A Deadly Affection (41 page)

“She liked the attention,” she said sullenly. “She was always playing up to him, looking for favors, getting him to interfere when I tried to discipline her.”

“She wanted love and affection! She didn't ask to be raped!”

“It wasn't my fault he couldn't keep his filthy hands off of her.”

“She was your child; it was your duty to take care of her.”

“What about me?” she snapped. “Who was taking care of
me
? I had to do everything—he couldn't even lift the meat off the hooks without my help. My clothes stank of beef fat no matter how much soda I put in the wash. He was useless! And still he expected me to treat him like a king, when he couldn't even tie his own shoes.”

“He couldn't help the clumsiness, at least; it was because he was ill…”

“He disgusted me! I couldn't stand him pawing at me, breathing on me with his liquor breath.”

“So you locked him out and let Elizabeth suffer the consequences.”

Her eyes narrowed. “I was a good wife, so long as he held up his end of the bargain. And he did, at first. But after Elizabeth was born, things started to change. He didn't care about the business anymore. I was working myself to the bone while he went from saloon to saloon, spending the money I'd earned. And still, he always wanted it when he got home. He wouldn't take no for an answer. I had no choice but to lock him out.”

“Leaving Elizabeth to fend for herself. And then when she bore his child, you acted as though it had never happened—as if you could make it just disappear!”

“I did make it disappear. Everything was fine until you showed up.”

“Nothing disappeared,” I said between clenched teeth. “You only made things worse for Elizabeth by making her believe it was all her fault. And it didn't stop there. Her daughter is carrying the same disorder that killed your husband. She doesn't know it yet, but she's going to have to be told.”

“No,” Mrs. Braun said quickly. “No one must know.”

“If she isn't told, she may bear children of her own who will suffer the same fate.”

“No one must know,” she said more firmly.

I shook my head. “It's not up to you anymore.”

She regarded me for several long moments with an inscrutable expression. Getting up from the table without a word, she walked to the door and took the dirty apron back down from its peg. She tied it on, locked the door with a key she took from the top of the molding, and slipped the key into her apron pocket.

“What?” I scoffed. “You think you can keep me locked in here forever?”

Smiling grimly, she reached for a long, narrow canvas bag that was hanging with the mops and brooms near the door. Loosening the drawstring at the top, she reached in and pulled out the largest butcher knife I'd ever seen. She turned to face me, letting the bag drop to the floor. “I told you to leave us alone. I tried to scare you away. I did everything I could, but you wouldn't stop poking your nose into our affairs. You just…wouldn't…stop.”

I stood up, knocking back my chair. The blade was longer than her forearm, with a finely honed edge that glinted under the ceiling light; but it was the glazed look in her eyes that was making my blood run cold. “Mrs. Braun, please, put down the knife. I know you're upset, but I'm sure we can talk about this rationally…”

“I should have just left you in there and let you freeze to death.”

I looked up from the blade as her meaning struck home; she was talking about the meat cooler. My mind raced back to the morning she'd “discovered” me, remembering how uncharacteristically solicitous she'd been, wrapping me in blankets and bringing me tea. “You pushed me in!” I said aloud as the pieces fell together. “You wanted me to think it was Eliza, that she was crazy enough to commit murder…”

“If you were smart you would have walked away. But instead you stayed, and caused even more trouble. All you've done since you met Elizabeth is cause us trouble. I knew something was wrong the minute she got back from church that day; I could tell from the way she was acting. And then the doctor called that afternoon to tell me she had contacted him, asking about her baby. Thank God I knew to follow her the next morning. He was going to show her the child's records. I heard him say so through the door.”

“It was you,” I said, my mind reeling. “You went into the doctor's office while Eliza was waiting in the examining room.”

“He promised me when he took the baby that he'd never tell a soul. He swore there would be no records. But he lied.”

