by Susan Breen
“Thank you for driving me,” she said. “I have to find him before Walter does. He’s going to do something foolish, I just feel it, and he’ll wind up getting shot and it will all be because he’s angry. He’s so angry and he’s been like that for years.”
She brushed away tears. The landscape looked blurry as though in a dream. They were driving down Broadway, there were streetlamps, and yet her tears smudged everything.
“He really was something special, something fine. A golden boy. He would have been a great soldier. He should have gone to war, but he’d never leave Juliet, you see. And then he wouldn’t leave me. It’s almost as though our love for him has been toxic.”
Past the statue of Major André, the British spy hanged during the Revolutionary War, past a playground Juliet used to love that she called Circle Square Park, past Lyndhurst with its concerts and roses and then farther south and past her church.
“I’ll tell you something I’ve never told, anyway. I’ve always believed that something happened that night, in the car. Between Peter and Juliet. Something must have happened for the guilt to have stayed with him for so long, because really, it wasn’t like it was his fault. The car was parked. They were at a stoplight. How could he have possibly known that a car was coming from the opposite direction, and yet he’s blaming himself for something. I feel it.”
“You can’t blame yourself,” Frank Bowman said, hand on the stick shift, slowing as they approached the park. No one was there. The park was empty, deserted. Past 9:00 at night. Even the lights were out.
“No, I don’t blame myself, and yet I suppose I do because if I could have figured out what was wrong, maybe I could have helped him. And if he’s done something wrong, not that I think he has, but I suppose he might have, then I have to blame myself for a part of it because the man he’s become is in part due to me.” She felt like her eyes were swollen, and Frank handed her a handkerchief.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s get out of the car. Let’s see if he’s here. We could use some air.”
“I should call Walter Campbell,” she said. But her phone wasn’t charged. She was losing her mind.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she said. “Can I borrow your phone?”
“I don’t have one,” he said. “Never use them.”
She scanned the park, which seemed empty and yet she was sure Peter would head this way. He loved the river. “Do you mind waiting?” she asked Frank.
“Of course not.”
They walked around the path, a broad oval that she knew from an ancient attempt at fitness was half a mile. It felt good to walk. They walked to the farthest point, at which you could see the tip of Manhattan. You used to be able to see the Twin Towers rising up from that point, and after they fell, the beams of light shining up, and now the Freedom Tower, though that always looked lopsided to Maggie. And there was the spruce that she had planted so long ago for her daughter, such a pretty little tree, so dainty compared to her oak.
“This is my favorite place,” she said. “Isn’t it funny how some spots just feel special. Even the air seems special here. I’m glad to have you here with me.”
She looked up, expecting to see his warm eyes gazing on her, but saw instead that he was covering up a yawn.
“I’m so sorry,” he said. “All the excitement is catching up with me. I’m not as young as I was.”
“No, I’m sorry. Here I am, going on and on and I barely know you. You must be ready to tear your hair out.”
He held her hand for a moment. “I wouldn’t say I barely know you. I feel like I’ve gotten to know you quite well in these last couple weeks.”
His grip was stronger than she’d expected; his expression more intense. She remembered how she’d felt the night he dropped her off home, the weird sensations that swirled inside of her. Desire? Was it possible?
The air was so still. The river quiet except for some waves that periodically smacked the shore. Even the bridge seemed subdued, the moon covered by cloud, a vast white shadow over the sky. A cluster of hydrangeas stood right near here, their bluish blooms also phosphorescent in the night light.
He ran his thumb down her cheek. She heard his heart beating, felt her own heart beating with the same syncopation.
“Maggie Dove,” he whispered. His eyes looked so dark. “Winifred loved talking about you, you know? She was so sure I would love you. She loved you. You and your mysteries, you and your husband, you and Darby, you and your daughter.”
Maggie felt her eyes tear, not sure why.
“She wanted me to call you, and I did one day, but you weren’t home, and I wasn’t sure I was ready for what Winifred was suggesting. I’m not a serious man, as you can see.” He laughed then, more of a bark than a laugh. “But then I saw you and I knew what she said was true. You were beautiful. You were what I was looking for. You were exactly what I was looking for.
“I know we haven’t known each other that long,” he whispered, but she found herself distracted by the hydrangeas, thinking about the night she’d stood out on her lawn, about how she’d thought about their poison, about how something so beautiful could cause death, about the heartbeat she thought she heard.
She stepped back, but his face was just as it always was, just as calm and friendly and kind, except surely his teeth had not always glistened so white. Surely there was something different about his smile. She wanted to take a step back but realized she was standing at the very tip of the park, that beyond her was a sharp drop-off into the Hudson. There was no way back and no way forward.
“You were there that night, weren’t you? In my garden. Watching.”
“What are you talking about?” Head tipped, smile even larger.
“You were there the night Bender died. You were watching him, watching me. I heard your heart beating. You have a loud heartbeat.”
He raised his hand to his heart. Laughed softly. “A birth defect,” he said. “Which I control with medicine.”
“Except in moments of excitement, I imagine. Seeing a dead man. Or being with a woman.”
