On the Street Where You Live

  “Then for the moment we have to just wait and see,” Osborne said. “What’s the matter, Duggan? You don’t look happy.”

  “I don’t have a good feeling about Natalie Frieze,” Tommy said flatly. “I’m wondering if somebody has anticipated the 31st by a couple of days.”

  For a long moment there was silence. Then Osborne asked, “Why do you think that?”

  “Because she fits the pattern. She’s thirty-four, not twenty or twenty-one, but like Martha Lawrence and Carla Harper, she’s a beautiful woman.” Duggan shrugged. “Anyway, I’ve got a very, very bad feeling about Natalie Frieze, plus I don’t like the husband. Frieze has a weak, unsubstantiated alibi for where he was when Martha Lawrence disappeared. Claims he was in his backyard working on his flower beds.”

  Welsh nodded. “He lived the first twenty years of his life in the house where the remains of Carla Harper and possibly Letitia Gregg were found,” he said. “And now his wife is missing.”

  “Sir, we’d better get to Dr. Wilcox,” Tommy Duggan suggested. “He’s coming in at three o’clock.”

  “What have you got?” Osborne asked.

  Tommy leaned forward in his chair with his hands joined, a position which meant he was weighing and measuring his options carefully.

  “He was willing to come. He knows he doesn’t have to. When he gets here, I’ll emphasize again that he’s free to leave at any time. As long as he’s fully aware of that, we don’t have to give him Miranda warnings, and frankly I’d rather not have to give it. He may button up if we do.”

  “What’s your take on him?” Osborne asked.

  “He’s hiding a lot, and we know he’s a liar. Those are two big handicaps in my book.”

  CLAYTON WILCOX arrived promptly at three o’clock. Duggan and Walsh escorted him to a small interrogation room, where the only furniture was a table and several chairs, and invited him to sit down.

  He interrupted them when they once again assured him that he was not in any way being detained, and that he was free to leave.

  A glint of amusement in his eyes, he said, “You have probably debated about whether or not to give me the Miranda warnings and come to the conclusion that emphasizing my freedom to leave has covered you sufficiently as far as the law is concerned.”

  He smiled at the expression on Pete Walsh’s face. “Gentlemen, you seem to forget that I spent the better part of my life in academia. You have no idea how many debates on civil liberties and the court system I heard, or how many mock trials I attended. I was the president of a college, you know.”

  It was the opening Tommy Duggan wanted, and he jumped in. “Dr. Wilcox, in looking at your background, I’m surprised to see that you retired from Enoch College at age fifty-five. Yet you had just signed a new five-year contract.”

  “My health would not permit me to carry on my duties. Believe me, the role of president of a small but prestigious institution requires a great deal of energy, as well as time.”

  “What is the nature of your ill-health, Doctor Wilcox?”

  “A serious heart condition.”

  “Have you discussed this with your physician?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Do you have regular checkups for your heart condition?”

  “My health has been stable of late. Retirement has removed a great deal of stress from my life.”

  “Doctor, that doesn’t answer my question. Do you have regular checkups?”

  “I have been careless about having them. However, I feel very well.”

  “When was the last time you went to a doctor?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “You weren’t sure about whether or not you ever had an appointment with Dr. Madden. Do you still claim that, or have you changed your mind?”

  “I may have had an appointment or two.”

  “Or nine or ten, Doctor. We have the records.”

  Tommy proceeded carefully in conducting the interrogation. He could tell that Wilcox was becoming rattled, but he didn’t want him to get up and leave. “Doctor, does the name Gina Fielding mean anything to you?”

  Wilcox paled as he leaned back in the chair and, obviously playing for time, looked up at the ceiling with a thoughtful frown. “I’m not sure.”

  “You gave a one-hundred-thousand-dollar check to her twelve years ago, just at the time you retired, Doctor. You marked the check ‘Antique desk and bureau.’ Does that refresh your memory?”

  “I collect antiques from many sources.”

  “Miss Fielding must be pretty smart, Doctor. She was only twenty years old at the time, and a junior at Enoch College. Isn’t that right?”

  There was a long pause. Clayton Wilcox looked directly at Tommy Duggan, then moved his gaze to Pete Walsh.

  “You are quite right. Twelve years ago Gina Fielding was a twenty-year-old junior at Enoch College. A very worldly twenty-year-old, I might add. She worked in my office and was very flattering in her attention to me. I began to visit her occasionally at her apartment. A consensual relationship developed for a brief time, which of course was entirely inappropriate and potentially scandalous. She was a scholarship student from a low-income family. I began giving her spending money.”

  Wilcox looked down at the table for a long minute as if he was finding the scratched surface totally fascinating. Then he looked up again and reached for the glass of water they had put on the table for him.

  “Eventually I came to my senses and told her that the relationship would have to end. I said I would have her placed in a different office job, but she threatened a lawsuit against me and the college for sexual harrassment. She was prepared to swear that I had threatened to have her scholarship taken away if she did not have a relationship with me. The price of her silence was one hundred thousand dollars.” He paused for a moment, taking a deep breath.

