The Silenced Women

by Frederick Weisel

  Eden raised the gun and, bracing the handle with two hands, pointed it at Partridge. “Are you here to confess to the killings?”

  Partridge took another step closer. “Oh, Chiclet. That’s not what you really want, is it? No, I think it’s going to end another way.”

  “Stay where you are.”

  “I came here tonight with a—let’s call it a suggestion. I hear you visited my friend, Lorin. She’s a pretty little thing, but sometimes she gets confused. I hold you responsible. So I’m here to tell you politely to stay the fuck away from my girl and my apartment.”

  At these words, Mahler felt a flash of recognition. The sensation came over him without his understanding. He remembered Woodhouse once saying sometimes with a hopeless case, he’d get a feeling of an opening even before the facts arrived. It’s as real as the world, Woodhouse said.

  Two days earlier in the interview room, Partridge had momentarily lost himself, peering at Eden like a prey animal. Now it was Eden again. But it was different. What was it? Without knowing why, Mahler lowered his gunsight from Partridge’s head.

  “Lorin Albright’s part of our investigation,” Eden said. “We can talk to her any time we want.”

  “Well, you can, but you shouldn’t.” Partridge stepped within ten feet of Eden. “Not if you don’t want to get hurt. You’re young and smart. Nobody wants you to get hurt.” With his hands still raised, Partridge wiggled his fingers and smiled.

  In an instant Mahler understood. The guy’s scared. The son of a bitch has never been scared. But now he’s scared. Mahler let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. Table’s turning, he thought.

  Mahler stared at Eden, standing now with her gun raised. How had this young woman done what he had failed to do for two years?

  Mahler walked forward, gun in hand. “It’s time for you to leave, Irwin.”

  Partridge’s focus moved from Eden to Mahler. “Lieutenant Mahler. What do you want?”

  “You remember where your car’s parked, Irwin?”

  Partridge looked back to Eden and winked. “We’re not done, Chiclet. You want to watch your step.”

  Eden waited for Partridge to disappear down the stairwell. Then she turned and crossed the garage floor to Mahler, shoving her gun in its holster. Suddenly unsteady, she leaned against the car. “Not sure I could have shot him.”

  “You did the right thing.” Mahler rested one hand on her shoulder.

  “Did you hear him? He knows the girls were strangled with a cord.”

  Mahler shrugged. “His lawyer’ll say he guessed. The important thing is, he’s worried about Lorin, and maybe that Kundalini thing. Whatever you’re doing, it’s getting to him.” Mahler put his gun away.

  Eden looked at him. “How long were you there?”

  “A while.”

  “You knew he wasn’t going to strangle me?”

  “I wasn’t certain, but an academically trained investigator on my team told me Irwin Partridge’s preference for killing is in a public park.”

  Eden managed a weak smile. “Why’d you come here in the first place?”

  “Looking after you, Detective Somers. From now on, none of us goes out alone.”

  Mahler’s cell went off. He fumbled for the phone, swiped his thumb across the screen, and stared at the image. Then he looked up. “Someone’s just broken into my house.” He was already running toward his car.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  (i)

  (THURSDAY, 8:04 p.m.)

  “Tell me again what your phone message said.” Eden braced herself as Mahler’s car accelerated around a corner. They were tacking across town, on the quickest route to his house.

  “Alarm trip. Time-stamped 7:21.”

  “Shouldn’t it go straight to the alarm company?”

  “Yeah. Usually goes to the Florida office. Automatically called in to the PD here. This time it didn’t.”

  “Why?” Eden asked. “Why would it do that?”

  “I don’t know. But after what happened to Steve, I want to look myself.”

  As they approached his address, Mahler pulled to the curb three houses away and shut off the engine.

  Eden looked down the street. “No car out front.”

  Mahler shrugged. “They could’ve parked behind and come down the hill on the back side.”

  “You see anything out of the ordinary? I could call it in and have patrol up on the street behind your house.”

