The Witch's Ladder

by Dana Donovan

  “But Lilith, what could anyone prove?”

  “It doesn’t matter. Two drowned cops, one empty swimming pool. It has all the makings of a bad Sunday night mystery movie of the week.”

  “I still say we need to do something about him.”

  “Let it go, Val. Marcella’s a good egg. He’s not your biggest worry anyway.”

  “I’m calling Michael. He’ll know what to do.”

  “I’m not helping you.”

  “We don’t need your help. We’ll get Jean. Marcella still trusts her.”

  “Fine, then count me out.”

  Eighteen

  The following morning I received a call from Jean Bradford. To say I was surprised would have been an understatement. After the incredible episode with the kitchen tornado, I hardly expected to hear from her anytime soon. If I thought she might still be upset, I couldn’t hear it in her voice.

  “Ms. Bradford, I’m sorry I couldn’t hang around and help clean up after that…incident.”

  “That’s all right, Detective. You know it’s the funniest thing. I went to the track later and bet a thousand dollars on a horse named Windy.”

  “Don’t tell me.”

  “She paid ninety to one.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I’m happy for you.” I really wasn’t. “Perhaps someday you’ll tell me how you do it.”

  “Well, that’s sort of why I’m calling.”

  “Oh?” I sat up in my chair and grabbed a pencil in case I needed to jot down something important—like maybe the name of a horse. “You have a tip for me?”

  “I do. It’s about your case. I’m not sure how to broach this exactly, so I’ll just come out and say it.”

  “Whatever it is, I’m sure I’ll have no trouble forgiving you. So go ahead and tell me.”

  “You know the bag you’ve been asking everyone about?”

  “The brown paper bag, of course.”

  “I’m afraid I haven’t been totally honest with you.”

  “I see.”

  “I guess I got nervous. I’m sure you can understand?”

  “Ms. Bradford, please.”

  “I found the bag in Doctor Lieberman’s office. When I saw the towels inside, I didn’t know what else to do. The next morning I heard about Doctor Lieberman’s murder and I became frightened. I thought the towels might implicate me, so I hid them.”

  I struggled to contain my excitement. I knew that finding the towels could be just the break I had been hoping for, the one hard piece of evidence that could link any or all of the workshop members to the murders. I still had the beads, of course, but I understood that those were circumstantial, lacking the most critical of all courtroom evidence: DNA. The bloody handsaw and Gordon’s jumper cables had plenty of DNA on them; unfortunately, it all belonged to Doctor Lieberman. And the finger of guilt from those items pointed to three dead suspects.

  “Ms. Bradford, you say you found the towels in Doctor Lieberman’s office?”

  “Yes. In his desk drawer.”

  “Why were you looking in his desk drawers to begin with?”

  She hesitated, perhaps wondering if I would find it so difficult to believe. “Well, Detective, to be honest the others all thought Doctor Lieberman was the Surgeon Stalker. They wanted me to search his office for just such a clue. I didn’t want to do it, but I wanted to clear the good name of the Institute. I didn’t expect to find anything. I swear. Once I showed it to the others, I hurried home. I didn’t want anything to do with whatever was going to happen next.”

  “What did you expect would happen next?”

  A cold silence gapped the next ten seconds. “Ms. Bradford? Are you still there?”

  “Detective, I want you to listen closely. Down at Suffolk’s Walk there’s an abandoned fish house at the end of Pier Four. Inside that fish house you’ll find a large bait box. Lift the cover. The bloody towels are there. If you’re lucky, they’ll contain a loose hair, a piece of fingernail or maybe a drop of the killer’s own blood. That’s all I can tell you.”

  “Ms. Bradford, I don’t understand. If you found the bag inside Doctor Lieberman’s office, then why—”

  “I said that’s all I can tell you, Detective. Goodbye.”

  The line went dead. I reached into my pocket, pulled out the witch’s ladder and ran my fingers along the line. It still had thirty knots tied in it. It occurred to me that at the rate I was going, the next one I untied could be my last.

