He was so disappointing, an unworthy opponent who made so small a noise in the world, he had failed to wake the cat.
The camera was rolling on to the music of cat snores and Kipling sobs. With a critical eye, Mallory looked at both her hogtied trophy and her weak criminal case. An assault on a police officer was not hard evidence for murder. There were loose ends to be tied, better evidence to be got, something with more weight for a DA who chickened on every case with less than a complete set of prints and a smoking gun in evidence.
Whatever she might have to do, Kipling wasn’t going to get away with this.
‘Stop crying. It’s not like I really hurt you. What did you do with my gun?’
But he would not stop crying, and she was not taking much satisfaction in this.
She lifted her head and turned toward the door with the first sound of metal on metal. The door was being unlocked. Charles? No, it couldn’t be.
It wasn’t.
Someone else was standing in the foyer, alone but for the long shadow extending back into the outer corridor.
Now this was more like it. This was walking death.
She was staring into mirrors of her own eyes above the barrel of her stolen.357 revolver. ‘Murder is the best game, isn’t it?’
‘Yes it is,’ said Justin Riccalo, leveling the gun at her head. Now he pulled the barrel up slightly. ‘Oh, that’s wrong, isn’t it? You’re supposed to aim for the widest part of the body.’ And now the barrel dropped to the level of her chest, her heart.
Perversely, she smiled. He didn’t like that. She knew he wouldn’t.
‘Kill the bitch!’ yelled Kipling, not sobbing any more but frantic in the eyes.
‘All women are bitches,’ said the boy in the monotone of a litany.
‘Yes, yes, they are, all of them,’ said Kipling with the fervour of a television evangelist playing the crowd. ‘Kill her now!’
‘Lighten up, you idiot,’ said Mallory to the man at her feet. ‘He’s going to kill you next. I thought you understood that.’
Kipling’s mouth hung open, and no more words came out.
All the words she heard were toward the back of her mind where Markowitz lived with Helen. Get him to talk to you, kid, said a memory with a Brooklyn accent.
‘Tell me, Justin, what kind of bird did you kill to make the bloody X on my door?’
‘It was a pigeon,’ said Justin with a hint of a query at the end of his words.
‘I love all the little details,’ said Mallory. ‘How did you rig the glass of water in the kitchen?’
Prime the pump. get him talking, and he won’t be able to stop.
Justin smiled. ‘I set the glass near the edge of the table, and then I put pennies under the back legs to make it slant, but only a little. The glass was leveled on a sliver of ice. When the ice melted, the glass crashed and the evidence was gone.’
He looked up at her with the expectation of being petted and admired for this.
‘Nice job, Justin. Same thing with the vase?’
‘Yes, it had to be something with water to explain away the slick of the melted ice.’
‘I thought your best trick was the knife in the target. You even fooled Charles, and that’s not easy. I’m betting you rigged the spring load.’
‘Yes. I was surprised to see that old carnival prop in the basement. As you may have guessed, I have a passing interest in magic. The spring was easy. It was old. You could see the rust, even in bad light. After I pulled the spring over the edge of a gear, I only had to keep Mr Butler talking until it broke and released the fake knife.’
‘Then later, you went back to the cellar and pushed the fake blade back into the target compartment, right? Then you stuck one of the real knives into the face of the target.’
Justin nodded.
‘How could you count on getting back to the building in time to change the prop for the real knife?’
‘It was easy. He goes everywhere in cabs. I’ve watched him from the street. I gather he doesn’t like subways and probably has so much money, it never occurs to him to take one. I took the subway back to Soho after he walked into the park. I had all the time in the world to change the knives.’
The gun was heavy in the child’s hands. He corrected the dip of the barrel which aimed at her heart.
‘Don’t you have any questions for me, Justin?’
‘You weren’t surprised to see me, were you?’
‘No.’
‘When did you begin to suspect me?’
‘From the first. Violence was coming, I knew that. You’d gone to a lot of trouble to set it up. You were the brightest one in the family. I always knew you’d be the last one standing.’
Justin moved the gun to point at Harry. ‘If you like, as a last request, I’ll kill him first.’
‘He is annoying, isn’t he?’
‘No! I can help you,’ he said to the boy.
‘You’re trussed up like a hog,’ said Justin. ‘You can’t even help yourself. Do you have any idea how silly you look? They’re going to find your body that way. Does that disturb you?’
‘Listen to me, boy. I can help you. I have an idea. It’s foolproof. I’ll back you up if the cops get on to it. She wants to arrest me for killing a woman, a bitch. You need me, and now you have something on me. I can’t tell on you, can I?’
Justin looked at Mallory. ‘Did he really kill someone?’
‘No. I don’t believe he’d have the nerve. Do you?’
‘Why did you tie me up, then? Explain that one to the kid.’
The boy looked to Mallory for his answer.
‘I tied him up because the twit pissed me off, and the Civilian Review Board won’t let me shoot him.’
She made a mental note to edit that out of the video tape.
‘You heard about the unidentified woman who died in the park?’ Kipling raised his head and yelled, ‘Well, I killed her!’
Mallory shook her head. ‘We call this a confession under duress. It’s worthless.’ And now she turned her eyes down to Kipling. ‘I don’t think Justin’s buying it either. You’re a documented liar, Harry. Now this kid is smart. He’s probably going to make it look like he was trying to defend me against you.’ She turned back to the boy. ‘Right, Justin?’
The boy nodded. Mallory looked down at Kipling, who was squirming on the floor. ‘Harry, I just don’t think you’ve got a handle on the situation. You’re an adult, you’re bigger than he is, or to put it briefly, a dead man. Right again, Justin?’
‘I’m afraid so.’
‘Damn straight. Not too bright, is he, Justin?’
‘I did kill her! I killed Amanda Bosch because she was a bitch,’ said Harry in his best attempt to pass for a fellow disciple in the hatred of women. And the boy who believed all women were bitches seemed to be weighing this.
‘Well,’ said Mallory, ‘let’s have some details that weren’t in the papers. In my case, it’s professional interest. Now Justin’s killed twice before. We can’t call him an amateur. But you are, Harry. Details. Did Amanda cry? Or did she take it like more of a man than you are?’
‘Hey, it was her own fault. If she hadn’t threatened me, it wouldn’t have happened. The bitch brought it on herself ’
‘All women are bitches,’ said Justin in the descending note of an amen.
‘Details, Harry.’
‘I hit her with a rock, and then I snapped her neck. That wasn’t in the papers.’
‘Did you grab her by the throat and strangle her?’
‘No, I twisted her head until her neck snapped.’
‘How long did it take you to teach the cat to dance?’
‘Four days! Okay, kid? Now untie me!’
‘No,’ said Justin, ‘I don’t think so.’ He pointed the gun at Kipling, and the man froze. Then the gun turned slowly back to Mallory. ‘It would be more logical to kill Mallory first. She’s the dangerous one. You, sir – you’re pathetic. You didn’t even hate that woman, did you?’