Winter House (36 page)

Bitty nodded unconsciously. She knew this list by heart: find an old woman approximately seventy years of age, tall and fair and blue of eye, a woman without documents or memories of family and home.

„It was a shopping list for a doppelganger,“ said Mallory. „You weren’t even
looking
for your aunt. Any old woman would do, as long as Cleo and Lionel believed she was their sister. You didn’t even have to worry about a DNA test. By the time – “

„I wanted to please them.“

„No, you didn’t. They were horrified. That’s the way Nedda put it in her last diary, the one she started in the hospice. She mentioned you, too – in detail. It was her impression that you weren’t all that surprised by the reception she got from Cleo and Lionel. Now back to your Pi’s shopping list. Addison told me you were only interested in nursing homes. Good hunting grounds for old women who can’t even remember their names.“

Bitty eased herself down to the floor, fearing that if she did not sit down, she might fall on weakening knees. Mallory had erred on one point. Not just any old woman would do to separate her family from their money. It had taken years and all of her savings to find just the right one, a senile old crone with a resemblance to the Winter family. How astonished she had been to discover that the best candidate of the lot was the genuine article.

„I even know why you picked the state of Maine.“ Mallory was moving across the room, and it seemed to Bitty that the detective would walk over her or through her, but the young woman stopped suddenly, as a train would stop just short of collision. „Maine was close enough to keep tabs on your search,“ said Mallory. „But it was far enough from New York City so you wouldn’t have to worry about the Smyth name being linked to the Winter family. The PI was pretty lame, and I’m guessing that’s why you picked him. But he finally made that connection.“

Bitty was always looking up at people, and suddenly she tired of this. She fixed her eyes on a middle ground, and her voice was insistent when she said, „I didn’t break any laws. I never – “

„Your plan was too complicated.“ Mallory hunkered down to Bitty’s eye-level. „That’s why so many things went wrong. You had to improvise too much. But, in every new game plan, Nedda was meant to die. Your mother and your uncle would take the blame. You supplied them with a motive. Their uncle James planted the idea, but you’re the one who convinced them that Nedda murdered their family.“

As Bitty formed the idea that Mallory was using pure guesswork, the detective was shaking her head, saying, „I
know
how you poisoned them against Nedda. So you planned a revenge motive for Cleo and Lionel. They do everything together, don’t they? Get one, you get two. With them in prison, you’d control all the money.“ Mallory held a sheet of paper within an inch of the other woman’s face. „Now you get nothing.“

Pulling back, Bitty recognized the page torn from a book on New York State law. The underscored passage mandated that felons could not profit from a crime. She watched the paper drift to the floor. In one fluid motion, Mallory was risen, then gone, and Bitty was left to stare at the fallen page washed in bright light. „I didn’t commit any felonies. There’s no proof of – “

„Let’s start with Willy Roy Boyd, the scum you hired to kill Nedda.“ The detective ripped a newspaper clipping from the wall and held it up for Bitty to see. The headline recounted the capture of a serial killer. „This was your idea of the help-wanted pages. It cost you a lot of money to get him out on bail with that new hearing. He’d need lots more to keep his pricey lawyer. He would’ve killed a battalion of women for you.“ She let go of the clipping, and it drifted to the floor.

Bitty turned away. „You can’t seriously – “

„I’m
dead
serious.“ Mallory’s voice came from behind, and Bitty could feel the breath on her neck. „I talked to Boyd’s lawyer.“ Another piece of paper rattled close by Bitty’s ear. „I have the letter you sent with the payoff money.“

Bitty raised her head with new hope. „In my handwriting? I don’t think so.“ The letter had been typed on a computer.

