Right now, some of the surface details of Tanya's story were cracking and moving apart. I worried about what implications that held for the foundation-the parts underground we didn't know and couldn't see. I didn't like noticing. After all, it was only the beginning of a hunch, but if it proved correct, that meant Ralph Ames and yours truly had once more been led down the primrose path by yet another pretty face.
People who labor long in the accountability sector are trained not to leap to hasty conclusions. Hunches aren't necessarily bad. Modern technology aside, well-played human hunches are responsible for most of the successful crime detection that goes on in this country. But homicide cops who don't want to become laughing-stocks don't flaunt their untried hunches in public. They keep them quiet while they go about checking details and verifying facts as much as possible. Only after that process is complete do they haul out the result and run it up a flagpole for all the world to see.
So when I got off the plane in Walla Walla, I didn't go straight to the nearest public phone booth, dial the Ashland Hills, and leave a message for Ralph Ames saying "Watch out, we're being played for suckers." I abided by the unofficial rules of accountability behavior-and got both Ralph Ames and J.P. Beaumont royally screwed over in the process.
The landing approach in Walla Walla took us within sighting distance of the gray-walled state prison-the Walls of Walla Walla, as they're called. It was odd to realize that I was visiting a town of approximately thirty thousand people, and the only folks I knew there were convicted felons. My connection to most of them was that of a police officer sending a never-ending parade of inmates up the river both literally and figuratively.
The state prison in Walla Walla is a repository for the worst dregs of Washington's society-murderers, rapists, drug abusers, robbers, and burglars. In fact, part of my job is making sure the prison system runs at full capacity. My current errand, however, brought me in search of Roger and Willy Tompkins, two supposedly well-respected local citizens, who currently and in the past had lived their lives well outside the confines of the prison's walls. Where was the justice in that?
Why should someone like Roger Tompkins-a man who had spent years routinely violating and terrorizing his very own daughter-be one of the keepers instead of one of the keepees? Why had he worked as a prison guard when he himself deserved to be a regular inmate just as much or more so than many of the people he guarded?
Extreme moral outrage doesn't leave a whole lot of room for playing happy-go-lucky tourist. I took possession of the one rental car available-a stripped-down Ford Tempo. I found my way to the local TraveLodge, checked into a room, and then asked the room clerk for directions.
Walla Walla is a relatively small town, and the desk clerk was a clean-cut young man in his early twenties. Since I'd been told Willy Tompkins worked in the high school cafeteria, I decided to go ahead and ask the clerk about the couple to see if he, by any chance, knew someone named Roger and Willy Tompkins. It turned out he did.
"Oh sure," he said, when I mentioned the Tompkins family. "Everybody knows them. I believe the old man's retired now. She's been a cook at the high school forever."
So far, so good. Then the young clerk read-justed his carefully knotted tie and threw me a curve. "I played baseball with their grandson, Walter. I don't believe Mrs. Tompkins ever missed a single home game in four years of ball. She was there rain or shine, win or lose. I always thought they should have given her a letter every time they gave Walt one."
The phone rang, and the clerk turned to answer it. I walked away from the desk feeling half-sick. What grandson? One old enough to be almost the same age as Tanya? I remembered her speaking at length about her father and her mother, but she hadn't said a word about brothers and sisters, nor had she mentioned a nephew-a contemporary-being raised in the same town and/or household right along with her. From the way she told the story, I had assumed that she must have been raised as an only child. It seemed as though the kinds of things that had gone on in that dysfunctional family would have been far more difficult to control or conceal with the addition of even one more family member, to say nothing of several.
I drove to the address Ralph had given me. To all intents and purposes, this was Main Street U.S.A., home of Ozzie and Harriet and Father Knows Best. The Tompkins house turned out to be a well-maintained bungalow set in an immaculately kept but tiny yard. Sunset was still almost an hour away, but already the house was wearing its evening face with pooling halos of lamplight glowing through curtained but open windows.
Funny, I thought. The place doesn't look like a candidate for House of Horrors.
As I pulled up to the curb, a late entry in the evening's neighborhood lawn-mowing detail chattered noisily into action. Neatly covered trash cans lined the street, awaiting a morning pickup. Squaring my shoulders, I started toward the house. When I pushed it slightly, the rust-free gate sprang open without an accompanying squeak. Everything about the place-from the carefully edged walkway to the newly varnished, old-fashioned screen door-exhibited pride of ownership and careful attention to detail. It wasn't at all what I expected.
I felt edgy walking up to the door. I believe most child molesters-" chesters," as they're called in prison parlance-are basically cowards. Otherwise, they wouldn't victimize helpless children. That doesn't mean they aren't dangerous, however, or that they won't turn on you if cornered or provoked. Some of the most vicious dog bites are inflicted by basically cowardly animals who find themselves trapped in unfamiliar situations. Cowardly people operate the same way.
Boarding the plane in Medford, I hadn't wanted to fight my way through airport security while carrying my automatic. Instead, I had checked it with my luggage. By the time I stepped onto the Tompkinses' wooden porch in Walla Walla, however, I was happy to have it with me-to feel the familiar weight of the weapon under my jacket and against my ribs. I couldn't shake a surge of uneasiness as I realized I was totally on my own-out of reach and hailing distance of any kind of help or backup. My 9-mm automatic and I were it.
Moments after I rang the bell, the door was answered by a straight-backed African-American woman whose age I would have guessed to be somewhere around sixty. "Yes?" she said without opening the screen door. "What can I do for you?"
"I'm looking for either Roger or Willy Tompkins."
She squinted at me, regarding my face through glasses that were probably designed primarily for reading. There wasn't anything threatening or antagonistic in her manner, only the understandable wariness of a householder whose evening quiet has been interrupted by an unexpected and unknown visitor.
"Who are you?" she asked.
Vacation or not, old habits die hard. Although my standing as a Seattle P.D. detective carried no more weight in Walla Walla than it did in Ashland, I dug into my coat pocket and
extracted my official I.D.
"My name's J.P. Beaumont," I said. "I'm with the Seattle Police Department. As I said, I'm looking for either Roger or Willy Tompkins."
The woman turned back into the room. "Roger," she said. "Maybe you'd better come here. This man's a police officer, but he won't tell me what he wants."
A tall but slightly stopped, gray-haired black man appeared behind her. "What's this all about?" he asked.
My mind reeled. This man was Roger? I must have made a mistake. Maybe I had given the desk clerk the wrong address. How could red-haired, green-eyed Tanya Dunseth's parents be African-American? It didn't make sense.
"I'm looking for Willy and Roger Tompkins," I stammered quickly. "I want to talk to them about their daughter. I believe her name is Roseann."
Sometimes when progress demands demolishing some stately old building, work crews will record the event for posterity. After first lacing the interior of the structure with explosives, they'll capture on film the moments just before and just after detonation. At first dust flies, but the building itself seems untouched. Then, gradually, details change-the facade shifts out of focus-and the entire building begins to crumble.