by Helga Zeiner
Dr. Vanderhoof looked up and opened his mouth, but Harding silently pleaded with him to keep quiet, and the doctor only coughed lightly into his left fist.
Macintosh quickly pressed on, praying that his deceit would bring the desired result. “So if you are up to answer a few questions now—that’s standard procedure I’m afraid—we can leave you to your hopefully speedy recovery.”
“What do you want to know?” She sounded harsh.
Macintosh opened his notebook and pretended to read from it. “Your name is Graciella Rodriguez.”
“How do you know?”
“You told the doctor when you woke up.”
“I did?”
“Yes. You did. You’re a visitor from Texas?”
“Mm, yes. Yes, I am. On a visit.”
“And you were staying where? The name of the hotel?”
“Ah, uhm, I don’t remember. I need to think.”
Dr. Vanderhoof interfered.
“I really think we should give the patient time—”
Macintosh nodded.
“Oh sure, just one more minute. My note here says you have relatives in Vancouver. I guess you probably stayed with them.”
“Yes. No.”
“No, you don’t have relatives or no, you didn’t stay with them?”
“I don’t have relatives. I’m a tourist.”
“Sure. Thank you.” He closed his book and turned to Dr. Vanderhoof. “We are done here.”
The doctor seemed relieved.
“Very good. Thank you, Ms. Rodriguez.”
The three men left the room, and, once outside, the detectives thanked the doctor again and walked to the elevators. While waiting for one to arrive, Macintosh watched Dr. Vanderhoof disappear down the hallway.
Harding bit his tongue until he was out of sight. “What was that?” he then asked. “Why did you stop?”
“Oh, I didn’t,” Macintosh said. “I only called a short time-out. Come on, the doc is gone, let’s get back in there.”
“But we can’t. It’s not procedure. We need the doctor’s permission.”
“Didn’t he give it to us just a few minutes ago?” Macintosh marched straight past the intensive care floor receptionist who barely glanced at them. They were detectives who had been in the company of a resident doctor, so their presence was not to be queried.
“No, he didn’t. We can’t do that, we’ll get into trouble.”
Macintosh stopped in front of the room they had left two minutes earlier.
“Do you really think the Sergeant is gonna do more than slap my wrist? And it’ll only be me who gets into trouble, you won’t. I’m the senior here, and I say we go in again. You got no choice but to follow my orders. I’ll write in my report that you objected and that we had a slight difference of opinion. I understood the doc’s shift was over and he didn’t hang around. Got it?”
Harding relaxed.
“Got it. It's all your responsibility and you’ll retire soon.”
“Thank you.”
Macintosh opened the door and immediately felt a hawk’s eye on him again.
“Sorry, Graciella, I forgot to ask you one more question.”
“What?”
“How did you kill Inez Alvares?”
“I … what are you—”
“We know you burned the house in La Marque down and stole Inez Alvares’ identity. We know who you are and where you’ve lived and what you’ve done. The only thing I don’t know is how you killed her, and I’m really very interested in that. I really want to wrap up this case.”
The eye blinked several times. “How the hell do you come up with all that shit?”
“That doesn’t matter, does it? You are in a hospital in Canada now, but as soon as you have regained enough strength to be deported, you’ll be sent back to the States to stand trial for your involvement in the child-abuse allegations Texas MCS is compiling against you, as well as the murder charge—”
“It wasn’t murder! It was an accident.” Her harsh voice had shrill overtones but was barely above a whisper by now. Talking obviously strained her.
Macintosh pulled a chair closer to the bed and sat down. “Tell me.”
Graciella blinked and swallowed hard.
“Wait,” Macintosh ordered. “Do you mind if we tape it?”
“What does it matter? I’m done, aren’t I?”
Harding took a small tape recorder from the inside pocket of his jacket, turned it on, stated time and day and asked the suspect again if she gave her consent to be interviewed. She nodded but he made her say yes.
