calls that came through from that phone in June and in August? The only reason to do that would be to make it look as if his wife was in the vicinity—alive and well enough to phone on Veronica’s birthday and again in August. Up till now, the calls from Ellen’s cell phone had provided hope. But if Erik had been making them, then another conclusion seemed chillingly likely: Erik had reason to toss red herrings on the path of the investigation, leading police astray as they sought the truth about his wife.
Liz knew she should inform the police immediately. Instead, she unplugged her answering machine, locked it in the car’s trunk, drove straight to Fenwick Street, and surprised Erik by knocking on his door. Finding that Veronica had a friend visiting, she convinced Erik to take a walk to the Newton City Hall Common. Noting that he carried a receiver for his portable phone with him as he left the house, she asked, “Do you also carry your cell phone with you at all times?”
“Absolutely,” he said, taking his phone from his pocket. “If Ellen gets in touch, I want to be available.”
“Do you know what time it is?” Liz asked. “I’m on tight deadline today,” she fibbed.
Erik turned on the cell phone and showed its small screen to Liz. The time and date were shown there.
“Thanks, Erik. What are your thoughts on the phone calls from Ellen’s cell?”
“My thoughts? I can hardly separate them from my emotions on this. Intellectually, I know someone other than Ellen might be making these calls, just to suggest she is somewhere near us. If that’s the case, and Ellen is the victim of foul play, her victimizer has added cruel insult to injury.”
Liz noted an odd formality in Erik’s speech. Was this his way of feeling some sense of sanity in a situation he could not control, or was it an indication of guilt?
“I don’t really believe that the calls are from Ellen,” Erik went on, “but I can’t help hoping that they are, especially the attempt to reach me on August eighteenth. I haven’t pointed this out to anyone else, but Ellen and I first met eleven years ago on that date. In any case, the calls have been an unbearable tease, especially for Veronica.” Erik paused. “I’m surprised you’re asking me about the cell phone calls on this day of all days. I had hoped you might have something to tell me that would shed light on the bodies found near Plymouth. Tell me the bones can’t be hers,” he pleaded.
“Observers say the bones seem too old. But there’s nothing conclusive. Erik, I have to ask you, why did you pick up Ellen’s cell phone today and call me? Was it because, in your distress about the discovery of the bones, you grabbed the wrong cell phone? Where have you hidden it all this time?”
“What? I don’t know what you’re talking about! Are you suggesting I have Ellen’s cell? That’s madness!”
“Her cell number came up on my caller I.D. when you called to ask about—”
“That’s impossible! Look, here’s the number of my cell.” He pushed a button on his cell phone, revealing its telephone number. “It’s a digit off from Ellen’s. The last part of mine is 4441; hers is 4440.”
“4440 came up on my caller I.D. And you were the speaker.”
“That’s inexplicable! I tell you, I don’t have Ellen’s phone.” At the sound of sirens, Erik looked toward Commonwealth Avenue frantically. “Did you report this to the police?” he cried out.
“Not yet, Erik. I wanted to see what you had to say first.”
“Then why are they here?” he said, turning distraught eyes on the reporter as several officers arrived.
“The line was bugged with your permission, sir,” an officer said. “Come along with us now.”
“Stay with Veronica until my mother-in-law arrives, would you?” Erik pleaded. “She’s on her way with groceries for us.”
“Of course, Erik,” Liz said.
Turning towards Fenwick Street, Liz ran across the common. Fortunately, it seemed Veronica had not heard the commotion. Liz could see her through the window engrossed in a video cartoon on the television. Liz waited on the front steps, a quiet guardian for Veronica, until the grandmother arrived. Grateful it was not her report but rather the traced call that had summoned the police, she nevertheless ached for the child whose father was now under arrest.
Liz called in her story to the city desk and then drove to Newton Police Headquarters, where she volunteered to answer questions and turned over her answering machine to authorities. Only after all this did she return home to get some food and rest.
Chapter 27
Too soon, Liz’s alarm announced it was 4:00 a.m. Time to swallow down some breakfast and get on the road to Plymouth. Coverage of 9/11–related stories still dominated television news. But on the radio, as Liz drove east, newscasters found time to vilify Erik as a jealous husband who most likely had known his wife was involved with a “Middle Eastern stranger.” They implied he must have done his wife and “her lover” in, and then placed calls from her phone to make it look like she was alive and well during the ensuing months.
Stopping for coffee, Liz bought a copy of the
Arriving at Forges Field just at sunrise, Liz found Rene DeZona already on the scene, strapped to the top section of a telephone pole and armed with a very long lens. Apparently the police who had been guarding the scene had not looked up: They seemed unaware the photographer was there. Following DeZona’s hand signals, Liz drew one police officer aside and loudly fired questions about the case at him, covering with her voice the sound of DeZona’s camera work. After a few minutes, DeZona pointed to a Porta-Potty nearby. As Liz approached the unit, she heard the sound of two small items dropping to the ground near her feet. Film cans. Stooping to tie a lace on her hiking boot, Liz pocketed the film. Minutes later, the police noticed the photographer and confiscated the film that was then in DeZona’s camera.
Just then John Sobel and Cormac Kinnaird arrived in separate vehicles. When Liz told them she needed to pass the film to Rene, Kinnaird surprised her by producing a pipe from his pocket. Taking the film, he approached the photographer and asked for a light. As the photographer fumbled for matches, Kinnaird passed the film to him. Film in hand, DeZona drove off, presumably headed for the newsroom.
As expected, the police prevented the reporter, teacher, and forensics man from entering the area they’d surrounded with crime scene tape. The trio hiked into the woods and then circled toward the vicinity of the crime scene.
“They’ve closed off a wide area around the remains,” the science teacher said.
“But that doesn’t mean they’ll find everything,” Cormac said. “That ME is green. And he’s rushing. I wonder if he’ll realize skeletal remains that have been there over time may have been disarticulated.”
“You mean taken apart?”
“That’s right, Liz. Scattered or even carried away into burrows by animals back when there was meat on those bones.”
Liz grimaced.
“It concerns me for another reason that this Stu Simmons seems in such haste to remove the bones. If they are kept in their position and context, it will be easier to evaluate the shower of organic material to which they have been exposed. In an area like this, we can tell quite a bit about the time of death—or at least the time when the bodies were placed here—by cataloging that organic material. Pollen found on the bones will tell us during which seasons they were exposed to the elements. Working back from that, and using insect evidence, we can make a remarkably accurate guess as to how long the body lay here before it was stripped of tissue by maggots and animals. These bones have been here for quite some time. Simmons is a fool if he thinks one more rainstorm will destroy the evidence they hold.”
Liz recalled the doctor’s scolding her about withholding the cigarette butt evidence months ago. “Even if we found a disarticulated bone or two, Cormac,” she asked, “wouldn’t you insist on turning it in to the police? What kind of advantage would that give us?”
“As much as I’m eager to see you get a scoop, we have to keep in mind that the search for the truth takes
