Breaking Point (21 page)

Chapter 23

             
At four o'clock, I drove the three miles down 965 to the Iowa Medical and Classification Center. The sprawling complex was a division of the Iowa Department of Corrections, and the site where most of the new inmates were sent while the proper facility for them was decided. Medical conditions were determined here also and some sex offenders underwent the treatment portion of their sentences at the site. It sounded like a tossed salad of assorted criminals. I'd called earlier and was told that Frank Goodwin was here and was allowed visitors. I signed in and took a seat in the visitor area. In five minutes he was led over to my table.

             
The thick gray beard and long hair made his face look small and weasel-like. Beady blue eyes didn't do anything to dispel the illusion, either. Goodwin took a seat across the table from me and stared at me.

             
"What the hell do you want, another swift kick?" A thin smile revealed a missing canine tooth and many small wrinkles around his eyes. The skin that was visible on his face had the leathery look of the outdoorsman. He looked older than his niece had indicated.

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              "I want to know something about Wilson. I know you weren't around when he died, but there's one bit of information I'm curious about. Did he really burn down some property he couldn't buy?'

             
He shook his head. "You assholes are all alike, cops and private cops. You always want to know something." He seemed to be thinking about it and started to rise out of the chair. He must have decided it couldn't hurt, so he said, "Yeah, Wilson torched it. Then he snooped around and found my place and saw some of the stuff inside. It worked out for him. He wanted a little meth and threatened to go to the cops unless I gave it to him. That was it. I gave him a few rocks when he wanted it and he kept his mouth shut. He wasn't no danger to me. Hell, he thought he was a big wheel and most of his so-called success was pure dumb luck." He stood and the guard started over to accompany him back to his cell.

             
Before he turned away, I caught his eye and asked, "What about the negatives?" He pulled his head back a millimeter and a blank look covered his face. I thought maybe I'd spoken in a foreign language.

             
"Negatives? What the hell are you talking about?" His expression said I was as crazy as he thought I was. "What negatives?"

             
"Never mind." I shoved my chair back and stood, turning to leave. As the guard was leading him away, he muttered some expletives concerning the legitimacy of my birth and my mother's sexual practices.

             
I was glad to get back out in the fresh air, freezing or not. At my place, Melanie's rental car was parked in the lot. I drove on by and went to the Community Center to walk a few laps around the track. I wanted to keep my back loose after the jarring it took in that cold march down the drainage ditch. Besides, I needed to think a little and mull over this case. When I returned home, the rental car was gone and there was a note on the kitchen table from Woody. They'd gone down to Iowa City for some dinner and dancing. He'd be late. I spent the evening in front of the TV. At eleven, I took another muscle relaxant and went to bed.

             
I had Wood drive me to the airport on Sunday. The roads were pretty good, with most of the icy stuff salted off and just the wispy snow blowing across from the fields. At ten AM, the sun was already a brilliant presence in the cloudless sky. I felt pretty good. Woody felt even better and couldn't stop talking about Melanie. She'd told him about her new global positioning device and promised they'd spend a day in the woods soon, figuring out precisely where they were at all times. From his enthusiasm, the idea must have appealed to him. I listened, nodding or adding a few words when he paused, which wasn't often. He dropped me off at the front of the airport, with a wave and a big smile. I didn't think he was going to miss me.

             
After a short layover in St. Louis, my plane set down in L.A. at about four thirty. An hour later, I was tooling along the California highway system in my rental, a new Ford Explorer. I'd been thinking of trading the Grand Am in on one, so this seemed like a good way to do a test drive. I found Everly easily enough. I'd phoned the Wilsons again from the airport and finally caught them at home. Lois said they'd been at some relatives over Thanksgiving and had just gotten in. She put Clyde on to give me directions to their house, which was near a shopping center. It sounded easy to find, and was.

             
Clyde Wilson was a big burly man in his sixties. He sported a dark gray mustache. Balding, he still retained enough of the dark waves to hint at a formerly thick head of hair. Charlie had more of his mother's features, smaller boned and fair complexioned. Clyde answered my knock and led me to the sitting room off the entrance. Lois was seated on a small sofa in front of which was an oblong coffee table, already set with a pitcher of iced tea and three tall glasses. I accepted one and took a chair opposite the sofa, where Clyde had seated himself beside his wife.

             
I laid a copy of the photo on the table and Lois snatched it up, smiling. "That's it. That's it. That's our Charlie getting the Kiwanis award. Wherever did you find it?" Clyde leaned over her shoulder for a better look.

             
"That's the day they gave him the plaque, but it was a day I remember more for what it meant to us," he said. "Charlie had been in some minor trouble; you know, graffiti, shoplifting, that kind of thing. Stuff that boys seem to have to try out. Anyway, the judge was smart enough to see that our boy just needed some guidance. He assigned him to community service and he stayed over at Saint Martin's for the summer, to help with the grounds work and with some of the kids, too." Clyde pointed to the photograph. "That's what this plaque was for. He lived over there, stayed right in the boys' home for the whole summer. Came home for dinner once a week, though, just like we asked. I think that experience really straightened him out, maybe made him appreciate what he had."

             
"So, do you know all the other people in the picture?" I asked.

             
Lois furrowed her brow. "It's been a long time, but we can probably remember their names. Is it important?"

             
I replied that I was just gathering all the information I could. They looked more closely at the photograph and I pulled out a piece of paper and a pen. "Just start from the left side, if you can, and tell me who they are."

