Winter House

by Carol O’Connell

  „But you know it was an accident.“

  „The fire was where it all went wrong, wasn’t it? The smoke and flames. You panicked. You ran up the stairs instead of down. Yes, I believe it was an accident. You’d never take that kind of risk. But, once again, Bitty, will the jury believe you?“

  Mallory paced the floor, snapping her fingers. „Stay with me, Bitty. Do the math. Willy Roy Boyd counts as the first murder charge. When the arson investigation is finished, the body count will stand at five.“ She ripped a sheet from the wall. „This is the autopsy report on your father. It links the trauma of the fire to a fatal heart attack. Every death by arson is murder.“

  „It was an accident!“

  The detective smiled, and Bitty grasped the irony before it was voiced.

  „After years of planning and scheming, you’ll get tripped up by something you didn’t do. But you did pull out the fuses and hide the spares. You lit the candles that set the house on fire – and those people died. Do you think I care if you only planned to kill one of them?“ Mallory’s voice was calm and all one note, almost bored as she walked along the wall, tearing off more sheets in quick succession. „So now I’ve got you for patricide, matricide, the murders of your aunt and uncle and Willy Roy Boyd. Too bad you couldn’t commit mass murder in another borough. Now the Queens DA won’t kill anybody, not even cop killers. But the Manhattan DA loves the death penalty.“

  The wave of Mallory’s hand encompassed all the chaos of the wall and the suitcase of diaries. „Now you might remember this from a law class you didn’t sleep through. The DA calls it a preponderance of evidence. The sheer weight of it is enough to crush you to death. And there’s more. Juries love things they can hold in their hands, like the fuses and the spares you hid by the garden door. That’s what really sealed the arson finding. Then there’s the pack of diaries.“

  „Aunt Nedda was insane. She had a history of – “

  „No, according to Dr. Buder, all those diaries were written by a per-fecdy sane woman. So – things the jury can hold on to. There’s the flashlight – and the fire ax with your fingerprints on it.“

  „You know why my prints are on the ax. I used it to – “

  „Yeah, right. Little Sally Winter’s bones. That was another nice touch, Bitty. Some malicious slander to paint Cleo and Lionel as the kind of people who could murder a child. Why not Nedda? What you don’t know is that your mother was on the phone with my partner before the fire broke out. She was making plans to surrender the trunk to the coroner’s office in the morning. Cleo and Lionel only wanted to know how long it would be before the family could bury that little girl’s remains. That was all they cared about. Finally – a proper burial for Sally Winter.“

  „You know I used that ax to get Sally’s trunk out of the closet.“

  „Right, that’s what you said in your statement, but we only have your word on that. Your mother never mentioned you. So the DA will argue that you used that ax to keep those frightened people from escaping a burning house.“

  „No, there was a witness who saw Nedda carry me out. I was unconscious. I couldn’t have stopped anyone from leaving if – “

  „A witness? You mean the homeless man who called in the fire? The arson team went looking for him. Turns out someone bought him a train ticket to a warmer climate. Now where was I? Oh, right – the prosecutor’s closing remarks. He’ll paint a picture of you swinging that ax, scaring those poor people, driving them up the stairs and then setting the fire to trap them there. When he’s done with the jury, they’ll want to climb out of their box and kill you with their hands.“

  „Is that what you’d like to do?“

  „No.“ Mallory shrugged. „It’s all the same to me – nothing personal, just a job.“ She handed Bitty a small white card. „This has your Miranda rights. You’re under arrest. Read the card fast, Bitty. We have to go.“

  „I know what you’re doing, Detective. So transparent. You want to scare me into a plea bargain – a guaranteed conviction instead of risking a lost trial.“

  „No, I’ve never known a lawyer to confess to anything. And I’m counting on that. So is the district attorney.“

  „You expect me to believe that all this – this spectacle – and what you did to my bird, nailing him to a wall – that was just fun for you?“

  „Yes,“ said Mallory, „that’s exactly what it was.“

  Bitty wished that this young woman would not smile. It was so unsettling. And those eyes. It crossed her mind that the detective might be seriously disturbed. Or was this calculated – just another part of the show?

