“She said that she and the Diane woman were fixing it up. . .” he began again and then stopped. I dropped Michelle off here after I saved her from the black dogs at the schoolyard that night. She went inside. I told the deputies this.
Dale fell silent and just watched the two men watching him. “You knew this in the middle of the night at the hospital when you were taking my statement over and over,” he said.
Deputy Presser nodded. “We knew that no one has lived here or stayed here in the past ten years. We know more now. Go with Deputy Taylor in his car.” Presser turned on his heel and clomped out of the dead building.
Dale had imagined the sheriff’s office to be in the tall old courthouse on Oak Hill’s central square, but it turned out to be in a low, 1960s-modern brick building a block from the courthouse. There were a few offices with venetian blinds closed, an artificial Christmas tree with one string of colored lights blinking on the dispatcher/receptionist’s counter, and enough cubicles for four or five deputies. Presser had Dale walk back to the furthest cubicle, where two glass walls met. The view was across the street to Gold’s Deluxe Bowling Center. The building was boarded and closed.
Well,thought Dale as the deputy waved him to an empty chair, at least they haven’t booked and fingerprinted me yet.
“Deputy,” he began, “I swear I don’t understand. Michelle told me that she and the other woman were living in that house when I met her. . . saw her here in Oak Hill for the first time a few weeks ago. That’s where she had me drop her off the night she called me about the dogs by the school. The sheriff can verify that. . .”
Presser held up one hand in the same motion he had used to silence Deputy Reiss. Dale shut up.
“Mr. Stewart,” said Deputy Presser, “I need to tell you about your rights. The sheriff has called me—he’s going to be back late tomorrow or early the next day—and he wants to talk to you, but he’s authorized me to carry out this interview. You have the right to remain silent. . .”
“Oh, Jesus,” said Dale. “Am I a suspect?”
“Let’s say that you need to know your rights right now,” said the deputy. “You’ve probably heard this a million times on TV, but I’ve got to do it. You have a right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you. . .”
“Christ,” repeated Dale. He felt as if someone had knocked the wind out of him again. His headache throbbed. “So I’m a suspect in Michelle’s disappearance.”
“No, you’re not,” said Presser. “Anything you do say can be held against you in a court of law. Now, would you like to call an attorney, Mr. Stewart?”
“No,” Dale said dully, knowing that he was being a fool and not caring.
“I’m going to turn on this tape recorder, Mr. Stewart. Are you aware of it and do you agree to me taping this interview?”
“Yes.” It was an old-fashioned reel-to-reel recorder, and Dale could see the reels turning, the brown tape sliding through its gate as Presser spoke into the microphone, giving the date and time of the interview, giving Dale’s full name and his own, and positioning the microphone on the desk. Both the deputy’s voice and his own sounded very distant to Dale. “If I’m not a suspect in Michelle’s disappearance, what am I being read my rights for? What other crime has been committed?”
“I’ll ask the questions during this interview,” Deputy Presser said flatly. “But I will tell you that it’s against the law to file a false report alleging that a crime or kidnapping or violent incident has occurred when it has not.”
Dale felt like laughing. “Oh, a violent incident has happened all right, Deputy. And Michelle Staffney is out there somewhere, possibly dying, because we’re wasting time here with you interviewing me. That’s the crime.”
“Mr. Stewart,” Presser said, obviously ignoring everything Dale had just said, “would you please read this?” He opened a thin file folder and slid a printout across the desk to Dale.
Dale first noticed the black-and-white photo of Michelle Staffney in the left column. The AP article was dated a little less than two years earlier.
HOLLYWOOD PRODUCER CHARGED WITH DOUBLE MURDER
Hollywood producer Ken Curtis was arraigned today in Los Angeles Superior Court for the January 23rd shooting murder of his wife, actress Mica Stouffer, and her alleged lover, Diane Villanova. Ms. Stouffer, the screen name for Michelle Staffney Curtis, had been separated from her husband for three months but was still involved in what friends called “a stormy relationship” with the producer. Curtis pleaded not guilty today and it is expected that his attorney, Martin Shapiro, will invoke the insanity defense. “Ken was obviously not in control of his faculties at the time,” Shapiro told reporters.
Curtis is known primarily as the producer of the successful Die Free films starring Val Kilmer. Mica Stouffer, a member of SAG for thirty-one years, had done bit parts for most of that time. Diane Villanova, with whom Ms. Stouffer was living for two months prior to the fatal shooting, was a screenwriter with such credits as Fourth Dimension and All the Pretty Birds Come Home to Roost.
Both Stouffer and Villanova were pronounced dead on the scene at Ms. Villanova’s Bel Air apartment last January 23 after neighbors called the police about—
Dale quit reading and set the piece of paper on the desk. “This has got to be a mistake,” he said thickly. “A joke of some kind. . .”
Deputy Presser removed two more pages from the file, slick old-fashioned thermal fax pages this time, and slid them across to Dale. “Can you identify either of these women, Mr. Stewart?”
They were morgue photographs. The first photograph was of Michelle—mouth open, eyes almost closed, but with a slit of white showing from beneath the heavy eyelids. She was on her back and topless to the waist, her perfect, pale augmented breasts flattened by gravity and the photographer’s flash. There were two perfectly rounded bullet holes at the top of her left breast and another—with a wider entrance wound—just below her throat. Another bullet hole was centered in a bruised discoloration in the center of her forehead.
“Michelle Staffney,” said Dale. His throat was so thick that he could hardly speak. He looked at the second photograph. “Christ,” he said.
“Curtis used a knife on her after he shot her,” said Deputy Presser.
“The hair and shape of the face looks like Diane. . . like the woman I met with Michelle. . . but. . . I don’t know.” He handed the photos back to Presser. “Look, your sheriff saw me with Michelle—with this woman.”
Presser just stared. “And when did you say that you first saw these two women in Oak Hill, Mr. Stewart?”
“I thought. . . I mean I saw them about six or seven weeks ago. A few weeks before Thanksgiving, I think. . .” Dale stopped and shook his head. “Could I have a drink of water, Deputy Presser?”
“Larry!” shouted Presser. When the other deputy appeared, Presser sent him to the water cooler.
Dale’s hand was shaking fiercely as he lifted the little paper cup to drink. He was stalling for time, and he knew that Presser knew it. The deputy had paused the tape recorder, but now he started it again.
“Is this woman from the news reports—Mica Stouffer, aka Michelle Staffney—the same woman that you say was attacked by dogs and carried off at the McBride farm last night, Mr. Stewart?”