For Whom the Minivan Rolls (24 page)

I was getting tired of every lead producing more
questions than answers. And I was more tired of the feeling,
growing since I first talked to Milt Ladowski, that the whole
kidnapping scenario had been staged for my personal benefit, that
someone decided it would look suspicious if nobody cared that
Madlyn ran off, so a patsy had to be found. A credible one, but one
who wasn’t a good enough investigator to actually find anything
out. The more I protested, the better I must have seemed for the
job.

They hadn’t wanted somebody good. They had wanted
somebody gullible.

I knew I should have been devastated by this
conclusion. It should have bothered me that I couldn’t rise above
the dismal expectations of my manipulator (or manipulators), that I
had played directly into unseen hands. But for some reason, it was
a liberating epiphany. I had been walking around with the weight of
Madlyn’s death on my shoulders. The idea had been holding me
back—the idea that somehow her death was my fault, that I should
have done something to prevent it, and hadn’t thought of it in
time.

Now, I didn’t have to worry about that anymore.
There had been no expectations. I didn’t owe anybody anything.

That freed me up to act in any way I saw fit. I had
my assignment now, and it came from me.

When I got home, I called the main number at the
Press-Tribune
and asked for the obit desk. Rory Anderson
picked up, and I smiled, although he couldn’t see. Rory is maybe
twenty-three, has hair that looks like he’s trying out for N’Sync,
and knows me from his days at the
Rutgers Daily Targum
. The
Targum
was, technically, my first employer, back in the days
I was an undergraduate and “employer” didn’t necessarily translate
into “paycheck.”

I had done a little advising for the
Targum
a
few years back, hadn’t reveled in my return to campus, and left by
mutual agreement. But I’d met Rory, and actually written a letter
of recommendation for him to the
Press-Tribune
. He was a
good reporter who, in true
Press-Tribune
fashion, was being
wasted on the obituary desk.

We had a brief verbal reunion, and I asked him to
look up Madlyn Beckwirth’s obit.

“Why don’t you just pick up the paper, Dude?” he
asked.

“Didn’t ‘Dude’ go out with, like, Pauly Shore?” I
asked. “And, for your information, I don’t get your rag. I
subscribe to the
New York Times.”

“Snob.” I could hear him clicking on his keys to
call up the obit. “You know, you could probably get this off the
web site.”

“You don’t keep obits more than a day.”

He stopped typing. “How come you’re not getting this
yourself, Aaron? You work for us, don’t you?”

“Hell, no. They fired me two days ago. I’m working
for the enemy now.”

“Cool!” Like all obit writers, Rory deeply and truly
detested his employer. Anything that could conceivably hurt the
paper would give him nothing but pleasure. “Got it,” he said.

“I need a little information. Survivors?”

“Husband Gary, son Joel. . .”

“Yeah. . .”

“Mother, Mrs. Charlotte Rossi of Westfield. A
sister, Mrs. Angela Cantucci of Toms River. That’s it.”

“You got where she went to high school?”

“No, but I’ll bet it was St. Joe’s.”

“Why?” I asked, startled that he’d come up with a
guess so quickly.

“That,” he said, “is where all the good Italian
girls go in Westfield, man.” I thanked him profusely, and hung up.
After gathering my courage, I called Mrs. Rossi in Westfield, told
her who I was, and asked if I could come over to talk about Madlyn.
She was unexpectedly calm, and agreed to see me the next day, which
was Saturday. It wasn’t until later that I remembered Madlyn’s
funeral would be Saturday morning. Mrs. Rossi was very brave.

And, yes, I know our interview was set for a
weekend, when I should be spending time with my kids, but hey, if
you can go talk to a woman about her dead daughter, what better way
to spend a Saturday? I asked where Madlyn went to high school, and
after a startled pause, Mrs. Rossi said, “St. Joe’s.” Score one for
Rory.

Right then, though, I realized I was out of ideas,
and there’s no better place to go for someone with no ideas than a
political rally.

That is how I came to walk again through the perfect
white trellis behind the perfect white picket fence and into the
perfect backyard of Martin and Rachel Barlow. “Barlow for Mayor”
signs were hung all over the house, the trellis, the fence, the
trees, and the sturdier of Martin Barlow’s hedges and bushes he had
installed all around the backyard.