“Good,” Macintosh said. “Now let’s get started. We know you’re Tiara’s aunt.”
“That little bitch. After all I’ve done for her. Whenever she opens her mouth, she’s lying. Make sure you tape that! I’m gonna tell you how it really was. It wasn’t my fault.” She stopped to clear her scratchy throat.
Harding came closer to the bed, sat on the edge and held the tape recorder in position. Macintosh moved Harding’s hand even closer. He had enough trouble understanding her foreign intonation without her windpipes damaged as they were.
“Tell us everything you remember from that day when Inez got killed by accident.”
“I was with Inez, at her place,” she whispered. “We were just talking when the phone rang. Inez has a brother, Antonio, her kid brother, she spoiled him way too much. I’ve always warned her that he was a no-good son-of-a-bitch, but she didn’t want to hear any of it. Even when he took up with Tiara’s aunt, who was actually his employer, she didn’t cut ties altogether. Imagine, the fool actually confided in her. I overheard it when he gushed about the affair like a love-sick puppy, even telling her that Melissa had stolen money from me and given it to him, out of sheer love. The idiot. He didn’t have a clue that I had been safe-keeping the money for Inez, so he actually had taken money that belonged to his own sister. At least then she stopped supporting him financially. Her own brother became a liability to her and she wanted to stay away from him as much as possible. The guy is a total loser.”
She had to pause again and swallow a few times before she could carry on.
“Anyway, he called on that day, all in a huff about something, and she was getting really pissed off with him. I heard her say he’d better lie low for a while, and assumed he’d gotten himself into trouble, but when she hung up, she told me that my sister-in-law Melissa was on the run with her daughter, leaving the country with another woman, one he didn’t know. Tony had said the three of them were packing up when he’d left their place, and he begged Inez to do something about it. Now, Inez was very worried about the money I was keeping for her at my place. Very worried, I tell you, and so was I. Melissa had stolen from me before and Inez had insisted I pay her back, so you can imagine how I felt.”
Now she coughed. Macintosh handed her the glass with tea from her bedside table but she ignored him. Her desire to finish off the story made her ignore the discomfort of talking.
“So we raced off like two crazies, over to my house, but it was all deserted. Melissa and Tiara and that other woman had left already. All the wardrobes were empty and the stuff from the bathroom was gone. Jesus, I tell you, my heart sank when I saw the door to my bedroom wide open. Inez went into panic mode. She started screaming at me that it was my fault that those women had left. I didn’t say anything, just went to my hiding place, and can you believe it, Melissa had cleaned it out. It was all gone. The lot of it, nearly one hundred thousand dollars. I thought I’d die. Inez then flew at me with claws out, like a werewolf on a rampage. She thought I had put Melissa up to it. And Tiara. It was actually not only about the money, but also about Tiara.”
“I bet,” Macintosh mumbled under his breath.
“What? Yeah, sure, she liked that girl a lot. Was like family to her. Tiara gone, and the money, that was just too much for her. Inez hurled herself at me, screaming I’d never get away with cheating her like that, and I had no choice but to defend myself. I knocked
her over and, would you believe it, she fell and banged her head against the brass frame of the sideboard. We had one of those glass and metal things to match the dining table, it had been Melissa’s idea, I hated that stupid thing from the start. Anyway, there she was, bleeding like a pig, all over the rug. It was a nightmare. I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to call an ambulance, but with her last breath Inez said I shouldn’t. She’d done some terrible things, she said, I guess to cleanse her soul before she would meet her maker, and it was no good for nobody to involve the authorities. She knew she was dying fast. She begged me, honestly, she begged me, to destroy the evidence of her wrong doings and to disappear for a while. She said Melissa was a mean woman and would try and destroy me, once she was out of the country.”
She had to stop to swallow a few times before she could carry on.
