Winter of frozen dreams (16 page)

The verdict is delivered, June 28, 1980. (David SandettlCapital Times)

13th and read "2 mg Valium, 50 tablets, taken as needed, for Gerald T. Davies." The bottle was empty.

Hair samples were collected from the rim of the tub, the sink, the toilet seat. A red Ace comb, the towels, the bathroom rug, a jar of bathtub water were collected for testing. The body was transported to the morgue for a morning autopsy.

It was about 6:00 p.m. when the phone rang. Doyle and Spencer had long since departed. Lulling and Lieutenant Joe Reuter were driving to Spring Green to inform Ruth Davies of her son's death. The phone rang a second and a third time. The lab crew suspended its work and waited, as if the call were a portentous event.

Urso picked up the receiver. "Hello."

A woman's voice, quite surprised, uttered, "Jerry?"

Urso identified himself, and the caller fell silent. He discerned the soft patter of her breath for a full thirty seconds before she hung up.

Five minutes later the phone rang again. Urso answered. This time the sound of her breathing was all he heard. He didn't question; he simply listened—for thirty seconds, a minute. The line went dead.

— 13 —

On Monday, March 27th, Sam Cerro was found guilty of attempting to purchase cocaine from undercover agents at a City of Madison parking facility.

The maximum penalty included $45,000 in fines and up to fifteen years in prison. Sentencing was postponed until a later date.

— 14 —

The Davies autopsy was performed by Dr. Billy Bauman at 9:30 a.m., March 28th. The body showed no signs of

physical trauma. A slight scratch on the neck was undoubtedly a nick from a razor blade, for Davies was clean shaven when he'd settled into the bath. A yellowish-brown bile had been secreted from the mouth and nasal passage. No bruises, no abrasions, no blood marred the skin.

Internally a myocardial hemorrhage was discovered on the anterior wall of the heart, but it was determined to have been minor and nonfatal. The lungs, however, had suffered harsh abuse. Their weight was more than twice the average, having increased from a normal 900 grams to 1,890 grams. The reasons were severe pulmonary congestion, edema, and hemorrhage—symptoms consistent with asphyxia due to drowning.

The examination lasted until 12:09 p.m. Bauman found nothing else that appeared contributory to expiration. Lung, liver, kidney, brain, urine, and blood samples were obtained and transported to the state crime lab in the hope that a careful analysis might detect a chemical cause for Daviess death.

Otherwise Bauman was baffled. It didn't seem plausible, yet for lack of anything better the initial conclusion was death by accidental drowning.

— 15 —

Every resident of the Woodview Apartments, the complex where Davies had lived, was questioned, and not a single individual had seen anyone enter or exit Davies s flat the entire Easter weekend. In fact no one could recall their neighbor ever having a visitor during his three years at the complex.

A check of the premises did not hint at any disturbance. Nothing appeared stolen or missing. Latent prints gathered in the apartment matched the identification marks of two people—Jerry Davies and Sergeant Peter Brown, the officer who had taken photographs of the

scene minutes after discovery of the body. None of the latent prints could be matched to Barbara Hoffman. An empty envelope, mailed to Linda Millar in care of Jerry Davies, with Barbara's return address, was tucked into a dresser drawer. Barbara s phone number and social security number and the post office box assigned to Linda Millar were written, in deliberate and legible script, in an address book next to the phone.

These findings, however, did not mean she had been present on the fatal Easter weekend. The sofa, the carpet, the bathroom tiles were scrutinized, yet not a strand of her hair was found. If Barbara had been there, she had been invisible and had left no trace.

16

The pathologist estimated the time of death to be between 5:00 and 7:00 p.m. on Saturday, March 25th. Dr. Bauman emphasized that this estimate was a very rough approximation. The humid environment and the water had hastened postmortem decomposition. These factors complicated matters and made a firm answer about when Davies had expired impossible to a degree of scientific certainty.

— 17 —

Frustrated by the inconclusive autopsy, Dr. Billy Bauman decided he wanted another opportunity to review Daviess body before it was laid to permanent rest. Davies was simply too clean. Any circumstance but the most bizarre or extraordinary would have left an indication, a clue as to what had happened. Yet Davies was perfect, as if he had fallen asleep contemplating his woes and chosen not to awaken and confront them. Maybe that was what the shipping clerk had wished, but it demanded more than

wishing to make it so. It required an ingestion or an injection.

