Ira Levin (15 page)

    "I'll bet you anything you want," she said, bending, choosing a doughnut, "that she was really Alice Rosenbaum. It's a perfect interlock. The medical examiner, or whoever is doing the autopsy, ought to know by now."

    "What are you talking about?" Joe asked. "Who's Alice Rosenbaum? I never even heard the name before!"

    "You probably did a few years ago and forgot," Rosemary said, eating a doughnut, holding her elbow. "I heard it in a PBS docu I watched a couple of weeks ago. One of my brothers dated an Alice Rosenbaum in high school and had fights with my father about it, so I noticed the name. The PBS Alice Rosenbaum was the female member of the Ayn Rand Brigade, the woman at the throttle of that train they hijacked. I guess trains were significant for her. Using "derailed," I mean."

    Joe said, "Judy is-was that PA?"

    Rosemary nodded. "I'm sure," she said. "It has to be." She ate some more. "The name can't be real," she said, "and no other woman would have had to do the Indian bit in the first place."

    "What do you mean, I don't get it," Joe said, standing up. "She had to be an Indian? Why? Why wouldn't a wig and glasses and Alice J.-Smith or Jones have been enough?"

    Rosemary tapped a fingertip at the center of her forehead. "Her tattoo," she said. "They have tattoos on their foreheads! What was she going to do, wear a band-aid for a month? Count on covermark? She needed the dot to hide the dollar sign." Joe stared openmouthed at her.

    She finished the doughnut, brushed sugar from her lips and fingers, licked them.

    He held his forehead, shaking his head. "Jeez, I'm all at sea here," he said. "So whoever-gave her the thirty pieces of silver"-he lowered his hand, looking at her- "was saying that that's what she was, a Judas? Betraying Andy?"

    She turned away. "How right-brace was Joe asked. "She loved him, like you said. Sure, you could see they had a little tiff or something last week, but there's no way he could have-if you could even imagine such a- He was with us the whole time!"

    She turned around, aimed her dat'k-ringed eyes at him. "The others weren't," she said. The buzzer buzzed, Andy's buzz. e caret Jssgr caret Just caret fesUs caret caret hey stayed looking at each other a moment, and she l. let breath out and walked away, slowing as she reached the foyer-Andy buzzed again-slowing more as she neared the door. She stood a moment. Joe moved out from behind the coffee table, watching.

    She opened the door.

    Andy nodded. "Mission accomplished," he said.

    "Oh good," she said.

    They hugged each other; he said "How you doing," kissing her temple, smoothing her hair back.

    "Okay," she said. Kissed his cheek. "You're back so soon!"

    His eyes shone. "Wait!" he said, closing the door behind him.

    They went arm in arm into the living room. "Joe!" he said.

    "Andy…" Joe said, looking at him.

    "Sit down, both of you," he said, taking his arm from around her. "I'm going to tell you something that's going to absolutely knock your socks off." He unzipped his jacket.

    They looked at each other.

    "I mean it," he said, shedding the jacket, looking back and forth between them. "Sit down or fall down, take your choice." He straightened his sweatshirt-navy, no message.

    Joe said, "Is this maybe about a tattoo?"

    Andy stared at him. Swallowed. "Who called?" he asked. "I've got to know who leaked it."

    "Your mother figured it out," Joe said, nodding at her.

    Andy turned and stared. "That Judy was Alice Rosenbaumi" Rosemary nodded. "Howf" Looking at him, she said, "The thirty pieces of silver, and the name."

    "The flame? "he said.

    She said, "Judith S. Kharyat…"

    "Say it fast, "Joe said.

    Andy's lips moved. He stared-at her, at him-and clapped the side of his head. "They even thought of thatl" he said. "A name that reinforces everything! I never put it together! She told me her middle name was this long Indian…" He spun a hand, looking at Rosemary. Stopped the hand. "Don't you see who did it?" he asked. "Don't you see who's behind it all?"

