“Judge commuted his sentence,” I said.
“So.”
“So?”
“It’s bullshit.”
“No,” I said with a smile, “it’s not.”
“It goddamn sure is,” he said, getting to his feet aggressively.
Detective King got quickly out of his chair and put his hand on the chief’s chest as a precaution to keep the chief from physically attacking me, which he was close to doing.
“Look,” I said, “I know you lost your son and daughter-in-law, and I’m sorry for your...”
“She was nothing but a goddamn tramp,” he said with red face. “A goddamn tramp.”
Allie came out the door with a suitcase in her hand, looking at me like she had just seen a ghost. She glanced to the chief briefly and came down the steps in a hurry.
She hooked her arm in mine and said, “Come on, Everett.”
I moved off with Allie as she practically dragged me away from the chief and Detective King.
I looked to her as we crossed the street in a hurry and tears were running down her cheeks.
“What is it, Allie?” I said. “What’s wrong?”
Allie pulled me around the corner and we walked a ways farther until we got to an alley. Then she pulled me into the alley.
“What is it, Allie?”
She let go of me and continued to walk in the alley, and when she was ten feet in front of me she turned on me and said, “She did it.”
“What?”
“She killed the woman in Denver.”
“What?”
“Daphne,” she said. “She did it, Everett.”
Allie dropped to her knees and opened the suitcase. Inside the case were tubes of oil paints, brushes, and a tintype photograph of Bloom’s Inn.
75
Though it was not direct proof, it was proof enough that Daphne was in part responsible for the death of Ruth Ann Messenger. Allie did not accompany me to the hospital, nor did I go with Virgil. I went alone. I wanted to go alone. When I entered her room she was sitting up in bed smiling, and sitting with her, with his back to the door, was Bill Black. He turned and smiled at me.
“Howdy,” Black said.
I nodded a bit.
“Everett,” she said, “I’m so happy to see you today. Happy Independence Day.”
Black’s big frame blocked Daphne’s view of the suitcase I held in my hand.
“Guess what?” she said.
“What?”
“Bill has asked me to marry him,” she said.
Black nodded and looked back to me and smiled.
“I was stupid enough to let her get away before,” he said. “Not this time, though.”
“And you have accepted?”
She smiled.
“I have,” she said.
I moved into the room, and when I did she saw the case in my hand. She stared at it as if I were holding something dead.
“No,” she said, and shook her head.
“No what?” I said.
She stared at the case for a moment longer, then looked to Black. Black looked to the case, then looked to me.
“What?” he said with a grin.
I set the suitcase on the foot of the bed and Daphne recoiled like the thing that was dead was now alive.
“Found this in your room,” I said. “In your closet.”
“No,” she said.
“Yes,” I said.
She started to shake her head back and forth like a child refusing to listen to her parents. Then tears started to fall from her eyes.
“What’s... what’s going on?” Black said.
“I won’t let you do this,” she said. “I won’t let you do this. I won’t let you do this.”
“I didn’t do anything, Daphne,” I said.
“What?” Black said. “What is it?”
“This is your doing, Daphne,” I said.
“What’s going on here?” he said, and reached for the suitcase.
“No!” Daphne screamed, and kicked the suitcase off the foot of the bed. It hit the wall next to the bed and opened, spilling the contents across the floor.
Black stood up and moved around the footboard to see the paints and brushes. He looked to me with a confused look on his face.
I walked to the case, bent down, and picked up the tintype photograph of Bloom’s Inn and handed it to Black.
“You might want to reconsider that proposal,” I said.
Black shook his head in disbelief and looked to Daphne.
“You?”
She smiled.
“It’s not what you think, sweetie,” she said.
Black looked to me.
“I just want to know if you did this alone,” I said.
“Why,” she said, “I don’t know what you are talking about.”
“You did this?” Black said.
“No, sweetie,” she said.
“You did,” he said. “Didn’t you?”
She stared blankly at Black but said nothing. Then she backed up, curled into a ball at the headboard, and cowered like she was about to be beat.
Black looked to me slowly and said, “My God.”
I moved toward her, and her eyes were wide with fear. She turned her head to the side but remained looking at me out of the corner of her eye.
“Daphne,” I said.
She cocked her head a little.
“Yes, Daddy,” she said.
I moved closer and she smiled.
“Daphne?”
She looked away.
“Daphne?”
She did not respond. She stared off, looking at nothing. It was now very clear to both Black and me that she was not well.
Black stared at her, but she did not look at him. She kept looking away, staring at nothing. He shook his head and moved the chair back away from the bed and sat.
“Daphne?” he said.
She did not respond.
“Are you not listening?”
She did not respond.
Black shook his head.
“My God,” he said.
I moved around to the other side of the bed, in the direction she was staring. I moved close to her and it was clear she was in some kind of shock. I looked to Black and he shook his head.
“Before,” he said, “I met this beautiful woman, I never knew anyone brighter, smarter, or kinder... but then there was always... I don’t know, something unusual. There were glimpses of someone other than her, within her, someone other than the bright, smart, and kind woman I got to know and love. I never was certain why I moved away from her but I knew there was something...”
“You left her?” I said.
He nodded and leaned over with his elbows on his knees and stared at the floor.
“I’d seen this before. Not like this, not this bad, but some. I also sensed a grave jealousy within her, but she never really, truly acknowledged it or acted out about it...”
“Think she’s done that now,” I said.
76
A tiny light whistled up high into the dark night, followed by an astounding kaleidoscope of bright red, white, and blue light that exploded in the night sky.
“Oh, my,” Allie said.
An enormous boom immediately followed.
“Oh!” Allie said, placing her hand to her chest. “That was loud.”
“Sure was,” Valentine said.
“So interesting how the boom happens after,” she said.
“Happens at the same time, Allie,” Valentine said. “Just sound travels a hell of a lot slower than light.”
Virgil, Allie, Valentine, and I were sitting on the front porch of Virgil and Allie’s house, watching the fireworks display that was being put on by Pritchard’s grand opening of his casino.
Earlier in the day, after Daphne had rested from her confrontation with me, and her subsequent mental lapse, she came to, not really remembering everything that had happened really clearly, but remembering enough.
Black and Pritchard remained with her throughout the afternoon as we made arrangements with the Denver contingent to take her back to Denver, where she would be charged with the murder of Ruth Ann Messenger.