Bloodlines (49 page)

Among the treasures found in Eric's trunk, sewn into the lining of his suitcase, were seventy-nine diamonds. Diamonds that matched exactly the cut and style and size of those missing from the Vanderveer necklace. Also in the trunk was the lighter Jack had given Katy, monogrammed with her initial.

Eric claimed that he and Ian had found these items while scuba diving. The fact that the lighter worked and showed no sign of having been exposed to sea water was something he could not explain.

Ian swore that he knew nothing about any of these items. Lefebvre didn't immediately challenge this. Instead he asked, "You like reading James Bond books?"

"Yes," Ian said warily, apparently puzzled by the abrupt change of subject.

"I wondered. Maybe you liked the writer's name. You know--Ian Fleming, Ian Yeager."

"No, that's not it. I just like them."

"I thought you might. Is that why you've hung on to that old Walther PPK of yours? What caliber is that? A 7.65 millimeter, isn't it? James Bond's gun. Your gun."

"You found..." But Ian's voice trailed off.

"You look surprised," Lefebvre said. "But you know, we look in all kinds of places when we have a search warrant, so it's a little hard to hide things from us. That business of taping the gun to the toilet tank lid--that's an old one."

Silence.

"You probably won't be surprised," Lefebvre said, "if I tell you that the bullets that killed Katy and Todd Ducane were 7.65 millimeter. I'll bet the rifling patterns and all those other little things we check when we match a weapon to a bullet just might tell an interesting story."

But Ian was surprised. "That fuckwad Eric killed them with my gun!" he said, and immediately provided an alibi for himself: he couldn't have been in the Buick--he had been invited to join Thelma and Barrett on the Sea Dreamer, and helplessly watched as they were swept overboard by a rogue wave.

"While you, on the other hand, could use your scuba tanks to breathe."

"Yes! No!"

It was only a matter of time before Ian admitted that he and Eric had been involved in the murders of all four Ducanes. Asked whose plan it was, he claimed that Eric had been the mastermind.

"Why would Eric want to kill the Ducanes?"

"They always looked down on us, that's why."

"Why spare Warren, then?"

Ian's voice took on a quality of recital as he answered. "If you kill your enemy, he's dead. He's not feeling another thing. But if you kill the people he loves and hide the bodies--you kidnap them and never let them be found-- then you make him wonder if they're alive or dead, if he'll ever see them again. He starts to think about what might be happening to them. That way, your enemy suffers all his life. Nothing you could do to him is worse than that. Nothing."

Like Lefebvre, I was certain Ian's confession was a mixture of truth and lies, but those few minutes were the most disturbing. Ian had spoken with utter sincerity, as if this was his religious creed, rather than a declaration of his depravity.

Ian claimed complete ignorance about other events of that evening in 1958-- the attack on Jack Corrigan, the kidnapping of the infant Max Ducane, the murder of Rose Hannon. His denials were convincing, and no further interrogation shook Ian from this position, or made the slightest change in his avowal that Eric had planned the murders of the Ducanes.

Eric denied everything--until he listened to a few minutes of Ian's confession. He then told of taking the younger Ducanes hostage, forcing Todd to drive while he sat in the back with Katy and the dog. As they went up the drive toward the farm, Eric had been bitten by Katy's dog on his gun arm, and he had clubbed the dog with his flashlight. That had so upset Katy, she had attacked him. During the ensuing struggle in the backseat, Todd lost control of the car and crashed the Buick into a tree. Eric had clubbed Katy as well then, and shot Todd as he sat dazed after hitting his head on the windshield. Griffin Baer had already prepared a burial place for the Buick, so Eric hadn't worried much about the crash.

Eric shot Katy just to make sure she was dead. He placed the bodies in the trunk. He wasn't supposed to take anything from them, but the diamond necklace was too big a temptation. He grabbed hold of it and it broke.

