the other day and says he doesn't think Karen will be up to having company.'
Karen Livingston, my first wife and Kelly's mother, has been battling cancer for more than two years now. Dave, her second husband, is a good guy, one I've come to respect more and more over the years. But the fact that Karen didn't want company for Thanksgiving, not even her new granddaughter, was not good news.
'Besides,' Jeremy added gloomily, 'I'm not all that sure the old van would make it that far. The clutch may be on its last legs.'
'How about coming up here?' I suggested.
'Kelly would probably like that, but I still don't know about the van making it over the passes between here and Eugene.'
'Talk it over with her,' I said. 'I don't need an answer right this minute, but if you want to come, we can see about flying you up from Medford.'
Jeremy's reply was interrupted by my call-waiting signal.
I make it a point not to switch calls when I'm on the phone with someone long distance. That seems rude to me. When call-interrupting starts buzzing in my ear, that's the time when I long for the good old days when a dialed telephone offered only one of three uncomplicated results-an answer, a busy signal, or no answer. Life was simpler back then, in more ways than one.
'…expensive?' Jeremy was asking, when I could hear him again.
'Don't worry about the money,' I told him. 'What matters is whether or not you want to come.'
'I'll check with Kelly right away,' Jeremy assured me. 'We'll get back to you with an answer as soon as we can.'
Even though we didn't rush in finishing up the call, as soon as I put down the phone, it rang again. Whoever was calling was persistent enough to stay on the line for far longer than I would have.
'Hello,' I said.
'Beau?'
'Yes.'
'Detective Stan Jacek here. What do you think of the latest?'
'The latest what?'
'The autopsy results, of course. I faxed them down to Seattle P.D. about half an hour ago.'
'Look, Stan, it's Saturday,' I pointed out. 'This may come as a surprise to you, but I have no intention of going into the office today. I'm trying to learn how not to work twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. I've already put in a helluva long week, and the Seattle Police Department's new chief isn't all that keen on sanctioning excess overtime. I figure Monday should be time enough for me to take another crack at all this.'
'Are you saying you'd rather I hang up now, then, so you don't get the news until after you've actually punched in on the time clock Monday morning?'
It seemed to me Stan Jacek was being a bit testy. 'Cut the sarcasm, Stan. We're already on the phone. Go ahead and tell me. What autopsy results?'
'It's not her.'
Now I was completely baffled. 'Who's not her?'
'Denise Whitney,' he answered. 'The dead woman isn't Denise. The dental records don't even come close to matching the ones her parents brought down from Anchorage.'
That blew me away. Once again my none-too-limber mental rubber bands were being stretched to the limit. One minute I was talking to my son-in-law and hoping to arrange a visit with my grandchild over the holidays, and the next I was back in the dark world of murder. A place where things you thought were straightforward suddenly weren't. And it wasn't even my case.
'If the dead woman isn't Denise,' I said, 'who the hell is she?'
'Good question,' Jacek answered. 'We're checking missing-persons reports all over the Pacific Northwest-from northern California to Vancouver, B.C., and from the coast as far east as Montana. Nothing so far.'
'What about him?'
Now it was Detective Jacek's turn to be bum-fuzzled. 'Him who?'
'If Denise isn't Denise, is Gunter Gunter?'
'I guess,' Stan Jacek answered. 'At least they didn't say anything to me about him. But then Gunter's your case, not mine, so they probably wouldn't have told me regardless. You'd better check that one out for yourself. I'll let you go, so you can get back to whatever it was you were doing.'
'Oh, no, you won't,' I replied. 'Now that you've dragged me back into a work mode, there are a few things I need to go over with you as well.'
In the next ten minutes, I gave Stan Jacek a brief version of what had gone on since he and I last parted company outside the Public Safety Building. I told him about Sue Danielson's and my intriguing interview with Kari Gebhardt and Michael Morris, and the results of my salsa-dancing foray. I told him about Lorenzo Hurtado's revelation that Gunter Gebhardt had been making hasty and ultimately futile preparations to leave town.
'It sounds as though as soon as Kari told him someone was looking for him, he tried to beat it, but the killer or killers got to him first,' I concluded.
'Sounds like,' Jacek agreed, 'but why would he be getting the boat ready to ship out when he already had a plane ticket stashed in his car?'
'Good question.' And it was.
'And what about those Wiesenthal guys,' Jacek continued. 'I always thought they played it straight up.'
'So did I, and so does everyone else,' I told him. 'But it occurs to me that having an international reputation for being absolutely above suspicion is a reasonable reason for checking them out, don't you think?'
'You do have a point,' Jacek allowed grudgingly. 'An organization like that is bound to have an occasional bad apple or else someone who tags along behind them. We should look into that. Can you go interview them?'
'Sure. If I can find them.'
'And how do you do that?'
'Beats me. Call the FBI, maybe? I'll give it some thought. If I come up with any bright ideas, I'll let you know, and you do the same. In the meantime, now that my day off is totally screwed, I could just as well drop by Else Gebhardt's and ask for the use of one of her husband's soldiers.'
'What soldiers?'
Oops. 'Didn't I tell you about the toy soldiers down in Gunter Gebhardt's basement?'
'Not that I remember.'
'They're handmade replicas of Nazi soldiers,' I said, making up for my oversight in not telling him earlier. 'As far as I can determine, making those miniatures was Gunter's sole hobby. Last night, when I was talking to Lorenzo, I had this sudden brainstorm that maybe they were made of gold, just like that wrench Bonnie Elgin found after the hit-and-run. And where better to hide them than in plain sight?'
'You think they're made from all those melteddown teeth?' Jacek sounded aghast. Even second- and third- hand, Kari and Michael's revelations about Sobibor had hit Stan Jacek as hard as they'd hit me. 'That's nauseating. How could he?'
'That's a question I don't even want to think about,' I told him.
'But it adds up,' Jacek said eventually. 'Are you going to check it out, or shall I?'
'I'm closer,' I told him.
So when I got off the phone with Detective Jacek, I simply put my jacket back on and headed for the parking garage. Duty called. At least that's what I told myself all the way downstairs in the elevator.
Even though it was early November and winter cold, at least it wasn't raining. So during that chill afternoon drive to Blue Ridge, I had to make my way around the last few end-of-season die-hard garage sales. And once I reached Culpeper Court, I expected to have to fight my way through another collection of friends and relatives to gain admittance to the Gebhardt residence. To my surprise, no one seemed to be around.
More surprising still was the orange, black, and white FOR SALE BY OWNER sign that had been stapled to a wooden stake and hammered into Gunter Gebhardt's otherwise-pristine front lawn.
Because of my job as a homicide cop, I naturally come in contact with lots of grieving relatives and friends. I have more than a nodding acquaintance with several of this city's best-known grief counselors. They differ on some points, but they all agree in advising traumatized relatives to avoid making any precipitous decisions about moving out of the family home or selling property too soon after the death of a loved one.
