a rhodie by a tamarack tree.”

Jennifer sucked in her breath.

Allison had to take the girl’s word for it. Forest Park was filled with trees, but that’s all they were to Allison. Trees, not cedars and spruces and tamaracks.

“This is very important, Starshine. I need you to tell me the truth about what happened to her. How did this girl die?”

“I don’t know.” She looked up at Allison with pleading eyes. “Father says I have to stay in the cabin. He told me not to ever come out no matter what.”

“Did your father have anything to do with this?” Allison asked softly. “Maybe there was some kind of accident?”

Starshine’s eyes grew wide with shock. “Father didn’t kill her. He just found her body. That’s all. He didn’t kill her! Don’t take him from me, don’t!” She blinked, but the tears that brimmed in her blue eyes remained unshed.

PORTLAND FBI HEADQUARTERS

January 5

W
here’s my daughter?” Tim Chambers demanded when Nicole and Allison walked into the interview room.

His impatient words overrode Allison introducing herself. His left eye was nearly swollen shut and his words were distorted by a fat lip.

“Where is Starshine? Is she okay? She’s not used to being away from me. She’s probably freaking out.”

Chambers had not requested a lawyer, which Allison had been glad to hear. Questioning was always easier when there was no one making objections.

“I understand your concern, but she’s fine,” she said. “Right now, she’s eating lunch.”

When Nicole had told her that the autopsy had shown that Katie had definitely been murdered, Allison’s sympathies had shifted away from Chambers. Clearly, he had done a good job raising Starshine. And just as clearly, he would have had the motive, means, and opportunity to kill Katie.

“We just need to clear some things up,” she continued, pulling out a chair and sitting down. “So why don’t you start by telling us why you’re living out there in the woods, Tim.”

“Is that really any kind of life for a child?” Nicole interjected, turning around the chair next to Allison and straddling it.

“Hold on,” Allison said, raising a cautioning hand. “Let Tim tell us his side of the story. I’m sure he has his reasons.”

With a sigh, Chambers sat down on the other side of the table. “Starshine’s mother is in Dammasch.”

Dammasch was the state mental hospital.

“We never got married to each other, but we lived together until Starshine was two. We were fighting a lot, so I took off. I’m not proud of it, but I only saw Starshine about twice a year, because my ex made it clear that she didn’t want me coming by. Then two years ago her sister-in-law sent a letter to my PO box saying my ex had attacked another boyfriend and been committed. She told me that if I didn’t take Starshine off their hands, they would put her in foster care. Of course I couldn’t have that. Starshine’s my flesh and blood.”

“But why live in the woods?” Allison asked.

“I get a $400-a-month disability check. There’s no way to live on that.” His tone was matter-of-fact.

Allison nodded. “What about a shelter?”

Chambers made a face. “I’ve done that before, but they’re not set up for men with kids. A woman with kids, yeah, maybe she could find a place. But a man with a kid—there’s no place for him to go, not really. They would have split us up. I won’t risk having my daughter taken from me. I’m the only family she’s got. And I won’t live on the streets and expose her to what she would see there—alcohol, drugs, kids her age selling themselves. So one day we hiked into the park, got off the trails, and just kept going until we were in a part that looked completely wild. It’s beautiful there. We’re surrounded by God’s creation, not by concrete and garbage and junkies. We started out in a tent. Then I built a little cabin. Once or twice a week we go through the trash bins in the park and look for recyclable cans and bottles we can take back to the store. You’d be surprised what some people throw away.”

Allison nodded agreement, hoping he was referring only to cans and bottles. It was one thing to think of a grown man eating someone’s dis-carded half-eaten sandwich. It was another to think of a child eating out of garbage cans.

“And on Sundays,” Chambers continued, “we go to church.”

“Church?” Allison echoed in surprise. “Which one?”

“First Congregational.”

“Do the people there know you’re homeless?”

The church, with its downtown location, was known for its outreach to the down-and-out.

“We’re not there for charity.” Chambers looked affronted. “We’re there so Starshine can learn about Jesus.”

Nicole cleared her throat, and Allison realized that they had wandered off track. She wasn’t here to solve Chambers’s problems. She was here to find out whether he had killed Katie.

Taking over the questioning, Nicole crossed her arms and slouched. “Do you know why you’re here, Tim? Why we want to talk to you?”

He didn’t bother to pretend that he didn’t know what she was talking about. “Because of that poor dead girl.”

“She’s got a name,” Nicole said. “It’s Katie Converse. She’s not just some dead girl. This was someone’s daughter.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Chambers said. “I pray for her soul every night. She must have been in terrible turmoil to do what she did.”

Allison watched him closely, wondering if the reason he was praying was to ask forgiveness for what he had done.