“It made sense to me then. I mean, I was Inez’ best friend, and Melissa had disliked me from the start. I’ve had a bit of a run-in with her a week earlier, about …, well, about all sorts of things, so I spent the week at Inez’ pad. Wasn’t in Melissa’s good books, so to say. Inez knew that. In fact, we’d been discussing all week how to solve this mess. With her dying breath she told me to protect myself. That was Inez, in her last moments still thinking of me. She made me promise to take care of everything and said it would be best for me to act as if she was still alive, until everything was sorted out. See, I had no choice. She hadn’t been totally legal in her dealings, they would’ve confiscated everything if they’d found out.”
“So you burned the place down.”
“She was dead. With my little niece gone and with all the money missing, the stuff in the house meant nothing to me. It was only a rental anyway.”
“But you said her business partners would come after her when they found out their money was missing. Weren’t you worried then to take on her identity?”
She lifted her one eye to the ceiling, brought it back and pierced Macintosh with an angry look.
“Actually, it was like this, Inez had some cash money stashed at her studio and at a few other places and she told me to get that and pay people she owed. Get it? That was part of what I had to do for her. And to get it all done, I needed to be her. I took care of things and then I left town. That’s all there is to it.” She closed her eye. “I’m tired now. I don’t think I need to say any more.”
“You certainly told us enough for today. Thank you very much.”
Macintosh waved to Harding to turn off the tape recorder, and as soon as he heard the quiet click, he came even closer to the bed. He bent low, until his face was right next to Graciella Rodriguez’ head.
“I’ll come back with a warrant. We know about the whole pedophile operation, and you’ll be held accountable, I don’t care which name I write on your deportation order, Inez or Graciella. In fact, I might ask Texas police which one they prefer. They got proof that Inez and you, you two scumbags, were partners, we got a witness statement—”
The eye flew open again, blazing like burning coal.
“Tiara is a liar. And she tried to kill me.”
“Why did you come to Vancouver?”
“What do you think? To get my investment back.”
“I take it with that you mean Tiara? You came to Canada because you knew Tiara is living here, you found out where she lives, stalked her, watched her movements for a while, followed her, and eventually confronted her in Starbucks to lure her back.”
“Nothing of the kind. I did nothing wrong.”
“Oh yeah? You entered Canada illegally by using the name Inez Alvares.”
“So what? I had to protect myself. Melissa’s a mean bitch. There’s no saying what lies she’d spread to stop me getting my niece back.”
“So you admit you tried to kidnap her.”
“Not against her will. Whatever she says is a lie. She was quite willing at first.”
Macintosh took a deep breath. He felt the burden of a lifetime lift off his shoulders. “But then you said something that aggravated her, and she lost it.”
“The stupid bitch! She’s a snake, a lying, two-faced snake. I had no idea she’d trick me like this.”
“You got what you deserved.”
With that he turned around and left, followed by Harding.
They were slowly walking down the hallway of the hospital, still a bit stunned by the latest developments.
“What did she mean with, ‘I had no idea she’d trick me like this’?” Harding asked.
Macintosh hesitated for a second, then he smiled.
“You didn’t hear that right. She said: ‘I had no idea she’d treat me like this’.”
“Yeah.” Harding frowned back at the door, then looked at his partner. “That makes a lot more sense.”
Back at MCS, they got busy. Harding called Josh and briefed him on the astonishing new twist. The Texan promised to have the warrant changed to Graciella Rodriguez’ name as soon as he got hold of a judge. With the original warrant they had forcefully entered Inez Alvares’ apartment and had discovered more damaging material than they had ever seen in one of their raids. Several computers were full of explicit pedophile pictures and video clips, there were actual prints of girls as young as four or five in erotic poses. Best of all, Josh told Harding with a pained voice, hating to have to use the word ‘best’ in such a context, there was a small book with a long list of names and telephone numbers. Incredibly careless, but Inez/Graciella must have felt immune to discovery. This started to make more sense to Josh now, with Graciella shielding herself behind the identity of a dead woman, she must have felt invincible and invulnerable.
