The Burn Palace

by Stephen Dobyns

  With water dripping down his face, Bobby stared at the body of Nina Lefebvre swinging back and forth, turning first one way, then the other, as if she were looking for something. Her ragged feet, coyote-bitten and pocked by BBs and pellets, were terribly white next to her dark jeans, as if scoured clean by the rain. Bobby’s response to grief was not tears but the desire to hit something. He kept his fists in his pockets.

  “Cut her down,” he said.

  “We need to go over the ground,” said Frank Montesano. He had arrived with the crime investigation unit at the dead end of Whipple Street at the same time as Bobby, and together they had slogged into the woods. A doctor from the medical examiner’s office was expected shortly.

  “I don’t give a fuck. Cut her down. Now!”

  The body hung from a branch about fifteen feet off the ground. The rain had slicked down Nina’s dark bangs, concealing her eyes, which was a blessing, thought Bobby. Her mouth was open, as if she were thirsty. Her clean and purposeless hands seemed to be floating. Water dripped from the fingers.

  Janie Forsyth trotted to the tree, jumped and grabbed a low-hanging branch. Then she pulled herself up and grabbed the branch above her. In another second, she was sitting on the branch to which the rope was tied.

  Bobby and Montesano stood beneath her. Ten other police officers remained back so as not to muddy the crime scene. Probably all of them wanted to urge Janie to be careful, but nobody made a sound. The body continued to turn this way and that.

  Janie had a pocketknife, and she opened the blade. Briefly, she looked down at the men staring up at her. They reminded her of hungry baby birds. Bobby’s wet black face seemed almost a vacancy into which the whites of his eyes were placed. Janie slipped the blade between the rope and the branch and began to cut.

  Bobby stood under the body. Nina’s feet hung three feet from the ground, and, reaching up, Bobby could touch her waist. When the rope was cut, Nina fell toward him, and he let her fall across his shoulder. He was surprised at how heavy she was. Her thick sweatshirt was saturated with water. Maybe it’s no more than that, he thought. BBs fell to the ground, a little splash of golden rain. Bobby lowered her so he could hold her in his arms. When her wet hair brushed across his face, he thought he’d scream. He was careful not to look at her. He didn’t want to see her eyes. He carried her to a stretcher back by the other officers. The rope trailed behind him. Like a snake, they all thought.

  Bobby stayed in the woods for another two hours. He had no cap, but he wore a leather coat. Still, he was drenched. The uniformed troopers all had rain gear. Someone offered Bobby an umbrella, but he turned it down. He felt he deserved to be drenched, no matter how stupid that was. He was also cold, though not half so cold as Nina, not a tenth so cold. Any age was a lousy age to die, but sixteen seemed particularly harsh. After a while, the medical examiner took her body back to Providence, but Nina still seemed to hang in the air, so much so that Bobby tried not to look up. Her cell phone was missing, and no bag was found. Montesano said there were no obvious footprints other than Nina’s and the police officers’, but that wasn’t conclusive. There were also paw prints. Slick leaves covered much of the ground, which still might reveal traces of footprints; they would be hard to detect. It seemed Nina’s death was suicide rather than murder.

  “I can’t swear to it,” said Montesano, “but everything points in that direction.”

  Bobby could only speculate about what had happened. When Nina escaped from her house, she’d either called someone or ran into someone she knew on Water Street where the dog lost her scent. Then she had either stayed with that person or met up with someone else. Somewhere she’d gotten a rope; somewhere she’d left her cell phone. Presumably her phone had an address book and would contain a list of her calls. He could get her calls from the phone company, unless Nina had used a prepaid phone. A lot of kids used those nowadays.

  As Bobby considered these possibilities, his anger returned. Whoever Nina was with hadn’t tried, or sufficiently tried, to save her from suicide. Had the person encouraged her? Had she been with the person Saturday night and all day Sunday? Had the person given her the rope and taken the phone? That suggested he or she had been involved in the rape and was trying to protect himself or herself. If so, Bobby thought, Nina’s death hadn’t been suicide but murder, though a court might not see it that way.

