Richard Montanari (62 page)

    She
looked at the head on the screwdriver, which was also rounded, dull with age
and use. She put the screwdriver into the slot, put all of her weight behind
it, doing her best to keep the tool perpendicular to the door.

    She
took a deep breath and tried to turn it. Nothing. She backed off, tried again.
This time she felt purchase.

    The
screw turned. Not much, but it turned.
Yes,
Lucy thought.

    A
lock was just a device with moving parts, right? If there were moving parts,
Lucy Doucette could handle it.

    She
set about her task.

    The
house was silent in a way that no small space could ever be; silent like a
presence. Every so often its tranquillity was broken by rain hitting the huge
windows in the great room or a branch scraping a gutter.

    Jessica
had lived most of her life in a place too small, a place where the extra closet
or tiny room was a premium. This was a fact of life in a Philadelphia row house.
But this place - with its high ceilings, tall doorways and cavernous rooms -
was too much. She didn't think she could ever live somewhere like this,
although the likelihood of that happening was somewhere between never and
absolutely
never.

    As
she peered out of the front windows, anxious to get back to the Roundhouse, her
phone rang. She jumped at the sound. She hoped it was going to be Josh telling
her he was on the way. It was not. It was a number she did not recognize. She
answered.

    'Hello?'

    'I'm
calling for Detective Byrne.'

    It
was a man's voice.

    'Who
am I speaking to?' Jessica asked.

    'My
name is Robert Cole. I'm trying to reach Kevin Byrne. He gave me this number as
a backup.'

    'I'm
his partner, Detective Balzano. Is there something I can help you with?'

    'I
have that report he wanted.'

    'The
report?'

    'He
had me red-ball a DNA test. Cold case.'

    'I'm
sorry,' Jessica said. 'What agency are you with?'

    Cole
went on to tell her that he ran a private, independent lab, and the work he had
done for Byrne was off the record. He also told her that the job was the
twenty-year-old homicide case of Gabriel Thorne.

    'How
much of the file do you have?' Jessica asked.

    'I
have copies of everything.'

    'The crime-scene
photos?'

    'Yes.'

    'Can
you send me the DNA summary and the photos of the crime scene?'

    'Sure,'
Cole said. 'I can send the photos now, but it will take a few minutes to scan
the DNA summary. It's on another computer.'

    Jessica
gave him her email address. Thirty seconds later the file arrived on her
iPhone. Jessica tapped the file, opened it.

    Cole
had sent her four photographs. The first photograph was of the hallway in which
she now stood. The fact that it had been taken twenty years earlier, in the
precise space she now occupied, gave her a chill.

    The
second photo was of the kitchen. And it was a horror show. Gabriel Thorne's
body was supine on the white tile floor, lying next to the kitchen island, a
pool of blood beneath him, his chest butchered.

    Jessica
walked down the main hall, stopped at the kitchen, turned on the light. The
room had not changed. Same island, same white tile, same light fixtures. She
scanned the photo and the real room, item by item. They were eerily identical,
right down to the color of the kitchen towels on the rack next to the sink.

    The
other two photos were of the floor leading into the pantry, which was just off
the kitchen, and the music room just off the pantry. The music room too was
identical, except that now the cello in the corner did not have blood on it.

    According
to the brief summary attached to the photographs, it was believed that
Christa-Marie Schönburg had stabbed Gabriel

    Thorne
in the music room, then followed him into the kitchen. When he collapsed, she
had continued to stab him in the chest.

    Jessica
tried to imagine the scene that night. She could not. But she knew what she had
to do. If she was leaving shortly, locking the house behind her, she had better
snuff out the candles in the music room. One by one she blew out the dozen or
so candles, the scent of burned paraffin filling her head.

    When
the room was dark, lit only by the gas lamps on the deck at the rear of the
house, she walked back into the hall, checked her watch.
Where the hell is
Josh?
She called him, got his voicemail.

    'Did
you get the photos?' he asked. 'I did.'

    'I'm
having some trouble scanning the DNA report. I could keep trying, or I could
just read it to you. Which do you prefer?'

    'Read
it to me.'

    Cole
read her the report. As he did, Jessica felt a cold finger run up her spine. It
turned out that, in addition to Gabriel Thorne's and Christa-Marie's blood on
the murder weapon and the floor of the kitchen, there were two other distinct DNA
profiles found.

    In
other words, two other people had been present on the night of the murder.

    What
did it mean to the case? What did it mean to Christa-Marie's guilt on that
night so long ago?

    Jessica
felt gooseflesh break out on her arms as she listened to the rest of the
report.

    She
thanked Cole, hung up, her mind spinning.

