Your Honor, Mrs. McDonalds attorney has offered Mrs. McDonalds house as security for her appearance, and the state has no objection to that. As you may know, the circumstances around this particular incident could lead to a change in the charges against Mrs. McDonald. ..
And a while later, it was all done. Audrey waited as Glass talked to the assistant county attorney over a few details, then said, Weve got to sign the papers and then Im going to talk to the press. If I dont, theyll be parked outside your house, hassling you…
She liked that, the press, though her face was determinedly grim.
… I dont really expect you to say anything, Glass was saying.
Ill talk to them, if that will keep them away, Audrey said.
THE PRESS CAUGHT THEM OUTSIDE THE COURTHOUSE, at the curb, where Helen Bell was waiting in her car. Glass made a short speech about spousal abuse, said he anticipatedthat all charges would be dropped, then asked Audrey if she wished to answer questions.
She bobbed her head. Did you kill your husband, Mrs. McDonald, a woman reporter blurted.
She bobbed her head again. Yes, she said weakly. I couldnt… I couldnt… He was hurting me so bad… She touched the bandage on her scalp and peered at the camera lens. Oh, God… A tear trickled down her cheek. God, I miss him. Im so sorry…
Why do you miss him?
He was my husband, she wailed. I wish he could come back… But he cant. She seized Glasss arm. I cant… She gasped.
All right, all right, Glass said. Shes really weak. Shes got to go. Im pleading with you all. If you have any sensitivity, leave her alone.
Mrs. McDonald…
Then she was in the car and Helen was driving them away. My God, Helen said. My God, Audrey…
Just take me home.
No, no. Youre coming to my place.
No. I want to go home, Audrey said. Helen, please dont argue with me. Just take me home. Please. I just want to turn off the phones and get some sleep.
AND BACK AT THE COURTHOUSE, LUCAS SAID TO Glass, Quite a performance.
Glass was staring after Helen Bells car, turned to Lucas and said, The last thing I expected.
You didnt prep her?
Hell, no. I figured she was such a sad sack, we couldnt lose. I didnt think we was gonna get Greta Garbo. Did you see that tear?
I didnt get that close.
A real tear, Glass marveled. Ran right down her cheek, and it was the cheek that was turned toward Channel Three. Tell you what, Lucasif I lose this case, Im gonna want to borrow one of your guns, so I can shoot myself.
THE HOUSE WAS SILENT: AUDREY ENTERED, LISTENING for the footfalls of Wilsons ghost. She heard creaks and cracking that she hadnt heard beforebut shed never before listened. Helen came in behind her, tentatively. Youre sure youll be okay?
Ill be okay, Audrey said, peering around. The police had been through the place, and though they hadnt been deliberately messy, the house looked… disheveled. I hope the police didnt steal anything.
Do you want me to come over tonight?
No… no. Im going to take a couple of pills and try to sleep. I just really need to sleep, I havent slept since before… before
…
Okay. If youre sure youll be all right.
Do you, uh… You used to take Prozac, Audrey said. Do you still use that?
Well, sure. Could hardly get along without it, Helen said.
Do you think it would help? In the next few days? Helen shook her head. I dont think its for your kind of problem, honestly. I could give you a few and you could try them, but I think a doctor could give you something better.
Maybe if I could just try a couple. If I dont sleep tonight…
Sure. Well talk tomorrow.
When Helen was gone, Audrey prowled through the house, already planning: shed bundle up his suits, dump them at Goodwill and get a tax deduction. She got a notepad and wrote: ACCOUNTANT/Taxes and Deductions, and under that, Suits. Wilson had all kinds of crap shed want to get rid of, starting with that XK-E. She wrote Jag under Suits. And he had a whole wall full of bullshit awards and plaqueschairman of this charity in 1994, director of that community effort in 1997. All worthless: straight into the garbage can, she thought.
So much to do.
Audrey really did hurt from Wilsons beating, and from her own enhancements to the damage. The scalp wound, in particular, felt tight, like a banjo head, its edges seeming to pull against the stitches. After half an hour of cruising through the house, she went up to the bedroom, set the alarm clock for nineP. M., and tried to sleep.
But sleep, she found, wouldnt come easily. Too many images in her head, a mix of plans and memories. If Wilson had only landed the chairmanship, none of this would have happened. Shed believed in him from the start, and the belief had only begun to falter after Kresge got the top job six years earlier. Kresge was a technocrat, and brought in other technocrats like Bone and Robles. They had no respect for family name, for fortune, for breeding or society. All they knew was how to make money. Wilson, running the mortgage division, which had always been one of the pillars of the bank, was suddenly out on a limb.
She didnt know that sleep had come, but it must have. The clock went off: she sat up, a bit groggy, realized that the room was dark. She groped around the bedstand, found the clock, and silenced the alarm. Then she touched the light and swung out of bed.
A little tension now. She went straight to the shower and stood under it, breathing deeply, flexing the muscles in her back and shoulders. Stiff. When she got out of the shower, she downed four ibuprofen tablets, then dressed: black slacks, a deep red sweater, and a dark blue jacket over the sweater. She found a pair of brown cotton gardening gloves, and pulled them on. The best she could do for nighttime camouflage. Now for a weapon.
The police had been all through the house, but she remembered that when the closet rod broke in the front closet a year or so earlier, Wilson had tossed the broken dowel rod up in the rafters of the yard shed, where it lay with other scrap wood. She found a flashlight in the kitchen, let herself out the back, and walked in the dark to the shed. Inside, she turned the flash on. She could see the scrap wood overhead, but couldnt reach it. The lawn tractor wasthere, and she stood on the seat, stretched to push the wood around, and saw the two pieces of the dowel rolling to one side. She got both of them down. One was a little more than six feet long, including the split; the other a little more than two feet long, including the sharp split end.
She carried them both back to the house in the dark, and inside the porch gave the shorter of the two pieces a test swing. A little lighter than a baseball bat, but it swung just as well. Wearing the gloves, she rubbed both of them down with WD-40, eliminating any fingerprints.
In the garage, she put both pieces in Wilsons Buick, then climbed on top of the car hood, pulled the cover off the light on the garage door opener, and unscrewed the lightbulb. She climbed down from the car and put the bulb on the passenger seat.
Ready. She took a deep breath, started the car, pushed the garage door opener. The door came up, but no light came on. She backed out of the garage, lights out, then rolled down the long driveway to the street. The houses were far enough apart, and the street dark enough, that she should be able to get out without being seen… a calculated risk. If anyone saw her driving without lights, theyd remember it. A risk shed take. She rolled into the street, drove a hundred feet, and turned on the lights. Shed gotten away with it, she thought.
On the south side of Minneapolis, she stopped in a beatup industrial area and threw the longer of the two pieces of dowel rod into a pile of trash; the other waited beside the passenger seat.