The pathologist chased that reasoning. To him it appeared to be a suicide by means of an exotic drug or poison. All other possibilities had been carefully screened and eliminated.

On March 30th Bauman and Detective Robert Doyle drove to the Richardson Funeral Home in Spring Green for a last examination of the corpse. The embalming had been completed, and Daviess skin looked like processed cheese.

Daviess inner and outer ears were searched for puncture wounds. The inner ear canal was probed for puncture wounds or the residue of a foreign substance or liquid. Baumans intimate search found nothing odd or unusual. He reexamined the body for any mark or cut or bruise he might have overlooked during the autopsy.

Baumans guess was that Davies had committed suicide by injection of a deadly chemical. Because Davies had not been found until two days later, the chemical had been absorbed into his system and was difficult to detect.

Bauman hunted for the wound of a hypodermic needle. Between the fingers, between the toes, under the arms, every fold of his skin was assiduously inspected. Due to postmortem degeneration and skin slippage, any findings would have been scientifically inconclusive, but they would have provided a possible framework for research with the biopsy samples.

After an hour and the discovery of no puncture wounds, Bauman quit the search. It was futile. Davies was clean.

— 18 —

April 1st was not chilly and not warm, somewhere between coat and sweater weather. The sunshine was deceptive, for the ground remained damp and cold from the winters long cover.

Ruth Davies wore a heavy tweed coat, black with weaves of charcoal and navy, tattered at the elbows, frayed at the collar and hem. The buttons didn't match. The coat drooped over her shoulders like a tent. A minister droned on about her son, praising virtues Jerry never possessed. Ruth felt the cold of the earth rise up through the soles of her shoes. Her other boys, Tom and Bob, had served as pallbearers, along with their father, Leo, and Chuck Richardson, Jerrys boyhood chum. Two men from the funeral parlor assisted in carrying the casket because the family had no one else and Jerry had no other friends. The cop from Madison with the walrus mustache and the assortment of pipes was present. Ruths daughter had driven up from downstate Illinois. It was the first time in nineteen years that the family had assembled, and Ruth Davies tried not to dwell on that thought or it would make her almost as forlorn as Jerrys death had.

Her children had scattered like seeds hurled by the wind. Now Jerry had also departed—Jerry, who was the only one to remain behind and care for her.

They were lowering her son into a hole in the earth. The rollers squeaked. The minister chanted a final prayer. Her daughter wept. Birch trees on a distant hillside looked like stark, shiny ghosts. Ruth heard the lead car of the funeral procession start its engine. She stared at the meager gathering. Her lips were blue and felt as cold as stone. Her eyes brooded, as tough and dark as black walnut shells.

19

The cause and circumstance of Jerry Daviess death puzzled everyone connected with the investigation. As incredible as accidental drowning in a bathtub appeared, the alternative theories seemed no less bizarre. No one had seen or heard a visitor enter or leave Daviess apartment. A thorough search had turned up no evidence of anyone else's presence. There were no indications of foul

play. Nothing was amiss in the apartment or with Davies, other than the fact that he was dead.

The obvious causes were discounted immediately. There were no bumps or contusions on his skull, so he did not trip and bang his head. He did not suffer a heart attack. His lungs had filled with fluid, as if he had drowned, and he had died from lack of oxygen.

The dearth of evidence concerning interference from an outside party and the empty pill bottle on the toilet suggested suicide. However, Valium was a peculiar weapon for self-destruction. Neither the pathologist nor the coroner knew of a single instance in which an overdose of Valium had resulted in death, and a quick check of medical records showed no recorded cases in state history. Official conclusions from the state crime lab would not be submitted for weeks, but initial tests of the residue in the vial indicated no alien substances were present.

Nevertheless the suicide theory gained wide support. Davies was fragile. Davies was in an excruciating predicament. The trial date was approaching. The pressure drew him taut, and he snapped. No other explanation was reasonable.

