“You’re right, it’s not-assuming you were there.”
“We were,” Jamie Devers insisted. “I swear it.”
Des would have to check this out further with the Coast Guard. And have a trooper canvas the area boatyards to see if anyone could recall spotting their fire. But even if someone did remember it that did not necessarily clear them. The fire was not a guarantee they were on Little Sister when Tuck Weems was murdered. It was not a guarantee of anything. They could have built themselves a huge bonfire as a decoy and then headed right back to Big Sister before the storm ever started.
Right now, the only alibi Jamie Devers and Evan Havenhurst had was each other.
Right now, they had no alibi whatsoever.
CHAPTER 11
A POKY LITTLE COMMUTER train called the Shoreliner shuttled its way back and forth through the villages and tidal marshes that stretched in between Old Saybrook and New Haven, where Mitch could pick up the Metro North line into Grand Central. It was Metro North that carried the Wall Street warriors in from Fairfield every morning, armed for combat with their matching Burberry’s, cell phones and game faces. For Mitch, the trip was about two and a half hours, door to door. The Shoreliner was not particularly crowded. He had a two-person seat to himself, which was fine by him. He did not enjoy bumping elbows and knees with someone he did not know. He had bought the morning papers to read. He spread them open and read.
Lieutenant Mitry’s superior, Capt. Carl Polito of the Central District Major Crimes Squad, was expressing his support for her in the Hartford Courant. “The investigation is proceeding in a swift and thoroughly professional manner,” he said. “We have every reason to believe we will have a suspect in custody very soon.” To Mitch this sounded remarkably like one of those ringing votes of no-confidence Yankee owner George Steinbrenner gave to his soon-to-be outgoing manager. No wonder the woman seemed uptight-her head was on the chopping block. There was still no acknowledged link-up between the two Dorset slayings and the Torry Mordarski murder. They were, it seemed, choosing to keep that under wraps for now. There was a mention that Niles Seymour would be buried tomorrow in Dorset’s Duck River Cemetery. Burial arrangements for Tuck Weems were still being made.
The New York tabloids, meanwhile, were pouncing on the Mandy Havenhurst angle with obvious relish. Her torrid love life, her run-ins with the law. “Beer Baroness Finds More Trouble Brewing,” screamed the headline in the Daily News. “Fanning the Flames of Mandy’s Passion,” shouted the Post. Both carried old photos of her. She was practically a teenager in them. Her hair was worn very differently-piled high atop her head. And she wore tremendous quantities of eye makeup. Mitch barely recognized her.
As he was reading, a woman strode down the aisle, stopped and asked if she could join him in his two-person seat. It was Mandy, of course, flashing her dazzling smile at him.
“I had a feeling I’d run into you,” she said happily, sliding in next to him and depositing a Ghurka shoulder bag at her feet.
“That’s funny,” said Mitch. “So did I.”
“I wouldn’t say the lieutenant sounded totally enthusiastic about me coming in, but she did say it was okay. She’s kind of a tight-ass, don’t you think?”
Mandy smelled of a heavy, fruity perfume, the kind that Mitch had always associated with the old widows he used to ride up and down in the elevators with in Stuyvesant Town when he was a kid, the bubbies with their shopping carts and moustaches and Eastern European accents. Styles must have changed, he decided. Because Mandy Havenhurst was nobody’s idea of a bubbie.
“The lieutenant came to see you this morning?” he asked her politely.
“No, no. I just bumped into her, is all. She was on her way out to talk to Red.”
“She was?”
Mandy stared at him intently now, as if suspecting his words held some secret double meaning. “Yes, she was.”
“Hey, did you know you made the papers today?”
“No way, really…?” Mandy drew her breath in sharply when he showed her the headlines. Then she heaved a long, pained sigh. “Lies,” she said between gritted teeth. “Nothing but lies. But what can I do-people have been telling them about me since I was thirteen years old. That’s what happens to you in this world when you’re someone like me. I’m pretty. I’m blond. And my family has money. Therefore, I am automatically considered a bitch-by people who don’t even know me. I’m used to it. But it hurts.” She turned the tabloids over so she wouldn’t have to look at them. “God, I’m so glad I’m coming in to the city today. It’ll be impossible out there. Reporters will be calling nonstop. And poor Bud will be wigging out.”
“Are you going to speak to them?”
“No way,” she said with sudden savagery.
“But if they have the story wrong don’t you want to tell your side?” he asked, wondering just exactly what her side might be. The facts in the stories seemed to jibe with what the lieutenant had told him about Mandy’s stormy past.
Mandy’s response was, “Why bother? Once people make up their minds about you there’s not a goddamned thing you can do to change it. No one ever believes me when I tell them that the men I’ve loved were abusive toward me, both physically and mentally. That I’ve had to literally fight for my life in order to survive their cruelty. I don’t know why I provoke that in men, Mitch. I really don’t.” Her big blue eyes locked on to his now. “When I love someone, I’ll crawl across broken glass on my hands and knees for him. There’s nothing I won’t do. And I’m as kind a person as you’ll ever meet. I don’t have a nasty bone anywhere in my whole body.” She sighed. She ran the tip of her tongue over her lower lip. She said, “I sure wish we could get together tonight.”
“Like I said, I’m going to be tied up all-”
“The God’s honest truth,” she broke in, “is that there’s something I have to talk to you about. It’s really personal, Mitch. And it’s really, really important. Could we meet somewhere after your dinner date? Just for a little while?”
Mitch wavered. She was married. She was crazy. She was trouble. But he was also intensely curious. What did she want to talk about? Was it the murders? Was it Bud? He had to find out. He couldn’t not find out. So he agreed to swing by her apartment at about ten and buzz her. She lived at 20 E. Sixty-fifth Street, a very posh address. They would go out for a nightcap together-someplace quiet where they could talk.
Their train pulled into Grand Central right on time. They separated in the Grand Concourse, near the clock, in a shaft of the bright morning sunlight that streamed in the newly scrubbed windows. As Mitch started to say good-bye Mandy surprised him by throwing her arms around him and giving him a big juicy kiss on the mouth, her pelvis pressing tightly against his own. Heads turned. Wolf whistles sounded. All of the blood in Mitch’s body seemed to rush right to his head. “Later,” she purred. And then she was off, the heels of her backless sandals clacketing sharply on the marble floor.
Mitch stayed right where he was for a long moment, waiting for some of the feeling to return to the lower half of his body. No, I really do not want to get mixed up with this woman.
He found he was way out of sync as he made his way across the floor of the giant terminal. The commuters criss-crossing in front of him were moving with much greater urgency than he was. Sauntering along at his Dorset pace, he kept bouncing off of them, like a human bumper car. But Mitch found this to be a short-lived phenomenon. It took less than thirty seconds for his metabolism to rev back up from small-town slo-mo to Big Apple overdrive. The city’s pace simply demanded it. Soon Mitch was darting this way and that, back in the flow, just another one of the hyper multitude.
He made his way down the long tunnel to the subway and caught the shuttle across town to Times Square. There was no faster way to get across town, day or night. When the one-stop shuttle pulled in at Times Square he maneuvered his way across the crowded underground station and down the steep stairs for the number One train, heading downtown. It had been a while since a train had come through. Folks were stacked up ten-deep at the edge of the platform, fanning themselves impatiently. The warm air was heavy and reeked of overflowing garbage cans and unwashed people. Burrowing his way in among them, Mitch found himself missing the crisp, clean, sea air of Big Sister. Also the sheer luxury of having so much space to himself. Here in the city, there was no such privilege. Everyone shared the same island.