Whirlwind

by Hilary Norman

  If they caught her, she thought, walking shakily upstairs, if they found out what she was doing, she guessed that her grandfather would probably try to defend her, would say she wasn’t in her right mind because of what she’d been through, and maybe that was true.

  Except it was not exactly true.

  She might not be in her right mind, might never be again, but she did know exactly what she was doing.

  Aiding and abetting criminals. Not because Reaper had asked her to do it, but because Michael had.

  Hurry.

  She reached the second floor, went into the bathroom, locked the door behind her, unzipped her parka and tore it off, pulled out the envelopes – more money than she’d ever had in her hands, that was for damned sure – and dropped them on the floor on top of the parka.

  She opened the mirrored cabinet, found the metal nail file that she’d seen when she’d looked for soap before her bath on Christmas Eve – and even while she’d been hiding the cash inside her clothes, she’d remembered that file, had known what she would do with it.

  ‘Calculating,’ the prosecution would say.

  She turned and looked at the side panel of the old-fashioned tub.

  It was as she’d remembered.

  She turned on the faucets in the hand-basin to disguise any sounds.

  Got down on her knees.

  Unscrewed the panel and withdrew it quietly, carefully.

  Space enough in the cavity. She slipped in the envelopes and Joel’s list, then replaced the panel and screws, stood up, legs trembling, wiped the end of the nail file and returned it to the cabinet.

  Voices below, all male.

  Slow footsteps coming upstairs.

  She kept the water running in the basin, began coughing.

  Tucked her vest into the top of her leggings, pulled down her sweater.

  Went on coughing.

  Thought of Reaper.

  And of Michael.

  Stared at herself for the first time, saw her blackened face and hair, let the tears in her eyes roll down her cheeks, thought about washing her face, then realized that the dirt was an important backup to her story.

  A bottle of Listerine stood on the shelf.

  Good idea, if she wanted them to think she’d been throwing up.

  As good a reason as any to want privacy.

  After all she’d been through.

  ‘Liza, are you all right?’ her grandfather called through the door.

  She pulled on her parka. ‘I’m OK, Granddad.’

  She let the water run for another moment or two.

  Saw the bottle of air freshener on the shelf and used that too.

  Thinking like a criminal.

  ‘Only there are two FBI agents downstairs,’ Stephen said.

  ‘I’ll be down in a moment.’

  ‘All right,’ her grandfather said. ‘Take your time. I’ll offer them tea.’

  She heard him going back downstairs.

  Her accomplice, she thought, and shook her head.

  The two agents, drinking tea that one of them had insisted on making, were both polite to her. Carson hatless now, his hair white and very short, the gentler of the pair; the other man, named Walker, younger, dark-haired, keen-eyed. Both appearing to accept the story of her desperate need, unwell and beyond exhausted, to get back to familiar territory, Stephen firmly backing her up and no one arguing with him.

  ‘So are we safe to stay here now?’ Liza asked.

  ‘Word is you’re far enough from Main Street,’ Carson said.

  ‘Has everyone down there been evacuated now?’ Stephen asked.

  ‘Apart from the people in the inn,’ Carson said.

  ‘Are they all right?’ Liza felt a rush of empathy.

  ‘We believe so,’ Walker said.

  ‘What about Bill Osborn at Shiloh Oaks?’

  ‘No word yet on Mr Osborn,’ Carson said.

  ‘Having come back here against advice,’ Agent Walker said, ‘orders are that you stay inside until further notice.’

  ‘House arrest now,’ Stephen said dryly. ‘What if I’m needed?’

  ‘Plenty of doctors on the scene,’ Walker said. ‘I believe you’re retired, sir.’

  ‘From what I’ve heard, they couldn’t have coped without Dr Plain,’ Carson said. ‘Though you both do need to get yourselves checked out – you especially, Ms Plain.’

  ‘There’s no need, I’m OK,’ she said. ‘Just a few bruises.’

  ‘Sleep needed,’ Stephen said. ‘And food,’ he added.

  ‘Plenty in the fridge,’ Liza said. ‘All the stuff I brought from Glover’s.’