Were the letters that Anita Clark and Chris Spencer had received on the morning of March 27th suicide notes? No one had guessed it at the time, but hindsight changed the context of the words. Moreover Davies had mailed two other letters—identical in form and content—to Stan Davenport, who was captain of detectives and technically in charge of the Berge murder investigation, and to Don Eisenberg, Barbaras lawyer. In retrospect it appeared that Davies had wanted to correct the record and provide an unequivocal public statement regarding culpability and innocence and Harry Berge's murder. A cursory evaluation by a state handwriting expert showed that the four letters were written by Davies, probably in succession and without apparent stress. Did he pen the letters, post them, then return home and kill himself?

With a single dramatic gesture, Davies had freed his

fiancee and terminated the agony they both had endured. At least that was the speculation.

Maybe Daviess desperation went deeper than that romantic scenario of suicide. Perhaps the image of Berge in the snowbank was the nightmare Davies couldn't escape. The ugly vision was compounded by the insidious thought that his sweetheart, despite her persistent denials, had committed the brutality. Davies had acted to police as if he believed Barbaras proclamations of innocence, but maybe even gullible Davies had suffered moments when doubt chewed through the shell of trust he had constructed around her. His predicament contained no solution. The harder Davies delved for a way out, the more his head hurt. A properly arranged suicide exonerated Barbara and liberated Davies from his own torment.

Could Davies have plotted it and carried it through? Chuck Lulling argued fiercely against the idea that Daviess death was a suicide. Could the fragile and frightened Davies coolly gobble a handful of pills, slide into a tub of warm water, and placidly await death?

The consensus said suicide. Lulling stuck with his intuition. Suicide was inconsistent with Daviess character, he told Doyle. Lulling smoked his pipe. He had discussed the case for hours with his wife, exploring the possibilities, critiquing his own theories, listening to Marian's reactions, and reconstructing the tragic event. Now he replayed his opinions for Doyle, for no one else was interested, and the investigation seemed stymied.

The veteran detective had based his views on his visceral reaction to Davies and on a clever interpretation of the apartment. Does a man intending to commit suicide lay out two clean towels and bathroom slippers next to the tub? Does he shave before killing himself? Does he worry about his collection of grocery bingo cards? Does he write a check for next months rent? These nuances disturbed Lulling.

If Davies was so concerned with Barbara, why didn't he leave a will? Why didn't he leave a suicide note? Davies

was not spontaneous. He would have left some message of explanation for his mother and for the only other woman he had ever loved, Barbara Hoffman. Yet there was nothing.

Reread the letter, said Lulling. Why wasn't it dated? Suicide was nowhere mentioned or implied. The letter was not a pathetic farewell; it was one awkward attempt at exculpating Barbara. Why fear jail if he didn't intend to survive the weekend? Why say "They can do what they want with me" when he knew he'd be dead before anyone read the letter?

The attempt to assume blame for killing Berge was transparent, said Lulling. Jerry Davies was timid and desperate and adrift in the world, but he was not intemperate. He did not slay Harry Berge in a fit of jealous rage, and he did not end his life by an act of utter despondency. He'd been murdered, quite neatly, quite deliberately—by Barbara Hoffman.

Lulling admitted the assertion was bold, but so was Hoffman. Only someone of supreme confidence and with a supreme sense of superiority would attempt such an audacious deed given the circumstances. Barbara was convinced of her cunning, of her acumen. It did not matter that the $750,000 insurance policy had been rescinded. It did not matter that Daviess testimony would be dissected by Eisenberg's scathing tongue. Barbara was compelled to exert her own control. Her extreme self-reliance would not let her do anything less.

The letters were devious and perfect. Driven by jealousy, Davies murdered his rival for Barbara's affections. He shoved the blame on Barbara because it was his obsessive love for her that had provoked his outburst. He had to hurt her too. When he saw the devastation he had wrought, he became penitent. Things had to be settled and the guilt reapportioned. Davies confessed, yet he wasn't strong enough to live with the burden of what he had done. With Barbara cleared of wrongdoing, he killed himself.

That was the interpretation Barbara wanted. With one

daring act she had eliminated the chief witness against her and had pushed the Berge murder case into hopeless confusion.