The emptiness in her eyes was making my skin crawl. Could she really have killed Dr. Hauptfuhrer? It hardly seemed possible; she was just a gray-haired old woman, while the doctor had been a man in his prime. Then again, I thought, looking back at the knife, she was an old woman who'd spent the better part of her life butchering meat, and was no doubt extremely proficient with a blade…

I had to get out of there. But she was standing between me and the locked door, and the key was in her pocket.

“She would have found the child,” she was saying, “and told her everything, and soon the whole world would have known. She didn't care who found out what she'd done. She'd flaunt her sin for everyone to see.”

There was no point in telling her that “Eliza” herself didn't know her daughter's true origins; she'd never believe me, even if she did give me the time to explain. “What if people did find out?” I said instead, edging behind the chair. “What happened wasn't her fault.”

“Do you think that matters?” she sneered. “Do you think people would keep coming to the shop, giving us their business, if they knew what had gone on here?”

“So you murdered him.”

“I'm not afraid to do the Lord's work when he calls. I've done it before, and I'll do it again.”

I froze with my hands on the chair back. “What do you mean, you've done it before?”

She nodded slyly. “You think I'm a bad mother. But I was the one who stopped it, in the end. When I heard him coming up the stairs that night, bellowing like a bull in rut, I prayed with all my might. I told the Lord I couldn't stand it anymore, not for one more day, not for one more minute; and the Lord heard me and told me what to do. The Lord gave me the strength of five men so I could make sure he'd never lay his shame on anyone again.”

I could picture it all too clearly: Mr. Braun climbing unsteadily to the top of the stairs, his legs rendered clumsy by drink and chorea, and Mrs. Braun greeting him at the top with a determined, dry-eyed push…

“The sins of the father were cleansed by the blood of the father,” she was saying, staring through me with glassy eyes. “And when the Lord called on me to keep the doctor from revealing what should remain hidden, I didn't hesitate to answer. The door to his office was unlocked, and the sword was waiting on his desk. With the Lord's help, I did what I had to do.”

“And the doctor's daughter?” I asked hoarsely. “Did the Lord tell you to kill her too?”

“I had no choice. She was going to give the doctor's old records to the police. I didn't know how much her father had guessed. But I was merciful. I told her I'd found a letter that her father had written to my daughter that made it clear why Elizabeth had killed him. She was soft, like you, and trusting. She let me right in. She was so eager to read what I'd brought her, she didn't even see the knife coming.”

I knew how unmoored Miss Hauptfuhrer had been by her father's senseless death. She'd been desperate for answers, just as Simon had said. I wasn't surprised she'd let the old woman in. I could easily imagine her rushing into the waiting room and dropping into the nearest chair, unfolding the letter in trembling anticipation—while Mrs. Braun followed with her canvas bag concealed in the folds of her skirt. “But how did you get out of your building without being seen?”

“I kept a set of keys when we were forced to sell the building next door.” She smiled bitterly. “A memento of happier times. All I had to do was wait for the bakery to open, then come down from the roof and in through the side door in the hall, wearing an old coat and hat, and slip out with the early customers.” Her face hardened. “It should have ended there. But you wouldn't let it, would you?” She pushed back her sleeves, revealing forearms that were sinewy from years of hoisting carcasses and hacking through bone. “Which is why now, I have to kill you too.” Gripping the knife handle in both hands, she lifted the blade over her shoulder like a baseball bat and started around the table toward me.

I lifted the chair and shuffled backward, holding it between us, wondering if the side door to the hallway was unlocked and if I could reach it before she caught up to me. I was still paralyzed with indecision when she sprang toward me, lighter and faster on her feet than I would have thought possible. I jerked back as the blade swung toward my neck, feeling a breeze as it missed my throat by inches. An image of Miss Hauptfuhrer's severed head flashed through my mind, unleashing a flood of adrenaline. As she swung again I pushed the chair up and out from my chest, stiffening my arms to block the blow. The tip of the blade caught in one of the chair legs, sticking for a moment before she managed to yank it free.

We froze, breathing hard, each waiting for the other's next move. “Eliza's asleep, sedated. If you kill me, they'll know it was you,” I panted.