  ‘Excellent,’ he said.

  ‘If you’re up to it, Ms Plain,’ Walker said, ‘we do need to speak to you.’

  ‘Of course.’ Liza stared at Carson. ‘Where’s the backpack?’

  ‘Safe,’ Carson assured her. ‘Don’t worry.’

  ‘If the equipment worked, it’s crucial evidence,’ Liza said. ‘Nemesis set it all up.’

  ‘That’s one of the gang,’ Stephen added grimly. ‘Female.’

  ‘She got out first,’ Liza said. ‘Through a tunnel.’

  She paused, remembered that she hadn’t had the equipment with her during the robbery, and, oh, dear God, she’d have to tell them about that, and then they’d be looking for the money …

  ‘You do know about the tunnels?’ she asked.

  ‘We do,’ Walker said.

  ‘I need to tell you what happened down there.’

  ‘Take your time,’ Carson said. ‘The vicar’s wife told us you said that Joshua Tilden had probably blown himself up.’

  ‘He told us he had explosives in his backpack,’ Liza said.

  ‘Us?’ Walker queried.

  And there it was, the proverbial elephant in the room. Her relationship – brief, but more than intense – with Michael.

  Her angst about the money faded, his face taking its place.

  ‘Michael Rider,’ she clarified. ‘Reaper took me down into the tunnels, and Michael came after us. If he hadn’t …’ She closed her eyes.

  ‘Drink your tea, Liza,’ Stephen said. ‘Questions later.’

  ‘I would just like some water, if that’s OK,’ she said.

  ‘Sure it is,’ Carson said, and went to fetch it.

  ‘We’re going to need to take some photos, Ms Plain,’ Agent Walker said.

  ‘Of what?’ she asked.

  ‘Of you,’ he said. ‘You’re evidence too.’

  Liza put a hand up to her face, saw it come away smeared with filth and began to cry. ‘I’m sorry, I’m making everything dirty.’

  ‘Good Lord,’ Stephen said. ‘Who cares about that?’

  Carson came back with the water, and Stephen took the glass from him, held it out to Liza and she took it, but then her hands began shaking, and he took hold of it again.

  ‘Let me help,’ he said.

  He knelt stiffly beside her armchair and tilted the glass against her lips, and Liza did not resist, managed a little.

  ‘I think it’s abundantly clear, gentlemen,’ Stephen said, ‘that my granddaughter needs a good long rest before she talks to you.’

  ‘No.’ Liza pushed away the glass. ‘It can’t all wait, Granddad.’

  ‘You mentioned murders earlier,’ Clem Carson said.

  Pike on the gibbet came into her mind, made her shudder.

  ‘There are bodies down there.’ The shaking grew worse, and suddenly it was hard to speak, but she had to get it out, they had to know. ‘Thomas Pike and six – or maybe seven, I can’t seem to think straight, I’m sorry – but there are graves.’ She was having trouble breathing. ‘Reaper killed them all. He told me, and I recorded it.’

  Dizziness hit her hard.

  And the world turned black again.

  EIGHTY-FOUR

  In the days that followed, people were very kind. Word got out about some of what had happened down there below their village, and most people who had questioned Liza’s ro
le in the siege no longer felt that way.

  William Osborn had not survived.

  The man called Amos now wanted for his murder.

  The whole gang wanted for a host of crimes.

  Once she had begun to recover, Liza began the lengthy process of debriefing, giving endless statements and answering repetitive questions by the FBI and State Police, holding back as little as possible. She explained her brief history with Michael, including the hours they’d spent together on the night of December 23, and told them about his strange attempts to persuade her to leave Shiloh. About her profound shock at seeing him in St Matthew’s as part of the gang.

  She told them about the robbery, about the safe and the jewelry given by Amos to Nemesis. About the money beneath the floor. ‘I don’t know how much there was,’ she said. ‘I’ve never seen so much cash.’

  ‘What happened to it?’ one of the Providence investigators asked.