  So what did this anonymous person stand to gain? Continued anonymity. And how had he or she convinced Nina to end her life? The person could threaten to publicize the rape and could exaggerate Nina’s role and willingness. Or Nina might be convinced she was protecting her friends; she was saving her parents from embarrassment. The person could have encouraged Nina’s despair as one might encourage a runner in a race.

  The similarity between what had happened to Nina and Peggy Summers had to be looked at: the bizarre ritual, the chanting and dancing, the hallucinogens, the man with the skull face. Could Nina be convinced she was carrying the Devil’s baby?

  A trooper shouted to Bobby and he jumped. The pellet pistol had been found among the brambles about fifteen yards from where Nina had hung. There was no sign that the boys had come any closer but plenty to show they had bushwhacked their way up to that point. Davie Bottoms and Alex Milbank sat in the backseat of a cruiser parked in the turnaround at the end of Whipple Street, their faces and hands patched with Band-Aids from the brambles. They didn’t talk; they were abject and miserable. They knew they wouldn’t get any sympathy from anyone and couldn’t imagine what lay ahead. They knew nothing would be forgotten, either by them or by others.

  • • •

  Sitting in Dr. Joyce Fuller’s office, Woody was amazed he had ever thought of having sex with her. It wasn’t that she was unattractive, nor was it that she was five or six years older than he. She was just so tidy, so consummate in her arrangements, so determined that nothing be out of place—not a hair on her head, not a pencil on her desk.

  “Certainly, I expect that staff members—medical, clerical, whatever their position—have had sex with one another, though it’s rare. It would also cost somebody his or her job.”

  “Would a doctor be more protected?” asked Woody.

  “Nobody would be protected. It would be a breach of hospital regulations.”

  It was late Monday morning. Through the closed door, Woody could hear the business of the hospital continuing—phones ringing, announcements over the PA system, secretaries talking and laughing.

  Woody had told Dr. Fuller about Dr. Balfour and Alice Alessio. It turned out that Balfour had already talked to Dr. Fuller earlier that morning. She had notified Reggie Adams, chairman of the board of trustees, who had urged her to do nothing about dismissing Dr. Balfour and Nurse Alessio until the police had made an arrest and the guilty party had been convicted. In the meantime, the relationship between Balfour and Alessio should be kept quiet.

  “Once everything is settled,” said Adams, “they can be sent on their way.”

  And me, too, Dr. Fuller had thought. I’ll be sent on my way, unless I resign first.

  “To tell the truth,” said Dr. Fuller, “I’m surprised by Dr. Balfour. There’s always a certain amount of flirting, and people might see each other—sexually, I mean—away from the hospital, though it’s discouraged, but there’s never been any hint of that in Dr. Balfour. He’s never seemed interested. Of course, that’s not the case with Nurse Alessio. I doubt this was her first time, though we’ve no proof. Perhaps Dr. Balfour had never been sufficiently tempted. Do you find . . .” Here Dr. Fuller paused. “Do you find Alice attractive?”

  Woody looked up abruptly. “She’s not my type.” She was a quickie, and he didn’t go in for quickies. He didn’t care to explain this to Dr. Fuller. “She’s not the sort of woman you go to for conversation,” he added. Then he wondered if he was saying too much. It would be easier to talk to a man.

  “No,” said Dr. Fuller, “I expect Nurse Spandex’s conversational abilities are few, whatever her othe
rs might be. Have you learned anything at all about that poor baby? It seems I spend most of my time thinking about him.”

  “Descriptions have been sent all over the country. The Summers girl has been no help.” Woody decided not to tell Dr. Fuller about the man with a skull instead of a face, but he expected she already knew. “She says she’s no idea who the father might be. What about you? Do you feel any better? I’m sorry, I know better isn’t the right word.”

  Dr. Fuller’s smile was ironic and sad. “I want to thank you for the other night. I think I no longer feel sorry for myself, or only a little bit, though my guilt, if anything, has increased. As you said, I can still be useful. I need a new approach to seeing myself, some way in which my pride plays a smaller part. But as soon as possible I need to get away from here. I don’t know if I’ll be able to stay until there’s a conviction, if it ever happens.”