  “No, let’s just go. We’ll call it in once we get inside, if we have to. Leave your gun in your belt until we get to the house. I don’t want to scare the neighbors.”

  They walked quickly down the street and into the drive at Mahler’s house. Along the far wall of the garage, they took out their guns.

  “Go around the front,” Mahler whispered. “Look for signs of a break-in. I’ll do the back side, and we’ll meet here.”

  Without waiting for an answer, Mahler crouched below the window line. He ran to the left of the house, while Eden moved to the right. A minute later they met again at the garage. “Doors locked,” Mahler said quietly. “No broken windows.”

  “Same for me.”

  They stood together, each holding a gun, catching their breath.

  Mahler leaned toward Eden. “I’m going in the back door. Stay here and watch the front. Stop anyone coming out and call patrol.”

  At the door, Mahler shoved his gun into his holster, unlocked the deadbolt, and eased open the latch. He slipped off his shoes and walked to the kitchen in his socks. Taking out his gun again, he sat on the floor.

  He closed his eyes and slowed his breathing. From an open window in the hallway, he heard the wind blowing through the oaks in the backyard and, closer, the refrigerator’s machine hum.

  Mahler remembered training for night patrols at the Army Ranger school in Georgia twenty years back. Sitting alone in the dark at the base of a tree, waiting for the other patrol. One, two hours at a time. The instructor was a scary guy named Wills, who had spent three tours in the jungles of Phuoc Long.

  As far as he could tell in the dark, nothing in the kitchen was moved. But now Mahler sensed something. What was it? A sound? A smell? Whatever it was, he knew what it meant: someone else was here. Where were they? Living room, dining room, bedroom? The first two rooms were open and exposed. If their places were reversed, he’d choose the back rooms. How many guys? More than one? No. It would be one. Every lesson learned in Ranger school told him so.

  He unconsciously squeezed the Sig. He let his hand relax and stilled his mind. From the office came the sound of a ticking clock.

  He thought of Wills again. Guy had a Zen about combat patrols. He heard Wills’s voice in his ear: What do you know about the other guy?

  Not a smash-and-grab kid, Mahler thought. Whoever this guy is, he broke into the house and got past the house alarm, and somehow reprogrammed it to bypass the alarm company. He knows my cell number.

  Why’d he do that? Wills asked.

  He wants me to come, Mahler thought.

  Now that you’re here, what’s he want?

  To find him.

  What’s that tell you?

  He’s ready. Sitting on the floor of one of the back rooms, holding a gun, just like me.

  Who has the edge? Wills asked.

  He does. He can sit there all night, waiting for me.

  How do you change that balance?

  Go to him, Mahler thought. Make him move. Assume he’s in the last bedroom, the master. The room has two doors: one down the hallway from the living room, the other through the back utility room. No matter where the shooter is in the bedroom, the first doorway exposes me to a clear shot. Also, if I go that way, there’s a chance I drive him out the back door, where Eden can’t see him. The second doorway has some cover, and I force him into the hallway and the
front door.

  Mahler stood. He walked quickly out of the kitchen, through the dining room, to the entrance to the utility room. He stopped at the doorway’s edge. He scanned the space around him. Then, holding the Sig in both hands, he swung into the utility room. The space was darker than the rest of the house. His eyes adjusted, and he could see the room was empty. Again, nothing seemed to be moved.

  In the darkness, he listened. Wind blew against the window.

  Stepping carefully across the utility room, he found the bedroom door closed. He turned the knob and stepped away from the doorway. He listened for a sound. Someone standing? Steps toward him? A slide pulled back to chamber a cartridge? It was silent.

  Had his instincts been wrong? Had the intruder left? Was the house empty?

  Mahler touched the trigger of the Sig. Then he crouched and ducked into the bedroom. The space in front of the bed was empty. He stared across the room, into the black at the far end. The darkness unfolded, revealing shapes and surfaces. He saw something beside the window. A figure bent over? As his eyes adjusted, the thing turned into a chair. Everything appeared unchanged.

