Mallory waited out a long silence in something close to pity or mercy – as close as she could come to these qualities. She had just told this woman that her life in hiding had been for nothing – that she could have gone home to grow up in her own house with Cleo and Lionel – her family. And now the truth was slowly, quietly killing Nedda Winter.
„If you like… I could get you a cup of tea,“ said Mallory, as if she had not just destroyed this woman.
Nedda reached out for the detective’s hand, but she must have sensed that her touch would be unwelcome, and she withdrew.
„These are just copies.“ Mallory slid the fingerprint cards across the table, making a little bridge to Nedda Winter with these sorry bits of paper. „You can keep them… if you like.“
The woman’s mouth opened wide to emit a strangled cry. She doubled over as if her great pain were physical and her wounds mortal. And then came the tears.
And now Mallory knew what she must do.
She left the room to fetch a cup of tea. The magical properties of this drink were writ large in her inherited rule book for life in Copland. Tea was a detective’s official bandage for grief and tears – so said her foster father. Coffee made people jittery, Lou Markowitz would say, and soda’s just as bad. Oh, but a cup of tea could soothe all the bloodless wounds, the killer pain that came with the worst news of life and death in New York City. Mallory had simply accepted this arcane lore and gave it equal credence with her store of instructions for the best way to bag blood-soaked clothing and the meaning of maggots in a ripe corpse.
Tea would fix Nedda Winter.
The three of them silently advanced down the hospital corridor, but Cleo and Lionel were not part of Sheldon Smyth’s united front. They had reservations, and Sheldon must have sensed this for he turned to his ex-wife, saying, „Cleo, we simply can’t leave Bitty here.“
„Why not?“
„It doesn’t matter now,“ said Lionel Winter. „The decision’s been made for us. Bitty isn’t going anywhere.“ He pointed to the end of the corridor and the police guard posted outside of his niece’s room.
„He won’t be a problem,“ said Sheldon. „I can get a court order if it comes to that. I’m not without friends in this town.“
„And family,“ said Cleo. Indeed, there were Smyth connections to all the major fortunes of New York City. They were prolific with their seed, all but sterile Sheldon. He had been forced to adopt his family’s bastards, Paul and Bitty, the cuckoo’s eggs planted in other people’s bloodlines.
„Bitty will be in my custody,“ said Sheldon.
„Weil see,“ countered his ex-wife. Lionel stood at her side to form a little wall of two that would brook no resistance. Cleo left her ex-husband to the chore of cowing the young policeman while, against the officer’s protests, she and Lionel walked into Bitty’s hospital room.
Charles Butler entered the interrogation room to find Nedda with her eyes red and swollen. Her face was wet with tears.
He held his arm out and she took it, allowing him to raise her from the table. As they moved toward the door, she did an odd thing, considering whom she was dealing with tonight. Nedda rested one hand on Mallory’s shoulder and lightly kissed her hair. The young detective never moved. She only sat there, rigid, unyielding – alone.
Charles and his elder companion strolled arm-in-arm out of the police station and down the narrow SoHo street, heading in the direction of his apartment building.
She corrected his premature judgment on her weeping. „Mallory has given me the greatest gift. I’ve never been so happy.“
Charles struggled with the image of Mallory as a bringer of gifts and joy. However, it was hard to argue with the evidence of this smiling woman at his side.
She pressed the precious fingerprint cards to her breast. „You know it was Bitty who told me that they were alive – my brother and sister. I had something to live for, someone to come home to. You can’t know how badly I wanted my family back.“ She paused in a pool of lamplight and studied her cards. „Now, thanks to Mallory, I can prove that I was innocent, and that I never abandoned them or stopped loving them.“
An hour later, Charles was still coming to terms with the gift, terrible and wonderful, that Nedda had received at the police station. Oh, the waste of all those years. Tonight, this woman glowed by candlelight that softened the evidence of age, and he could see what her alternate life might have been: far from the narrow confinement of hospitals, her intelligence and grace, wealth and beauty would have laid open the entire world for Nedda Winter. He found her lack of bitterness remarkable, and so he was the one who felt the profound sense of loss. They sat at the kitchen table, sharing a late evening repast of wine, a wide selection of cheeses and a generous assortment of oven-warm croissants stuffed with sweetmeats. Charles fobbed this off as snack therapy.
Stuffed with his good intentions of excess food, his houseguest pushed back from the table. „This is so charming – a psychologist who holds sessions in the kitchen. How wise. So cozy and secure.“
„Good,“ he said, „I’m glad you approve. The next session is breakfast.“
Nedda glanced at her watch. „I wonder if Bitty’s asleep. I suppose it’s too late to call her at the hospital.“
„No need to worry about her. I think it’ll do Bitty good to be out of that house for a night. And you, too.“ He had made up the spare room and intended to bar Mallory from the door indefinitely, even if it meant laying his body down across the threshold. „Tomorrow night, we’ll have your brother and sister over here for dinner.“
„And that, of course, means group therapy.“
„And down the road, we’ll include your niece when she’s ready.“
„Charles, did you find it odd that Bitty never wanted to move out of Winter House and get a place of her own?“
„No, not at all. I don’t think she’ll be able to leave until she has her mother’s approval. I assume that’s the reason she went looking for you – to finally please her mother.“
„She got no thanks for that. With just a few words, Uncle James made me believe that I was the prime suspect. I’m sure he had an easier time convincing two younger children.“
„You’re quite sure he did that?“
„Yes. It was pretty obvious the first time I saw them at the hospice. Horrible, isn’t it? For Lionel and Cleo, I mean. No wonder they spent all their time at the summer house. And poor Bitty. Not the response she expected from them, but she couldn’t take back her gift. And now – this suicide attempt. I’ve been such a disappointment to her.“
Bitty Smyth stepped out of the Rolls-Royce. Her father and mother held her arms as they supported her – imprisoned her, and Uncle Lionel drove off to the parking garage with his precious car. Bitty looked up at the only home she had ever known and its dark parlor windows so like dispassionate eyes. Winter House did not care what transpired within tonight, not because it was inanimate, but because it had grown accustomed to the lack of love and the plethora of death.
Chapter 11
CLEO WINTER-SMYTH FUMBLED IN HER PURSE FOR HER OWN prescription sedatives. She handed the pharmacy bottle to her ex-husband. „Sheldon, you’ll have to crush these in water.“
„Why?“
„Because your daughter could never swallow pills.“
Bitty watched him amble off toward the kitchen. She was always startled by each reminder that her father knew less about her than strangers did. But now this pain was put aside. Uncle Lionel would be back from the garage soon, and this was rare and precious time, a few minutes alone with her mother. „I want to show you something.“ She retreated to the foyer closet, flung open the door and swept three hats from a lower shelf.