             
"Well," Lois began. "The nun is Sister Alex. She was in charge of the volunteers at Saint Martin's. The boy beside her left Saint Martin's right before the end of summer. I remember because he turned eighteen and Charlie said they were having a party for him before he left. I wanted to bake a cake to send over but Charlie didn't want me to. Oh, what was the boy's name, Clyde, do you remember?"

             
Clyde shook his head. "I don't remember. He was an orphan I think. Charlie'd told me the boy was in some gangs before he came to the Children's Home." His finger punched at the boy's image. "He was a tough customer, I think. Look at the expression on his face. That boy was trouble. You can see that."

             
"The next one there, he died that same summer. He was Stanley Dalton. I worked with his father over at the bank. Sad case. Bob Dalton was really broken up over it."

             
Lois chimed in, her memory seeming to improve as she looked at the picture. "The boy in the wheelchair is David Watters. He has Cerebral Palsy. I heard he's in a group home now, someplace up in the northern part of the state. His parents live up there near him, so it's better for all of them. The next one is our Charlie, of course, and then the man from the Kiwanis Club. What was his name, Clyde?"

             
"I don't remember. He was from the Los Angeles Chapter, I think. Ken would know. He was supposed to give the award but he'd been in a skiing accident on vacation and was still laid up." He got up and went out of the room, calling back over his shoulder. "I'll get the phone book and call Ken. He'll know the guy's name."

             
Lois and I made small talk and I tried to find out more about the people in the photograph and their relationship with her son, but she was in the proud mother mode. Everyone loved her Charlie and he was a perfect son.

             
Clyde returned in a few minutes and handed me an envelope. He'd scribbled two names on the back, Bert Wilder and Ken Davidson There was a phone number under Davidson's name.

             
"Ken said Bert Wilder was the guy who came down for the ceremony. He lives over in L.A. someplace, like I thought. He said if you need Bert's phone number, just call him at his law office on Monday and he'll get it for you. Ken keeps all his Kiwanis stuff at work."

             
Clyde didn't have any insight into any other connections between Charlie and the other people present on the stage that day. He didn't know if Charlie had ever seen Bert Wilder again after that day, either. I thanked them for the tea and left them a copy of the picture. I still had two more in my suitcase. They walked me over to the door. Before I left, I thought of another question.

             
"Do you have the address of that Saint Martin's Home? Maybe somebody there can offer some insight."

             
"Oh,” Lois said softly. "I'm afraid the institution isn't there any more. All of those people were put into group homes a few years ago." She brightened up a little. "Sister Alex might be there, though. It's still a convent and I've seen a few nuns on the grounds or going in and out over there." While Lois looked up the telephone number of Saint Martin's, Clyde told me how to get to it.

             
Armed with the telephone number and address, I climbed back into the Explorer and was almost back to the highway when my cellular phone chirped. I pulled into the shopping center parking lot and answered. It was Woody.

             
"Rudy," he said. "You got a phone call here and I thought I'd better tell you. Oh, and the Wilson lady called and said she had to talk to you, so I gave her your number."

             
I asked what the first call had been about and he went on. "A guy from the camera place, name of Matt Barr, called earlier today. Mel answered the phone. I was...um...in the shower. Anyway, the guy wanted to know if you found the negatives you were looking for. Mel came and asked me and I told her to tell him yeah and thanks anyway."

             
"OK, that's no problem," I said. "How are you and Melanie getting along?"

             
"Great," he said. He told me they'd jogged out to the lake and had seen a couple more bald eagles. Before he hung up, he managed to mention Melanie at least two more times. "She's a little kookie, you know?" he said. She's always thinking of new stuff to try and saying things I don't expect. It keeps me off balance." He sounded happy about it and I was glad for his enthusiasm. While I was still parked in the shopping center, my cell phone rang again. Iris Wilson was calling and she sounded like she could use a tranquilizer.

             
"Rudy, listen, there's something I should have told you but I forgot all about it until today. Gary thought it could be important so we called right away." Her voice started to waver. "I've just been so upset about the fire and losing my house and all my..." She started crying then. Mercifully, Gary Omar came on the line.

             
"Here's what happened, Rudy," he began in a calm tone. "A couple of months ago, the little recording tape went bad on Iris' answering machine. She'd seen a tape the same size in one of the boxes of pens and paper clips and little things that she'd brought from Charlie's apartment. It fit, so she just dropped it in her machine and forgot all about it. She's been using it since then. Last week, I think it was Tuesday, she needed to listen to one of her messages a second time and tried to replay it. The tape must have rewound all the way to the beginning, though, and she heard some messages that would have been left for Charlie at his place. One of them sounded like it might be something important. At least she thought it was odd."

             
"Was it a man's or a woman's voice?"

             
"A man, but Iris didn't recognize him. She said the man wanted to change the time of a meeting, I guess between him and Charlie. He said he couldn't make it until about eleven o'clock that night. Then he said that he'd meant what he said and that this would be the last meeting." I was aware of Iris's voice in the background, verifying Omar's words.

             
"Did he mention the place or the date of the meeting? I asked. I could hear Gary relaying my question to Iris.

             
"No. That was all she can remember. Do you think it could be about a meeting the night Charlie died?"

             
"Maybe. Where's the tape now?"

             
"Well, that's part of the problem. Iris didn't tell me about it until we got back. When we were getting ready to go visit my folks over Thanksgiving, she decided she'd just try to forget about the whole thing for a few days. She took the tape out of the machine and put it back in one of the desk drawers. It...um...looks like the tape got burned up in the fire."