There were maybe fifty people milling around, eating
Portobello mushroom canapés and drinking coffee from insulated,
specially printed “Barlow For Mayor” paper cups. The plates had the
same imprint. The forks and spoons managed to avoid the logo, but
were red, white, and blue, just in case anybody thought that Rachel
was anti-American and would try to subvert the system from the
great seat of power known as the Midland Heights mayor’s
office.

There was, as advertised, no music, which meant we
were not being subjected to the string quartet that had obviously
been intended for one corner of the yard. A bandstand of sorts had
been set up, comprised of two pallets underneath the tops of two
discarded Ping-Pong tables. It was ringed in red, white, and blue
bunting and emblazoned with—you guessed it—“Barlow For Mayor”
signs, in case you’d wandered back here and thought it was just a
boring neighborhood cook-out.

Barry Dutton was not there, which was not a
surprise, and most of the borough council members had also avoided
the event, since they were still betting on Sam Olszowy to pull
this thing out of the fire with a last-minute miracle. Besides,
Rachel had managed to piss off enough of them throughout the
campaign that even if she won, they might not attend any council
meetings at which she appeared.

Other reporters were present, some of whom I
recognized. Others were identifiable as press strictly by their
reporter’s notebooks or microphones. Local radio stations had sent
their reporters to get some news on the murder, not the campaign
event, and there was even a satellite truck outside from News 12
New Jersey, the system set up by the local cable provider and two
area newspapers. Rachel Barlow was getting the coverage she so
sincerely craved, but not for the reason she would have
preferred.

The candidate herself was quite the vision in a blue
pants suit from about 1988, reconstituted for the new millennium by
cutting the pants a couple of inches above the ankle. Either that,
or Rachel Barlow had grown since the last time she’d worn these
pants. If she wore her blonde hair in a flip, it evoked flips from
circa 1966. In sum, here was a mayoral candidate projecting herself
as a complete throwback in time, as an object of nostalgia, in
effect.

She was standing at the far end of the yard, near a
perfectly bloomed rose bush (Martin was clearly a very accomplished
gardener), answering questions for the News 12 reporter, and
wearing an expression of concern and seriousness, despite the fact
that, since the murder, she’d probably jumped seven
sympathy-and-name-recognition points in the polls.

Martin was standing near Rachel, but not too near,
dressed in a Ralph Lauren polo shirt and a pair of khakis pressed
to the point where the pleats could probably cause a deep cut in
anyone unfortunate enough to brush against him. He was one of the
few men I’d ever met who actually would have looked more
comfortable in a suit and tie. (They said the same thing about
Richard Nixon, but I never met him.)

I hadn’t been to the Y that morning, and I was
trying to watch what I ate, so I bravely avoided the canapés. It
was quite a trial, but I managed. On one table near the bandstand
were bagels, slices of marble cake, and blueberry muffins (no doubt
low-fat ones). That table was harder to avoid, so I decided to
concentrate on the task at hand, and approached the Barlows.

When Martin saw me closing in, he put on a face like
he’d smelled something bad, and I don’t think it was the Portobello
mushrooms. Rachel caught me out of the corner of her eye as she was
saying to the TV reporter, “Well you know, Juanita, the saddest
part is that she died so needlessly, just when she was about to
share in the great victory we’re going to accomplish here in
Midland Heights.” Martin caught me before I could get to Rachel,
and steered me to one side, which made me mad. If he got me too
close to that marble cake, there was no telling what could
happen.

“What are you doing here?” he hissed. “After all
you’ve done. . .”

“I’m a voter in Midland Heights, Martin,” I said, a
mocking smile on my face. It was nice to be the one wearing the
smug expression for a change. “I came to hear the candidate speak
on the issues.”

“It’s speak
to
the issues.” He couldn’t
resist.

Neither could I. “You’re wrong this time, Marty. The
issues are not here listening to Rachel. She can speak
about
the issues, or she can speak
on
the issues, but speaking
to
the issues is incorrect. You’re slipping. Have you gotten
enough sleep lately?”

He recoiled as if I’d slapped him. “What do you mean
by that?” he demanded.

I didn’t know what he thought I meant, but it
clearly worried him. I upped my vocal volume from the stage
whispers Barlow and I had been exchanging. “I mean there’s more to
this murder than meets the eye,” I said, and then, louder, “and you
know it!”

