Killing Critics

by Carol O’Connell

  Gregor had come at the right time in his life. He was only twelve then. The following year he would not believe in anything magical, under pain of ridicule by peers. Then, the boy had put this feeling away with the comic books and the toys, and had forgotten where he left it.

  Now the man remembered. He had come back for it.

  Unshaven, unbeliever in this holiest of places, he was looking here for Sabra, though she was probably miles away and worlds, sitting somewhere cradling her own mind like a child upon her lap.

  It was magic, it seemed, that sent her over, so he lit a candle now to bring her back. But how far and from exactly where? She had begun to leave him on the day Aubry died, growing farther and farther away, killing him as she left him, going away from him, bit by bit of her mind, and then altogether gone and taking her body with her.

  Once Sabra’s life had been filled with glorious color. Color had throbbed about her in an electricity of bright scarves, textured stockings and summer dresses of impossible combinations of purples and greens. When she lived alone, her apartment had been alive with color. The rugs and drapes held vibrant, clashing conversations. Each careless thing that lay strewn about the rooms would contradict the thing it lay upon.

  This had been a part of the excitement of her, the wild charm of Sabra. After they were married, he began to work his changes on her, maintaining all the while that he loved her as she was. First he changed the shape of her body with their only child. Then he refurnished her environs, save for the rocking chair that had been her mother’s, all that he approved of, good solid wooden thing. But glaring prints of rugs and drapes were cast out with the trash and the multicolored coat.

  Standing in the perfect quiet of the church and gazing up at the stained-glass windows, he saw again the wild colors in a jam of rolling rainbows, escaping down Bleecker Street in the junkman’s cart. And he watched Sabra running after the cart, shaking her fists at the junk-man, and returning triumphant with her coat of many colors.

  Oddly, it was never Sabra the mother he saw whenever she walked into a room in middle age with thickened waist, but wild Sabra, her bright colors flashing and waves of jet-black hair.

  And then insanity had come to their house with the death of Aubry.

  It seemed as though it happened in one night when Sabra came downstairs, very late, to sit in her mother’s chair. At first he thought she’d come to keep him company as he grieved for Aubry in the dark. Then as he stared at his wife and she took form in the poor light from the street, he realized that her lustrous black hair was gone. Her crown was a cap of stick-out hair, and in some places she was shorn to the gleam of white scalp. Then Sabra had begun to rock, slowly at the beginning and then faster and faster, rocking furiously. Laughing like a mad child, she spilled out onto the floor, and crawled like a baby to the stair.

  Twelve years later, Gregory Gilette lit a candle for his wife, and then another candle, and another. He went on to the next statue and the next, lighting all the candles. One by one, he begged the saints who stood above the flames, did they know where his Sabra was? Did they know the way she had gone and, most important, the way back?

  The poor Protestant atheist, rational man of show-me country, broke down like a child when stones would not consult with him.

  And that cat-size creature at the far side of the roof, twitching and compulsively rubbing its hands. Was that a mouse? Surely not. Mice were cartoons, and rather cute. This was something loathsome.

  Tonight, the creature had come close enough to be splashed with champagne. Not to waste the wine, Andrew made a cross in the air above the scurvy animal, and he christened it Emma Sue. Then he tried to smash it out of existence with the bottle. But he was too slow- the empty bottle too heavy.

  His head lolled back and he was staring up at an empty sky. Empty? He was too tired to crawl to the edge of the roof where he had left the binoculars. He shivered and hugged his knees to his body. His naked eyes drifted slowly from side to side, scanning heaven, searching for the stars.

  But they were gone.

  He fell into a light sleep, awakening at the thud behind him. He turned around slowly to see the brown paper bag, torn open to reveal a small loaf of bread.

  A miracle.

  He fell on the loaf, ripping the cellophane wrapping away from the bread. He broke the loaf open and smelled it, and then he wolfed down the sweet, white, fibrous, glorious bread, his gift from the sky.

  So, there was a God.

