Finding no sign of a bell, I knocked. Initially, no one answered, but a diesel VW Rabbit parked nearby convinced me that someone was home. I knocked again, harder this time.
Finally, a woman wearing a blue sweatshirt and matching sweatpants came to the door. She peered out at me through the window and then pulled down the rolling shade over the inside of the window. The door opened, but only three inches or so, as far as the end of the latched security chain allowed.
“Who are you and what do you want?”
“My name’s Beaumont, Detective J. P. Beaumont. I’m a police officer. Are you Emma Jackson?”
“Dr. Emma Jackson.” There was a certain injured reproof in the way she emphasized the word “doctor.” She had evidently worked hard to earn the title of doctor, and she wanted me to know it.
“Dr. Jackson, I need to speak to you.”
She unlatched the chain and opened the door a few more inches, standing in the opening with her arms crossed. “What about? Why would a police officer need to speak to me? Did my license tabs expire? Is my front bumper hanging too far over the parking strip?”
In the past few years, Seattle area blacks-I still haven’t learned to say African Americans with any kind of consistency-have complained about alleged instances of police harassment, incidents in which law-abiding people have been stopped and questioned by Seattle PD officers for seemingly no other reason than their being wherever they are. Blacks certainly do live and work on Queen Anne Hill, but they’re not exactly plentiful.
I heard the undisguised antagonism in Emma Jackson’s voice and wondered if maybe she had experienced some similar kind of treatment. Even so, I’m sure she would have found undeserved police harassment far preferable to receiving the painful news I was about to deliver.
“It’s your son,” I said quietly. “About Adam. Do you mind if I come in?”
Instead of asking me in, Emma Jackson stepped out onto the concrete pavers that constituted the tiny apartment’s make-do porch and closed the door behind her. She was a woman in her early thirties, fairly tall, and well built. Her face was attractive but haggard, her dark eyes red-rimmed and bloodshot from lack of sleep.
“What about him?” she asked. “Where is he? Is he all right?”
It didn’t seem right, telling her there on the porch in front of God and everybody. “Really, Dr. Jackson, if we could just go inside…”
“I’m too tired to play games. If something’s happened to Adam, tell me and tell me now!”
“There’s been an incident…”
“What kind of incident?”
“Where did your son spend last night?”
“With some friends. Why?”
“Could you tell me their names?”
“Why should I?”
“Dr. Jackson. Please, this is a very serious matter.”
For the first time the tiniest bit of alarm seemed to leak into her overriding anger. “Ben and Shiree Weston. They live down in the south end. What’s this all about?”
There was no way to soften the blow, and she had refused any suggestion that would have allowed me to tell her in the privacy of her own home.
“Dr. Jackson,” I said quietly, “I want you to understand that we don’t have a positive ID yet, but we have reason to believe that your son has been murdered, along with Shiree and Ben Weston and two of their three kids.”
Emma Jackson’s eyes darted back and forth across my face as though trying to read the truth of what I was saying from what she saw there. Both hands went to her mouth.
“No,” she said.
“Officers were summoned…”
“No,” she repeated, a little louder this time. “That can’t be true!”
“It is true, Dr. Jackson,” I insisted. “I came to take you downtown so…”
“No!” This time the word was an anguished shriek that echoed through the relative peace of a pristinely clear Seattle morning. Not only did Emma Jackson scream, but she launched herself at me in an all-out physical attack, flailing at me with both balled fists. I caught her by the wrists and held her at arm’s length-far enough away to keep her from bloodying my nose.
“Please, Dr. Jackson,” I pleaded. “Quiet down. Listen to me.”
But she didn’t listen and she didn’t stop screaming. “No! No! Please, God, no!”
Anyone hearing that terrible, agonized cry on a city street was bound to assume the worst, that a woman was being viciously assaulted in broad daylight. A neighbor evidently took corrective action and called for help, because the two of us were still standing there locked in struggle when I heard the quick sharp burst of siren from an approaching squad car. The wail of the siren seemed to penetrate through Emma Jackson’s pain. She stopped screaming suddenly and stood quivering, her hands limp. I didn’t know if I dared let loose of her or not. To be on the safe side, I didn’t.
“We need you to do a positive ID,” I said into the echoing silence. “On the other victims as well, if you could, since you evidently knew them all.”
“It’s true then?” she whispered brokenly. “All of them?”
“Yes,” I answered. “It’s true, all but Junior.”
I expected another outburst. Instead, she tugged her hands free of mine just as a blue-and-white squad car pulled up and parked behind the Rabbit. Emma Jackson started inside as two uniformed cops leaped out of the car and came toward us.
“Where are you going?” I asked.
“To put on some other clothes,” she answered, her voice fiercely calm and controlled. “I can’t go downtown dressed like this.”
I’ve seen some pretty amazing things in my time as a police officer, but Emma Jackson’s transformation was downright astonishing. Now that I know her a little better, I suspect that pride kept her from wanting to share pain that was that deep, that intense with a total stranger, but I can’t say for sure. In any event, she started into the house.
“Tell your friends here that it’s okay,” she said over her shoulder. “I’ll be right back.”
I turned to meet the two patrol officers who were hurrying up the walkway. Rank hath its privileges around Seattle PD, and most of the day-shift officers have been on the force for some time. I knew both these guys, Joe Miller and Fred Keanes.
“Hey, Beau,” Joe said, recognizing me. “What’s going on? We had a report of a domestic disturbance.”
“Not a domestic,” I told them. “The woman who lives here is the mother of the child who spent the night with Ben and Shiree Weston.”
“The one who’s dead?” Joe asked. I nodded. “And she just found out?”
“That’s right. I came to tell her what happened and to take her downtown for the ID.”
“Jeez!” Joe shook his head. “It’s terrible. I hear through the grapevine that whoever it was took a potshot at you too, didn’t they? What’s the world coming to, Beau? Seattle never used to be like this.”
He was wrong there. Seattle always used to be “like this.” That’s why people like me have jobs as homicide detectives.
Moments later Emma Jackson emerged from the house. She was wearing a blazer, a blouse, and a pair of well-tailored slacks. Her face was set in a grim mask. “I’m ready,” she said flatly. Her voice was low and husky, as though the strain of screaming had somehow damaged her vocal cords. “Where to? The medical examiner’s office?”
I nodded, remembering after all that since she was Dr. Emma Jackson, she probably knew the drill.
“Yes.”
I led the way. Emma Jackson stood to one side while I held the car door for her. Once we were both inside, I started the car and headed for Harborview Hospital and Doc Baker’s office. I glanced at her from time to time, but she remained locked in stoic silence. I felt like I was riding next to a human Mount St. Helens. Emma Jackson was quiet, just like the mountain was for a hundred-and-twenty-odd years, but smart money said she was probably going to blow sky-high sooner or later.