“How did you feel when you found out that he didn’t really die of a heart attack?”
“Well, that wasn’t for quite a long time,” said Finn. “At first, I just felt sorry for her, to have somebody die in her house. Her life was so lonely.”
Ugh, I thought. All it took was a death at a very inconvenient moment for Finn Vogel to even consider how lonely Felicity’s life would have been. Did he think about the context of her life otherwise, at all? Did you think about what your dentist was doing at a given moment? At that same time, I consideredthe timeline: It seemed as though this happened while Felicity was supposedly at her parents’ house, but Finn Vogel had just put Felicity at the scene of the murder.
“How do you know that she was in her apartment?”
“I didn’t really. I didn’t even recognize her cell phone number because she never called me...”
Even before he completed the sentence, I completed it for him:for obvious reasons...The reasons being because if she existed at all, she was supposed to exist in a shadow world from which she popped up at his convenience. Then, against my will, I felt a terrible pang for her too, so frightened and friendless on the darkest night, despite what she’d done, if she had done it, even more so if she had not, knowing as she did that it would be so much harder to maintain her innocence. After all, she was a person who had fallen so far and would now need to prove she had not fallen still further. I wrote that down.
“Are you quoting me?” Finn asked. “You should have said that.”
“What did you think I was doing?”
“I don’t know, background for a magazine story.”
“Well, I do intend... I do want to quote you on this, not on anything salacious, Mr. Vogel, but as you know, this could all come out in court anyhow...”
“Well, there are degrees. An obscure trial versus a national magazine.”
“The trial is more notorious than the magazine at this point. It’s captured a lot of attention. One of the reporters I met at the arraignment was from Quebec,” I told him.
“Then I want to review the quotes before you use any of them.”
“You know I can’t do that. Maybe you don’t know, but that’s not how it works. You can review the quotes for accuracy if youwant, but I’m not going to change the substance.” I went on, “Frankly, Mr. Vogel, the cat is out of the bag at this point. The only thing you can really do is tell your side of it.”
And yet again, it worked, even on a lawyer, like peanut butter and jelly.
“Well, I thought this man had died accidentally. That wasn’t Felicity’s fault. The most she could be charged with was not reporting a death, not a felony, not really even a crime, moving or concealing a dead body, yes, a crime, but she might not even have been charged, her motive being the motive of fearfulness...” Vogel’s English was getting more and more formal; that is, it was deteriorating. “But then, after he was found and the other murder, ah, death, occurred, her problems were snowballing...” He spoke about the legal implications of motive, how even killing someone by accident is not a crime in most jurisdictions unless negligence is involved, but of all the motives, money was the worst one.
I asked for more coffee, to buy time. Vogel kept consulting his watch. There was nooh, honey, I’m a sexy conservativeanymore... he was scared. His wife evidently would be due home soon.
“I only have a few more questions,” I reassured him, then asked how he and Felicity got started and more importantly, why.
“Oh, I met her at this place where there were nude dancers and these sorts of hostesses, where I went with men I knew.”
That place was, of course, Ophelia. What was up with men?What is the allure, I wanted to shout at him,and why do you think it’s okay?
But then he went on, “It wasn’t just sex.” Of course it wasn’t, and there it was again. If I had a nickel for every time a guy said that, as well... “She was different. She was beautiful but also just so very smart and... an active listener.” He explained what he meant. In a marriage, no matter how much love is there,there are also other matters of consequence: money, children, family members, careers, tension, anxiety, boredom. The love that first combusted flickered, sank. You were lovers, yes, still, but also partners, relatives, best friends. That was if you were lucky, and Finn said he had been lucky with Briony.
But with Felicity, the focus was on him. She relaxed him. She asked questions. She even offered insights, whatever thorny issue was at hand for him in the context of his work environment, like a professor’s repeated refusal to see that unwanted flirting was just as serious when the instructor was a woman; she asked how he was sleeping; she bought his favorite tea; she taught him to tie a double Windsor knot, which made him the envy of his colleagues.
I might have wanted to screech, but I moderated my voice and said, “What you’re telling me is like some cliché from an old movie, like the whore with the heart of gold... who understands when the wife is too busy...”
“It’s not just that. You know, writing is your gift. It’s your talent. Her talent was men.”
“How long did this go on, with her?”
“Six months? Eight months? I can’t remember exactly. It was summer at the beginning.”
As I left the house, Finn Vogel abruptly switched off all the Christmas lights, as well as all the lights inside. How long after the holidays did people leave those decorations up, anyhow? I always thought it was kind of sinister, seeing houses where Rudolph was still prancing across the lawn in February. Finn Vogel didn’t need his lights on; it was still daylight, a gloomy daylight—hell is murky—but it reminded me of the way little kids cover their own eyes and then think you can’t see them. Once again, I began to tell myself how grateful I was that I had decided never to have children. For the first time, however, I wasn’t sure that I was telling myself the truth. Whether or not I ever had children,I suddenly realized I wanted to love someone enough to mingle our genes.
The next guy on Ross’s list was, I recalled, the shortstop, an avid athlete. I’d looked him up on his Facebook. With his mop of still-thick silvered red hair and sprinkling of freckles, he could have played Huck Finn grown up. Pregnant wife named Allegra. Golden retriever named Forbes. His legend proclaimed, THERE IS A LOT OF LIFE IN ECONOMICS AND A LOT OF ECONOMICS IN LIFE. A live wire!
He answered his phone, and I told him my business. “It’s about a woman who’s charged with murder who was an escort. I think you knew her in that context.”
“This is a mistake. I have no idea who this woman is. I never met her. How did you get my name?”
