The policeman in that squad car on the back road would come rushing over the fence and run toward the dining room. The television crew, too. When they were all past the pool house Bruno would leave by the back door and be over the fence in seconds.
It would take him only four minutes to jog to the public parking lot at the train station. The lot was only a block from the room he was sitting in right now.
He had chosen the car he would steal, a Lexus station wagon whose owner parked it at seven every morning to get on the seven-fifteen train to Manhattan.
Bruno would be driving away before they had even figured out where the shot had come from.
The owner wouldn’t report the car missing until Thursday evening.
Bruno was so busy going over his plan that he did not even realize his coffee cup was empty.
What were the possibilities of failure?
Of course there were a few. A policeman might not be able to scale the fence. In that case he’d be sure to challenge me, Bruno thought. I don’t want to have to shoot him. The noise would bring the other cop back. But if I used the butt of the rifle, I’d have all the time I need…
The element of surprise, the confusion over Laurie slumping over, blood beginning to pour from her head-all of this would work in his favor.
I might be caught, Bruno admitted to himself, and that would permanently end any hope of eliminating Timmy. But if I get away with it, I’ll take care of him fast. My luck won’t hold out forever.
By hacking into Leo Farley’s computer, Bruno knew that Timmy was at camp, and even knew which tent he was in and every detail of its layout. But even if he could get into the camp during the night and kidnap Timmy, Laurie would be notified in minutes, and he’d never be able to get near her. Timmy had to come second.
Bruno shrugged. He was sure that old lady had heard his threat, “Your mother’s next, then it’s your turn.” He’d have to stick to that plan.
He hadn’t checked Leo’s phone since yesterday, not that Leo had much to say to anyone.
Bruno listened to the recording of Leo’s call to the police chief last night. Leo Farley was in Mount Sinai Hospital in intensive care.
Bruno began to consider the possibilities this suggested.
Then he began to smile.
Of course, of course, it would work. It would have to work. He could pull it off.
When Laurie was at the farewell breakfast, Bruno would come out of the pool house holding Timmy’s hand-and pointing a gun at his head.
40
Regina’s hands were trembling so violently that she could hardly pull the T-shirt over her head. Laurie Moran had told them to dress simply. She had had replicas made of the outfits they had been wearing when the police arrived after Betsy’s body was found. They had handed over their pajamas for evidence and been asked to wait in the den until they could be questioned.
Regina had been wearing a long-sleeved red T-shirt and jeans. The thought of wearing a similar outfit now was upsetting. She felt as if all the protective layers she had built around herself over twenty years were being peeled away.
Just thinking about that outfit made her remember how they had all sat huddled together, not allowed to go into the kitchen even to get a cup of coffee or a piece of toast. Jane, too, had been in the den with them, despite pleading to be allowed to go in the ambulance with Mr. Powell to the hospital.
Who had taken her father’s suicide note from her pocketbook? And what would that person do with it?
If the police found it, they could arrest her for taking the letter from her father’s body. She knew they always suspected that if he’d written a note, she’d taken it. She had lied over and over to them when they were investigating his death. Whoever had the note now could provide the police with everything they needed to indict her for Betsy’s murder.
Regina’s eyes filled with tears.
Her nineteen-year-old son, Zach, had had the brains to destroy the copy she made of the note and had tried to find the original, then begged her not to carry it with her.
What would it do to his life if she were arrested and indicted for Betsy’s death?
She thought of the little boy who would come to the real estate office after school when he didn’t have practice for one of his sports and want to help her by folding and mailing ads for the agency to the local communities. He was always thrilled when one of the ads resulted in a listing. They’d always been close. She knew how lucky she was on that count.
When Regina’s breakfast arrived, she tried to drink the coffee and eat a bite of the croissant, but it stuck in her throat.
You’ve got to get a grip on yourself, she thought. If you look too nervous when that lawyer, Alex Buckley, interviews you, you’ll only make things worse.
Please, God, she thought, let me be able to pull it off. The phone rang. The car was here to take her to the Powell estate.
“I’ll be right down,” she said, unable to conceal the quiver in her voice.
Alison did not go back to sleep after the sleepwalking incident. Rod felt her tossing and turning in bed and finally put his arm around her and drew her close to him.
“Alie, you’ve got to keep reminding yourself that you were sleepwalking that night. Even if you believe you were in Betsy’s room, it doesn’t mean that memory is accurate.”
“I was there. She kept a low night-light on. I even remember seeing the earring sparkling on the floor. Rod, if I had picked it up, my fingerprints would have been on it.”
“But you didn’t pick it up,” Rod said soothingly. “Alie, you’ve got to stop thinking like that. When you’re in front of the camera, you’ve got to just tell what you know-which is nothing. You heard Jane scream and rushed to the bedroom with the others. Like the others, you were shocked. When you’re interviewed, just keep saying ‘the others’ and you’ll be all right. And remind yourself that the reason you’re doing this program is because you want to have the money to go to medical school. What is it I’ve been telling you since you got the chance to go back to school?”
“That one day you’ll be calling me the new Madame Curie,” Alison whispered.
“Correct. Now go back to sleep.”
But even though she stopped twisting and turning, Alison did not go back to sleep. When the alarm went off at seven o’clock, she was already showered and dressed in the slacks and polo shirt that she would soon be exchanging for the T-shirt and jeans she had worn the morning after Betsy Powell’s murder.
42
Laurie, Jerry, and Grace arrived at the Powell estate a few minutes after the crew, which included a hairdresser, makeup artist, and wardrobe assistant this morning. Two new vans were on the set for their use-one to serve as a dressing room, the other for hair and makeup for those who would be on camera.
Laurie had worked well with all three crew members before. “The first scene we’re shooting will be of the four graduates and the housekeeper in the clothes they put on after the body was discovered. The makeup should be light, because they wouldn’t have had the time or inclination to put any on. We have a picture taken that morning by the police. Study it, then try to make them look the way they looked twenty years ago. Obviously they don’t have the long hair, but they’ve all aged very well.”
Meg Miller, the makeup artist, walked over to the window of the van to get a better look at the photograph. “I can tell you this, Laurie: they all look scared to death.”
“I agree,” Laurie said. “My job is to find out why. Of course you’d expect that they would look shocked and grief-stricken, but why do they all look so fearful? If Betsy was killed by an intruder, then what are they afraid of?”