Murder at the Washington Tribune - Margaret Truman [119]
“I don’t know,” she replied honestly. “I have to do something. I can try to keep it within channels and away from the Trib. But you know as well as I do that it’ll be leaked. Want my suggestion?”
“Go ahead.”
“Level with Morehouse before he finds out from someone else. Maybe you can get him to run something about new evidence being uncovered pointing to different individuals having committed the murders. I don’t know whether Morehouse and the Trib would be willing to publish something that vague, without naming you and citing the letters, but you can try.”
“Yeah. I can try.”
“The paper might be happy to cover it up to save face,” she offered.
“Maybe.”
“I have to admit, Joe, that I questioned the serial killer angle from the beginning. Two murders don’t add up to serial killing. If you hadn’t written the letters and just continued speculating, it wouldn’t have mattered so much.”
He managed a smile. “I think I’d better cancel the TV and radio appearances, Edith, and my meeting with the New York publisher.”
She said nothing.
“And I want to talk with Roberta about what she was doing here today with Michael.”
“Sure.” She started the engine. “I’ll drive you back to the Trib, but we’ll have to talk again, more formal next time.”
“I understand,” he said. “No, I’m not going back to work. I think I’ll head straight home. I want Georgia to hear it from me. Just drop me at my car.”
“Of course. I’m sorry, Joe.”
“Not nearly as sorry as I am, Edith. Thanks for breaking it to me this way, private, just the two of us. I appreciate it.”
“Joe,” she said as they neared the parking garage. “What about your brother? Do you think he might have had something to do with the murders?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did you write the letters at his place?” she asked.
His sigh was unmistakably affirmative.
To frame him? she wondered.
He was out of the car before she could ask.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Roberta Wilcox was at the studio screening the tape they’d recorded at Michael’s apartment when Vargas-Swayze’s call came in.
“Hi, Edith. What’s the occasion?”
“Does there have to be an occasion for me to call?”
Roberta laughed. “No, of course not. Just surprised, that’s all. We haven’t spoken in a while. What’s up?”
“I’m calling to ask you the same question.”
Vargas-Swayze waited for Roberta’s silence to end. “Just insanely busy,” Roberta finally said.
“What’s with your dad’s brother, Michael?”
This time, the silence was broken by Roberta’s audible, deep breath.
“I know you were at his place today with a camera crew,” Vargas-Swayze said. “Does he have an interesting story to tell?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Edith.”
“Please, Roberta, don’t insult me. If you’re sitting on evidence in a murder case—make that plural—you’re treading on thin ice.” Roberta started to respond but Vargas-Swayze said, “And don’t give me the shield law speech. I’m not impressed by it.”
“Dad told you about Michael?” Roberta asked.
“In a sense. I know about your uncle’s history, the murder of the young girl, the years in confinement, all of it. So let’s not do this dance. What do you know about the letters?”
“What letters?”
“The ones allegedly written by the killer.”
“What do I know? I know my dad received two of them, one at the office, one at home.”
“Any idea who wrote them?”
Roberta guffawed, gathering courage. “Of course I don’t know who wrote them,” she said. “If I did, MPD would know, too. You don’t think I’d hold back something like that—do you?”
“You’re a reporter,” Vargas-Swayze said.
“And a citizen,” Roberta retorted. “And, I might add, a single young woman who happens to work in a media job. I’m not into being a victim.”
Vargas-Swayze gave it a beat: “What sort of story are you doing with your uncle?”
“A—a human interest piece.”
“Is he that interesting, aside from having killed someone and spending most of his adult life in a mental institution?