‘Are you going to tell me what’s going on, Mrs Burkhart?’
‘Just wait a minute.’
‘For what? This is getting us nowhere.’
‘I need some time.’
‘That’s up to you, Mrs Burkhart. I thought maybe I could help you out a little. That’s why I stopped by. But I can see you don’t want any help, do you?’
She had a harsh Gucci laugh. ‘How can you say that with a straight face? My God — you stopped by to help me out a little. You stopped by because you want to get my husband in trouble.’
‘If that’s the way you choose to look at it, Mrs Burkhart, that’s up to you. Now please get out of my way. I’ve got things to do.’
She clutched my sport coat. She wasn’t restraining me as much as she was pleading with me. I doubted she played the supplicant very often.
‘Give me until tonight before you do anything, including the police. I have to make some decisions. I’ll give you my cell number. Then we can talk.’
She dug in her purse and extracted a business card. ‘Turn around.’
This was the Mrs Burkhart I’d come to know and love. Barking orders. As she scribbled her cell number on the card she had pressed to my back she kept up a stream of whispered curses. I had the feeling they were aimed as much at herself as at me.
‘There. You can turn around again.’
‘Thank you, Your Highness.’
‘You know, I really don’t like you.’
I took the card. ‘You wouldn’t be surprised if I said the feeling is mutual, would you?’
But she was done with me. ‘I expect you to keep your word.’
I hadn’t given my word but she was so used to getting her way she just assumed I’d pledged undying loyalty to her throne.
By the time I’d backed out and started for the street, she was rushing through the side door and into the maelstrom of the campaign.
THIRTEEN
I bought a grilled cheese sandwich and a Caesar salad and a beer in the hotel cafe and took them up to my room. I worked while I ate. In addition to interviews the DVD held names of people and places. I needed to verify that these actually existed. In the age of photoshopping you had to check and recheck everything.
The first two names checked out. I found them in the white pages online.
I finished my food. I still had half my beer. I worked on the bottle as I punched in phone numbers. Three rings, four rings.
‘Hello.’ Female. Wary.
‘Mrs Hayes?’
Silence.
‘Mrs Hayes?’
‘Who is this?’
‘My name is Dev Conrad. You don’t know me, but I’d like to set up an appointment to see you.’
Long pause. ‘Those days are behind me. Now leave me alone.’
She slammed the phone with a fury that told me how much she wanted to forget her past and resented — despised — anybody who’d bring it up.
The second number I dialed yielded only an automatic message voice, one of those robots who will someday be our masters. The robot wouldn’t even part with the name of who owned this particular phone number. I left no message.
I called Ward headquarters and asked for Lucy.
‘I was getting worried about you. We hadn’t heard anything from you. Jimmy’s murder has really freaked me out. And I haven’t said “freaked me out” since college.’ I could feel her smile over the phone, a fresh, appealing young woman who just happened to be smart as hell.
‘I’m fine. Just busy. I wanted to ask you about your newspaper contacts. Do you know anybody friendly on the Winthrop Times?’
‘I do, as a matter of fact. Why?’
‘I’m doing a background check on something. I just need to talk to somebody from the area who won’t mind answering some questions.’
‘This sounds mysterious.’
‘Not really. I’m trying to check on some brochures that are circulating down there claiming that Jeff’s family managed to get two DUI charges expunged from police records in Winthrop.’
‘Wow. When did this come up?’
It came up as I spoke the words. Sometimes my facility with lies amused me; other times it depressed me. After a few too many drinks I liked to think of myself as a noble knight fighting an honorable war. After a certain amount of liquor you can rationalize any number of sins.
‘Somebody in my home office picked it up from one of our ops and then they phoned me with it. But please don’t share this with anybody on the staff, all right? No need to worry about it until I can verify it. So far nobody’s actually seen one of these brochures.’
Urban legends prosper in campaigns on both sides. Did somebody accuse my opponent of being a horse-fucking, grave-robbing child murderer? Gosh, I just can’t imagine how a story like that got started (after your minions had been whispering it for weeks).
‘That’s so ridiculous. If that was true we would have heard about it a long time ago.’
‘We’re in a tight race and running out of time. Anything goes now.’
‘Oh, I met that Detective Fogarty. She was just here. She’s pretty cool. She said she talked to you.’
I had to give Fogarty her relentlessness. This was the sort of case that would get a detective noticed in the press.
‘Well, I’ll be there in a while, Lucy. Now how about the name of that reporter in Winthrop?’
‘Oh, sure.’
She told me. I entered name and phone and e-mail into my Mac laptop. ‘I appreciate it, Lucy.’
Nan Talbot was in a meeting but was expected back in fifteen minutes or so. Would I like to call back then?
In twenty minutes I called again. I used Lucy’s name more often than I probably needed to, but given the kind of questions I was about to ask she needed to trust me. And every time I used it, Nan Talbot said something flattering. ‘She’s one of the few political press people I like. Very straightforward. A lot of them are just flacks. They don’t do anything but brag about their candidate and if you ask them anything serious about an issue they can’t give you a coherent answer. Lucy can do it all — and talk and write and really walk you through any issue you have questions about.’
‘Well, she said you might be able to help me.’
‘I’ll sure try but I have to warn you that I need to leave on a story in about fifteen minutes.’
‘I keep thinking of the right way to bring this up-’
‘Boy, this should be good-’
‘I need to know about a house of ill repute you had in Winthrop about five years ago.’
She laughed. ‘A popular subject. I’m from Des Moines. I’ve only been here for two years or so, but last winter a private investigator asked me pretty much the same thing and I had to go ask the people who’d been here a long time.’
‘A private investigator?’
‘Yes. He wanted the background on the house and where he might find Vanessa La Rouche. The first thing I told him was that was her — I don’t know what you’d call it — stage name, I guess. Her real name was Sandy Bowers. She was the madam of the place. Then I had to tell him that I had no idea where she went after the state shut her down. She operated for four years here, two terms of the same mayor. He protected her. Some said she had something on him and some said it was a straight payoff. Whatever, when the mayor got voted out she didn’t last long.’
‘Has anybody ever heard from her?’
‘Not that I know of.’
‘How about that private investigator? Would you happen to remember his name?’
‘No. But it’s somewhere on my computer. I’ll look it up when I get a chance. You have an e-mail address?’
I gave it to her.
‘What happened to the girls?’
‘That’s what made her place so special. That’s why she got so many important people going there. Winthrop’s economy went down the tube in 2005. Three big manufacturing plants went under and so did a bank. The feds closed it. Sandy or Vanessa was smart. She used only housewives. You know what MILFs means?’