He laughed at that, and now his features did change. Lines appeared that had not been there before. It was as though the picture of Dorian Gray suddenly aged in front of her.
“I’ve been with many women,” he said. “You are not that exciting.”
She knew she should yell. The first rule of self-defense. Make noise. And yet she couldn’t; she felt overcome with helplessness. They were so alone; the park so deserted.
“But why?” she asked, trying to understand. “Did you even know Bender?”
“Yes,” he said. “I knew Bender. How could I not know him? Winifred talked about him all the time. Bender did this and Bender did that. Poor Maggie Dove and her tree. She sent me to talk to him. To try and persuade him to leave you alone.”
“But you didn’t have a quarrel with him?”
Maggie sensed him pushing her even closer to the edge. How far down was the drop, she wondered. Steep enough. How sharp all the rocks were. Even if the fall didn’t kill her, the water would. She would disappear into the Hudson. Still, even frightened as she was, her mind kept working, trying to puzzle it out, and suddenly she felt something shift inside her. She understood.
“All along I thought that Winifred was killed because she knew something about Bender, but it was the other way around, wasn’t it? Winifred was the one you wanted to kill. Bender was just a sideshow. You must not have been sure the Ecstasy would work. You weren’t sure how much of a dose to give, and you wanted to practice, and who better to go after than my neighbor, a man you knew was disliked. But you needed to watch him die, you needed to know how long it would take.”
He snorted softly, in a sound she thought of as agreement.
“He was vulnerable because he was so worried about dying. I imagine you gave him some vitamins. Told him they would help him live longer. Or maybe you just put some poison in his food when you were at his house.”
“In his Gatorade, act
ually.”
She looked again into his handsome eyes and thought of what Winifred had said. There’s someone I want you to meet. She’d assumed Winifred was trying to set her up on a date because Winifred was always doing that, but what if she’d meant it quite literally? What if she really did just want Maggie to meet Frank because he was someone she already knew?
“Were you her husband?” she asked. The third husband, the one who didn’t come to the funeral, the only one Winifred really loved. That’s what she said. But then, there’d only ever been Winifred’s word for that and Winifred was an awful liar.
“You’re good,” he said. “Too bad your mysteries with Inspector Benet have been your only place to use those logic skills.”
A train roared past, a bullet on its way from Connecticut.
“You needed money,” she said, because it always seemed to come back to money. “It costs a lot of money to live the life you’re living and you told me yourself how unethical your mother was, how you grew up making money on scams. You must have tracked down Winifred, which wasn’t so hard to do. She’d probably spoken about the village. She would have been surprised to see you, but happy too. Her life had changed quite a bit. She was a prisoner of her body. It must have been nice to have you show up, interested in her again. Maybe she knew you weren’t really interested in her, but she was flattered, and she’d have liked the secret. But something you did made her uneasy. She wouldn’t remarry you, and then you got a different idea. She must have kept talking about me. Me and my successful late husband. Me and my widow’s benefits. You could get the money from me, and I must have seemed ripe for the picking.”
He yawned again, this time not even bothering to cover his mouth. “Yes, but now it’s all a great waste of time. Two months wasted, and it’s time to move on, Maggie Dove. I’m sorry, but it’s time to go.”
His heart began to beat louder. He took a flask out of his pocket. He poured some liquid into a cup and held it out to her. “It won’t hurt,” he said. “It never does. It’s a blessing really, to go to sleep. Here, in this park that you love so much. Right near your daughter’s tree. How peaceful it would be. No more fear and upset. It will all be over.”
He put a finger in the cup and tapped it to her lips. She tasted wine. Communion. She felt her own heart beating in rhythm with his and she thought of Juliet, in the car, her face twisted at an angle that was so wrong. A tear slipped down her cheek.
“You told me yourself that you were getting tired of life,” he said. “You were tempted to eat the bread pudding Agnes gave you. No one should have to suffer as you have.” His eyes were so tender, lips so close. “Juliet’s waiting for you.”
She was too, Maggie thought. She could see her, her beautiful daughter and her husband and her best friend. How desperately she wanted to see them.
“It’s fast,” he whispered, and he leaned so close she could have kissed him, and at that moment, remembering the words of her jujitsu instructor, Maggie raised her hand up and smacked him as hard as she could under his nose, and then she ran. He staggered behind her, swearing, but she ran, in her heels, her poor middle-aged body wheezing for breath, running, hearing him behind her. Now she yelled as loudly as she could. And ran, and ran, but she wasn’t fast enough, he was gaining on her, yelling for her, and then she heard a sound that was the best sound she’d ever heard in her life.
It was the roar of a dirt bike, and it was coming right at her, and behind it was a phalanx of villagers, led by Walter Campbell, striding forward, Maggie thought, as though Frankenstein were leading the villagers and not the other way around. They ran toward her, Walter Campbell faster even than the dirt bike, grabbing her off her feet and crushing her in his grip.
“My dear,” he said. “My dear, are you all right?”
“Yes,” she said, leaning her head against his chest for just a moment, thinking how surprising the turns in her life were becoming. His own heart beat softly against her ear, a warm and sympathetic sound. “But I believe Frank Bowman has a broken nose.”