    She said, looking at him, "No…"

    He turned to Joe.

    Joe shook his head, looking at him.

    "The rest of the Brigade!" he said. "The five guys! Or some of them. The Commish got word who she was just as we got there. I realized right away what the story was, what it meant: they had planted her here to spy on us, they were getting even with her for-I guess you'd say switching teams-and at the sarfae time they were messing up the Lighting by making it look as if she was killed for betraying me somehow! Because I look the way I do, and the thirty pieces of silver-which that name only reinforces! That's why they killed her in such an attention-getting way. Really, who except someone looking for absolute maximum worldwide publicity would-I mean, Tiffany's, nudity, blood, silver-come on, it had to be a setup."

    Joe, gasping, said, "Whew, kiddo, I have to admit, your mother and I had a little nervous moment there, at least I did, I shouldn't speak for you, Rosie. What a relief. Whew!" He wagged a hand, slapped at his chest.

    Rosemary said, "It sounds logical…"

    Andy lifted a finger. "But before I could even say a word," he said, "the Mayor had put the whole thing together himself! Including the thirty pieces of silver!" He tapped his temple, nodding. "Once he laid it all out, everyone agreed in a flash. She stays unidentified, both identities, till after the Lighting, after vacation, Jan third. The FBI is mounting full surveillance on Fort Whatever- they-call-it in Montana, and their computer already found a connection between one of the Brigade members and a lawyer on the eighteenth floor."

    "What a relief," Joe said, checking the doughnuts.

    Andy turned to Rosemary, took her by the shoulders. He sighed, gazing into her eyes. "At least we know who did it," he said. "I hope that helps a little." Nodding at him, she said, "It does, dear."

    "Ahh, poor baby…" He kissed her nose, hugged her. "You look old enough to be my mother." She punched, he chuckled.

    Joe, eating as he watched them, smiled.

    Rosemary, looking up at Andy, said, "It really does help, angel. I'd probably have seen myself that the Brigade was behind it if I'd had more time to think about it. I only realized who she was minutes before you came in. I'm glad the FBI is on it so quickly,- I'm sure they'll find them." She smiled up at him-radiating candor and sincerity. And honesty and openness. 9-caret SZANDr*andcaret @lffand-9 t bar caret he Antijudas… l. It figured she'd have been in there among his twelve antiapostles.

    Eleven now.

    She split multaroses, shifted the tiles, made ASTRO LUMES.

    Sitting at the table in the late afternoon, after a nap and a shower. Soft lounging pajamas, soft jazz on the radio, soft snow sifting down past the window. ultramesso. Like a teenager's room. Not so common a word, though, that five- and six-year-olds use it.

    Could Judy/alice have been lying about Roast Mules too-to drive her bats? Was there really no word using those ten letters? Was it a hoax, like her saris and the dot?

    No… Not even a PA would do that…

    And they'd been friends. That hadn't been a hoax.

    MORTUALESS…

    Hutch had been stopped from telling her Roman's real identity by the spell Roman and his coven cast, the spell that finally killed him.

    Judy had been stopped from telling her-what? That Andy had a coven? were witchcraft and Satanism, not fraud and tax evasion, what Alice Rosenbaum had found-what Andy had derailed her into? And after she had told her, who would the Antijudas have told today? The Times* The tabloids? They'd sit on that for about two seconds, coming from her. Or a publisher, for a book to be published next April or May? Why else would she have been killed that way? They must have been high on something, like many a knife-wielding murderer in recent history-far fewer nowadays, thanks to Andy.

    Could the Antijudas have spread the worse news, the Bad News?

    No. If she had known who Andy's father was, she would never have opened up to his mother, not even partially comand would have pried for more information besides. The Indian cultural thing-ha!-would have given her the excuse.