  „Now,“ said Mallory, „I’ll tell you what’s going to happen to you, and that’ll be fun, too. The courts might unfreeze just enough money for a reasonable criminal defense. They will not give you millions of dollars to buy legal talent. When your cut-rate attorney sees the trial going sour, he’ll try to plead you out on the weaker case, the murder for hire, one death – Willy Roy Boyd. You’d be Nedda’s age when you got out of prison, but you’d be alive. Here’s the snag. Once the trial has started and all the facts are out, the DA can’t accept a plea on a lesser charge. He’s a political animal – it’s an election year – the voters would crucify him. You see the beauty of it, Bitty? You won’t plea-bargain until your case is sinking. But the DA can’t settle for less than mass murder and the death penalty, not if he’s winning. And – he – can’t – lose.“

  The detective slung a coat over one arm, then picked up the suitcase of diaries. „We have to go now.“ She consulted a pocket watch. „You’ll be arraigned tonight. What’s your plea?“

  This was the showdown or at least a countdown of sorts, for Bitty was tensing her body as Mallory tapped off the passing seconds with the toe of one shoe.

  „Time’s up.“

  The electric lights went out, leaving only the illumination from the skylight dome. Bright motes of dust swirled around Mallory, catching light and endowing her with a cylindrical aura. As the detective moved forward, Bitty backed out of the room, slowly retreating to the foyer, where the body of the dead bird was staked to the wall, but all she could see was the detective crossing the front room, coming closer and growing in height and mass with each footfall.

  Oddly enough, a stone weight was rising from Bitty’s breast. Her nerves had calmed, and she could breathe more easily. She called out to Mallory, almost defiant, „You lied to me! This case was personal, wasn’t it?“

  Mallory had been all too right about one thing: Bitty had no intention of pleading guilty to any charge. Done with hysterics, she was coolly plotting the destruction of the case against her, all circumstantial evidence. And, if she could not win at trial, she would win on appeal. If she confessed, all was lost. Her last thought was that the detective could read her mind and sense the rebirth of hope.

  The suitcase dropped from Mallory’s hand to the floor.

  Bitty knew this moment would be burned into memory until the day she died. Years from now, she might recall the angry young avenger standing there with a great sword in her right hand. And perhaps that peculiar fantasy would arise from a glint of gunmetal in the shoulder holster – that coupled with this stunning sight of Mallory with eyes burning bright and hair disheveled, as if she had just stepped from the whirlwind.

  Only now, as the last few steps between them were closing, did Bitty understand that this case was indeed a personal matter to Mallory, that some great harm had been done to this young woman, deep damage beyond the evidence of her broken left hand. Oh, her eyes – that fixed stare, a cat’s dare for the mouse to move, even to twitch. And the gun in her right hand was on the rise.

  BANG!

  Chapter 13

  LIEUTENANT COFFEY SAT IN A COP BAR ON GREENE STREET, downing straight shots of bourbon with his senior detective. The mood was not celebratory, though Riker believed that Mallory would never be punished for what she had done.

  The lieutenant lifted his head to pose a question, one that could only
be asked at that point of inebriation where he had hopes of forgetting the answer by the time his hangover kicked in. „What the hell happened? The real story?“

  „What’d Buchanan tell you?“

  „I never asked for his version. I want yours“

  „Okay.“ Since the lieutenant was buying, Riker ordered another round. „That morning, we laid it all out for the district attorney, more evidence than he’s ever seen for one case – a ton of documentation. Buchanan didn’t care. He refused to prosecute Bitty Smyth. Little coward. He was actually afraid to risk losing the biggest case of his career – in an election year. Can you beat that? After all this work, what does he say to us? He says it’s all circumstantial.“

  „He was right,“ said Coffey.