  • • •

  Bingo Schwartz was a state police detective who often worked with Woody and Bobby Anderson, but he felt creaky and looked forward to retirement, although he was only fifty. Still, he’d been a trooper for more than twenty-five years, and enough was enough. He was overweight and had a bad leg, his wife hated him, his kids were spread out across the country, and, well, he wanted some enthusiasm again. Some joie de vivre. He didn’t think he’d find it in the state police, which wasn’t a complaint. He was just tired of cop thoughts, as he called them, tired of standardized cop procedure.

  When Bingo had been young and foolish, he had wanted to be an opera singer. He had been sixteen and it had taken maybe no more than two weeks to see it was an impossible desire. But the choirmaster at St. Luke’s in Warwick, Mr. Pasero, had said he was a natural basso, and Father Michael agreed. Mr. Pasero had played Bingo records of Ezio Pinza. These, Bingo told himself, had changed his life. Soon he had learned to sing “Some Enchanted Evening,” and his mother had invited neighbors into the living room to hear him. One woman wept and said he was even better than the original. This is when Bingo thought he’d be famous.

  Then, luckily, common sense prevailed. Bingo had still sung in the choir and in local theatricals, but it was amateur stuff. Even so, he spent many hours listening to Pinza, and other bassos—Samuel Ramey, Jerome Hines, Boris Christoff, and the greatest of them all, Chaliapin. He studied Chaliapin’s roles and could sing parts of Boris Godunov, as well as parts of Gounod’s Faust and Boito’s Mefistofele. His favorite was Leporello in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, and the aria he liked best was “Madamina, il catalogo è questo,” in which Leporello brags that Don Giovanni had fucked one thousand and three women in Spain, and another thousand elsewhere.

  Of course, in retirement, Bingo wouldn’t be a singer, though he might join a choir again, but he would like to work part-time in a theater helping to build sets, ideally for operas. He was a first-rate carpenter and had friends in the theater, even singers, so it didn’t seem an impossible ambition. And he was humble. As he liked to say, “I only want to swing a little hammer.”

  Bingo was known among his colleagues as the “Mumbler,” because he would sing or hum his favorite arias under his breath. This Monday afternoon, as he made his way along the sidewalk in the rain from the Brewster Brew to Crandall Investments, he hummed the aria about the thousand and three Spanish victims of Don Giovanni’s passion.

  Ma in Ispagna son già mille e tre.

  V’han fra queste contadine,

  Cameriere, cittadine,

  V’han contesse, baronesse,

  Marchesine, principesse.

  E v’han donne d’ogni grado,

  D’ogni forma, d’ogni età.

  Nella bionda egli ha l’usanza

  Di lodar la gentilezza,

  Nella bruna la costanza,

  Nella bianca la dolcezza.

  Bingo was hardly conscious of this, but it gave him comfort and made his walk more than simple plodding. As for the reason for his short journey, it had happened, in the search for a person who might have seen Nina, that somebody had mentioned Ronnie McBride. If Ronnie had slept in the doorway of Crandall Investments, as he did nearly every night, he might have observed something. Then it turned out that Ronnie hadn’t been seen since late Thursday.

  So Bingo Schwartz was on his way to talk to George Crandall, head of Crandall Investments. Walking with a distinct limp, Bingo hardly felt the rain. “In winter he likes fat ones, in summer he likes thin ones,” he sang in Italian, though no one could hear him. He wore a brown suit and black raincoat. On his head was a Greek fisherman’s cap.

  George Crandall had been born and bred in Brewster, but he did his best to look like a Wall Street mogul, and his suits were knockoffs of five-thousand-dollar originals. He was forty years old, and most people still thought of him as Georgie. When first introduced to a person, he exuded weighty solemnity, but then he would giggle at some silly thing or make a foolish remark and all his seriousness would be overthrown.

  “Ronnie’s been sleeping in my doorway for about two years,” Crandall told Bingo, “ever since his wife died. He has a house; he just doesn’t want to use it. He’s a little touched in the head, though he’s as gentle as a lamb. I’ve known him all my life. The grieving process hits everyone differently, I suppose. At first it bothered me to have him sleeping out there. After all, it’s my doorway. But then I grew used to it. He wasn’t doing any harm and he didn’t make a mess, just some crumbs now and then. He’d be gone by seven and take his sleeping bag with him. I’m not sure where he went, but he’d often be in the library during the day.”