  “I paid. I also resigned my presidency because I did not trust her, and if she broke her word and sued the college, I knew there would be much less media interest were I no longer the president.”

  “Where is Gina Fielding now, Doctor?”

  “I have no idea where she lives. I do know that she is going to be in town tomorrow, looking for another hundred thousand dollars. She obviously has been following the tabloids, and she has threatened to sell her story to the highest bidder.”

  “That’s extortion, Doctor. Are you aware of that?”

  “I’m familiar with the word.”

  “Were you planning to pay her off?”

  “No, I was not. I cannot live the rest of my life like this. I am going to tell her that I will not give her one more penny, knowing, of course, the consequences of that decision.”

  “Extortion is a very serious crime, Doctor. I would suggest that you allow us to equip you with a taping device. lf you can get Miss Fielding on record demanding the money to buy her silence, we can press charges against her.”

  “Let me think about it.”

  I believe him, Tommy Duggan thought. But that still doesn’t let him off the hook, as far as I’m concerned. If anything, it’s proof that he’s attracted to young women; besides, it’s still his wife’s scarf that is the murder weapon. And he still doesn’t have an alibi for the morning of Martha Lawrence’s disappearance.

  “Doctor, where were you between seven and eight this morning?”

  “I was out walking.”

  “Were you on the boardwalk?”

  “At some point I was, yes. As a matter of fact, I started on the boardwalk, then walked around the lake.”

  “Did you happen to see Mrs. Joyce on the boardwalk?”

  “No, I did not. I was very sorry to learn of her passing. A brutal crime.”

  “Did you see anybody you know, Doctor?”

  “Frankly, I didn’t pay attention. As you can now understand, I have had a great deal on my mind.”

  He stood up. “I am free to go?”

  Tommy and Pete nodded. As Tommy got up, he said, “Let us know about taping your talk with Miss F
ielding. And something I must tell you, Doctor—we are vigorously pursuing the investigation into the deaths of Miss Lawrence, Miss Harper, Dr. Madden, and Mrs. Joyce. Your responses to our questions have been evasive, to put it in the most generous terms. We will be talking to you again.”

  Clayton Wilcox left the room without responding.

  Walsh looked at Tommy Duggan. “What do you think?”

  “I think he decided to come clean about the Fielding woman because he has no choice. She’s the kind of woman who’ll buy his silence and go to the tabloids anyhow. For the rest of it, he does seem to have a habit of going on those long walks of his and never meeting anyone who might verify where he was at a particular time.”

  “And he also seems to have a thing for young women,” Walsh added. “I wonder if there’s more to the Fielding story than he fed to us?”

  They went back to Tommy’s office where the message from Joan Hodges was waiting for them. “Douglas Carter,” Tommy exclaimed. “The guy’s been dead for over one hundred years!”

  seventy-seven ________________

  ERIC BAILEY HAD PLANNED to drive down to Spring Lake on Friday evening, but changed his mind after making a phone call to Emily. She told him she was having dinner with the owner of the inn in which she had stayed during visits while she was in the process of buying the house.

  There was no point, Eric decided, in spending time in Spring Lake if he didn’t know where Emily was. Just to get a glimpse of her coming home at the end of the evening wasn’t worth it.

  He would drive down tomorrow, and get there by midafternoon. He’d park the van in an inconspicuous spot. There were plenty of parking spaces on Ocean Avenue, and no one would pay attention to a late model navy-blue RV. It would blend in with all the other moderate to expensively priced vehicles entering and leaving the parking spaces near the boardwalk.

  Faced with an empty evening ahead of him, Eric felt himself growing increasingly impatient. He had so much on his mind, so much to deal with in the days ahead of him. The sky was crashing down. Next week the company’s stock would be downgraded to junk. Everything he had would have to be sold. Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in five years, he thought angrily.

  He was engulfed in this nightmare because of Emily Graham. She had started the selling trend on his company’s stock. She had not put a penny of her own into the company but had made ten million dollars because of his genius. She had then rejected his offer of love with a dismissive smile. And she was set for life.

  He understood that soon it would not be enough to make her fearful.

  There was another step he would be forced to take.

  Saturday, March 31

  seventy-eight ________________

  A SENSE OF FOREBODING had settled over a town reeling with the series of events of the past ten days.

  “How is it possible that this is happening here?” the early risers asked each other as they met at the bakery. “It’s March 31st. Do you think that something will happen today?”

  The weather contributed to the sense of unease. The last day of March was proving to be as capricious as the rest of the month had been. Yesterday’s warm breeze and sunny skies had disappeared. The clouds were now heavy and gray. The wind from the ocean was sharp and biting. It seemed impossible that in a few weeks the trees would once again be laden with leaves, the grass would turn velvety green, and flowering shrubbery would again surround the foundations of century-old homes.

  After a pleasant evening with Carrie Roberts, Emily spent a restless night filled with vague dreams, not as terrifying as they were mournful. She awoke from one of them with tears in her eyes and no memory of what had brought them on.

  Ask not for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

  What brought that on? she wondered as she settled back on the pillow, unwilling as yet to start the day. It was only seven o’clock, and she hoped she could sleep for a little while longer.