  “Jean Bradford, huh? Sounds like you have a lead on the phantom brown bag.”

  I looked up at Carlos. “I do. This could be the break I’ve been waiting for.”

  “What’s she doing with it?”

  “Nothing. She dumped it.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. None of this makes sense.”

  “What exactly did she say?”

  “She said the others all thought Doctor Lieberman was the Surgeon Stalker. They had her rummage through his office to look for incriminating evidence. That’s when she found it.”

  “They?”

  “The group, everyone in the workshop.”

  Carlos took a seat opposite me. “All right, let me get this straight. The members of the workshop all believed Doctor Lieberman was the Surgeon Stalker. So they had Bradford search his office and she found this bag with bloody towels inside. Right so far?”

  I nodded.

  “Okay. She shows the bag and its contents to the others and they just decide to kill Doctor Lieberman?”

  “I guess. That’s certainly the way it looks, isn’t it?”

  He eased his chair back on two legs and laced his fingers behind his head. “It does look that way, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned from you over the years, it’s that things aren’t always what they seem.”

  “So what do you think?”

  “I think Doctor Lieberman wasn’t the Stalker.”

  “No, of course not. Not after—”

  “After someone cut out his liver.”

  “That’s right. He didn’t do it himself.”

  “I think I get the picture now.” He dropped his chair back on all fours and folded his hands up on the desk. “I think those guys killed Doctor Lieberman, but then the next morning found out that the real Surgeon Stalker came along and cut out the doctor’s liver. Realizing their mistake, the twins threatened to go to the police with the truth. The others voted against it. They argued about it at the gazebo. Unfortunately, the twins were unable to convince the others to turn themselves in to the police. A fight ensued, they bludgeoned the twins to death, and to cover up the crime they set the gazebo ablaze.”

  This time I shook my head. “No. I don’t think it’s that simple, Carlos. I think you’re overlooking a couple of important details. For instance, how did the Stalker know to find Doctor Lieberman’s body hanging from the tree? And why were the bloody towels in Doctor Lieberman’s office in the first place?”

  “You think he was set up?”

  “It sure looks that way.”

  “Did the twins set him up?”

  “Perhaps, and then maybe the others found out. So they killed the twins.”

  “Or maybe it’s the other way around. Maybe the twins figured out that Michael was the Stalker, and he killed them for discovering his secret?”

  I agreed, remembering how Michael actually did the deed according to the flashback I witnessed at Lilith’s house. “That brings us full circle then, doesn’t it?”

  “How so?”

  “There’s still Valerie’s role in all this. Don’t forget, yesterday while you were strolling around the pool, I had an opportunity to read her thoughts about the bloody towels.”

  “That’s right. You did, didn’t you?”

  Oh, how times had changed, I thought. Not twenty-four hours earlier if I had made a statement like that, Carlos would have accused me of bordering on the lunatic fringe, unable to resist making snide comments laced with sarcastic overtones and stinging innuendoes of psych
o dribble. It seemed amazing how readily he accepted the notion that I could read another person’s mind.

  “I’m not really sure what to make of her thoughts, Carlos,” I said. “The image was very strange. I think she may have performed a psychometric analysis on the towels.”

  “Psycho…?”

  “It’s when someone reads a record of events connected with an object that someone once possessed.”

  “Oh, I thought it was the study of psychos.”

  “Yeah, close. Anyway, the killer used the towels to wrap up the bloody livers so he could carry them away.”

  “Carry them where?”

  “That’s just it. I don’t know. Valerie recited the phrase, attraction of blood, to herself. I’m sure that has something to do with it.”

  “What?”

  I shook my head. “I have no idea. The questions still outnumber the answers. But I do know one thing.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Valerie thinks you have one hell of a nice butt.”

  Laughter broke out among the guys in the immediate vicinity. I got up and scuffed my fingers through Carlos’ hair as I walked past him on my way to the door. I made it halfway across the room before he stood and hollered, “Where’re you going?”

