The Girl In The Glass (15 page)

Chapter 32

M
AGGIE HANDE
D
M
C
C
ABE
a large Styrofoam cup of coffee and a paper bag. “Here. Stopped for these up on the way over. Figured you hadn’t had a good nutritious breakfast yet.”

She pulled the unmarked Interceptor out onto the Eastern Prom and turned right toward the Old Port.

He peered inside. Two chocolate-­covered donuts. “Both for me?”

“Both for you. I gobbled mine on the way over.”

He bit into one, licked chocolate off his finger and washed it down with a generous slug of the coffee.

“Do you suppose,” he asked, “that we became cops because we like donuts? Or that we like donuts because we became cops?”

They crossed Franklin and continued west on Fore Street, still quiet at six thirty on a Friday morning.

McCabe finished his first donut and pulled the second from the bag.

“I think,” said Maggie, bearing left onto York Street and heading for the Casco Bay Bridge, “that we like donuts because, as responsible, health-­conscious adults, we are both aware that a good, nutritious breakfast is the most important meal of the day.”

“Exactly what my mother used to say when she poured me my Sugar Pops.”

“A wise woman. How’s she doing?” Maggie stayed in the middle lane as she crossed the bridge that spanned the Fore River and separated Portland from South Portland, or SoPo, as it was called. She turned right onto Cottage Road, then left onto Ellesmere.

“Not so great. According to my brother Bobby, she’s getting more and more forgetful all the time. He thinks it’s Alzheimer’s.”

“Sorry to hear that,” said Maggie. She navigated a series of lefts and rights that led to Willard Haven Place, where Byron Knowles and his wife, Gina, lived. “Changing the subject, how convinced are you that Knowles killed Aimée?”

“ ‘I can never forgive myself for the terrible things I have done’? I suppose that could refer to a lot of things, but given the coincidence of timing, it sure seems likely that what he can’t forgive himself for is killing her.”

“Jesus, her English teacher. If you can’t trust your English teacher, who can you trust?”

“Yeah. It makes me happier than you can imagine that Casey’s English teacher is a fifty-­five-­year-­old overweight female.”

They pulled up in front of a small, light green Cape Cod on Willard Haven Place in the Willard Beach section of the city. Another unmarked police car was parked on the opposite side of the street. A big man with a dark black mustache exited the vehicle. Maggie and McCabe crossed over to meet him.

“Detective Holmes?” asked McCabe.

“Yup, Tommy Holmes.”

“Anybody ever call you Sherlock?”

“Only folks who don’t mind getting their asses kicked.” Since Holmes stood a good six foot three and probably weighed 220, most of it muscle, there was no question he could have kicked most asses without breaking a sweat. Including McCabe’s.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” said McCabe with a smile. “Anyway, I’m Detective Sergeant Mike McCabe. This is my partner, Detective Maggie Savage.”

They all shook hands. “You talked to the wife yet?” asked Maggie.

“Yeah. One of our patrol guys answered the missing persons call. When she showed him the text, he alerted me.”

“You checked the source of the text?”

“Yeah. It definitely came from Knowles’s cell phone. He sent it at 2:21 a.m. Phone’s been offline ever since. Pops right to message. I asked her where Knowles was last night. Apparently he teaches English at Penfield and went to a school graduation party out on Whitby Island. Went in his own boat.”

“What kind of boat?”

“An old nineteen-­foot Midland he fixed up himself. Mostly uses it for fishing. He was supposed to be back by midnight. Never showed. He keeps the boat at the Sunset Marina off Front Street. We checked, and it wasn’t there. But his car was still in the lot. A maroon ’02 Camry.”

“Anything of interest in the car?”

“Nah. Just some empty coffee cups and a kid’s toy.”

“Did you look in the trunk?”

“Yeah. Just in case he’d been murdered and stuffed in there. But there was nothing there. It’s possible he had some kind of problem with the boat on the way home. Engine conking out or whatever. But given the contents of the message, I’ve got a feeling he took a dive. Coast Guard Search and Rescue are looking for both the boat and for Knowles if he’s in the water. When I heard you guys had a brand-­new homicide, a female teenager, and since Knowles taught teenagers, seemed like there might be a connection. I don’t know. Like maybe he killed your vic and then himself. Or maybe he’s using the boat to make a getaway.”

“Definitely a connection. Our victim was in Knowles’s class and was at the same party with him.”

“Well, there you go then. Anyway, the Coasties are patrolling the area looking for him and/or the boat.”

“What’s the boat’s registration number?” asked McCabe.

Holmes took out his notepad. “Want me to write it out for you?”

“Not necessary. Just read it out loud. I’ll remember it.”

