In recent years, Las Piernas has taken missing persons cases more seriously. The Express has always given those cases special attention, which has brought some pressure to bear on law enforcement. Nick Parrish, I suppose, brought a different kind of pressure to solve missing persons cases.
So the Las Piernas Police Department called a news conference late Wednesday morning. Mark Baker was on the road, sent up north to cover the Parrish stories, so John sent me out to it and asked me to try to get an interview with Dwayne Foster.
The public information officer for the LPPD handed out several photos of a thin thirty-eight-year-old woman with short, dark hair and blue eyes. Although there were no signs of struggle at her home, they believed she might be in danger. Their press release included photos of her blue Chevy Malibu, gave a plate number for the car, and mentioned a fact that made me understand why they might have been quicker to move on this case than on some others.
Marilyn Foster was a type 1 diabetic. She was dependent on insulin, and had not taken her insulin supply with her.
If Dwayne Foster was suspected of doing away with his wife, the police weren’t giving any indication of that. They might be keeping an eye on him, or have information I didn’t, but from everything I could see, Dwayne Foster was devoted to his wife, genuinely worried about her, and hadn’t a clue where she might be.
He agreed to my request to meet at his house and tell me more about Marilyn, hoping my story would increase interest in her case.
Dwayne had known Marilyn since high school, although they hadn’t dated then. “She was kind of wild back then,” he said. “I think because she had to take insulin and all, she wanted to prove something. She used to drink a lot, which was really dangerous for her. I don’t know, she wanted to show everybody that she could be just like any other teenager, I guess. Wanted people to like her. Every kid does, right? Anyway, she got pregnant by this older guy, dropped out, and went to one of those places where girls get cared for if they agree to give the baby up for adoption. I guess because of the diabetes, the whole thing was even harder on her.” He paused. “Later, when we tried, she kept having miscarriages. Last one damned near killed her, and we decided maybe we’d adopt but never actually took the steps to do it. She kind of has funny feelings about adoption. I know she still regrets giving the baby away.” He paused. “She always feels sad on his birthday. He’d be twenty-two now. She’s tried to locate him and joined a couple of online groups that help people connect up with their adopted kids.” He wiped at his eyes. “That’s another reason I know she didn’t run away! She’s waiting for that kid to show up here. If he shows up now, what do I tell him?”
The question caught me off guard, especially because apparently it wasn’t rhetorical-he seemed sincerely to want an answer. “Tell him what you told me,” I said.
After a moment, he nodded. “I’ll welcome him. I’ll see if he’ll stay here until she’s found. I think his birth father was probably an A-number-one Asshole, but that doesn’t mean he is. Shit, my own dad was a real piece of work. Nothing dooms you, you know?”
“I agree. Any chance Marilyn’s old flame is still around?”
“No. He wasn’t a flame really, just a one-night stand from what she told me. I mean, the dude had to know she was underage. But she’d never tell anyone who he was. Her parents tried really hard to get that out of her, but she always said she’d been drunk and didn’t know who he was. She knew, though. Once I joked that if she found the kid, she might end up reconnecting with his dad. She told me there was no chance of that, and not just because the kid’s dad was in prison for life but because she had wised up since then, and I was the only one for her. I asked her how she could know he was in prison, but she got all upset and said she never wanted to talk about it. Ever.”
He grinned ruefully. “When Marilyn says something in that tone, you don’t argue. Besides, I didn’t want her to think I thought less of her. I never have. Never. She’s the only one for me, too.”
“So, she hasn’t been acting strange in any way lately? No tension, no odd behavior?”
“No. Not at all.” He looked me square in the eye and said, “She’s not cheating on me.”
“I’m not suggesting that,” I said and meant it. Although I’d known plenty of people who had been surprised by the devilry of supposed spousal saints, most of them had deliberately closed their eyes before the moment of revelation. Nothing about Dwayne said he had his eyes closed. And the more he told me about his wife, the less it seemed likely that she had been looking for an escape. I’d have to check that out with other people who knew her, though. For now, I asked, “Any new acquaintances? Strangers approaching her? People hanging around the neighborhood who haven’t been around before?”
“Not that I know of. And we talk. She’d tell me. Police asked about that, too.”
“So life has just gone on as usual lately? Nothing out of the ordinary?”
He hesitated.
“What?” I coaxed.
He shook his head. “It’s so stupid. It doesn’t have anything to do with her being gone.”
“Tell me anyway.”
He seemed embarrassed. “Hell, she’s going to kill me for telling you as much as I have already.”
I waited.
“The other night,” he said. “Not the night she went missing, but the night before? She did do something that’s not like her. But it was just forgetfulness, that’s all. I didn’t even mention it to her.”
“What?” I asked again.
“You know, when she’s upstairs asleep, she turns the fan on-makes white noise, so she probably didn’t hear anything, or it wouldn’t have happened. But I came home, usual time, and here’s the garden hose, turned on and running. Like we’re building a pond in the backyard. Please don’t print that in the paper, okay?”
SEVEN
I talked to Marilyn Foster’s co-workers at the dentist’s office where she was employed as a receptionist. She was a reliable worker. The dentist and his wife, who was a hygienist in his office, looked upon Marilyn almost as a daughter. They were sure she would have confided any troubles to them, and had no indications of unhappiness in her marriage. She was the last person, they said, who would ever simply disappear.
I talked to her mother and sister, who lived in the San Fernando Valley. Again, no sign that her life was troubled, that she had a secret romance going, that she was feeling restless or wanted a change of scenery.
The contacts I had at the police department didn’t have a lot to say beyond what had been said at the press conference-no leads, hoping that any publicity the Express could give the case would help to generate those. It was clear they didn’t think this was a voluntary disappearance.
I wrote up the story and tried to pull myself together for a completely different kind of press conference-the one Wrigley had arranged for late that afternoon. As I walked downstairs with John Walters, he glanced at me and said, “You look like a cold slice of hell on stale toast.”
“Always so kind,” I said.
That made him laugh, not something he was doing very often these days, so I had a smile on my face when we went into the room Wrigley had designated for the event-a large space that had once been used for staff meetings. That was in the days before you could fit the staff into a phone booth and still have room to dance.
I was relieved to see that while the turnout wasn’t embarrassingly low-local television, a few local papers, two radio stations, and a couple of online news outlets-the room wasn’t crowded enough to cause me to panic. All the same, the subject wasn’t one I wanted to talk about. I prefer being one of the people asking the questions in these situations.