“We need to find out what happened to her,” she said. “If you’re completely honest with us, we can help you and Starshine get into a subsidized apartment, get you on food stamps.”

Nicole glared at Allison, but it was all for show. At least Allison thought it was. Nicole had been in a bad mood ever since she had come back from the autopsy. And Nic was always better at playing bad cop than Allison was at playing good.

“Don’t lead him on.” Nicole turned back to Chambers. “You’ve got a dead girl a couple hundred yards from where you camp out, and you expect us to believe you had nothing to do with it, and just let you go on your merry way? Tell us what happened. And don’t lie to us, because we already have the forensic evidence.”

“It must have been hard keeping it a secret,” Allison said sympathetically. “No one to talk to.”

Chambers sighed. “What happened is, Starshine and I, we were down at the grocery store turning in our cans. It was getting dark. We were almost home when I saw this girl sprawled on the ground. Not moving. I yelled at Starshine to get in the cabin and stay there. I knew that she didn’t need to see it.”

“What day was this?” Nicole asked.

“I don’t know.” Chambers shrugged. “A school day, that’s all I remember. When we go into town on a weekday, I have to make sure we do it late enough in the day that no one will ask me why Starshine’s not in school.”

“Did you pass anyone on your way back?” Allison asked.

“No. But the girl had obviously killed herself. There was a leash around her neck and a broken branch overhead. Poor kid.” His eyes misted at the memory. “She didn’t look that much older than Starshine. I didn’t know what to do with her. I figured if I told anybody, they would start asking questions about us and then take Starshine away. I thought about trying to carry her closer to the main trails so she could be found right away, but I was afraid someone would see and get the wrong idea. So I yelled at Starshine to stay in the cabin. Then I pulled the girl underneath a bush and away from the path we use to get to town. I didn’t want my daughter to have to see her every time we went someplace. And then I said a prayer over her.”

“Look, Tim—do you love your daughter?” Nicole demanded. “If you tell us what really happened—and I mean the full truth—then I guarantee Starshine will go to a good home. With loving parents who can give her everything, even send her to college when the time comes. Otherwise she’ll be left to the mercies of the foster care system, bouncing from home to home. And you’ve heard what those places are like. Children’s Services pulls a kid out of one home because they’re getting beat up, then sticks them in the next home where they get sexually abused.”

As Nicole spoke, tears gathered in the corners of Chambers’s eyes. “You can’t take her away from me. Starshine and me, we’ve only got each other.”

“Then tell the truth,” Nicole said. “Because you know where I was this morning? At that girl’s autopsy. And she didn’t kill herself. So I already know you’re lying to me. Somebody did that to her. And I think that somebody was you.”

To Allison’s eyes, Chambers looked genuinely bewildered. “No, I didn’t. Why would I do that? I saw enough death in Vietnam. I would never do that. I tell you, she was already dead when I got there.”

Allison leaned closer. “But is that what really happened, Tim? I mean, if it went down another way, it’s completely understandable. You’re living out there in privacy, not bothering anyone, and then this girl comes blundering in. Did she see your camp? Or worse—did she see your daughter? You had to stop her, didn’t you, before she ran off and told. Was there some kind of accident?”

“What are you saying?” Chambers looked shocked by Allison’s words. “She was dead when I got there. She was
already
dead. That’s not how it happened at all.”

“Isn’t it, Tim?” Nicole’s face was all planes and edges, no softness at all. “Tell us the truth now, while you still can. Because we have that leash—and the prints on it are being analyzed right now.”

This was a total bluff, as far as Allison knew. Nicole had said there weren’t any prints. But then there was a knock at the door. A Portland police officer stuck his head in.

“Nicole, I need to talk to you.”

Chambers watched her go, biting his lip.

Allison figured Nicole must have arranged for this. “Tim, I’m a Christian like you. And we both know that Christ offers us forgiveness if we confess our sins. Now is the time to get this off your chest. It will look a lot better for you if you confess than if you keep lying.”

“But I’m not lying.” He was calmer now. “When I found her, her spirit had already fled. If someone did that to her, I didn’t see them.” His faded blue eyes fastened on her, and he leaned forward and patted her hand. “God’s laid a heavy burden on you about this girl, hasn’t He? She’s become as much your responsibility as Starshine is mine. But the Psalms say, ‘Cast your burden upon the Lord and He will sustain you; He will never allow the righteous to be shaken.’”

Allison looked at him in astonishment. What had just happened? How could some homeless guy who lived in the woods be offering her solace and comfort?

When Nicole opened the door, she was holding something behind her back, her face incandescent with rage. “Oh, you’re just some poor disabled vet, forced to live in the woods because you don’t make enough on the government dole? Then how do you explain this?”