He could see Baer on his way over with a tractor, ready to tow the car to the pit. Eric rushed to pocket as many of the diamonds as he could before Baer reached him.

"Why not kill Baer to keep him quiet?"

"I knew Griff wouldn't talk. He was a friend of my father. Of my grandfather. You think I would kill an old family friend?"

Lefebvre was silent for a long moment, then said, "Thelma Ducane was a friend of your uncle Mitch, and so was her husband."

"This has nothing to do with my uncle Mitch."

"What is it he's promised you?" Lefebvre asked.

"Not a thing."

"I'm supposed to believe it's a coincidence that all of this took place on the same night that the Ducane heir was kidnapped?"

"I don't care if you believe it or not. That's the way it happened. I know nothing about any kidnapping."

"Why was Warren Ducane spared?"

"You ought to ask him. Have you found him yet? Besides, if you really want to hurt your enemy, you don't just kill him. That's quick. He doesn't suffer at all. You want to make your enemy suffer, you kill the people he loves and hide the bodies--you make him wonder if they're alive or dead. Nothing is worse than that."

O'Connor was convinced the Yeager catechism was a direct quote from their uncle Mitch. While I didn't doubt it, there was simply no way to prove it, or to prove that Eric and Ian had any connection to the disappearance of Max Ducane or Jack's beating or even the death of Gus Ronden.

Mitch Yeager had been present at the trials, publicly playing the role of the shocked and saddened uncle who couldn't believe that these "boys" would do such terrible things.

The D.A. at the time was not as skilled as his opponents. The prosecutor told Lefebvre and Arden that he was concerned about the age of the cases, lack of witnesses, and the little physical evidence that tied Eric and Ian to the murders. Under public pressure he decided to prosecute the cases, but he sought the death penalty--which had only been reinstated in California the previous year.

Lefebvre later told me that he didn't think the D.A. did a good job of screening the jury. Post-trial interviews revealed that the possibility of a death sentence had weighed strongly with the most reluctant juror. After five days of deliberation, the jury informed the judge that it was hopelessly deadlocked, and the judge declared a mistrial.

Ian and Eric weren't free--there was still the problem of the little house-warming party they had thrown for Max and me. Rather than pursue a second murder trial, the D.A. brought them up on the assault and kidnapping charges--not even attempted murder, which was arguable.

But the safe bet paid off, and the D.A. won that case. I was relieved to know the Yeager brothers wouldn't be free, but it didn't seem right that they were going to jail for hitting Max and locking us in a tunnel for a few hours rather than for taking four--or more--lives.

In the months before the trial, Max and I figured out that dating would ruin a perfectly good friendship. By then, the friendship meant too much to us to risk that. He recovered from his injuries and went back to New Hampshire to pursue his MBA at Tuck. He came back to Las Piernas often, though--he hired some friends from Dartmouth to help him start a company that would develop applications of GPS technology, and based the company in Las Piernas, where he planned to live after graduation.

The day the verdicts were handed down, he left our post-trial celebration early to catch a flight back East. Before he left, he gave me a hug and said, "Write to me. Call me collect. And keep slaying dragons."

Lefebvre stopped by the party for an hour or so, and was the first person to notice that I wasn't drinking. "Driving tonight?" he asked when he was sure he wouldn't be overheard.

I glanced at O'Connor, who was quietly downing one scotch after another. "I think that would be best."

"You two are getting along now, I see."

"We still have our occasional differences of opinion," I said, which made Lefebvre smile. "But I like it when we tackle a story together. It's hard to describe, but there's a kind of energy there that I don't always feel when I work on my own." I shrugged. "This is going to sound corny, but I like him because he tries so hard to do the right thing."

"Corny, huh? Maybe not. I've been reading some of the articles you've written together--it's a good partnership, I think. And speaking of partnerships--I hear that you'll soon be related by marriage."

I sighed. "For as long as it lasts. Yes, my sister Barbara and his son Kenny are getting married. The only upside to this is that Kenny has moved out of O'Connor's house and bought a place of his own."