“You got a photographic memory or something?”

“Or something.”

Holmes shrugged and read off the six-­digit registration number.

“I’ve also got somebody watching the car in case Knowles turns up. Also to make sure nobody else touches it till it can be checked for possible evidence.”

“Mag, would you see if Jacoby’s got anybody left who can go over the car?”

“If it helps, I could have our ­people do it,” said Holmes. “We’ll send over whatever we find.”

“That’d be a big help. Thanks. We’re stretched thin at the moment.”

Holmes nodded and made the call. After he’d arranged for South Portland evidence techs to check out the Camry he hung up and asked McCabe, “Can you tell me the name of the victim yet?”

Since it’d be all over the media in just a ­couple of hours, there was no point in holding back. “She was Edward Whitby’s daughter. Veronica Aimée Whitby.”

“Whitby?” Holmes made a whistling sound. “That ought to make things interesting.”

“Yep. She took senior English from the missing Mr. Knowles. You get anything more from Mrs. Knowles?”

“Not really. I didn’t want to get into her relationship with her husband. Figured I’d leave that to you. By the way, you do know she’s gonna have a baby any minute?”

“We heard. Thanks for your help.”

“No problem. Let me know if you need anything else.”

Just as Holmes was getting in his car, McCabe called out, “Give my regards to Dr. Watson.” Holmes smiled and extended the third finger of his left hand.

Chapter 33

A
S THEY W
ENT
up the walk, McCabe suggested that Maggie do most of the talking. She was good at it, and he preferred watching for visual reaction. McCabe knocked. A very pregnant but otherwise slender-­looking blonde in her midthirties opened the door. A little girl about four peered curiously out from behind her mother’s trousers.

“Mrs. Knowles?” asked Maggie.

“Yes. Gina.”

“I’m Detective Margaret Savage. Portland PD. This is Detective Sergeant Michael McCabe. May we come in?”

She eyed them suspiciously through large black-­framed glasses. “Why Portland? I already talked to two ­people from the South Portland Police.”

“Detective Holmes called us because we’re investigating another case that might shed some light on your husband’s whereabouts. May we come in?”

The door opened wider, and they walked into a small, neatly furnished living room. Maggie looked down and smiled at the little girl. “What’s your name?”

In response, the child shoved two fingers into her mouth and buried her face in her mother’s leg.

“Her name is Patti.”

“Hi, Patti.”

Patti peeked out and smiled shyly.

“Would you two like some coffee or anything while we talk? I’m drinking some.”

“No, thank you. Where’s the best place to sit?”

“Over there.” She pointed Maggie and McCabe to a table on the other side of a Formica counter that separated a dining area from the open-­plan kitchen. “But let me get her set up first. “Hey pumpkin, c’mon, let’s watch
Curious George,
okay?”

Ms. Knowles pushed a DVD into a player and sat her daughter down in front of the TV with a pair of earphones that had cartoon tigers covering each ear. When the program started, she joined them in the dining area. Maggie sat at the head of the table. Gina Knowles took the side chair, which gave her the best view of her daughter. McCabe distanced himself at the other end.

“She won’t be able to hear anything but the TV with those earmuffs on.”

A Toshiba laptop sat open in front of her, a smartphone next to it. Maggie placed her digital recorder next to the phone and told Gina she was going to record the conversation.

“Okay.”

“Gina, you sound like you’re originally from Boston?”

“Born and raised. Been in Maine for eleven years now, but the accent sticks with you.”

“Are you a full-­time mom?”

“Don’t I wish? But no way can we afford to live on one salary. Especially when one of them’s a teaching salary from a private school. I work as a lab technician for Intex.” The company, one of the largest in the area, made veterinary pharmaceuticals. “My mom takes care of Patti while I’m at work. She’ll also help with the new baby when it comes.”

“She live nearby?”

“A few blocks away. She and my dad came up from Boston after he retired. Wanted to be closer to their granddaughter. Anyway, I’ll be taking four weeks maternity leave when the baby comes, but after that it’ll be back to the grindstone.”

“Please tell us about your husband’s disappearance.”

“Yes. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? All I know is that I’m worried sick. What I told the ­people who were here before is that his name is Byron Knowles. He teaches at Penfield Academy in Portland. Here . . .” She slid some copy paper across the table. “ . . . I printed out a bunch of pictures. Maybe these will help you find him.”

Maggie picked them up. Studied the slender, handsome face for a few seconds, then slid them down to McCabe. “Good-­looking guy,” she said.

“Yeah,” said Gina. “Sometimes I think too good looking.”

“Why do you say that? Do women make a play for him?”

At least thirty seconds passed before Gina Knowles spoke. “Some do.”