  Riker ignored this because it was true. „So Mallory says the whole package is enough to bury Bitty Smyth. Buchanan says no. He says juries are too stupid to follow her evidence. It would be a fight just to keep ‘em awake long enough to present the case.“

  „The man’s right again,“ said Coffey.

  „So Mallory asks him, point blank, ‘What’s it gonna take?’ Then Buchanan says, ‘Bring me a full confession.’“ Riker slammed the flat of his hand on the bar. „And that’s exactly what she did. That afternoon, we went to Winter House to wire the place for sound.“

  „I don’t remember listening to any tapes, Riker.“

  „Never got a chance to plant the mikes. Bitty showed up as soon as the last cop car pulled away from the house.“ In other words, no tape was better than an edited tape. He did not hold with the idea of tampering with evidence.

  After a go-around with Bitty Smyth, the detectives had returned to the DA’s office and handed the woman’s confession to Buchanan along with the terms of a plea bargain.

  „And then,“ said Riker, „Buchanan really pushed his luck. He told us he wouldn’t accept the confession. Said it was probably obtained under duress. That pompous little weasel never even talked to Bitty Smyth. He didn’t know squat.“

  „Was he right?“

  Riker was selective in his deafness. Timing was so important tonight. „Well, the DA went back on a solid deal.“ The detective leaned toward his commanding officer. „This is just between us, right?“

  Jack Coffey nodded his understanding, and this was his promise, his seal of silence.

  Half of the battle for Mallory’s job security was won.

  „Good,“ said Riker. „So Mallory staked the confession to the DA’s desk with an ice pick.“ He averted his eyes from the lieutenant’s startled face as he added, on a point of historical interest, „It was the same pick that was used in the Winter House Massacre.“ Now he turned back to Coffey and smiled. „It was a gift.“

  In a sudden change of heart – inspiration of cowardice – District Attorney Buchanan had accepted the confession, electing to follow that time-honored credo: never make an enemy of a psycho cop. And, bonus, the little man had wet his pants, further guaranteeing that what had happened in that room would never leave that room. Riker had not enjoyed any of this. Mallory had scared the hell out of him, too, and he had almost felt sorry for a lawyer. Sometimes, in unguarded moments, he forgot that she was always dangerous – and more so now that she was wounded. The cast on her hand broke his heart.

  How much more should he disclose to Jack Coffey before he requested a long leave of absence for his partner? And which one of them would take Mallory’s gun away from her?

  „Wait, Riker. Back up. How did Mallory get that confession? You skipped over that part.“

  Stalling for time and just the right words, Riker checked his watch. A police transport would be en route to the women’s prison by now. The case had ended without a trial, only Bitty’s anticlimactic confession in open court. She had pleaded guilty to a charge of murder for hire and four counts of manslaughter, all sentences to run concurrently. The only proviso of the plea bargain had been that Mallory not be present during the proceedings. „Bitty Smyth got a better deal than she deserved.“

  „That may be,“ said Coffey, „but why did she waive her right to a trial? No, wait – I got a better question. What did Mallory do to that woman?“

  „Nothing.“ Riker was feigning indignation, and he must be doing it badly; the boss was still waiting on his answer. How should he put this? As if he had just recalled some minor detail, he said, „Well, she shot the head off a dead bird.“ Riker was quick to raise his right arm in the gesture of an oath. „My hand to God, that’s all she did. The kid never even yelled at Bitty Smyth.“

  „So Mallory spent a bullet. Where’d it go?“

  „It’s not in the wall anymore. You can’t even tell where the hole was.“

  „And the headless bird?“

  „It went to swim with the fishes in the East River.“ Of course, that would depend on the vagaries of plumbing and sewage routes; Mallory had flushed the bird down a toilet.

  This evening, Charles Butler was dressed and showered, but not shaved; his cleaning woman had hidden the razor.

  Mrs. Ortega watched her employer pulling volumes from his library shelves. He called them guidebooks for the road.