  He stood still, his gun aimed ahead, listening.

  Where is he, Ranger? Wills asked. You can’t see him, but he can see you.

  Mahler blinked at migraine hallucinations dancing across his vision. He swung to the left and looked behind him into the farthest corner. Nothing.

  With each passing second, his fear grew. Where was this guy?

  Suddenly, something caught his attention on the floor, ten feet away. A small, upright object. He didn’t remember anything there when he’d left the house two days before. A step closer, he could see it was a bottle. He stared at it in wonder. Someone had been here.

  There’s always a reason, Wills said. Why’d he put it there?

  Could it be wired? Rigged with explosives? He felt with his hand for a trip wire. He slowly reached to the bottle. He touched it, tipping it over. The glass clattered to the floor and rolled slowly under the bed.

  He realized he was holding his breath. He breathed deeply. In the same instant Mahler heard a sound—a footstep down the hall. He swung his gun to the door. Nothing could be seen in the darkness.

  As he jumped out of his crouch, the room swam. He staggered to the doorway and looked down the hall. Empty. His body flat to the wall, he crept to the study. He waited and listened again.

  A sound came from the living room. So soft, at first Mahler felt it must be his imagination. Something metallic. No, music. A single piano. Bright, quick, high notes. A familiar melody. What was it? He rushed to the archway entrance to the living room.

  He looked into the dark. Ahead of him were still, black shapes. He stared into them, looking for something out of place, moving. A faint light shone through a space in the curtains and played along the floor, climbing the bookshelf.

  All the while the music softly played. Short piano notes, the same repeated phrase. Had the intruder turned it on? Had he, Mahler, inadvertently set a timer in the sound system?

  The music grew louder, first filling the room, then blaring, until it vibrated the speakers. Mahler felt the piano keys hammering inside his head. The sound swelled the pain of the migraine throbbing behind his eyes. He braced himself against the wall to keep from falling to the floor.

  From the back of the house came another sound, something moving. Mahler pulled away from the wall and raced across the living room, through the dining room and kitchen. At the back entrance, he found the door open.

  Mahler looked into the dark backyard and heard someone running ahead of him toward the woods. As he jumped down the back steps, he saw Eden sprinting across the lawn. He wanted to call to her to take cover as she ran, but she was gone in the darkness. Running after her, he stopped at the edge of the woods and took cover against the trunk of an oak. Without his shoes, his socks were wet and cold. Ahead someone crashed through the underbrush. Behind him the music still blared from the open door.

  He turned away from the tree and began running through the woods, the headache pain weighing him down. He heard a car engine start at the top of the hill and knew that by the time he climbed the hillside, the car would be into the switchbacks rising through the neighborhood. He could call for a patrol car, but he did not have a description to give dispatch.

  Eden appeared out of the darkness, breathing heavily. She bent over, bracing her hands on her knees. “One male… Tall, maybe six feet… Light-colored sedan… Couldn’t get the plate.”

  She straightened up and fell awkwardly forward into Mahler. He caught her and let her head rest against his chest. For a moment they stood together while she caught her breath. Neither of them spoke. From the house, the music slowly faded. In the silence, he let her go, and they walked back through the darkness.

  (ii)

  (THURSDAY, 9:17 P.M.)

  Entering Hyde’s, Mahler found Tom Woodhouse at the bar. The retired detective must have noticed him come in the door, but Woodhouse’s face gave nothing away.

  When Mahler sat next to him, Woodhouse put down his drink. “You look even crappier than usual, Junior. Have a beer.”

  “Can’t, old man. I’m out there saving the city.”

  “Sorry. I forgot I’m sitting next to a hero.” Woodhouse raised his hand toward the bartender, a young woman in a black blouse and trousers, wearing narrow-framed glasses. “Sydney, please bring Junior a coffee—black and strong enough to dispel the forces of evil.”