“You were telling us about what your husband does,” said McCabe.

“Byron teaches eleventh-­ and twelfth-­grade English. Been at Penfield eleven years. The job offer from Penfield was why we moved to Portland. Graduation was yesterday morning. Byron went. I didn’t.”

“Why not?”

“Faculty spouses aren’t invited. Seating’s limited. Besides, I had to work.”

“Did you see your husband at all after the graduation?” asked Maggie.

“Yes, he got back around one o’clock and was still here when I got home from work at four fifteen. We’re converting his home office into a nursery for the new baby, and he spent part of the afternoon painting it. He took a shower and got dressed for a graduation party out on Whitby Island. Left about five. Took our boat out to the island. Two of the Whitby girls, twins I think, were both students of Byron’s, and all the Upper School faculty was invited.”

She delivered this information in a flat voice, as empty of emotion as if she’d been reading out a shopping list. McCabe wondered if she was working hard at keeping her emotions bottled up. Or maybe she just didn’t give a damn where her husband might be.

“When Byron left for the party, what was he wearing?”

“What he always wears for school events. Blue blazer. Striped or checked button-­down shirt. I don’t remember which. Red tie. Loafers.”

“Wouldn’t he have gotten kinda wet in a small boat dressed like that?”

“He keeps waterproofs in the boat. Bright yellow coveralls. They fit right over his clothes.”

The yellow ought to make it easier for the Coasties to spot Knowles if he was still floating around somewhere. Or trying to escape by sea.

“Generally wear a life jacket?”

“Always.”

Unless, thought McCabe, he was planning to kill himself.

“Spouses not invited to the party either?” asked Maggie.

“I was invited. But I wasn’t about to go cruising out to Whitby Island in this condition.” She placed a hand on her pregnant tummy. “I probably would have thrown up before we got out of the harbor. Didn’t really want to go anyway. I can’t stand all that preppy party chatter. The Penfield crowd thinks they’re all so high and mighty. Particularly the Whitbys. The invitation from them made me feel like one of the serfs being summoned to the manor house. Yes, m’lord. No, m’lord. And since I can’t even drink in this condition, I declined.”

“But Byron went?”

“Yes. Said it was part of his job to be there. Headmaster expected it. Students expected it. I asked him if he could just put in an appearance and maybe be home by nine or ten, but he didn’t want to do that. We compromised on midnight.”

“But you weren’t happy about that.”

“No, I wasn’t happy.”

“Did you wait up for him?”

“No. I went to bed around eleven. I couldn’t wait up any longer.”

“When did you notice he hadn’t come home?”

“Three fifteen. I woke up to go to the bathroom. There’s a digital clock right next to the bed.”

“You didn’t call the police till after five. Why didn’t you call at three fifteen?”

Gina Knowles took a deep breath. “Sometimes Byron doesn’t come home when he’s supposed to.”

“I see. What about the text message?” Maggie picked up the phone on the table. “That came in at 2:21.”

“I keep the phone on silent when I sleep. And I didn’t look at it when I woke up.”

“Why not?”

“I just didn’t.”

“Your husband was over three hours late coming home from a party across open water in a small boat in the dark. Didn’t that worry you enough to at least check if he’d sent any kind of message?”

“No.”

Maggie waited for some kind of explanation. There was none. “Why not?”

“I already told you. Sometimes Byron doesn’t come home when he’s supposed to. Or he calls and says he’s working and he’ll be home late. Eight. Nine. Sometimes even midnight.”

Maggie frowned. “Working? Does he have a second job?”

“The romantic poets are his specialty. He’s supposedly writing a biography of Lord Byron. He used to work at home but he says there are too many distractions here, so now he works at the university library at USM. During the week it’s open till
11:00
p.m.”

“Does he do that frequently?”

“Frequently enough. At least for the past year or so. Before that hardly ever.”

“Why do you think that is?”

“Well, if you really want to know the truth, I don’t think he’s doing anything at the USM library. And I don’t think he’s been working on his book. If he is, he certainly doesn’t seem to have made much progress on it.”

“Do you think he’s having an affair?”

Gina Knowles glanced over at her daughter, who was still immersed in
Curious George.
“That’s right, Detective. I think my husband is having an affair. In fact, I don’t think it. I know it.”

“How do you know it?”

“I just know it. A wife knows things like that. So when I woke up at three fifteen and saw he wasn’t here, I didn’t get worried. I got angry. So angry I couldn’t go back to sleep. I just lay in the bed picturing him out on Whitby Island, or maybe back here with whoever the hell he’s having sex with these days.”

“Did you ever discuss divorce?”

