Witch House (39 page)

“Now wait a minute, Ursula.” I reached across
the table and patted her hand reassuringly. “Chief Running Bear may
be a crooked, untrustworthy individual, but we do not look upon all
Indians that way. I know that in your time, you considered Indians
evil savages, and you had good cause to fear them. You must
remember, however, the White man invaded
their
country, not
the other way around, and they brought with them disease and
pestilence on a scale the Indians had never known before. How would
you feel if the shoe were on the other foot?”

“I would feel as thou, when that foot hast
kicked thy butt and hard.”

“It is not that way now.”

She straightened up in her seat and turned a
smug cheek, something I would have expected of Lilith. “`Tis my
thought, is all,” she said, and I let it go at that.

“What’s to become of the girl, Trish,” Lilith
asked.

“Oh, we let her go,” said Spinelli.

“Why?”

“Had to; we didn’t have anything on her.”

“That’s the trouble with this case,” I said
to her. “With regards to the money, none of our suspects can claim
a clear conscience, yet for dirt, nothing will stick to them.” To
Spinelli I said, “You thought Sergeant Powell’s hands were dirty?
If you ask me, I think he played an integral part in the initial
armored car robbery. I just cannot prove it.” I turned to Ursula.
“The same goes for Daniel Mochohyett, your Indian friend. I smell
his stinking paws all over this thing. Still, I can’t prove
anything.”

“And Stiles?” said Carlos. “Where does she
fit in?”

I shrugged faintly. “She may have perjured
herself at Landau’s trial. Aside from that, I don’t see where she
broke any laws. The same goes for Warden DeAngelo and Frank
Tarkowski. A love triangle bent on squeezing secrets out of an
ex-con hardly constitutes a felony. No, it looks like everyone knew
more than he or she were letting on. Some, like Stiles, made out
okay; others, like DeAngelo, paid big premiums and received zero
dividends. In the end, the biggest losers were René and Adam
Landau. If only they kept their sights on the real prize, they
could have had what they wanted most.”

“Each other?” Carlos guessed.

“Yeah, each other.”

“All right,” said Lilith. “Not to change the
subject, but are we done eating?”

“Why?” I asked.

“I have a surprise for everyone.”

“A surprise? Lilith, we don’t need any
surprises today, not after—”

“Quiet, killjoy. You’ll like this one. We are
all going to look at another house that Ursula and I found the
other day.”

“Another haunted house?”

“Haunted, no, not yet anyway. Come on, slide
out. We’ll take you there.”

“Does anyone have today’s paper?” Carlos
asked. “I want to check my numbers.”

“Oh, and my horoscope,” said Lilith. “I want
to see if it’s my lucky day.”

“It’s always your lucky day,” I said.

“I know. I just want to see if they know
it.”

“Fine, I’ll pick one up at the counter. Why
don’t you guys go on? I’ll meet you outside.”

After paying the tab and leaving a tip, I
picked up the newspaper and read the headlines.
Mystery
Solved
, it said, explaining how the Feds had recovered the
money from the armored car robbery from Davis’ grave. I had to dig
all the way back into the local section for any mention of how
Carlos, Spinelli and I solved the Landau murder case. Strangely, I
felt remarkably satisfied with that.

I headed out to join the others, who had
already piled into Dominic’s car for the ride across town. “Here,”
I said, handing the paper to Carlos as I hopped in. “Read it and
weep.”

“Why would I weep?” he asked.

“They spelled your name wrong. They said
Detective Dominic Rodriquez took a bullet in a ferocious gun battle
up at the cabin.”

“Really? They said it was ferocious?”

“Yes, but didn’t you hear me? They called you
Dominic.”

“Yeah, but they got my last name right.”

“So, you are not upset?”

“No, why should I be? It just means that
tomorrow I will see my name in the paper again under the
corrections column. That’s twice in one week. I don’t see them
putting your name in the paper twice in one week, do I?”

“No,” I said, “I guess you don’t. I suppose
that means you win.”

He sat back and smiled wide. “Yup, I
win.”

A few miles out of town, we turned off the
main road onto a dirt drive just outside the Chapel Hill district,
a neighborhood primarily sporting older Colonial style homes,
complete with picket fences, black and white chimneys and real
wooden shutters. It is the kind of neighborhood I would not expect
to find Lilith sifting through while house hunting, however, I
would expect that Ursula might find it comfortably familiar.

The dirt road narrowed as it wound deeper
into thickening stands of birch and pine, until finally emptying
into a clearing upon a flat hilltop. And there sat Lilith’s house.
That is not to say that I knew the house was Lilith’s. I mean that
it was Lilith’s house, the same one destroyed in a cyclone during
our return to prime ceremony nearly two years earlier. The pleasant
little Cape Cod with shiny white vinyl siding, trimmed in warm hues
of peach and gray, looked just as it had the day it blew away. On
the front lawn, as I remembered, tacky garden gnomes peeped out
mischievously from behind miniature plastic windmills. I turned to
Lilith, my mouth unhinged in awe. “H…how did you do this?”

“What, find a cute house in the country?”

“No, I mean how did you do
this
? This
is your house.”

She laughed. “Well, not yet it isn’t. I just
signed the contract yesterday. We won’t close for a few weeks
still.”

“So, we’re out of the apartment?” I grabbed
Lilith around the waist, pulled her in tightly and gave her a huge
hug. “I don’t know what to say. It’s beautiful!”

“It is,” said Spinelli, “It’s just as I
remembered.” He turned to Ursula. “Can you do that for us some
day?”

“For us?” She blushed into her dress sleeve.
“Why, Master Spinelli, doth thee wish to propose before thy kindred
fellows the bond of matrimony?”

“Propose? I didn’t…I mean, we….”

“Dominic Spinelli!” Lilith cried. “You sneaky
little cheeky monkey. Of course, she’ll marry you! Won’t you
Urs?”

“Aye and yea twice over kind Sir! I shall
carry thy name with pride and honor.”

“Spinelli, you sly dog.” I pulled Dominic
into my huddle with Lilith and patted him on the shoulder. “I had
no idea! And you,” I pulled Ursula into the fold as well. “What a
lucky girl. You’ll be getting your own place now. What a wonderful
day indeed! What could possibly make it better?”

“I won the lottery,” said Carlos.

I laughed. “Yes, I suppose that would be
better if you won the lottery.”

Carlos held up the newspaper I had given him
earlier. “No, I mean I won the lottery.”

“What!”

Dominic snatched the newspaper from him,
along with the one-dollar lottery ticket that Carlos had purchased
on our ride out to Walpole prison a few days before. “Oh, my God!
He did win the lottery. Look.” He held the two articles out for our
inspection. “The son of a bitch just won twelve million
dollars!”

“Carlos,” I said. “What do you have to say
for yourself?”

He looked at us, stupefied, as I was sure it
had not yet sunk in. “Well,” he said, hesitating. “I guess dinner
is on me tonight.”