  It was difficult, though; she had so much on her mind. She had the tantalizing feeling that she was very close to finding the link between the past and the present, and being able to make the connection between the two sets of murders. She was also hopeful that she might find the clue she needed in one of Julia Gordon Lawrence’s diaries.

  The handwriting was exquisite, but small and spidery and therefore difficult to read. In many places the ink had faded, and she had had to focus intensely on whole sections of the diaries.

  Detective Duggan had called while she was at dinner and left a message that the photo lab would have the enlargement of the group picture for her by late today. She was looking forward to seeing it.

  Getting that photo would be like finally meeting people that she’d heard a lot about, she thought. I want to see their faces clearly.

  The overcast morning meant that the room was in semidarkness. Emily closed her eyes.

  It was 8:30 when she woke again, this time without the lingering sense of fatigue and feeling all around more cheerful.

  It was a state of mind that lasted only an hour. When the mail was delivered, in it was a plain envelope with her name printed in childish letters.

  Her throat closed. She had seen that printing on the postcard with the tombstone drawings that had come in the mail only a few days ago.

  With trembling fingers she ripped open the envelope and pulled out the postcard inside it.

  Even though it had come in an envelope, the postcard was addressed to her. She turned it over and saw a drawing of two tombstones. The names on them were Natalie Frieze and Ellen Swain. They were placed in the center of a wooded area adjacent to a house. The address printed across the bottom of the card was 320 Seaford Avenue.

  Shaking so violently that she misdialed twice, Emily phoned Tommy Duggan.

  seventy-nine ________________

  MARTY BROWSKI WENT INTO THE OFFICE on Saturday afternoon to try to clear his desk, looking forward to a few hours without interruption. But after only a few minutes there he decided he might as well have stayed home. He simply could not concentrate. All of his attention was focused on only one person. Eric Bailey.

  The financial page of the morning newspapers plainly stated that Bailey dot-com would be forced into bankruptcy and that the misleading statements of its founder about new product developments were a matter of great concern to the director of the New York Stock Exchange. The article speculated he might even be facing criminal charges.

  He fits the profile of a stalker so well he could have posed for it, Browski thought. He had the EZPass records checked again, only to find that neither one of Eric Bailey’s vehicles had been recorded as driving south of Albany.

  There was absolutely no additional car registered to him, and it was unlikely that he would rent a car and risk leaving a paper trail.

  But what about a company car?

  The thought hit Browski as he was about to give up the attempt to work and go home. I’ll get the guys to run through that one, he decided. They can call me at home if they find anything.

  There was just one more possibility: Bailey’s secretary. What was her name? Marty Browski looked up to the ceiling as though expecting a voice from the heavens to answer him.

  Louise Cauldwell—the name came to him suddenly.

  She was in the phone book. Her message machine was on. “Sorry, I’m not answering the phone right now. Leave a message, please. Your call will be returned.”

  Meaning maybe she’s out and maybe she’s not, Marty thought irritably as he identified himself and left his home number for her. If anyone knew whether or not Bailey had other means of getting around than the two vehicles registered in his name, Ms. Cauldwell just might be the one.

  eighty ________________

  FOR THE THIRD TIME IN TWO DAYS, tapes marked CRIME SCENE went up on the property of a Spring Lake home owner.

  This residence, one of the oldest in town, had originally been a farmhouse and still retained the simple lines of its early nineteenth-century design.

  The spaci
ous property was composed of two building lots. The house and garden were on the left, while the area to the right was unchanged from its natural wooded state.

  It was there, in the shadow of a cluster of sycamore trees, that the body of Natalie Frieze, encased in heavy plastic, was found.

  For area residents, the events that followed had the feeling of déjà vu. The media flocked to the scene in large vans with antennas. Helicopters hovered overhead. In contrast, the neighbors gathered in quiet dignity on the sidewalk and on the closed-off road.

  After receiving Emily’s shocked phone call, Tommy Duggan and Pete Walsh immediately alerted the Spring Lake police, passing on to them the message on the postcard. Before they had reached Emily’s home, they received confirmation that the postcard was not a hoax. The difference was that this time the remains had not been interred.

  “Wonder why he didn’t bury her?” Pete Walsh asked soberly, as once more they watched the forensic team perform the grim task of examining and photographing the victim and the surroundings.

  Before Tommy could reply, a squad car pulled up to the site. A pale and shaken Bob Frieze emerged from the backseat, spotted Duggan and rushed to him. “Is it Natalie?” he demanded. “Is it my wife?”

  Duggan nodded, but didn’t speak. He had no intention of offering even perfunctory sympathy to the man who might well be the murderer.

  A few feet away, Reba Ashby, her identity camouflaged by dark glasses and a scarf that covered her head and shadowed her face, was scribbling in her notebook: “Reincarnated serial killer claims his third victim.”

  Nearby, Lucy Yang, a reporter from New York’s Channel 7, was facing the camera, holding the microphone and quietly saying, “The eerie repetition of the crimes of the late nineteenth century has claimed its third, and possibly last, victim. The body of thirty-four-year-old Natalie Frieze, wife of restaurateur and former Wall Street executive Robert Frieze was found today . . .”