„Don’t even try to run a bluff on me.“ Mallory’s face appeared in front of her, blotting out everything else in the world. „Your bedroom was the only one with locks, two heavy-duty bolts –
recently
installed. You were afraid that Boyd might get carried away and kill you, too. He never knew that you were the one who hired him.“

„No, there was an attempted breakin the previous week. You
know
that.“

„Right. I always wondered if that one inspired the second try, or did you arrange both of them? Was Boyd your fallback plan? Heavy guns, Bitty – a serial killer. But at least he was a proven commodity. He’d already killed three women. Must’ve been a shock when Nedda brought him down with an ice pick. You never imagined that, did you? Well, some plans only work on paper.“ Mallory stood up, suddenly impatient, and walked back to the wall. „Willy Roy Boyd died during the commission of a felony. You hired him to kill your aunt. By law, his death belongs to you.“

„That’s absurd.“

„Oh, really? Did you sleep through every class on criminal law? The next charge is conspiracy in attempted murder for hire. Pecuniary gain raises the ante on the penalty. Look it up.“

Bitty rallied and lifted her head, feeling braver when speaking to the younger woman’s back. „You have nothing to link me with that man.“

„You’re right.“ Mallory’s smile was a chilling piece of work. „In your original plan, Nedda would die and Boyd would survive. So you’d never give him anything that would lead the police back to you. But I’m sure you fed him enough detail to implicate your aunt and uncle.“

„Supposition.“

„Yes, it’s a very weak case. Lucky I have you for multiple murders.“

„No,“ said Bitty, head slowly shaking from side to side. „What are you – “

„Every death by arson is murder. I only have to prove one and the jury will throw in all the rest for free – including Willy Roy Boyd.“ The detective padded toward the scaffolding and knelt down by the open suitcase and its spilled contents. She picked up one of the diaries and flipped through the pages until she found an entry that she liked. „Listen to this. It begins, ‘Love me again.’ She means Cleo and Lionel. All Nedda wanted was a reconciliation with her brother and sister.“ The detective turned ahead a few pages. „For a while, she was making progress. Then it went sour after Nedda stabbed Boyd. That was your work, Bitty.“ She held up the book. „It’s all here. Oh, one more thing – I know what you did with the videotape, the one that went missing that night.“

„All right, I burned it to protect Aunt Nedda. I thought she’d killed an unarmed burglar.“

„Nice touch, Bitty. Always a good idea to work a little truth into the lie. I believe you burned the tape, but that’s not what I meant. Your car service logged the trip to the summer house the next morning – a very early ride. You showed that videotape to Cleo and Lionel, didn’t you? You wanted them to see Nedda’s handiwork with an ice pick – the same kind of weapon that slaughtered their family. It must’ve destroyed them to watch that film. Too bad you don’t have the tape anymore. It might’ve come in handy at your trial. The state will say you burned incriminating evidence. Boyd was dead before the lights came on, but maybe the tape showed you pulling out the ice pick and driving a pair of shears into his corpse.“

„I didn’t do that.“

„Bitty, I never thought you
could
do it. But will
the jury
believe you? Now – just take it a little further. The autopsy proves two strikes and two different weapons – maybe two killers. Maybe Boyd wasn’t quite dead when he was stabbed the second time. The prosecutor might argue that you were afraid Boyd could identify you as the one who hired him.“

„That’s not true.“

Mallory arched one eyebrow. „So?“ She looked down at the journals in her hands. „When the jury reads these diaries – Nedda’s little dream – they’re going to hate you, Bitty. They’re going to kill you, too. On the night before the fire, Nedda called you from SoHo. She was planning another attempt to reconcile with her brother and sister. That would’ve ruined all your hard work shoring up the revenge motive. So, you staged a suicide, and you cut it close, but then you expected Nedda home for dinner hours earlier. Charles Butler’s fault. He invited her to a poker game.“

The detective busied herself with picking up all the spilled diaries and putting them back into the suitcase. „Let’s see. More crimes. Oh, right – the night of the fire? You turned out the lights at the basement fuse box.

