“I'll do what I can, of course. Do you mean no one has told your father yet?"
“Nobody can find him. He's just not used toaccounting for his movements to anybody but Phy—Oh, my God—!”
He was staring past Jane as if he'd seen a ghost. Turning her head, Jane saw it, too—a portrait photo of Phyllis Wagner was on the television screen. She quickly picked up the mysterious controller, fidgeted frantically for a few seconds before finding the volume control.
. . wife of entrepreneur Chester Wagner. The former Chicagoan reportedly died of stab wounds. Police located her husband this afternoon at a downtown hotel under an assumed name....”
On the screen a fit, tanned, silver-haired man was being escorted to a police car. At least he wasn't handcuffed, and without the narration, he would have looked like a diplomat with his own security men. "Oh, shit—" John Wagner whispered, leaning forward.
The next shot was of Mel VanDyne shaking his head and holding a palm out toward the camera.
“No, we are merely questioning Mr. Wagner in regard to his wife's death. There has been no arrest. You will be informed when there is.”
The station cut to a commercial, and Jane and Wagner were left staring at each other wordlessly.
Fifteen
“I'mnot going to let this happen. Those bas- tards aren't going to pin this on my father," John Wagner exclaimed, standing suddenly and striding toward the door. "Excuse me, Mrs. Jeffry." With that, he was gone.
Jane sat quietly for a minute after the door slammed, then picked up the controller and started cruising through channels. It was time for the local news, and each of the major stations had something to say about Phyllis's death. All the reports focused on Chet, as if Phyllis herself were nothing more than an important object belonging to him. Of course, what was there to say about her except that she was Chet's wife? That she once made lonely old people happy with tatted ornaments? That she was a superb knitter? That she loved a long lost son who didn't deserve her? Hardly.
One station showed a picture of the house with the yellow plastic police barricades. Another had dredged up a file photo of Phyllis in a crowd of second string international celebrities. A third went on at quite some length about Chet's financial empire and showed a shot ofthe island house—or was it the hotel? Jane couldn't tell.
She learned nothing more than she'd heard earlier about the case, but she did see a familiar face on one report. It was the same scene she'd seen on the other channel, Chet being led to a car by two plainclothes officers, but it was shot from a slightly different angle, and in the background two men were conversing over an open notebook. One of them was a big, late-middleaged man in a somewhat wrinkled gray suit and a fedora hat right out of the forties.
He was Jane's Uncle Jim—not a real uncle but an honorary one, her father's lifelong best friend. Formerly of the army, for many years with the Chicago police department, he remained close to Jane, especially since Steve died and left her "a helpless widow" in his words. She turned off the television, went to the kitchen, and dialed his precinct telephone number. He'd gone for the day, she was told. There was no answer at his apartment yet.
While she waited, she got out some ground beef and onions to brown. Ten minutes later, when they were nearly done, Shelley came over. "Jane, did you see the news? Your friend was all over it."
“I know. Did you see my Uncle Jim in the background? I'm waiting for him to get home so I can pump him for information."
“He's not crazy about giving you inside information, is he?"
“I want 'outside' information," Jane said, carefully draining the meat and onion mixture and adding beans and tomato sauce. "John Wagner was here. Shelley, it was weird. He was nice. Nice!"
“Jane, have you considered getting psychiatric help? You're going to clog up your disposal if you don't run cold water.”
Jane turned on the water. "I mean it about John Wagner. He even apologized for being so hateful about volleyball."
“He must have really wanted something."
“From me?" Jane asked, shaking chili seasoning into the pot and stirring. "All he asked was that I help him look over Phyllis's things to see if anything was there that shouldn't be. Of course, he'd barely gotten here when the news came on, and he dashed off. I've never seen a man look so upset. He even seemed genuinely sorry about Phyllis, and then there as that picture of Chet being led away, and John turned the color of cauliflower."
“I've got to go back to fixing dinner," Shelley said. "Call and tell me what you find out from your Uncle Jim, will you?"
“Say, Shelley—what are you doing after dinner?"
“Nothing planned. Why?"
“Well, I'd like to do what John Wagner was asking—look through Phyllis's things—and get it over with. He made me feel horribly guilty, saying I'd know what was hers just because I knew her so well. The fact is, you and I might know if something isn't hers just because we're women. I mean, Steve once saw me using a nail whitening pencil and said he'd always wondered what they were. His mother always had one around. He thought it was some secret feminine hygiene thing you don't talk about. I guess that's sort of an opposite example of what I mean, but—"
“I get it anyhow. I don't think you'll find anything interesting, but sure—I'll come along. How do you plan to get into the house?"
“Last I heard, Bobby was staying there." Shelley shuddered. "I forgot about him. Do you think we ought to get near him? What if he is the murderer?"
“There's safety in numbers. Besides, he'd have no reason to do anything to us.”
Jane fed everybody, drove Mike to band practice, dropped Todd at a friend's house, and took Katie to her pal Jenny's, whose mother had offered to take them to a teen fashion show at the mall. Certain they all had rides home, Jane came back for Shelley. "Let me give Uncle Jim one more try," she said, stamping the snow off her boots at Shelley's kitchen door.
This time she got him.
“Hey, Janey. You calling to uninvite me to Saturday dinner?" he asked.
“Don't get your hopes up. Mike is counting on you coming to his concert, and I've already got the sauerbraten marinating. I'm calling because I saw you on television this afternoon."
“Oh, yeah. The Wagner thing. VanDyne is in charge. Did you know that?"
“I not only know it, I'm a suspect. Phyllis was a friend of mine. In fact, she'd come to Chicago to visit me."
“My God, Jane! The things you get into."
“I didn't get into it. It came looking for me. Uncle Jim, what do you know about this?"
“Up until now, nothing. I was just asked to have a man or two at the exits in case there was trouble. There wasn't. Jane, if I'd known you were involved—"
“Don't get upset. I'm not involved. But I want to know what's happening. Have they actually arrested Chet Wagner?"
“Not that I know of. Like I say, I didn't take much interest. I had the idea it was just a matter of time. Give me an hour or two to see what I can find out. I'll call you back. You home?”
Jane paused. "Ah—no. I'm at Shelley' s, and we're going—going Christmas shopping.”
But the pause had alerted him. "Jane," he said menacingly. "You stay away from all this, understand?"
“Well, of course. Don't be ridiculous. I'll call you back when I get home." She hung up the phone and said, "Let's get out of here quick before he decides to come babysit me.”
The police boundary tape was gone, and the rented Jaguar was in the driveway. Bobby came to the door with a drink in his hand. "Yeah? Whaddaya want?"
“I'm Jane Jeffry, and this is Shelley Nowack. Remember us from yesterday? I loaned your mother a book, and I wondered if it would be all right if I went up and got it back." Jane was rather proud of this little story. It had crossed her mind on the way over that asking to browse through Phyllis's belongings for clues might not please Bobby. And if he was the killer, they certainly didn't want to offer him a motive to harm them.
“Yeah, I guess it's okay. The cops have already gone through all her stuff," he said, apparently not fooled in the least by Jane's story.
He opened the door and allowed them in. Jane noted that he was already making a shambles of the house. Clothing was strewn around, beer bottles were making rings on the dining room table, and several ashtrays overflowed with butts.
Bobby slouched toward the kitchen, leaving Shelley and Jane to their own devices. That was good; he didn't intend to stand over them while they went through her things.
At the top of the stairs, Shelley grabbed Jane's arm. "Look at that!" she said, pointing toward the master suite. In addition to the unmade bed, clothing and suitcases flung everywhere, there was an elaborate sound system on the far wall next to the door to the deck.