  “To pick up some dirty laundry.”

  “You think I should go with you?”

  “No, I got it,” I said, and I waved goodbye with one hand over my head. He retreated to his desk in a hail of teasing catcalls and whistles.

  Fifteen minutes after leaving the station I pulled up to the gates of the once thriving marina district of Suffolk’s Walk. As I strolled along the boardwalk, I slipped my hand into my pocket to check on the ladder. The move had become routine to me, subconsciously drilled into my brain. My fingers brushed the rope’s burly knots. The confidence it gave me seemed disproportionate to my apprehensions, seeing as I still had no idea how to control its awesome powers. It seemed just when I thought I knew what to expect from the ladder, it showed me another side of its fickle tendencies. Perhaps Lilith intended it that way, I thought, and perhaps its most awesome surprise awaited me in the next knot.

  At the end of Pier Four, just as Jean said, sat an abandoned fish house. It stood battered and worn from years of neglect and the relentless assault of Mother Nature’s elements.

  I walked the length of the rickety planks out over the oil-stained waters of the bay. The boards groaned with every step as I placed one cautious foot in front of the other, avoiding the loose and broken timbers awaiting the chance to deliver me to the chilly waters below. When I reached the tattered structure at the end, I looked back to assess the virtual minefield I would have to negotiate on the return trip. The tide was high and rising. Closest to the shore, the waters broke in rhythmic waves, slapping into the pilings and spraying like geysers up through the cracks and spaces in the planking.

  I turned and faced the shack. The door, made of wood and sheet metal, was staunchly mounted to the structure by oversized hinges attached with heavy bolts. A large slide-pin latch substantial enough to secure a door twice its size held the marriage of door and structure with impeccable integrity. I slid the latch to one side and pulled on the handle. The door relented, creaking open with unusual ease against the rusty hinges and the high-tension spring designed to keep it shut in the persistent sea breeze. I looked around but saw nothing inside of imminent danger. The place appeared empty, save for a small wooden table with vacant shelves clinging to the otherwise bare walls. It seemed obvious that no one had used the shack in years. It stood void of windows and skylights, and except for the horizontal beam of sunshine pouring in through the open door, it remained dark, damp and uninviting.

  In the middle of the floor, as Jean promised, stood a large fiberglass bait box measuring some five feet wide by three feet tall. A cluster of tiny air holes drilled into the lid proved much too small to allow me a peek inside. I searched for a suitable prop to hold the door open and found it in a wedge-shaped piece of glass among the broken bottles at my feet. I picked it up and jammed it under the door. Its sharp edges dug deep into the timbers of the boardwalk, proving ideal for the task.

  With the door securely propped open, I took a deep breath, gathered my wits and stepped inside. Two tension-springs like the one used on the door flanked each side of the bait-box, holding the lid securely in place.

  “This is it,” I said to myself. I felt it in my bones, the missing link I needed to crack the Surgeon Stalker case wide open. I walked up to the box, placed two hands firmly on the cover and gave it a lift. The lid popped loose with greater ease than I thought. I leaned into it, looked and found the much-anticipated treasure: the mysterious brown paper bag. I removed a handkerchief from my pocket and covered the top of the bag before snatching it up. When I pulled my hands away, the springs snapped the lid shut in a cloud of chalky white dust.

  At last, I had it. A nervous twitch gnawed in the pit of my stomach. I unfolded the bag gingerly but with great anticipation, careful to use only the handkerchief so as not to contaminate the evidence. My hands shook, and it was only when I looked inside did I realize what a fool I had been.

  “Stupid,” I said. “I’m so stupid.” I sifted through the contents in dismay. “Cookies, Chocolate Chip Cookies.”

  It seemed almost too perfect to condemn, too comical. I knew then that I was not only dealing with a heartless killer, but someone with a twisted sense of humor. But why? The answer came to me like a cold slap in the face. It was a setup!