    Which meant, probably, that the eleven others didn't know either. Coven members shared their secret knowledge,- that was one of Roman's lures, whenever he tried to get her to join…

    STEALORMUS…

    Last Christmas Eveher last, six months ago-she had let Andy go to Minnie and Roman's alone, for the first time, and stay overnight. He had been five and a half, to the day. There were rituals that had to be performed half a year before his next birthday, Roman said, instructions to be given. They were honoring their part of the bargain; she had to honor hers. His father had rights too. Rites too.

    She needed the coven. When you have a toddler with beautiful tiger eyes, and horn buds slightly less beautiful, and other parts even less beautiful-all of which today he presumably controlled (she wasn't asking) by the same semi-Satanic willpower that gave him hazel eyes-when you have a toddler like that, you can't drop him off at a preschool and go on to the job. When you really desperately need a sitter for a few hours, you can't call an agency or the teenager in the apartment down the hall.

    The coven paid the bills. The women were doting nanas on whom she relied only when absolutely necessary, under strict rules whose following she checked in secret ways. All of them, men and women-except Laura-Louise, the bitch-treated her with the same helpfulness and respect everybody gave her today.

    Roman promised her-he made a vow he said was sacred to him-that Andy wouldn't be harmed in any way or pressed to do anything he resisted, that he would only be strengthened mentally and physically in ways that would be useful to him all his life. The experience would be inspiring and uplifting, like any other good religious service. Though she couldn't be there as an onlooker, she was more than welcome, as she surely knew by now, as a celebrant. The coven could certainly use some young blood-his old eyes twinkled-and there were two places empty. That way she could keep an eye on Andy.

    Thanks but no thanks."

    She had spent half that Christmas Eve sitting on a footstool in a deshelved closet whose back opened, when it wasn't bolted on the other side as it was then, into a closet next door-the same passage she'd been carried through that night in October of "65. Sitting there with an ear to the bottom of a glass pressed to white-painted plywood, she heard faintly now and then echoes of the piping flute of that night, the chanting, the beating drum. The tang of tannis root sneaked through cracks, sour but not unpleasant… A whiff of sulfur, though, sickened her. Had he come up, or out, or materialized from outer space or wherever the hell?

    She wept for Andy then. She should have taken him and run. She would, and before his birthday-far, to San Francisco or Seattle. She'd get the plane fare somehow, and find an agency or children's hospital, a church-run hospital, that would help her.

    Once the sulfur smell was gone and there was just the scent of tannis again, stronger soon in the closet's shelter, she felt better. She recalled the tannis taste of the drinks Minnie had made for her during her pregnancy, drinks that had nourished Andy. Minnie and Roman loved him, they'd take good care of him.

    Later she poured herself a glass of eggnog, added a splash of bourbon, and watched It's a Wonderful Lifeon the way to becoming a TV Christmas tradition. Sweet movie. Second time she'd seen it.

    When Andy came through the closets the next morning, he was fine, happy, glad to see-hug-kiss her and run into the living room. Had he had a good time? He nodded, looking up at the tree. "What did you do?" she asked, kneeling beside him, smiling at the lights shining in his eyes, on his cheeks.

    "I said I wouldn't tell," he said. "Should I?"

    Her hand on his flannel-shirted back, she said, "If you really didn't want to say it, yes. Or if you changed your mind and want to tell me anyway. Kids can do that. If you don't want to, no. I gave permission, I said you could go."

    He chose not to tell. Her last Christmas. He'd had twenty-seven since, or this would be the twenty-seventh. The ones when he was growing up and in his teens, at least, must have been like that one, scented with tannis, caroled by whining flutes and chanting. Black Christmases…

    TREMULOSSA…

    He had told her he was through with Satanism-after looking her in the eye and saying he would never lie to her again. If he had lied… Friday night could be just the time to find out.

    He had said on the plane that he and Judy had plans for Christmas Eve, that they would exchange presents with her and Joe on Christmas Day in the morning. And Judy had started saying something the first time they played Scrabble about goings-on on the ninth floor…