Gurney had a powerful urge to turn around and go back over the roads where Hardwick’s chase was likely to have led him. But there were too many possibilities. Too many intersections. Each one would multiply the odds against duplicating the actual route the man had taken. And even if by some remarkable coincidence he made a series of accurate guesses and ended up in the right place, his unexpected arrival could create as many problems as it solved.
So he drove on, conflicted, coming eventually to the turn-off for his hilltop property. He drove slowly because deer had a way of leaping out of nowhere. He’d hit a fawn in the not-too-distant past, and the sickening feeling was still with him.
At the top of the road he stopped to let a porcupine move out of the way. He watched as it waddled off into the high grass on the rise above the barn. Porcupines had a bad reputation, earned by chewing up just about everything, from the siding on homes to the brake lines on cars. The farmer down the road had advised shooting them on sight. “They’re a world of trouble and good for nothing.” But Gurney had no heart for that, and Madeleine would never tolerate it.
He put the car back in gear and was about to head up the grassy lane to the farmhouse when something bright caught his eye. It was in one of the barn windows—a gleaming point of light. It occurred to him that perhaps a light in the barn had been left on—maybe by Madeleine when she last fed the chickens. But that bulb was relatively dim, with a yellowish cast, and this light in the window was sharp and white. As Gurney peered at it, it grew more intense.
He switched off his headlights. After sitting there mystified for a few more seconds, he picked up Hardwick’s heavy metal flashlight from the passenger seat without turning it on, got out of the car, and walked toward the barn—guided through the darkness by that strange point of light, which seemed to move as he moved.
Then he realized with a touch of gooseflesh that the light wasn’t in the barn at all. It was a reflection—a reflection on the window of a light somewhere behind him. He turned quickly, and there it was—a powerful light gleaming through the line of trees along the top of the ridge behind the pond. The first thought that came to mind was that it was a halogen searchlight mounted on an ATV.
In the barn behind him, perhaps in response to this illumination, the rooster crowed.
Gurney looked again at the ridge—at the swelling, brightening light behind the trees. And then, of course, it was obvious. As it should have been from the first instant. No mystery at all. No strange vehicle probing the high forest. Nothing out of the ordinary. Just a full moon rising on a clear night.
He felt like a fool.
His phone rang.
It was Madeleine. “Is that you down by the barn?”
“Yes, it’s me.”
“Someone just called for you. Are you on your way up?” Her voice was distinctly cool.
“Yes, I was just checking something. Who was it?”
“Alyssa.”
“What?”
“A woman, by the name of Alyssa.”
“Did she give you a last name?”
“I asked her for that. She said you’d probably know her last name, and if you didn’t, there wasn’t much point in talking to you anyway. She sounded either stoned or crazy.”
“Did she leave a number?”
“Yes, it’s here.”
“I’ll be right up.”
Two minutes later, at 10:12 p.m., he was standing in the kitchen with his phone, entering the number.
Madeleine was at the sink island in her pink and yellow summer pajamas, putting away a few pieces of silverware left in the dish drainer.
His call was answered on the third ring—by a voice that was both husky and delicate. “Could this be Detective Gurney calling me back?”
“Alyssa?”
“The one and only.”
“Alyssa Spalter?”
“Alyssa Spalter, who was left at the altar, just wearing a halter.” She sounded like a twelve-year-old who’d been at her parents’ liquor cabinet.
“What can I do for you?”
“You want to do something for me?”
“You called here a little while ago. What do you want?”
“I want to be helpful. That’s all I want.”
“How do you want to help?”
“You want to know who killed Cock Robin?”
“What?”
“How many murders are you involved in?”
“Are you talking about your father?”
“Who do you think?”
“Do you know who killed your father?”
“King Carl? Course I do.”
“Tell me.”
“Not on the phone.”
“Why not?”
“Come see me, then I’ll tell you.”
“Give me a name.”
“I’ll give you a name. When I get to know you better. I give all my boyfriends special names. So when am I going to meet you?”
Gurney said nothing.
“You still there?” Her tone was wandering fluidly back and forth between clarity and intoxication.
“I’m here.”
“Ah. That’s the problem. You need to come here.”
“Alyssa … you either know something useful, or you don’t. You’re either going to tell me what it is, or you’re not. Up to you. Decide now.”
“I know everything.”
“Okay. Tell me about it.”
“No way. Phone might be tapped. Such a scary world we live in. They tap everything. Tippety, tippety, tap. But you’re a detective, so you know all that. Bet you even know where I live.”
Gurney said nothing.
“Bet you know where I live, right?”
Again, he said nothing.
“Yeah, I bet you do.”
“Alyssa? Listen to me. If you want to tell—”
She interrupted with an exaggerated, slurry seductiveness that might have been comical in other circumstances. “So … I’ll be here all night. And all day tomorrow. Come as soon as you can. Please. I’ll be waiting for you. Waiting just for you.”
The connection was broken.
Gurney laid his phone down and looked at Madeleine. She was studying a fork she was about to put in the silverware drawer. She frowned, turned on the water in the sink, and began scrubbing it. Then she rinsed it, dried it, examined it again, seemed satisfied, and placed it in the drawer.
“I think you were right,” said Gurney.
The frown came back, but now it was directed at him. “About what?”
“About the young woman being stoned or crazy.”
She smiled humorlessly. “What does she want?”
“Good question.”
“What does she say she wants?”
“To see me. To tell me who killed her father.”
“Carl Spalter?”
“Yes.”
“Are you going to see her?”
“Maybe.” He paused, thinking about it. “Probably.”
“Where?”
“Where she’s living. The family house on Venus Lake. Out by Long Falls.”
“Venus as in the goddess of love?”
“I guess.”
“And venereal disease?”
“I suppose.”
“Nice name for a lake.” She paused. “You said ‘the family house.’ Her father’s dead and her stepmother’s in prison. Who else is in the family?”
“As far as I know, no one. Alyssa’s the only child.”