  Riker had a few bad moments watching her make the drop from the edge of Bloomingdale’s roof to the narrow ledge beneath the top-floor window. When she was safely inside the building, he breathed again. He trained the binoculars on Andrew Bliss and watched him feeding on the loaf.

  Riker’s binoculars strayed to the surrounding buildings and then down below to the stream of late traffic. Ah, New York, all decked out in city lights like sequins on her best dress-all dazzle and smart moves. He had seen the city in harsher light, and he knew she was really a whore, but that could be fun, too.

  He had underestimated Mallory’s time in crossing the street and climbing to this tenth-floor roof. He turned to the right, and she was standing beside him, looking down on Andrew Bliss.

  “Mallory, there’s gotta be a better way to feed him. That ledge is dangerous.”

  “Yeah, right. A little old lady wouldn’t have a problem with that ledge. The roof would be crawling with reporters right now if the bastards weren’t afraid it would kill their story. Whoever Andrew’s hiding from will get to him eventually.”

  “Didn’t Markowitz ever tell you it wasn’t nice to hang a taxpayer out as bait?”

  “I think he did run that by me once.” She checked the bolt action on the assault rifle, and aimed the sight on the roof of Bloomingdale’s to test the night scope. “Charles thinks Quinn is stalking me.”

  “Quinn has good taste. He only goes after the brightest and the best. You’re his type, kid.”

  “So was Aubry.”

  “What are you saying, Mallory? She was his own niece.”

  “Oh, right, and murderers are such stand-up moral people. What was I thinking of?” She walked off to the other side of the roof and stood there staring down at Andrew, her pet mouse, as he was nibbling at his bread.

  “It doesn’t work for me, kid.” And he suspected it didn’t work for her either, but this was her idea of sport.

  He turned the binoculars to all the dark corners of the roof below, and lost track of Mallory by sight and sound.

  “But the killing of Dean Starr suits him,” said Mallory, close to his ear now, spooky kid, back for another shot at him. “According to Quinn’s bio, he’s a fencer, a former Olympic champion,” she said. “He’d know where to put the steel to do the most damage. And it was such a neat crime, wasn’t it? No mess. And that suits him too.”

  “So now you’re thinking revenge?” Riker shook his head and lowered the binoculars to face her. “Quinn’s not the type to go on a vigilante solo.”

  “Quinn held out on the old man, and he held out on us. He knows what the connection is. Dean Starr was tied to the old murder case, but I’m betting he wasn’t the only one.”

  “Well, you’re not thinking that poor little bastard down there could have done murder with an axe?”

  “Andrew? He knows something, and so does Quinn. I’m sure there’s more than one killer.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t think Starr could have taken the artist and the dancer down by himself.”

  “Peter Ariel was stoned on dope that night. A twelve-year-old could have done him in.”

  “But Starr was a junkie too. So what about the dancer? Physical peak, good reflexes and some muscle.”

  Well, the killer couldn’t have taken Mallory down, but Aubry was not the same species. She had been young and protected. Mallory could only see the muscle of the dancer, the reflexes. That was as close as she would come to Aubry.

  She paced behind him. “I think Quinn c
ould tell us who wrote that letter to Special Crimes, but he won’t. He wanted Starr dead. If he didn’t do the killing, he’s still part of it somehow.”

  “Truth, Mallory? I think Qren Watt killed the artist and the dancer. But let’s say he had some help, maybe Starr’s help. If Starr’s death was revenge, I’m on the perp’s side of this one. You can’t know what that crime scene was like. All the pictures and all the reports won’t tell you. If Starr was part of that, I’m glad the freak is dead. If Quinn had any part of the killing, I’d rather give him a medal than arrest him.”

  “When I catch the perp, I’m gonna bust him. I don’t care who he is or why he did it. Those are the rules.”

  He was startled for a moment. For she had been the child voted most likely to send the crayons outside the lines of her coloring books. Sometimes he forgot that she did have rules. Markowitz had given them to her, but they were the rules of sport. Markowitz had been ingenious at fashioning games for her, games to keep her alive, to help her pass for normal. She was a born competitor, and this had been the only way to reach her.