Heads turned. Reporters pulled notebooks out of
their pockets. Rachel’s head turned, too.

“I know what happened to Madlyn Beckwirth,” I said,
coming within a single decibel of shouting, “and you know more than
you’re telling, Martin! So does Rachel!”

Juanita the TV reporter widened her eyes to roughly
the size of garbage-can lids. And then the worst thing that could
have happened to Rachel Barlow followed: the microphone was pulled
from her face.

“What did you say? Who are you?” said Juanita.

“I’ve been investigating Madlyn Beckwirth’s murder,
and I’m saying Rachel and Martin Barlow know more than they’re
telling!” I had, of course, nothing more than a suspicion, but what
the hell, this was, as they say, “great television.”

Meantime, I watched Martin and Rachel Barlow. They
weren’t surprised or shocked. They weren’t even unnerved. Their
eyes narrowed, their mouths tightened, their nostrils flared.

The Barlows were good and angry.

But that wasn’t what caught my eye. Just at that
moment, I had one of those moments of acute observation that
Sherlock Holmes himself would have treasured. I looked past the
Barlows, past the reporters, who were now clamoring for my name and
shouting questions at me, past the other voters who thought they
were coming for a political event and showed up for a homicide
analysis. I looked past the bandstand, the campaign signs, and even
the bagels and marble cake.

Behind Martin Barlow was his prized rose bush, in
full bloom, affording an office seeker the finest background for
the finest photo-op in American political history. If you looked
carefully, you could see the tiny specks of blue in the pink
petals, almost in the shape of diamonds.

Martin Barlow had gotten his rose bush from Arthur
P. MacKenzie.

“Did you really say, ‘give me a by-line or give me
death’?” Abigail asked. She and Mahoney were staring blankly at me
across the kitchen table as I finished our chicken and couscous. I
kept eating, having devoted most of the day to not eating.

“You had to be there,” I told her. “It was more a
spur-of-the-moment kind of thing.”

“What were you thinking?” Mahoney wanted to know.
“You don’t have anything on these people. Not yet, anyway.”

“I wanted to make them think I did. I wanted to
force them into a stupid move that I can exploit.”

“And you wanted to piss them off,” Abby added.

“Well, yes, that too.”

Abby stood up to clear her plate, and picked
Mahoney’s up while she passed, since he had finished as well. He
nodded thanks.

“I don’t know that I’m crazy about this, Aaron,” she
said, scraping couscous into the garbage so she could put the
plates in the dishwasher. “If the Barlows were involved in killing
Madlyn Beckwirth, and you make them think you can prove it, they
might come after you.”

“That’s why
he’s
here,” I said, pointing at
Mahoney. “While I’m taking my little drive tonight, the galoot here
will be watching you and the kids.”

“Galoot?” Mahoney said, raising his eyebrows.

“I meant it in the most affectionate way possible,”
I said.

“You stay on that side of the table, Pal,” he said.
“I still have my knife.”

Abby put the dishes in the dishwasher and sat back
down at the table. “So you were just trying to irritate the Barlows
today?”

“Well, there were plenty of news organizations
there, too. If somebody wants the complete story, they now know
there’s a reporter who has the inside track.”

“Oh yeah,” said my wife. “Screaming ‘Don’t vote for
Mayor Murder’ while you’re being thrown out of a suburban backyard
cookout is going to look really good on your resumé. Not to mention
I don’t know how I’m going to get through the supermarket now.
Everyone will be staring at me.”

I stood up. “They all stare at you now, Honey,” I
said. “At least the men do.”

At the door, she kissed me a little more
passionately than she normally would. “Drive safe,” Abby said. I
gave Mahoney the eye over her shoulder. He understood the message,
and I left.

The ride to Emmaus seemed a lot longer this time,
even though I could listen to A.J. Croce, Elliott Smith, Janis Ian,
and Ella Fitzgerald on the way. But Mahoney’s absence meant two
things: no friendly banter, and possible danger at home. It was
difficult to resist the urge to call home on the cell phone every
three minutes. But I managed to call only twice en route, and
things were fine both times, although Leah couldn’t make up her
mind whether to take a bath or a shower. Some decisions are just
too big to be made quickly.