"You don't place much hope in their future?"

"I shouldn't be so negative," I admitted. "They'll probably be together forever. Kenny needs constant care and attention. My sister loves providing it-- to a healthy male like him, anyway."

He studied me after I said this, and I found myself hoping he didn't ask me what I meant by it. He probably knew about my father, but he changed the subject.

"I wanted more of these old questions to be resolved," he said, "but I have worked in law enforcement long enough to feel relieved that at least Ian and Eric now have felony convictions on their records. If they fail to win appeals, I'll be happy."

"I know what you mean. I just wish Betty Bradford had called me back."

"Maybe she will, one of these days."

"She's passed up a huge reward, and if the person who was her boss was convicted today, she should have stepped forward."

He shook his head, but didn't comment. We both knew the big fish got away. And neither of us thought there was a hope in hell he'd be caught.

When last call rolled around, O'Connor and I were the only ones still in the bar. O'Connor was under full sail. Still, he managed to walk fairly steadily to the Karmann Ghia, and didn't have too much difficulty getting in.

I drove him home. He was sobering up a little by then, and invited me in for coffee. I had been to his house many times by then, and he to mine, but this was something he had never done before. I accepted the invitation, but watching the clumsiness of his movements, seated him at the kitchen table while I made the coffee. Never let a drunk loose in a kitchen. Too many sharp implements, and the simplest tasks will take forever.

I made coffee that was the equivalent of forty-weight motor oil. He drank three cups of it. I could see him coming into focus, so I asked, "What is it, O'Connor?"

"What's what?"

"What's eating at you?"

He shrugged. "I was thinking of Ian and Eric's catechism, and wondering if I could have become Mitch's Yeager's enemy before I was eighteen."

"When you were a copyboy?"

"Maybe before that, even."

"What do you mean?"

He didn't answer. I poured him another cup of coffee.

"I was thinking of Maureen tonight, that's all," he said. "I think of her every day, but sometimes ...like that night when you were in that tunnel... God, did that worry me."

"Who's Maureen?"

He seemed surprised I didn't know, then looked down at his coffee. "Was...who was Maureen."

After a long silence, he told me the story of his missing sister, and how he blamed himself because he had not walked her home that night. He talked of the misery his family had experienced, of the years of waiting for her to return. Of how even the discovery of her remains, while a relief of one kind, hadn't brought him the peace he had hoped for. He spoke with bitterness over the fact that her murderer had not been caught. He seemed to blame himself for that, too.

I thought of the many times, over the past few months, when we had talked of unidentified bodies and missing persons. Not once had he mentioned Maureen. I realized that not even the loss of Jack could compare with the painfulness of this wound.

"We had been so close," he said quietly. "I miss her to this day."

I couldn't think of a thing to say or do to comfort him. I wanted to hug him, and while in later years that would become a natural part of our friendship, it was not yet. Finally, I said, "When you told me about the way she felt about your work--she was proud of you. I think she still would be proud."

"Do you?" he asked. "I wonder."

"I'm sure of it."

He smiled softly then said, "It's late, Kelly. Will you call me to let me know you've got yourself home safely? Don't worry you'll wake me."

I called him when I got home, thinking of that night when he searched for me along the bluffs, and of his admission tonight that he had been afraid for me. I vowed that if he ever again wanted to see me safely to my door or wanted me to call him when I got home, or check in with him during the day, I would not fight it or refuse to do as he asked. These requests were not, I saw at last, overbearing protectiveness. His fears came out of a devastating loss, one that had haunted him all his life.

At work the next day, thinking of how drunk he had been, I wondered if he would remember telling me about his sister. He drew me aside and said, "I know you heard my sad tale with a kind heart, Irene, so I won't regret the telling of it. But I have no right to use my sister's memory in such a way. I would be grateful if we did not speak of it again."