  „Where yagoin’?“

  „Not every journey involves leaving the house,“ he said.

  She perused a volume by Hermann Hesse, but found the print too dense for her taste. „Me, I like a good fast read,“ she said, „with lots of white space on the page.“

  He ran one finger down a row of titles on a lower shelf, plucked out three novels and handed them to her. „Here, gifts, first-edition Hemingways. I think you’ll like them.“

  She set them on top of her cleaning cart, then turned back to his own short stack. „I don’t get it. If you’ve already read them, what good are they?“

  Mrs. Ortega could wait all day for an answer to that one. Charles Butler’s eyes had gone all strange as he focused on some point above her head and behind her. She turned around to see Mallory standing just inside the door.

  Spooky kid – quiet as a cat.

  One icy glance from Mallory told the cleaning woman that she was dismissed from this babysitting job, and Mrs. Ortega was glad to go. She was sometimes afflicted with magical thinking from the Irish side of her family; over a passage of days, she had sensed a change in the very air of this apartment; it was thickening with sadness, and she could hardly breathe.

  Charles Butler sat beside Mallory as she drove along Central Park West.

  She had not yet convinced him that he was not responsible for Nedda Winter’s death, but she had finally succeeded in getting him out of the house. They were going on a field trip to see the radio. Shock therapy.

  The man was badly broken. His eyes had a shattered look, and other fracture lines were showing in his face and in his rambling speech. Somehow she must put him back together again without any helpful manuals on human frailty. His world was more fragile than she knew.

  Charles’s luck with parking spaces was riding with her tonight. She pulled up to the curb in front of Winter House. He was still going on and on about the radio when they climbed the steps to the front door. Why did he have to pick that one thing to obsess about?

  Mallory led the way into the house. He was beside her in the foyer as she trained her flashlight on the two silver control panels by the door. „This one is for the security alarm. And this one is for the sound system. There’s a panel just like it in every room. It works the same way yours does.“ She tapped the built-in speaker. „The music you heard after the dinner party – when you and Nedda were sitting outside on the steps? It came from here.“

  „No, I told you – Nedda couldn’t work this thing, and neither could I. She played the old radio in the front room.“

  „All right, let’s have a look.“ Mallory took him by the hand and led him across the foyer threshold, preceded by the beam of her flashlight. She pulled the smoke-stained drapes aside, allowing the light of streetlamps into the room, and she opened the front windows to cut the smell of mildew with cl
ean, cold air.

  Charles was staring at the old-fashioned radio.

  Mallory pulled it away from the front wall and turned it around to expose a rotted backing with holes in it. Charles moved closer as she used a metal nail file to undo the screws. She removed the back panel to expose the innards: another century’s technology of cracked glass tubes, frayed wires and loose connections. There were also cobwebs made by generations of spiders spinning their homes inside this antique box. The bones and skull of a long-dead mouse completed the evidence of a nonworking radio.

  And now Mallory deconstructed this tiny crime scene for Charles. „Twenty or thirty years ago, this mouse took a hit of current from an exposed wire. It made him wild. He batted around in the dark and broke these tubes. Probably bled out on the broken glass. You see? This radio has been useless for a very long time. The one in Nedda’s room is in worse shape. It doesn’t even have a cord.“

  „No, it’s a trick. This is a different radio.“

  Mallory shook her head, and waited for his good mind to kick back into gear, to shake out the dust of deep depression and function logically once more.

  „Butyou heard a radio the night of the fire,“ said Charles, „and no one has questioned your sanity.“

  „Well, I know it wasn’t this one. Even if this radio had been in working condition, Bitty pulled out all the fuses that night – no electricity. What I heard was probably a small portable. It must’ve been destroyed in the fire.“

  He seemed so suspicious now. Did he know she was lying? No, there was also doubt in his face. Her lie was making sense to him. Apparently, Charles did believe in the rules governing electricity.