There was an old flashlight kept on that box. The arson investigator found it in your closet. Did you think you’d have time to plant the flashlight in someone else’s room after your aunt died?“

„The fire was accidental.“

„I know. So what were you planning for Nedda that night? A fall down the stairs? No, too uncertain. Most people survive that sort of tumble. You were the one who pointed that out on the night of the dinner party.“ Mallory reached back into the suitcase and pulled out a diary. „It’s all here. Your aunt was a great one for detail. You planned to push Nedda over the banister, right? According to you, that’s the way Edwina Winter died, a tried-and-true method.“ She opened the diary and turned the pages. „Here it is. Nedda describes you rushing Charles Buder at the banister. For a minute there, she thought he ‘d go over the rail. That was your dress rehearsal, Bitty. For the real thing, you had to pull the fuses – turn off every light. It’s the only way you could do a murder – behind the back and in the dark. The prime suspects would be Cleo and Lionel. But now that they’re dead, you inherit everything. Good motive for arson.“

„But you
know
it was an accident.“

„The fire was where it all went wrong, wasn’t it? The smoke and flames. You panicked. You ran up the stairs instead of down. Yes, I believe it was an accident. You’d never take that kind of risk. But, once again, Bitty, will the
jury
believe you?“

Mallory paced the floor, snapping her fingers. „Stay with me, Bitty. Do the math. Willy Roy Boyd counts as the first murder charge. When the arson investigation is finished, the body count will stand at five.“ She ripped a sheet from the wall. „This is the autopsy report on your father. It links the trauma of the fire to a fatal heart attack. Every death by arson is murder.“

„It was an accident!“

The detective smiled, and Bitty grasped the irony before it was voiced.

„After years of planning and scheming, you’ll get tripped up by something you didn’t do. But you
did
pull out the fuses and hide the spares. You lit the candles that set the house on fire – and those people died. Do you think I care if you only planned to kill
one
of them?“ Mallory’s voice was calm and all one note, almost bored as she walked along the wall, tearing off more sheets in quick succession. „So now I’ve got you for patricide, matricide, the murders of your aunt and uncle and Willy Roy Boyd. Too bad you couldn’t commit mass murder in another borough. Now the Queens DA won’t kill anybody, not even cop killers. But the Manhattan DA
loves
the death penalty.“

The wave of Mallory’s hand encompassed all the chaos of the wall and the suitcase of diaries. „Now you might remember this from a law class you
didn’t
sleep through. The DA calls it a preponderance of evidence. The sheer weight of it is enough to crush you to death. And there’s more. Juries love things they can hold in their hands, like the fuses and the spares you hid by the garden door. That’s what really sealed the arson finding. Then there’s the pack of diaries.“

„Aunt Nedda was insane. She had a history of – “

„No, according to Dr. Buder, all those diaries were written by a per-fecdy sane woman. So – things the jury can hold on to. There’s the flashlight – and the fire ax with your fingerprints on it.“

„You know why my prints are on the ax. I used it to – “

„Yeah,
right.
Little Sally Winter’s bones. That was another nice touch, Bitty. Some malicious slander to paint Cleo and Lionel as the kind of people who could murder a child. Why not Nedda? What you don’t know is that your mother was on the phone with my partner before the fire broke out. She was making plans to surrender the trunk to the coroner’s office in the morning. Cleo and Lionel only wanted to know how long it would be before the family could bury that little girl’s remains. That was all they cared about. Finally – a proper burial for Sally Winter.“

„You know I used that ax to get Sally’s trunk out of the closet.“

„Right, that’s what you said in your statement, but we only have your word on that. Your mother never mentioned you. So the DA will argue that you used that ax to keep those frightened people from escaping a burning house.“

„No, there was a witness who saw Nedda carry me out. I was unconscious. I couldn’t have stopped anyone from leaving if – “

„A witness? You mean the homeless man who called in the fire? The arson team went looking for him. Turns out someone bought him a train ticket to a warmer climate. Now where was I? Oh, right – the prosecutor’s closing remarks. He’ll paint a picture of you swinging that ax, scaring those poor people, driving them up the stairs and then setting the fire to trap them there. When he’s done with the jury, they’ll want to climb out of their box and kill you with their hands.“