He laughed at that, his giant face creasing into a smile, and then he strode off to help Joe Mangione, who’d already put handcuffs on Frank and was leading him off.
Then they all surged past and only Agnes was there, the two of them watching the commotion, and Agnes said, “Maggie Dove, would you like me to take you home?”
“Yes,” Maggie said. “That would be very nice.”
Chapter 40
“I never liked him,” Peter said. He was lying in a hospital bed. Turned out he’d run from the restaurant and drove toward the Saw Mill Parkway, toward the very spot where Juliet had died. He’d parked his car on the side of the road, got out, tripped and knocked himself unconscious. He was lucky he’d fallen onto the small grassy patch of land instead of onto the road or he likely would have been run over. Instead some Good Samaritan found him, called an ambulance, and, for the second time in his life, he was transported from that particular spot to the hospital. “I always knew something was wrong with him.”
“That would have been good to mention before he tried to kill me,” Maggie pointed out.
“I still can’t believe he was married to Winifred.”
“She was always so mysterious about him,” Maggie said. “She dropped off the radar during those years. I always thought it was because she loved him so much, and I assumed, when she came home, that she was heartbroken. But now I wonder if perhaps she was scared. She’d had a close call with him and she’d managed to get away. Maybe she just wanted to forget about him.”
“Why didn’t she say anything?”
“I think she was going to. That’s what she called me about, but at first, after not having seen him for so long, it must have been a delicious feeling to have him there. He was a charming man and he was attentive, and she wasn’t quite who she had been. She was so vulnerable.”
Maggie thought of her foolish friend, so eager for love, and she thought of herself. She surely looked like an open wound, she thought. How he must have laughed to see how easily she fell for him. Peter, looking at her, seemed to read her mind.
“I hear you broke his nose.”
“I did,” Maggie said, with some satisfaction.
“Agnes told me once that Winifred had terrible taste in men, and she did. But I think it was when he turned his attention to me that she realized how dangerous he was. Poor friend, I do think her last act was to try and protect me.”
“He wanted to marry her again,” Peter said. “He wanted her money.”
“That’s what drew him to her, but Winifred had run through most of her money. There wasn’t much to tempt him with, and then she began talking about a much more promising candidate,” Maggie said. “Someone who had a good pension from her husband. Someone who had enough royalties to live on. Someone trusting, and so he got rid of Winifred and went after me.”
The room was quiet then, save for the inevitable noises of a hospital, the padded footsteps, the beeping, the announcements.
“I would have married him,” she said. She looked down at the slim gold band she’d worn ever since she married Stuart Dove. It felt hot to the touch. “Had he asked me, I would have said yes. I loved him, or I thought I did. I felt so swept away by him.” She thought of the night at the museum, how pretty she’d felt. She blushed as she remembered how hyper she’d been that night, how aroused, and she wondered if he’d amused himself by putting some Ecstasy in her drink.
“You were vulnerable,” Peter said.
“That was his skill, wasn’t it? To know who was vulnerable. Walter Campbell told me that when they looked at nursing homes near where he lived, they found a number of unexplained deaths.” Walter Campbell, who was back to being his brusque, annoying self. Who had barely deigned to look at her when she’d asked him for information, though she knew his secret, Maggie thought. My dear. “They don’t even know yet how many women he might have killed. I guess a nursing home is a good feeding ground for a man like that.”
&n
bsp; “Yeah,” Peter said, grinning. “But you’re one tough Dove. You beat him off.”
“It was close,” Maggie said. She was sitting alongside him, waiting for him to be discharged. Doc Steinberg would be by soon.
“There was a moment, Peter, when I didn’t think I had the energy to fight him. When I thought of surrendering. He was talking about Juliet and how she was waiting for me in heaven, and I thought how easy it would be to die, to be with her, to have all this over. I wonder if Winifred felt something similar. She’d left me a message, telling me she’d done something stupid. When he came to her with that flask, when he handed it to her poor twisted hands, I wonder if she decided to surrender as well.”
Peter nodded. Poor face so bruised. Eyes filling with tears. He was the one person, she thought, who she could talk to about this, who understood exactly how she felt, who felt Juliet’s loss as desperately as she did. Something within her twisted. Would she never feel better? Would this eat at her for her entire life? She couldn’t let it. She owed it to Juliet and to Peter.
“We’ve had a tough time, you and I.”
The hospital gown gave Peter’s face a green cast. He looked middle-aged. One of his teeth was chipped. She wished she could stop him in time. But then her daughter had escaped aging and such foolishness by dying. She was forever young, forever a young woman on the brink.
She heard the sounds of trays rolling on the aisles. She smelled chicken. Hospitals always smelled of chicken, she thought. Chicken and sweat and fear.
“You’ve been a devoted friend to me, Peter. You’ve been like a son. More than a son really. But I realize that I haven’t been fair to you.”
“You, Dove? You’ve been more than fair to me.”
“No. You have your life to live. You should have a wife and children.” Her eyes started to tear up, but she forced herself to stay calm, to keep her voice steady. This boy, this man, needed to hear strength from her.
“Much as I love this village, Peter, I think it’s toxic for you. I think I’m toxic for you.”