“You tell me.”
“It means only money.”
“So you kill people for your ideology?”
“Nothing is simple,” he said.
“Why don’t you tell me how you and Simonova were involved? Where did you meet her?”
“Suddenly, I don’t remember.” He leaned back and folded his arms.
“Try.”
“No good. I don’t remember.” He closed his eyes.
I leaned close. “Fucking tell me what you know about her.”
For three, four, five minutes, I listened to the clock on the wall tick. Ivan remained silent.
“What did Simonova tell you?”
He looked at me. “She tells me to be quiet, so this is what I will be.”
He closed his eyes again.
The door banged opened and Virgil came in, rubbing his eyes.
“Can you take it from here?” I said.
“Sure. You leaving?”
“For a while. See if you can get it out of him who he worked for,” I said, and looked at Ivan. “Do what you have to.”
Gloria Lopez met me on her way to work. She emerged from the train station at 145th Street, and we sat in Starbucks and drank coffee. She was wearing a red winter coat and a white hat. In her hand was an envelope.
“I got you some stuff on those pills.”
“Already?”
“I’m a fast worker,” she said. “I also got hold of a friend at the ME’s office and asked them to check on Dr. Hutchison. It’s all in the envelope. I wasn’t on a date last night, by the way. I was working the phone for you. I just wanted to make you jealous.”
“Fair enough. Thank you. And you look great.”
“Thanks. You look like shit. You get any sleep lately?”
“Not a lot. Listen, I know you had to call in something big for this.”
“You have no idea, Artie. I have to go.” She got up, kissed my cheek, and said, “Merry Christmas.”
“I’ll call you,” I said.
She turned. “So is it Lily?”
I didn’t answer. After Gloria left, I just sat, drinking black coffee and reading the notes the ME had faxed to her.
CHAPTER 54
Lionel Hutchison died from cyanide poisoning.” I stood in Lily’s doorway.
Lily, stared at me. “My God. Come in. Lucille is here. Take it easy when you tell her, will you? She loved Lionel.”
I went into the apartment. Lucille Bernard got up from the kitchen counter.
“You OK?” I said. “I’m sorry about Carver. How are your kids doing, Dr. Bernard?” This time she said she’d like it if I called her Lucille.
“They’re with my mother. You know, I’m really sorry about Carver, too. We were once in love, and we have the children,” she said. “I came over to pick up some things they left at Carver’s place. I didn’t want them stopping by. They have their own keys, you see.” Her eyes filled. “I’m sorry. I’m just so tired.”
“Do you want something to drink, Artie? You look cold. Lucille?”
I nodded and Lily poured Scotch in three glasses. Lucille pushed aside her mug of tea and took the drink.
“How come you’re wearing that jacket?” Lily said to me.
“He put his own jacket over Carver,” Lucille said. “I heard. Thank you. I’ll get it cleaned for you.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“You were there the whole time?” Lucille asked. “With Carver?”
“Yes.”
“Did he say anything?”
“He couldn’t speak much.”
“You sat with him. He wasn’t alone.”
“I was with him until they took him to the hospital.”
“Thank you,” said Lucille.
“Tell her, Artie.” Lily picked up her drink.
“Tell me what?”
“It was cyanide that killed Lionel Hutchison.”
“My God,” Lucille said. “How do you know?”
“This.” I gave her the ME’s notes.
“Was it Celestina?”
“It was Marianna Simonova,” I said. “I think she switched some of her blood pressure pills for Lionel’s. I think she opened the capsules and put them in his bottle. She could have borrowed some of his medications, they both took similar drugs.”
“Tell me how you got the information.”
“I took a stab. I have a friend who works for the city. She has friends at the ME’s office.”
“My God,” Lily said. “There was something Marianna used to say. She used to say, ‘In old days, hero is never taken alive.’ In the old days, according to Marianna, soldiers and spies carried cyanide pills. If they were captured, they could bite on the tablet. It would kill them fast. ‘Hero is never taken alive.’ God, she loved saying that. I should have thought of it. But how do you get the stuff?”
“It’s easy,” said Lucille. “Do you remember the Tylenol scare? I think it was in 1982.”
“Yes,” Lily said.
“I was in high school. I remember,” Lucille said. “Some nut put cyanide in Tylenol. People died. We had Tylenol at home, and my mother went bananas. She never used it again. It would be so damn easy. And Lionel was obsessive about his medication. He always always took it.”
“Help me understand,” Lily said.
“Let’s say Simonova told Lionel she needed some extra pills, and she borrowed his bottle,” Lucille said. “Or she switched the vials. Or she got the drugstore to deliver both their prescriptions to her. What difference would it make? Either way, she could get her hands on some of his pills, open the capsules, replace some of the medication with cyanide. Sooner or later, he’d take one with the poison. They borrowed from each other all the time, Lionel told me that once.”
“Someone checked the prints on the bottle with the poisoned capsules,” I said. “It had Lionel’s name on the prescription and his prints, but also Simonova’s. I took a glass from her apartment earlier. They made a match. But it had Lionel’s prints as well as hers.”
“It’s cold in here,” said Lily. “How would Marianna get the cyanide?”
“You can buy it online,” said Lucille.
“But Lionel fell,” Lily said.
“What are the effects of cyanide?” I asked Lucille. “Not counting death.”
“The effects are similar to suffocation. Cyanide stops the body’s cells from being able to use oxygen.” She looked up. “It can produce dizziness, seizure. Acute ingestion has a very fast onset. The heart can collapse.”
“He told me he sometimes took his meds along with his coffee and went outside really early, on the terrace or the roof, so he could smoke. What if he took the capsule with the cyanide early yesterday morning, when Celestina was still at her sister’s. What if he got dizzy or had a seizure and fell?” I looked at Lucille.
“In that case, he wasn’t pushed,” she said.
“Cyanide works fast?”
“If you use the right dose.”
“Marianna killed him,” said Lily. “She did it in a way so nobody would ever know.” She smashed her fist on the counter. “She killed him even after she was dead. Artie?”
“What?”
“I still don’t understand,” said Lily. “How come the medical examiner didn’t spot it in Lionel right away?”
“They wouldn’t look for it unless they knew what to look for,” I said. “It’s not part of the usual tox screen.”
“And there’s no other symptoms you can see?” Lily said, sounding desperate. She didn’t want to believe what Marianna Simonova had done.
“Only one,” Lucille said. “It can discolor the skin. Sometimes it makes it redden. It’s one of the symptoms that makes you look for cyanide in an autopsy. But only in some people.”
“Some?” I said.
“If you’re black, chances are nobody will notice.”
CHAPTER 55
There were red and green cupcakes on Lily’s kitchen counter. I ate one.
“Amelie Smith brought those,” said Lily. “They were taking them to a school fair with their kids. Everybody’s out,” she added. “The floor feels empty.”
I told Lily about Ivan.
“Marianna knew a lot of people.”
“Did you meet them? Russians?”
“Some. Some just in passing. A few when I took her to Washington Heights shopping. A few once I went with her to Brighton Beach. She had an address book where she wrote everything. She always took it with her, in a big, old-fashioned leather purse,” Lily said, pouring more Scotch. “Take off that jacket, Artie, it makes you look like a cop.”