  ‘Nemesis stuffed as much as she could carry under her clothes before she left through what I assumed was an escape tunnel, and Amos brought the rest back to Reaper, who was waiting in the undercroft at Saint Matthew’s.’ Liza paused, her heart hammering. ‘And after that, from what I could tell, Reaper divided what was left between Amos and Jeremiah.’

  ‘All of it? Including the dead men’s cuts?’

  ‘So far as I know. Joel was still alive then, but he told Reaper he didn’t want his cut.’

  ‘And Rider? Didn’t he take a cut?’

  ‘If he did, I didn’t see it. I don’t remember him carrying anything except a shotgun and a flashlight when he came down into the tunnel to find me.’

  ‘Are you sure that’s why he came down there?’

  ‘Not entirely,’ Liza said. ‘But he wanted me to escape, I know that.’

  ‘You said that Reaper told you to get out too.’

  They referred to him mostly as Reaper, avoiding any confusion between the two Tildens.

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  ‘Why do you think that was, Ms Plain?’

  Liza shut her eyes. ‘That’s what he called me all through the whole thing. “Ms Plain”. As if being courteous made it better.’

  ‘A courteous psychopath,’ someone said.

  ‘He called himself a psychopath,’ Liza said.

  ‘So why do you think Reaper told you to get out?’ The investigator returned to the unanswered question.

  ‘I don’t know.’ She paused. ‘Anyway, he didn’t wait for me to get out, did he? I was still in the tunnel when he detonated his backpack.’

  ‘Did he offer you a cut, Ms Plain?’

  ‘No!’ Outrage made her shake again, and for the first time she wondered if she might need a lawyer. ‘Of course he didn’t. I was a hostage, same as all the others.’

  ‘Not quite the same,’ the investigator said.

  She was believed, so far as she could tell.

  Law enforcement agencies were not the only ones wanting to talk to her.

  Segments of her reporting of the ‘Christmas Eve Siege of Shiloh’ – as it was largely being called, though there were some references to the ‘Midnight Mass Siege’ – had been heard and seen by vast numbers of people after snippets had escaped onto YouTube, trending for a while on Twitter and other social networks.

  Newspapers and media all knocking on the door.

  Not a good feeling.

  ‘So,’ Stephen said before her return to Boston, ‘you finally got what you wanted.’

  ‘You can’t think I wanted any of that to happen, Granddad,’ she said.

  ‘Nevertheless, you got your big story,’ he said. ‘No shame in that.’

  ‘I’m not ashamed,’ she said. ‘Though in some ways, I did feel dirty for doing what Reaper wanted.’ She paused. ‘I still do, because it’s the horrors that are getting the most attention.’

  ‘Isn’t that the nature of your kind of journalism?’ he said.

  She wanted to argue with him, wanted to tell him that good journalism was about truth, that she didn’t know yet what kind of journalist she was – if, in fact, she was any kind at all.

  Before this, she had at least believed herself to be honest.

  She wasn’t sure of that anymore.

  Not really sure of anything.

  EIGHTY-FIVE

  It took time for the tunnels to be made safe enough for the investigative and forensic teams to make their way to Reaper’s torture and burial chamber, the processes slow and painstaking, especially since the explosion that had trapped Liza had all but demolished the major crime scene down there.

  First indications – minimal information only being passed to her as a courtesy – were that at least the sound recordings of Joshua Tilden’s confession were clear enough to be helpful for legal purposes.

  Not that the killer would ever face trial, his remains having been conclusively identified. Along with those of Thomas Pike. DNA and dental matching of the other victims was to be a lengthier process.

  Michael Rider’s body had not yet been found.

  Placing him, along with Amos, Jeremiah and Nemesis on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list.

  That alone enough to make Liza want to weep.

  Better dead, she thought now, hard as that was for her to contemplate. Trying not to wait for news of him, yet still doing that every day.

  She knew, with absolute conviction, that even if he had made it out, Michael would never contact her again, would keep himself far from her, for her sake. She asked herself harshly how she could be sure of that when she’d hardly known him, when he had, after all, become one of Reaper’s gang, had allowed himself to be used that way.