    This
changed everything.

    She
stepped back to the front doors, opened them, fully expecting to see a sector
car from the Fourteenth District at the gate. There was none. This was strange.
The house would not be searched for evidence and cleared for at least
twenty-four hours, and a police presence was standard procedure.

    She
keyed her two-way handset, spoke into it. No response.

    
What
is going on
?

    She
closed the doors, walked back into the main hall.

    That
was when Jessica Balzano heard the music.

    As
Jessica moved across the great room the music grew louder.

    It
took her back to the first time she'd heard this piece in Byrne's van, the
nocturne by Chopin.

    She
soon realized it
was
coming from the music room, but it sounded live,
not recorded. It sounded like someone was playing the cello in that room.

    '
The
house is clear, ma'am
.'

    From
across the hall she noticed candlelight illuminating the room, candles she had
just put
out.
As she approached the entrance, peering around the
doorway, she saw someone sitting in a chair at the opposite side of the room.
It was Christa-Marie. She held the beautiful cello between her legs and was
playing the nocturne, her eyes closed.

    It
made no sense.

    
Why
is she back? Who let her come back
?

    Jessica
drew her weapon, held it at her side, rounded the door- jamb, and saw a second figure
standing in the shadow of the short hallway leading to the kitchen.

    It
was someone she knew very well.

    The
figure in the hallway did not move. Christa-Marie continued to play, the notes rising
and falling with the sound of the wind outside. As the piece came to a
crescendo Jessica stepped fully into the music room.

    'Is
it now?' the figure in the hallway asked.

    Jessica
did not know how to answer. Too many things could go awry with the wrong
answer.

    The
figure emerged from the shadows.

    Michael
Drummond had changed his clothes. He now wore a navy suit with thinner lapels.
It was a style that might have been popular with fifteen-year-old boys when
Drummond had been a guest, and probably a student, in this house.

    There
was something bulky in one of his suit-coat pockets. Jessica watched his hands.

    'Teacher
is mad at me,' Drummond said softly.

    Jessica
glanced at Christa-Marie. She was lost in the music.

    'Is
it now?' Drummond asked again.

    'No,'
Jessica replied. 'It's then, Michael. It's Halloween night, 1990.'

    The
notion registered on Drummond's face. His features softened in a way that told
Jessica that his mind was returning to that night, when all things were
possible, when love burned brightly in his heart, not yet tempered by the
horror of what was to come.

    'Tell
me about that night, Michael,' Jessica said. She began to inch closer to him.

    'We
went to the concert. Joseph and I.'

    'Joseph
Novak.'

    'Yes.
When we came back, he was here.'

    'Doctor
Thorne?'

    'Doctor
Thorne!' Drummond spat the name like an epithet, glanced into the kitchen, then
back. Jessica circled closer.

    'What
happened?' she asked.

    'We
argued.'

    As
Jessica closed the distance by another few inches, she noticed a shadow to her
left, right near the entrance to the kitchen, just a few feet from where
Michael Drummond stood. She looked over. So did Drummond. Someone was standing
there.

    'Joseph?'
Drummond asked.

    But
it wasn't Joseph Novak, of course. Somehow, Lucinda Doucette was standing
there. Lucinda Doucette from the Hosanna House and Le Jardin.

    In
one fluid motion Michael Drummond reached for Lucy, pulling her close to him.
He now had a straight razor in his hand. He flicked it open.

    Jessica
leveled her weapon. 'Don't do it, Michael.'

    'Zig,
zig, zag.'

    Everything
Jessica had seen in Drummond's face, everything that told her he might be ready
to give all this up, was gone. What stood before her now was a feral,
calculating killer.

    'Let
her go.'

    Drummond
held Lucy even more tightly. Jessica saw the young woman's legs start to sag.

    'I
have a little more work to do,' Drummond said.

    'Not
going to happen.'

    Drummond
brought the razor up in a flash. The gleaming blade was now less than an inch
from Lucy's throat. 'Watch.'

    'Wait!'

    Drummond
glanced at the clock. It was 11:51.

    'There's
no time left,' he said.

    'Just
put down the razor. Let her go.'

    Drummond
shook his head. 'Can't do it, detective. There's one note left to play.'

    'We'll
get you help,' Jessica said. 'It doesn't have to end this way.'

    'But
it
does,
don't you see? This must be completed.'

    Jessica
glanced again at the grandfather clock in the hallway. 'It's not midnight yet.
Let her go.'

    'Look
how many unfinished symphonies there are. Beethoven, Schubert. I am not going
to leave a legacy like that.'

    Jessica
looked at Lucy. The girl was going into shock. Jessica knew she had to keep the
man talking.