“He brought it up a ­couple of times. I told him I wasn’t interested. We were married in the Catholic Church, and I firmly believe when you make vows before God, you keep them. No matter what. Till death do you part.”

“Is Byron Catholic?”

“He used to be.”

“But not anymore?”

“No, he hardly ever goes to church except at Christmas, and then only because he likes the music.”

“But you go regularly?”

“Yes. Every Sunday. To Holy Cross over on Cottage Road.”

“What did he say when you told him you wouldn’t agree to a divorce?”

“He got angry. Yelled at me. Told me our marriage was a sham.”

“When was that?” asked McCabe.

“When I first realized I was pregnant. Back in early November. I thought he’d be overjoyed. Like I was. Like he’d been when we had Patti. But all he said was ‘Oh,’ as if he was disappointed. Then, ‘Are you sure?’ like another child was the last thing he wanted even though we’d talked about it a million times. It was like he was wondering if I might be willing to end the pregnancy.”

“Did he ask you to have an abortion?”

“No. But I could tell that’s what he was thinking.”

“Did that make you angry?”

“Of course it made me angry. He knows how I feel about abortion. A new life is a gift from God. You don’t destroy it.”

“Did you fight about it? Lose your temper?”

“Yes. Well, at least I did. But it’s hard to fight with Byron. Whenever I get angry or shout at him, he just retreats into a shell and doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t even try to defend himself. When he doesn’t want to talk about something, he can be so damn passive, it makes me crazy.”

“Any idea who the other woman, or women, might be?”

Gina looked first at Maggie and then at McCabe. He got the sense that she was debating her answer to the question.

“I don’t know,” she said after a minute. “I do think it’s just one woman. Byron was never like this before this year. This not showing up when he was supposed to and then offering some flimsy excuse. I think it’s probably one of the young female teachers at Penfield. There are a lot of single women on the faculty, some quite attractive, and I can’t think where else he’d have an opportunity to meet someone. He doesn’t hang out at bars. And I don’t think he’d have the nerve to start prowling around online. He’s just not aggressive enough for that. Byron’s a hopeless romantic, but at the same time, like I told you, he can be passive. When we met, I was the one who had to ask him out first. I expect it’s the same thing with whoever he’s been seeing lately. She came on to him and he didn’t have the strength or integrity to say no. Like you said, Byron’s a good-­looking guy.”

“Did you ever ask him or accuse him directly of having an affair?”

“Sort of. Once. I went through his wallet and found a credit card receipt for dinner at an expensive restaurant. The Chart House in Cape Neddick. $208.26. April twenty-­third.”

McCabe’s mind clicked back to his conversation with Tracy. April twenty-­third. Aimée’s birthday. The evidence was beginning to squeeze a little tighter around Mr. Knowles’s neck.

“I asked him who he was having dinner with. He said it was with his old roommate from Bowdoin. Guy named Barry Meyers.”

“How do you know he wasn’t?”

“I just know it. Byron’s fallen for some woman. Probably some little cutie in the English Department.”

“Do you have a contact number for this guy Meyers?” asked McCabe.

“No. He’s Byron’s friend, not mine. But you shouldn’t have any trouble finding him. He’s a very successful screenwriter. Nominated for a Golden Globe last year. Lives in L.A.”

“So what time was it you first saw the text?”

“About five fifteen. Since I couldn’t sleep, I finally decided the heck with it and got up to do some work. I made some coffee. Brought my laptop and phone down here, and the first thing I did was check for messages. And there it was. ‘I can never forgive myself for the terrible things I have done. Please know that I have always loved you.’ My first thought was maybe his girlfriend dumped him and he was trying to make it up with me. Or maybe, with the baby coming, he was starting to feel guilty about the whole thing and managed to work up the courage to dump her. My second thought, since he still wasn’t home, was that it sounded like a suicide note. Detective Holmes agreed. He notified the Coast Guard. They sent a helicopter to look for Byron’s boat.”

“There’s a third possibility,” said Maggie.

“What?”

“If Byron decided to run away, disappear, to hide out for a while, where do you think he’d go?”

“Why do you think Byron might have run away?”

Maggie didn’t answer Gina’s question. “Where do you think he’d go?”

“Lord, I don’t know. He doesn’t have any money. Just our bank debit card. There’s less than a thousand dollars in the account, and one other Visa card that’s pretty near maxed out. His parents are both dead. He has a brother, Paul, who lives just outside of Asheville, North Carolina.”

The western mountains of North Carolina were not easily accessible by boat. Neither was Los Angeles. At least not from Maine. McCabe figured that if Knowles was running, he’d probably ditched the boat down the coast somewhere and gotten himself some wheels. Maybe Barry Meyers had wired him some money.