  Now Riker almost felt sorry for the nameless, faceless perp who got between Mallory and what she wanted most-to win.

  He watched Andrew gathering up the last crumbs of his loaf, then handed the binoculars to Mallory as he pulled back from the edge of the roof. “You know the little guy is totally nuts.”

  “No he’s not. That’s just the booze working on him,” she said to the alcoholic standing beside her, “and the guilt. I see he found another candle. What’s the deal with the candles? Any ideas?”

  “It’s gotta be religion,” said Riker. “That altar with the mannequin is giving me the creeps. I say he’s nuts, but I can’t see him hacking up those bodies or slipping a pick into Starr’s back.”

  “He did something.”

  CHAPTER 5

  Gregor Gilette carried a steaming cup of coffee to the kitchen table and set it down beside the morning newspaper. By lowering the window shade only a little, he demolished every tall building above the tree line of Central Park. Five flights above Fifth Avenue traffic, it was almost possible to believe that he was no longer in Manhattan.

  He glanced across the table at an empty chair and an empty space where Sabra might have been, if their only child had not been slaughtered. At some point in the past decade, acknowledging Sabra’s absence had become a part of his daily routine, and once more, he sat down to breakfast without her.

  As he unfolded his newspaper, the jewel of his ring flashed a dazzle of blue light, calling for his attention as it often did. The stone was cheap. He wore it because it was the very color of Sabra’s eyes.

  The doorbell rang precisely on the appointed hour, and that would be Detective Mallory.

  Gregor ushered his young guest into the kitchen and poured her a generous portion of coffee. Visually, she had lost nothing in the transition from ball gown to blue jeans. But her manner had altered. He thought she seemed somewhat mechanical in the small civilized comments of “How are you, sir?” and “Sorry to bother you so early.” Of course, he realized she was not at all sorry to bother him, and now, done with courtesy, she launched into the business of her visit.

  She settled a laptop computer on the kitchen table by her cup. “I need more information on the night your daughter died.” She opened the computer, and then reached into her blazer pocket to draw out a plastic device with a ball at its center, which she plugged into her machine. “You were planning to have dinner with Aubry that night?”

  “Yes. I was to meet her at a cafe in the West Village.” He felt a vague disquiet. The night of the ball there had been conversation. This was interrogation, cold and impersonal.

  “You brought her roses.” She began to tap on the keyboard, not meeting his eyes, almost disconnected from him.

  “Yes, the roses were red.”

  “Was it a special occasion?” Now she did look at him, and he wished she had not, for she might as well have been regarding his chair and not the man who sat close to her, sharing coffee.

  “No. The flowers were to brighten Aubry’s apartment-a gift from her mother. Sabra was a woman of extreme color, and Aubry was very austere. So, every time we saw our daughter, Sabra would give her a gift of color-a scarf, a bright ceramic bowl. Sabra believed one could die for lack of color, so she continued to feed color to her child.”

  “Where was your wife the night of the murders?”

  “Sabra was visiting her mother, Ellen Quinn.”

  For a moment, he thought Mallory was going to challenge that statement, but her voice was casual as she said, “I had the idea Sabra and her family didn’t get along very well.”

  “They didn’t. But my mother-in-law was getting on in years, and Sabra was too big a person to hold a grudge against a lonely old woman.”

  “Do you know why Aubry wanted to meet Quinn at the gallery that night?”

  “No, Detective, you have it wrong. It was Jamie who chose the meeting place. Aubry called me to say she would be late for dinner, because her Uncle Jamie wanted to see her.”

  And now he saw suspicion in her face, as though she had caught him in a lie, and he was puzzled over this. But as quickly as he put this together, the trouble in her eyes had resolved itself.

  “You’re sure she didn’t ask to meet him!”

  “Quite sure. She said Jamie wanted her to meet him at the gallery.”

  “She spoke to him?”