  Each time, the answer came in the form of two memories. The first, of the young, gentle, bright-eyed teacher at Walden Pond School. The second, of their kiss.

  Meantime, Michael’s share of the proceeds of the robbery were still secure.

  She had waited until the day of her return to Boston to remove the envelopes from the side of the bathtub. Had run herself a long, foamy tubful as cover, had locked the door, taken the cash and Joel’s list of charities and wrapped them up in a large towel before taking them to her bedroom and packing them in her travel bag.

  No word to Ben about it when she got back to Snow Hill Street.

  Beyond unfair to turn him into an accomplice.

  Her biggest quandary was what to do with the money.

  She considered taking a safe deposit box, but feared that she might be under scrutiny, realized that donating large sums to Joel’s or Luke’s charities would be idiotic, and that likewise, trying to get Luke’s money to his parents, now that he had been identified, would be dangerous for her and for them.

  She had shredded Joel’s list one weekend while Ben was away with Gina, had disabled the smoke detector in the kitchen and burned the shredded pieces in the sink, watching the ashes disappear.

  Not so easy to get rid of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

  Not that she’d actually counted, because she had no wish to know, because all that taking it had brought her was ongoing guilt and fear. Because investigators had already visited her twice in Boston, asking questions about anything that Michael might have told her, anything that might have ‘slipped her mind’.

  ‘Nothing,’ she’d said, terrified both times that they might search her room.

  Knowing that they might return again, perhaps with a search warrant.

  She wavered about her final plan for a while, realizing the risks, knowing too that the only alternatives – keeping the money or calling the FBI – were untenable. The decision made, she burned the original envelopes and, wearing gloves, divided the cash into six parts, placing the wads of notes into new envelopes, hiding one away before setting off on two separate excursions to drop the other five at soup kitchens and homeless shelters around Manhattan, Queens, the Bronx and Brooklyn. Afraid to donate closer to home or anyplace that might link to Michael, always disguising herself in a gray hooded jacket and large sunglasses, in case of survei
llance cameras.

  Some good done with it, at least.

  On the upside, she had received a number of offers since the holidays: from magazines, publishers and even one from a TV movie production company.

  Had not decided which, if any, to accept.

  ‘You have to write this,’ Ben encouraged her. ‘You’d be certifiable not to.’

  ‘I need more time,’ she told him.

  ‘Don’t wait too long,’ he said. ‘People have short memories.’

  ‘Not always,’ Liza said, thinking of Reaper.

  Still, she knew that Ben was right. Knew too that it might actually be healthy for her to write it all down, though catharsis did not necessarily mean that she would achieve a worthwhile finished product.

  And she did need time.

  To sift through the emotional wreckage, to consider all the human stories that had been thrown at them in church that long night. To think about John Tilden, a monster in his own right, his trial still to come if and when the Rhode Island Attorney General’s office was ready. Whole gobbets of her story, therefore, sub judice for the foreseeable future.

  The list of victims horrifically long, starting with Naomi Tilden, Alice Millicent and Donald Cromwell, continuing with Reaper’s victims, ending with poor Thomas Pike and, finally, with the suicide of the serial killer himself.

  And then there was Michael.

  Dead or alive, folly or not, she knew she would keep his money for him.

  Suspected that her own crime made her feel closer to him.

  Chose not to analyze that any more deeply.

  For now, her plans were loose, few things certain. She would steel herself to return to Shiloh for a special service following the completion of St Matthew’s restoration works, and she would force herself to go home more often, try to become the granddaughter that Stephen deserved.

  As to Shiloh itself, she would never be able to forget what lay beneath, what her dreams reminded her of most nights. Of endless black tunnels and the stench of Reaper’s ‘place’, ingrained in her memory along with the sight of Pike’s branded flesh and agonized, dying eyes.

  And the terror of being trapped after the explosion.

  She had decided that she would write her story, find out in the process what talent she really possessed, feared learning that she might, after all, be mediocre. Long-ago daydreams of a career in broadcast news laid irrevocably to rest after the siege.