And now I had none.
I turned away from Rita’s body. Astor stood behind me, chewing her lower lip. “Is she … is Mom … dead?” she asked me.
I nodded.
“But isn’t there … Can’t you … do something?”
“I did,” I said. “It didn’t work.” And I might have added, like everything else I’ve tried lately.
Astor looked down at her mother’s body and shook her head. For a moment I thought she might actually cry-but of course, that was not in her, any more than it was in me. Instead, she knelt beside Rita and touched her cheek. For a long moment she stared down at Rita, her face showing no more than her mother’s did. Then she turned and looked up at me. “What do we do now?” she said.
I sighed. There were many things I might do-but all of them led, eventually, to the same cell in the detention center downtown. And even I had to admit that I deserved it. My entire career had never been any more than a prelude to prison. I’d kept ahead of Just Deserts for a very long time by using my wits-but recent events proved those were gone, dried up and blown away like last autumn’s leaves. It was all over: inarguably, inescapably over, and as I admitted that to myself, I even felt a little bit of relief.
There was no point in prolonging this any more than I had to.
I pulled Astor to her feet. “We call the police,” I said. “And then we face the music.” She looked puzzled, but that didn’t matter.
I took out my phone and called it in. Then I sat with Astor and waited for the music to start.