  Bingo wondered where this was leading, but he was patient and believed in letting whoever he was interviewing tell their story at their own pace. It was a mistake to hurry them. They tensed up.

  “That’s why I began to worry on Friday morning. Ronnie’s sleeping bag was still here. I couldn’t leave it in the alcove, so I brought it inside. Then I took it over to West Cleaners to have it washed—purified and sanitized is more like it. It was absolutely filthy. I thought Ronnie would be pleased. It’d be a treat to have it all smelling lemony. But Ronnie hasn’t been back, not Saturday night, not Sunday night. So I called the police. I hope that’s all right.” Crandall gave a nervous laugh.

  “Has he done this before?” asked Bingo.

  “Absolutely never. I mean, he’d miss a night, but he’d never leave his sleeping bag behind. And I thought with all these awful things—the baby being stolen and the snakes—better safe than sorry. I was in school with Ralph Summers, Peggy’s dad, though he was a few years ahead of me, and I met her mother when I was Peggy’s age. And then the scalping. I even imagined poor Ronnie might have been scalped. And now Nina’s disappeared. You see, Ronnie being gone a few days, it’s never happened before.”

  • • •

  Monday night it was dark by six and the rain fell as hard as ever. The wind continued to pluck the last leaves; on a few streets there was flooding. It was a night to stay home, a night to have a fire in the fireplace.

  At eight o’clock two cars drove out Whipple Street past the farmhouse, where Sister Asherah and Sister Isis lived, to the dead end, where they turned and slowly made their way back. As they reached the farmhouse, the cars cut their lights and their doors opened. Four men hurried across the lawn, while two others sat behind the steering wheels and waited. The sound of the rain probably concealed the sound of the motors. Lights were on downstairs and several were on upstairs, but the women weren’t visible, which was just as well. Sister Asherah’s blue Prius was parked in the driveway. Sister Isis’s Civic was in the garage.

  Each man carried several bricks. They approached the windows, ducking down so they wouldn’t be seen. The men stopped and then one gave a whistle. Each began throwing his bricks. There is nothing subtle about a brick through a window. There’s no development, no buildup. The violence is immediate. The glass crashed and crashed. Bricks bounced across the floor and broke things. Windows in the living room and dining room, windows in the kitchen—they all shattered. A woman scr
eamed.

  Then the men ran back to the two cars. The doors slammed. A man shouted, “Get fucked, bitch!” The cars squealed and fishtailed back down Whipple Street.

  TWELVE

  IT RAINED ALL NIGHT and into the morning, steady and unrelenting. Shortly after six, Woody and Bobby Anderson sat in Woody’s Tundra out at the beach. Woody had a permit to drive on the sand, though he did little fishing, and he’d pulled up almost to the high-tide mark facing the ocean. Ajax sat in back. He didn’t like the rain and had a wet-dog smell. Woody had gotten muffins and coffee from Dunkin’ Donuts. It was barely light, a lighter gray against the dark. The waves seemed to come in from nowhere, invisible until they crested and broke in a white rush. The windshield wipers whapped lazily back and forth.

  Woody and Bobby often communicated in a light banter, jokey and jivey. It was like a separate language, heavy with gesture, and resonated with multilayers of irony, cynicism, and gravity. They had developed it over years of working together, and very few people could catch its nuances, hear meaning in its seeming foolishness, or had a sense of its complexity. Bingo Schwartz understood it and found it exasperating. Frank Montesano understood it and found it too exclusive, with slang only Woody and Bobby understood. “We de bullen,” Bobby might say. “We la flic,” Woody might answer. No more than “We’re the cops.” Pure silliness.

  After Nina Lefebvre was found hanging in the woods, the banter disappeared. They didn’t stop out of respect or a sense of seriousness. They weren’t even aware of stopping. It just stopped, and who knew when it would begin again, if at all.

  “Has it occurred to you,” said Woody, “there might be a third girl, even a fourth and fifth, who had a baby? They might not have been born in a hospital.”

  “How d’you find out about them?”