The attic was four flights up. At some time it had been partitioned to serve as a separate apartment; Mrs. Voss was locked in the tiny room that had once been the kitchen. The key was in the lock, turned sideways so that Mrs. Voss couldn’t push it out with a hairpin and maneuver it through the crack at the bottom of the door.
Charlotte opened the door. Mrs. Voss stopped in the middle of a scream, her mouth gaping, both hands clutching at her throat. She was sitting on the floor with her legs sprawled out in front of her. Her skirt was slit to the hip where she’d torn at it in her frenzy. A little red Christmas candle was burning in one corner of the room — the light bulb had been removed from the ceiling months or years ago, and tiny house spiders lived like kings in the empty socket.
“I didn’t have nothing to do with it!” Mrs. Voss shrieked. “I didn’t have nothing to do with anything! I didn’t even hear nothing, I didn’t, I didn’t!”
“Of course you didn’t,” Charlotte said. “Of...”
“They wouldn’t let me go along, they wouldn’t take me, they locked me here to die!” She began beating the floor with her fists and shaking her head back and forth. The candle flame flickered, leaning away as if in fright. “They said I talked too much, I can’t keep my mouth shut. They said I got hysterical alla time. Me, me, me, hysterical!” She drew a long shuddering breath. “They wouldn’t take me along.”
“I can’t understand you when you shout like that,” Charlotte said softly. “No one’s going to hurt you. Take it easy.”
“They said I got hysterical alla time. I don’t, I don’t! I never did!”
“Easy now.” She turned to Lewis who had remained outside the door. “There’s some brandy in my car. Would you get it?”
“And leave you here alone with...”
“Of course. Mrs. Voss realizes that I’m her friend, I’m going to help her.”
“Yes,” Mrs. Voss sobbed. “Yes, yes! You’re my friend! You’re my friend!”
Tears spurted out of her eyes as if something had suddenly smashed inside her. Charlotte knelt down and put her arm around the woman’s shoulders. She could hear Lewis going down the stairs, very swiftly, as if he was glad to get away.
“I didn’t have nothing to do with it, I didn’t.” She dabbed her eyes with the hem of her torn skirt. Even after all her shouting and weeping, her face was still white. “They can’t put me in jail. I’d die if I was put in jail. I’m sick anyways, I’m sick.”
“I know.”
“You can see in my face I’m sick. Maybe I’m going to die, anyways.”
“That’s nonsense. You need some good, nourishing food, and a nice rest in the hospital.”
“No, no, I’m scared of hospitals. I never been in one.”
“That’s why you’re scared... Here, hold onto my arm and well go downstairs.”
Mrs. Voss was still breathing heavily and rapidly, but she was no longer hysterical. She had enough presence of mind to remind Charlotte to blow out the candle before they went downstairs.
In the huge barren living room Mrs. Voss lay down on the couch and Charlotte took off her coat and wrapped it around Mrs. Voss’s legs.
“What happened that you had nothing to do with?” she asked.
“I don’t know nothing.”
“Yes, you do. I can’t help you if you won’t tell me anything.”
“They was fighting, they was all arguing down in the kitchen after I went upstairs.”
“Who was?”
“Eddie and Clarence and the old man.”
“Tiddles?”
“Yes, Tiddles.”
“What were they arguing about?”
“A purse. Something about a purse.”
Lewis returned with the brandy and Charlotte mixed an ounce of it in half a tumbler of water. She wasn’t sure what effect brandy would have on Mrs. Voss; too much, undiluted, might send her back into hysterics.
“They were arguing,” Charlotte said, “and then what?”
Mrs. Voss began to cry again, softly, exhaustedly. “Oh, I can’t tell. I don’t know.”
“Something happened.”
“I think — I think Tiddles — died.”
“Do you mean they killed him?”
“No — oh, I don’t know. I didn’t see. I just know there was blood, a lot of blood. I heard Eddie on the porch talking about it, he’s ascared of blood. He kept saying they got to wash it off. I started to come downstairs to see what’d happened, only Clarence saw me. That’s when they took me up to the attic and locked me in. They wouldn’t take me along, they said I couldn’t keep my tonsils from flapping. ‘Good-bye, sweetheart,’ Clarence says, ‘good-bye sweetheart, it’s been hell knowing you.’ ” She turned her face away and pressed it against the brown mohair upholstery to hide her shame and humiliation.
Lewis had gone out into the hall again. Charlotte could hear him walking around on the creaking floor, walking and walking, like a man exploring the possibilities of escape from a cell.
Charlotte said, “What makes you think Tiddles is dead?”
“The quiet. They was all arguing in the kitchen first, afterwards on the porch. And then suddenly there was a quiet, a long, dead quiet before Eddie started to talk about the blood and washing it off with a hose. That’s when I started to come downstairs and Clarence heard me. ‘Something has come up,’ he says, ‘Eddie and me are going on a little trip.’ ”
“Where do you think they went?”
“Somewheres in Eddie’s car, I don’t know where. Maybe they took the old man away.”
“Maybe.”
“I’m tired, I’m so tired.”
“I know. I’ll see what can be done.”
She found the phone in the dining room and dialed the County Hospital. When she had finished talking she went out into the hall. Lewis was sitting on the bottom step of the staircase rolling an unlighted cigarette between his fingers. He looked grimly amused, as if it had just occurred to him how funny it was that he, Lewis Ballard, should be in such a place.
“Now what?” he said.
“I though you could drive Mrs. Voss out to the County General. They’re expecting you...”
“Why me?”
“I have to go to the police. I think there’s been a murder and it’s better if you stay out of it entirely.” He was no longer amused, no longer anything but frightened. He said, “Christ,” and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand.
“You needn’t come into the picture at all,” Charlotte said, keeping her voice low so that Mrs. Voss wouldn’t overhear. “I’ll tell them that I came here alone and found Mrs. Voss locked up and hysterical and that I phoned a friend to come and drive her to the hospital.”
“Your story’s not going to match hers.”
“She’s confused. She may not even remember that we came here together.”
“I hope to God not.”
“Take her around to the back of the hospital — there’s a door with ‘emergency’ printed on it. The doctor on duty is a friend of mine. I told him what to do. Just drive her there. Don’t stay, get home as fast as you can.”
“Christ.”
She went back into the sitting room and told Mrs. Voss that she was going to be driven to the hospital.
“I don’t want to go,” Mrs. Voss moaned. “No. I’m scared.”
“There’s nothing to be afraid of. You’ll have a good sleep tonight and tomorrow morning I’ll come in to see you. We’ll try and get you back to normal again.”
Lewis brought his car around to the front of the house and he and Charlotte half carried Mrs. Voss out and put her in the back seat.
Mrs. Voss was weeping again, hiding her face with her hands. Good-bye sweetheart.
11
When the car was out of sight she went back into the house and called Easter. The phone rang eight or nine times before he answered.