  Mahler looked around the room. The rest of the bar was empty. Only one table was occupied. “Not exactly a cop’s bar.”

  “This place has everything a great bar should have,” Woodhouse said. “The absence of TVs. The faint scent of the roasted meat on the menu tonight. The couple at the table behind us, who haven’t stopped looking into each other’s eyes for the last thirty minutes. And most of all, Sydney here.” The bartender put a mug of coffee in front of Mahler. “Sydney knows how to make the perfect gimlet: half gin, half Rose’s lime juice—the way Terry Lennox drinks them in The Long Goodbye, the greatest American novel. Her only fault, other than extreme youth, is a delusion that Pabst Blue Ribbon qualifies as beer.”

  Sydney smiled. “Long as you believe that’s my only fault, Tommy.”

  As the bartender moved away, Mahler said, “I didn’t take you away from your cooking shows, did I?”

  “No, I was sitting alone in a dark room, waiting for Eddie Mahler to call. How’s the headache?”

  Mahler blew across the top of the coffee. “Coming and going.” As if on cue, bright flashes of light streaked across his line of vision.

  “Yeah?” Woodhouse looked at Mahler. “These days, I’ll bet mostly coming.”

  “We’re a little busy down at the shop.”

  “And I heard you and the new chief are like brothers. That didn’t take long, did it? You ever get along with anybody your whole life?”

  “Let me get back to you on that. This afternoon he gave us twenty-four hours to make an arrest.”

  “Are you that close to making one?”

  “No idea. You know how it is.”

  “Also heard about Steve Frames. Pretty rough.”

  “How’d you hear that?” Mahler sipped the coffee.

  “I have friends in the department.”

  “Better friends than me?”

  “They’re all better friends than you, Junior. Speaking of which, how’s young Detective Somers?”

  For an instant, Mahler remembered Eden falling into his arms an hour earlier. “Fine. Why’d you ask?”

  “Because she strikes me as a good investigator. Have you told her how good she is? No, you wouldn’t. You’re probably just making her life hell.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Because you didn’t get what you needed when you were three years old?” Woodhouse shrugged. “How woul
d I know?”

  “The worst part is, after she talked to you, she decided to investigate a homicide in Fresno.”

  “Fresno? I didn’t say anything about Fresno.”

  “No, but she’s found a case there with similar evidence.”

  “I’ve got to hand it to you, Junior—you’re a brave man to hire someone smarter than you. By the way, you have a leaf in your hair. Trying out a new look?”

  Mahler pulled a dry leaf from the side of his head. “Must have come from my backyard. Someone broke into my house tonight.”

  “Take anything?”

  “Don’t think so. Left something. Classical recording of a tune called ‘Für Elise.’”

  “The name of your victim? Someone screwing with you?”

  Mahler drank his coffee. “That’s what it looks like.”

  “So?” Woodhouse asked. “Why’d you call me?”

  “I need you to keep an eye on Partridge.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Yeah. He approached Detective Somers tonight. Threatened her. Told her to stay away from his girlfriend. I don’t trust him.”

  “Since when did we ever trust him?” Woodhouse held up his glass to study the ice cubes. “I’m too old to sit in a car waiting for a jerk-off like Partridge to do something stupid, and this will seriously cut into my flirting with Sydney.”

  “We all have to prioritize. You told me that.”

  “Probably sounded smarter when I said it. Tell you what, Eddie. I’ll do it. Not for you, but because I admire your Detective Somers.”

  “It’s an honor working with a man of principle,” Mahler said. “Remember, Partridge knows you, so you’ll need to be a little—”

  “Okay, I’ll be a little. You want to teach me how to do this now?”

  “Maybe you could wear that ugly Giants cap of yours. I hear it’s what the homeless are wearing this year.”

  “What’d you want to know?”

  “Where he is, where he goes, day and night.”

  “Tall order.”