  A crackle of glass raked across the floor behind me. I turned on my heels and drew my gun. Something outside flashed by the doorway, but the sun silhouetted its figure and so I didn’t take the shot. The door swung shut. I heard the heavy slide-pin locking into place.

  “No!” I stumbled forward and threw my weight against the door. Outside, someone began nailing spikes into its frame.

  I riffled through my pockets, found a book of matches and lit one. A tiny flame sputtered to life. I held the match above my head. Familiar forms began to take shape as my eyes readjusted. When the match burned down to my fingers, I used the dying flame to ignite another. When that one burned down, I repeated the process until nearly all the matches in the book were gone.

  People gathered outside. I heard them talking, but could not hear what they were saying. A man laughed; a woman shushed him, and then the talking stopped. I thought they had gone away, but then I heard it: a peculiar splashing, random and unnatural. I imagined the tide had come in and the waves were spraying up through the splintered planks of the boardwalk outside the shack. It seemed probable at first, but the more I thought about it, the more I doubted it, as the splashing sounded more like someone tossing liquid onto the building’s walls and roof. That is when it hit me. The realization sent shivers through my bones. I could smell it. Kerosene.

  I blew the match out and stomped it to the floor. My sudden plunge into darkness proved short-lived when an abrupt whoosh of air pushed past me to feed a sudden blaze that engulfed the tiny structure from outside.

  Red-hot flames reached through every knothole, nook and cranny the old fish house had to offer. I could feel the intense heat building, bringing with it a thick plume of choking black smoke. I threw my body against the door again, gaining little more for my efforts than a badly bruised shoulder.

  Smoke gathered overhead, soothing over dry, bulky timbers in a ghostly cloud. It thickened quickly, forming a lid of swirling black soot that descended down on me with each passing second. I began to choke as the hot air cut into my lungs like bits of sand and glass. My options for escape were evaporating. I contemplated the only two choices for dying presented before me. I could burn to death, or face asphyxiation from inside the bait box. The latter, I imagined, would come less painfully.

  Flames licked the walls inside the shack from all four sides as I prepared to climb into the box. I palmed the lid and lifted it when something incredible happened. At first glance I believed my imagination had played a tric
k on me. It’s the shadows, I thought, flickering shadows on the wall. Then from my periphery, I saw it again. I turned and looked over my shoulder, disbelieving my eyes. I was not alone. Leona Diaz stood before me as majestically as anything I had ever seen in my life. She looked like an angel, a vision of tranquility amidst a backdrop of smoke from Hell’s own fire.

  “Leona!”

  She didn’t respond. I called to her again, offering outstretched hands. I thought she might join me, if only temporarily before the smoke and flames consumed us both.

  “Leona, give me your hand.”

  In the corner, a beer bottle popped from the heat and a shard of glass sliced through Leona’s silhouette unimpeded. It caught my right cheek and cut me below my eye. I wiped my cheek with the back of my hand before reaching for her again.

  “Leona. What is it?” I supposed fear had paralyzed her to the point of immobility, but if so, I didn’t see it in her eyes. Instead of terror, I saw only empathy, a calm but passionate look of concern. I realized then her concern was only for me, as she was not there, at least not physically. I had never seen Leona, or anyone else for that matter, in the nonphysical state of bilocation, yet I knew that was how she came to me in my final hour—my final minutes.

  She held something in her hand and offered it to me. I tried to take it, but could not unite a physical link between her world and mine. I could not take the object; I could only study it. I squinted through stinging eyes and concentrated. It looked like her rosary, and I had no doubt that the beads in her hand were the same as those Carlos found at the murder sites.

  “Why are you showing me this?” I asked her. “It’s self-incriminating.”

  She held them higher, and I realized that another rosary already hung around her neck. I tried to ask her what it meant, but the thickening smoke choked me to the point I could no longer speak. The intense heat licked at my flesh. It singed the hairs on my arms and on the back of my neck. In the middle of it all, it came to me: the significance of the beads and the reason Leona was trying to help me. How obvious and ironic, I thought, that I should figure it out just in time to take my newfound discovery to my grave.