  “No. He left her a message at the ballet school. When I couldn’t reach Jamie by phone, I called the school’s director. Aubry had used Madame Burnstien’s phone to call her uncle at the newspaper. Her message had been garbled-too many instructions for the school receptionist to write down in a hurry. It was a clerk at the newspaper who told Aubry to meet her uncle at the gallery. When I spoke to that clerk, she looked up the name of the gallery on the message carbon.”

  “Did you and Quinn ever speak about this?”

  “I honestly don’t remember. There were so many things to distract me from the small details. My only child was dead, my wife was falling apart… there was the funeral to deal with.”

  “Who broke the news to Sabra?”

  “Jamie did. He took care of everything. He made the funeral arrangements and hired security men to keep people away from us. Sabra was going to pieces. Then, as I told you, she left me and checked herself into an institution.”

  “You left for Europe after that?”

  “Perhaps nine months later-only after it was made very clear to me that Sabra wouldn’t see me. The breakup of a marriage is a common piece of damage when two people lose a child. I had been in Paris for only a year when I heard she left the institution and disappeared. I did what I could to find her, but I failed.”

  “Would you like me to find Sabra for you?” She looked up from her computer.

  “The best private investigators in New York are still looking for her. I never stopped trying to find my wife. So, I thank you for-”

  “The best PIs are ex-cops. They get most of their information from old buddies on the force. Now I’m a cop, and I’m better than the best you’ve got. And the service is free.”

  He liked arrogance, but he mistrusted youth. “My people have been working the case for years. They’re familiar with every-”

  “I’ll bet you didn’t have one decent photograph to give them.”

  “No, I didn’t.” He smiled at this reminder of Sabra’s eccentric camera hatred. “I gave the investigators a photograph of my daughter. Aubry bore a strong resemblance to her mother.”

  “Sabra was in her forties when she disappeared. Now she’s twelve years older. Your detectives are looking for a family resemblance to a twenty-year-old girl.” She tapped the laptop computer with one long red fingernail, and then turned it so he could see the full screen. “This is an identity kit.”

  He leaned closer to examine a photograph of Aubry. “It is a strong resemblance to Sabra.”

  “But the daughter wasn’t
an exact copy of the mother, was she?”

  “No. Aubry was very pretty, but Sabra was striking, dramatic. My wife was a great presence in every room she entered… But the day of the funeral she seemed small and tired. The ordeal added years to her face. Grief is an exhausting thing.”

  Mallory revolved the ball device wired into her computer. “I’m aging the photo of Aubry.” A moment later she said, “Here, take a look at this.”

  He left his seat at the table to stand behind her chair. And now he was looking at the woman his daughter might have become. Mallory was adding wrinkles to the brow. It was cruel, this aging process, but fascinating. She had taken away the softness of Aubry’s face and created lines around the mouth. The delicate nose was slightly enlarged, and the eyes were given their own lines. The black hair had been lightened with strokes of gray.

  “That’s very good,” said Gilette. “Sabra’s eyes were a bit larger and more expressive.”

  Mallory enlarged the eyes.

  “Sadder,” said Gilette.

  She dragged down the corners of the eyes.

  “And the mouth was wider, the chin a little stronger.”

  When she was done, he said, “That’s what Sabra looked like on the day of the funeral.”

  Mallory folded down the top of her computer and picked up her car keys, preparing to leave him. Now she put the keys down again. “One more thing-how well did Andrew Bliss know your daughter? I have an old newspaper article that quotes him as a personal friend.”

  “Andrew? Well, he saw Aubry at her mother’s art shows. He always made a fuss over her when she was a child. He even went to her recitals when she was a student at Madame Burnstien’s school. I like him for that. My daughter was a lonely little girl. There was a quality in Andrew that could speak to her, child to child.”

  “You were there every time they met?”

  “No. They sometimes saw one another when he visited the ballet school-Andrew was a generous patron. Sometimes he met with Aubry after her dancing class. When she was a little girl, Andrew would insist that she call home to tell us she’d be late.”