She shook her head. “No they won't. Not if they don't find your body.” Tightening her grip on the knife handle, she lunged toward me with a guttural cry.

This time as she swung the knife, I hurled the chair right at it. It hit her hands—hard enough to make her grunt, but not enough to make her drop the knife. I stood defenseless before her, looking frantically around for something to use as a weapon, spotting a broom hanging near the door. I started toward it, rushing up one side of the table as Mrs. Braun ran up the other with her breath rattling in her throat, arriving an instant before she did. I pulled the broom from its peg and whirled around just as she was readying the knife for another swing. I leveled the broom handle, drew it back, and jabbed it squarely into her stomach.

She keeled forward with a little popping sound, her mouth pumping like a fish, clutching her stomach with her forearms. The knife was still in her hand. Changing my grip on the broomstick, I pulled it around and swung at the side of her head, striking her hard on the temple. She sank to the floor, dropping the knife as she fell.

I scooped the knife up and stepped back, brandishing it in front of me; but the fight seemed to have gone out of her. Keeping her in my sights, I grabbed a spool of heavy twine from the shelf above the chopping block. She offered no resistance as I bound her hands and feet, or when I removed the key from her pocket. When I tried to lift her up from the floor onto one of the chairs, however, she suddenly raised her bound wrists and raked my face with her nails.

“You!” she hissed, livid with rage, spraying spittle into the air. “Why did you have to come along and ruin everything?”

I rocked back, pressing my hand against my forehead where her nails had dug the deepest. “I've done nothing wrong,” I said, knowing at last that it was true.

I left her on the floor, using the last of the twine to tie her hands to the radiator, then went out the side door to summon the guard upstairs. I only made it up half a flight before my legs collapsed and I sank onto a stair tread, thinking of what Mrs. Braun had planned to do to me. I wanted to hate her, pure and simple, for all the harm she'd caused. And yet, I knew that in her twisted mind, she'd believed she had no choice. With no one to turn to and nowhere to go for help, she'd taken the only path she thought open to her. Her desperate actions had left a trail of innocent victims in their wake, but I supposed that she too had been a victim in a way.

Pushing myself to my feet, I climbed to the top of the stairs and shouted to the officer in the hall. He followed me back down to the shop, where Mrs. Braun was now slumped against the radiator, staring blindly ahead of her. When I'd told the officer everything I intended to tell him, he used the shop phone to call for a patrol wagon, while I went upstairs to check on Eliza.

She was sleeping peacefully, with her mouth ajar and her hand tucked under her cheek. I leaned against the doorframe, watching the covers rise and fall with her breath. The nightmare was over. Against all odds, and my own self-doubts, I'd managed to get to the truth. Eliza would go free.

I crossed to the bed and sat down beside her. There would be trials ahead, to be sure; but at least she wouldn't be alone in her suffering any longer. I didn't know how or when I'd reveal to her the full extent of her daughter's illness. But I believed that, when the time came, she would be able to cope with it. Because Olivia wasn't the “Joy” Eliza had yearned for. Joy was an idea fixed in time, a symbol embodying an event in Elizabeth's past, just as Conrad embodied an event in mine. Joy and Conrad had been real; they had had real places in our lives. But that place was behind us. It was time for us both to let them go, and move on.

I gently stroked back a strand of hair that had fallen across her eyes. I had helped Eliza, by listening to her as no one had listened before and allowing her to reveal her terrible secret. But she had helped me as well—by trusting me, and forcing me to trust myself. I might be imperfect, and a woman, but I'd never again let someone else tell me what to believe, about myself or anyone else. I lifted my head, inhaling the scent of baking bread from the building next door. For the first time in days, it felt good to be alive.

A police wagon was making its way down the avenue, its gong growing steadily louder as it moved in our direction. Waiting until I heard policemen in the stairwell, I tucked the coverlet more securely around Elizabeth's shoulders and went downstairs to join them.