“He’s shy but competent, Mrs. Rodney,” Latovsky said.
“Oh, I daresay. It’s the smoothies you have to watch out for, isn’t it?”
They smiled at each other.
“But something he said confused me, Lieutenant. He made it clear, as clear as he made anything, that is, that last night’s murder was committed on the east shore of the lake, and our cabin, which you said was germane to your investigation, is on the west shore.”
Her head tilted as she waited for an answer.
Careful, he thought. She was a bright old babe, she’d see right through a dumb lie, and he was too tired to think of a smart one. He tried a little truth.
“A piece of information came our way, Mrs. Rodney. The source is admittedly, uh, unconventional... the sort of source we usually ignore, but we’ve got five murders and no leads, and we can’t afford...”
Exhaustion swept him, he ran out of words in midsentence and stared at her with his mouth open.
“To ignore anything?” she prompted.
He collected himself. “Yes, to ignore anything no matter how farfetched. The information suggests that one of your tenants, maybe from a long time ago, is connected to the killings.”
“That’s impossible. All our tenants have been families.”
“Killers have families, Mrs. Rodney.”
She looked startled, then smiled. “Of course they do, Lieutenant. Forgive me—getting old makes you forget the obvious.”
He wondered how old she was.
“I prepared the list you asked for on the phone. It’s on the desk by the doors. Would you mind?”
He went to an antiquey-looking pulldown desk next to the French doors. The polished top was clear except for a single folded sheet of heavy, off-white paper with her name engraved at the top and a list of names and addresses in looping Palmer penmanship. If Eve was right (and he was here because he knew she was), the killer’s name was on it. He picked it up, tucked it in his pocket, and went back to the chair next to the fire.
“I won’t keep you much longer,” she said. “But I thought you should know a little about the house, in case it’s important for some reason. You never know.”
“You never do,” he said, hoping he could stay awake through whatever she had to say.
It had been a dairy farm when her father bought it back in the forties, she told him. “A very small one, with a house and barn. The house was beyond repair, but the barn had a solid stone footing a couple of feet thick, and my father had it remodeled.”
And left the pulley in the kitchen ceiling, he thought.
She went on, “He used it as a fishing and hunting camp for himself and his friends. He used to try to get my mother to go up there, but she loathed the great outdoors in general and the Adirondacks in particular. About the only thing my mother and I ever agreed on. People wax rhapsodic about Whiteface; to me it’s a worn-down, malevolent-looking hump.”
“I’m in the rhapsodic camp,” Latovsky said.
“Most men are. Anyway, when my father died, he left the house to me. A good thing too, since my son adores it, uses it as soon as our summer renters leave and all through the winter. He fishes.” She laughed softly. “I make it sound like child-molesting, don’t I?”
“A little.”
“Do you fish?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Pike, muskies...”
“Crappies, bass, perch, trout, anything I can hook.”
“Just like Alan Junior. Anyway, it’s been his much more than mine. And I got his permission before I rented it to Mr. Klein, since there was a chance he’d be there all year and my son would miss his ice fishing. They build a shack, you know. Out on the frozen lake. Quite elaborate some of them, with stoves and so on.” She stopped herself, then said, “I’m rambling and I’m sure you want to get some rest before you begin following that farfetched lead. I should tell you, Lieutenant, we’ve been renting the little house since the fifties. Many of the families on that list have certainly moved, some may have died out.”
It was four by the time Latovsky opened the side door to his house and went down the hall to the kitchen, shedding his coat and jacket. The message light blinked on his machine and he played the tape as he stripped off his shirt and tie and left them on the kitchen chair. He was usually compulsively neat and put everything away (something his ex-wife had liked about him), but not today. Lucci’s voice came through the speaker.
“Dave... where are you? The press’s at our throats, Meers is shitting cinder blocks.” Then some clicks and another message from Lucci. “Only fifteen minutes to go, Dave. Please... please... where are you?” There were no other messages.
He gulped orange juice straight from the carton (his ex had hated that), reset the machine, turned off the phone bell, then stripped and showered and staggered into the bedroom. He never slept in his underwear because he thought it was disgusting (the only other thing he and his wife had agreed on) but was too tired to put on pajamas, so he lay down naked and pulled the comforter over himself.
Sam and Eve Klein must’ve worn themselves out making love by now. He wondered if she’d drive to Connecticut tonight or stay in Raven Lake. Rain roared on the roof; a branch of the old ash tree smacked the kitchen window. It was a rotten night for a long drive; he hoped she’d stay put, then hoped she wouldn’t.
What an amazing, terrible, wonderful thing she could do... if you believed, and he did. But if he believed she’d seen Abigail Reese from across the lake and the little boy who’d grown up to kill her, he also had to believe she’d seen something happen to Bunner at that party.
Don’t go, she’d said. Latovsky should have asked her why.
He made himself sit up and call Bunner.
“Hi,” said Mary Bunner’s taped voice. “We can’t come to the phone right now...” He waited for the beep, then said, “Bunny, it’s me. Call me at home. Call me—it’s important.”
He hung up, set the clock for six to give himself two hours’ sleep and enough time to get hold of Bunner before they went to the dance, then he flopped back on the pillow and fell asleep.
Higher... push me higher.
The boy zoomed back and forth on the swing with jagged shadows of leaves flashing across his face. The face was intact, but the body was slit open from throat to crotch; blood streamed out behind him as he swung. His organs glittered in the sun...
Latovsky woke up with a jerk. His face and hair and the pillow under him were drenched with sweat. He lay frozen, afraid to close his eyes and fell asleep again in case the dream recurred. Then exhaustion dragged him under and he slept deeply and dreamlessly until the alarm went off.
“Come in, son, come in...” Donald Fuller said heartily.
They went into the living room, where the arms of Adam’s mother’s green velvet sofa were threadbare and the straight velvet skirt that hid the legs was streaked with heel scuffs.
The house was not dirty. Mrs. Longmire, who lived in the next block, still came every week to clean. But it looked sad, especially this room, which had been his mother’s favorite. She’d made sure there were fresh flowers every week, and the silver dish on the coffee table had been polished and filled with candy on a doily. Now the little stemmed dish was tarnished and empty, there were no fresh flowers.
He and his father always started in here. He sat on the couch, his father on the chair on the other side of the small hearth, and they tried to make conversation.