Josh and Harding breathed a sigh of relief. With the evidence collected at the apartment, the VPD would be able to arrest Graciella still on her hospital bed.
Harding wrote the final report, conveniently forgetting his objection to interrogate the patient without a doctor present—after all, he had her consent on tape—to complete the Princess file. A copy of it would go to the Sexual Offense Squad. Within the hour, their detectives would be on the way to St Paul’s Hospital. He then got two coffees, wandered over to Macintosh, placed the cups on his desk and sat down.
“This feels better, doesn’t it?”
Macintosh looked up. He leaned back, scratching his neck. Time to shave.
“Yeah, for once the baddies are either dead or arrested. And with a bit of luck, the innocent one gets a new chance in life.”
“I wonder what will happen to Tiara.”
Macintosh shrugged. “Somebody’s got to tell her that the victim of the attack was her aunt and that she’s still alive. I don’t think Tiara will be overjoyed, but then again, until now, she hasn’t even been aware of who she’s attacked.”
“Are you absolutely sure about that? Is it really possible that she remembers so much of what happened to her, but nothing about the attack?”
Macintosh took a long time to answer.
“That’s what Dr. Eaton said. His report explains that Tiara is unable to understand her behavior, and if it’s in that report, it’s good enough for me. As far as I’m concerned, Tiara can’t be criminally responsible for her action, period!”
“Then call Dr. Eaton. He can break it to her gently.”
Macintosh scratched again.
“You know what. I think I’ll call it a day. Didn’t get much sleep lately. I might just drop by the Center on my way home and tell her myself. It’s only a short detour.”
Chapter 58
Tiara was immediately brought to the visitor’s room. She wasn’t as composed as on his previous visits. Her fingers kept pulling on her lower lip, exposing her teeth. And as soon as she sat down, her left leg, balanced on her toes, quivered uncontrollably. When she noticed that he noticed, she stopped working on her lip, placed her hand on her knee and pressed her heel down.
“I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news,” he said. “Remember when I told you your aunt had died in that house fire?”
Tiara did
n’t move.
“We had that wrong. It wasn’t your aunt.”
“I agree, that is bad news.”
“What I’m saying is, your aunt is alive, which means, well, this is quite complicated. The person they found in the burnt ruins is now identified. It was Tony Alvares’ sister, Inez, the one we know to be the Purple Shadow.”
Tiara cocked her head very slightly, turning her ear toward him as if she needed to concentrate on what he was explaining.
“Which means, the one in hospital, that’s not Inez. It’s your aunt. She has been acting as Inez Alvares, taking over her illegal business in the past three years—” he halted, not sure how to proceed without hurting her. “But she’s being arrested as we speak.”
“Is she awake? Have you spoken to her?”
“We did interview her and she has admitted to trying to lure you back.”
“Did she say anything else?”
“Lots of accusations, but we know she’s lying through her teeth, so it’s of no importance to us. We’ve heard enough to be able to deport of her to Texas. They’ll deal with her there.”
“You won’t talk to her again?”
“We got all we needed.”
He waited for more questions, but none came. Tiara was absorbed in a world of her own. He had to ask his next question though.
“Did you know it was your aunt? Did you recognize her?” He sounded like a sulking child. Why didn’t you tell me? But it did bug him. In front of Harding, he had presented Dr. Eaton’s assessment far more definite than it really was. How could she not have known? Why hadn’t she told him that it had been her scumbag of an aunt? It could have saved them all a lot of work.
She sucked in her lower lip and sunk her teeth into it while slowly shaking her heard.
“You really don’t remember?”
No reaction. She still couldn’t deal with it. She must have seen her aunt, recognized her and lost it. Shock does that to people. Dr. Eaton would be able to analyze this. Macintosh made a mental note to ask the psychiatrist to modify his report to the judge and include the latest information; it should make Tiara’s action and her memory loss a lot more explainable.