„Yes. Twice I thought he was dead, and I was wrong both times. When I was fourteen, I thought I was being watched. No – I knew he was watching me.“
„Your uncle James.“
„Yes. I found cigarette butts at the edge of the yard, and sometimes I’d see them glowing in the dark from my window. I didn’t want Uncle James to come after me while I was living with the McReedys. I couldn’t lose my second family that way. So… when the family left town to visit relatives… I stayed behind.“
„You set yourself up as bait to draw him out.“
„I loved the McReedys.“ Nedda looked down at her folded hands. „The man came for me in the dark. He broke down my bedroom door. But I was ready for him. I’d been ready for two years.“
„You stabbed him with an ice pick you kept under your pillow.“
„Yes, but it wasn’t Uncle James. I sat next to the corpse all night long. When morning came, I never looked at the man’s face. I couldn’t bear to see him. I was still afraid of him – even then. Can you understand that?“
No, Mallory could not, but she nodded, saying, „You were only a little girl.“
„When the McReedys found me there with the body, I was sent to a hospital. They said I was in shock. I couldn’t speak for days. It took a long time for Walter McReedy to identify the corpse. He visited me in the hospital and told me that I’d killed a small-time criminal named Humboldt. I asked him over and over if that could be a mistake, and he said no, that was impossible. Fingerprints never lied.“
„So you stayed in the hospital to keep that family safe. You figured James Winter was always out there, waiting for another chance to kill you.“ This also explained the death of Willy Roy Boyd and the near-death experience of the private investigator in the park. It was Nedda Winter’s job in life, all her life, to protect the people she loved.
The detective laid two sets of fingerprint cards on the table. One had been found in Pinwitty’s stash of stolen evidence, souvenirs of a massacre. „These are your uncle’s elimination prints. The police took them on the day of the massacre. They wanted to rule out family members.“ The second set of prints had come from the New Orleans police; this was the fruit of Riker’s grandfather and his lifelong search for Red Winter. „This set of prints belonged to the man you stabbed in Maine. They’re a perfect match for James Winter.“
„That’s impossible.“ Nedda shook her head. „My uncle was alive for years after I stabbed Humboldt.“
„No, that’s the story you got from your family. And the real story? After two years as guardian, James Winter’s signatures were forged on all his checks. He was dead. You stabbed him to death when you were fourteen years old. He died in Maine the night he came back to kill you.“ She held up both sets of cards. „Walter McReedy was right. Fingerprints can’t lie. Your uncle and Humboldt were the same man.“
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.“