The third Deadly Sin exd-3

by Lawrence Sanders

  Not letting her out on the prowl to pick up some innocent slob, going with him to his hotel room, and then ripping his throat. With the cops tailing her and breaking in at the last minute to catch her with the knife in her hand and the victim-to-be still alive. That would never work.

  It would have to be a carefully plotted scam, using a police decoy. The guy selected would have to be a real cowboy, with quick reflexes and the balls to see it through. He'd have charm, be physically presentable, and have enough acting ability to play the role of an out-of-town salesman or convention-goer.

  He would have a room in a midtown hotel, and they would wire it like a computer, with mikes, a two-way mirror, and maybe a TV tape camera filming the whole thing. A squad of hard guys in the adjoining room, of course, ready to come on like Gangbus-ters.

  She'd be tailed to the hotel she selected and the cowboy would be alerted. He'd make the pickup or let her pick him up. Then he'd take her back to his hotel room. The pickup would be the dicey part. Once the cowboy made the meet, the rest should go like silk.

  It would be important that even the appearance of entrapment be avoided, but that could be worked out. With luck they'd be able to grab her in the act, with her trusty little jackknife open and ready. Let her try to walk away from that!

  Delaney admitted it was a chancy gamble, but Goddamnit, it could work. And it would cut through all the legal bullshit, all the court arguments about the admissibility of circumstantial evidence. It would be irrefutable proof that Zoe Kohler was a bloody killer.

  But the politicians said No, don't take the risk, all we want to do is stop her, and start booking conventions again, and if she walks, that's too bad, but we stopped her, didn't we?

  Edward X. Delaney made a grimace of disgust. The law was the law, and murder was wrong, and every time you weaseled, you weakened the whole body of the law, the good book it had taken so many centuries to write.

  By God, if he was on active duty and in command, he would smash her! If the cowboy didn't succeed, then Delaney would try something else. She might kill again, and again, but in the end he'd hang her by the heels, and the best defense attorney in the world couldn't prevent those words: "Guilty as charged."

  By the time he arrived home, he was sodden with sweat, his face reddened, and he was puffing with exhaustion.

  "What happened to you?" Monica asked curiously. "You look like you've been wrestling with the devil."

  "Something like that," he said.

  July 22; Tuesday…

  She did not wake pure and whole-and knew she never would. The abdominal pains were constant now, almost as severe as menstrual cramps. Weakness buckled her knees; she frequently felt giddy and feared she might faint on the street.

  She continued to lose weight; her flesh deflated over her joints; she seemed all knobs and edges. The discolored blotches grew; she watched with dulled horror as whole patches of skin took on a grayish-brown hue.

  Everything was wrong. She felt nausea, and vomited. She suddenly had a craving for salt and began taking three, four, then five tablets a day. She tried to eat only bland foods, but was afflicted first with constipation, then with diarrhea.

  Her dream of happiness, on the night following Ernest Mittle's proposal of marriage, had vanished. Now she said aloud: "I am sick and tired of being sick and tired."

  When Madeline Kurnitz called to ask her to lunch, Zoe tried to beg off, not certain she had the strength and fearful of what Maddie might say about her appearance.

  But the other woman insisted, even agreeing to lunch in the dining room of the Hotel Granger.

  "I want you to meet someone," Maddie said, giggling.

  "Who?"

  "You'll see!"

  Zoe reserved a table for three and was already seated when Maddie arrived. With her was a tall, stalwart youth who couldn't have been more than twenty-two or twenty-three. Maddie was hanging on to his arm possessively, looking up at his face, and whispering something that made him laugh.

  She hardly glanced at Zoe. Just said, "Christ, you're skinny," and then introduced her escort.

  "Kiddo, this stud is Jack. Keep your hands off; I saw him first. Jack, this is Zoe, my best friend. My only friend. Say, 'Hello, Zoe, how are you?' You can manage that, can't you?"

  "Hello, Zoe," Jack said with a flash of white teeth, "how are you?"

  "See?" Maddie said. "He can handle a simple sentence. Jack isn't so great in the brains department, luv, but with what he's got, who needs brains? Hey, hey, how's about a little drink? My first today."

  "Your first in the last fifteen minutes," Jack said.

  "Isn't he cute?" Maddie said, stroking the boy's cheek. "I'm teaching him to sit up and beg."

  It was the other way around; Zoe was shocked by her appearance. Maddie had put on more loose weight, and it bulged, unbraed and ungirdled, in a straining dress of red silk crepe, with a side seam gaping and stains down the front.

  Her freckled cleavage was on prominent display, and she wore no hose. Her feet, in the skimpiest of strap sandals, were soiled with street dirt. Her legs had been carelessly shaved; a swath of black fuzz ran down one calf.

  It was her face that showed most clearly her loss: clown makeup wildly applied, powder caked in smut lines on her neck, a false eyelash hanging loose, lipstick streaked and crooked.

  There she sat, a blob of a woman, all appetite. It seemed to Zoe that her voice had become louder and screakier. She shouted for drinks, yelled for menus, laughing in high-pitched whinnies.

  Zoe hung her head as other diners turned to stare. But Maddie was impervious to their disapproval. She held hands with Jack, popped shrimp into his mouth, pinched his cheek. One of her hands was busy beneath the tablecloth.

  "… so Harry moved out," Maddie chattered on, "and Jack moved in. A beautiful exchange. Now the lawyers are fighting it out. Jack, baby, you have a steak; you've got to keep up your strength, you stallion, you!"

  He sat there with a vacant grin, enjoying her ministrations, accepting them as his due. His golden hair was coiffed in artful waves. His complexion was a bronzed tan, lips sculpted, nose straight and patrician. A profile that belonged on a coin.

  "Isn't he precious?" Maddie said fondly, staring at him with hungry eyes. "I found him parking cars at some roadhouse on Long Island. I got him cleaned up, properly barbered and dressed, and look at him now. A treasure! Maddie's own sweet treasure."

  She was, Zoe realized, quite drunk, for in addition to her usual ebullience, there was something else: almost an hysteria. Plus a note of nasty cruelty when she spoke of the young man as if he were a curious object.

  Either he did not comprehend her malicious gibes or chose to ignore them. He said little, grinned continuously, and ate steadily. He poked food into an already full mouth and masticated slowly with heavy movements of his powerful jaw.

  "We're off for Bermuda," Maddie said, "or is it the Bahamas? I'm always getting the two of them fucked up. Anyway, we're going to do the tropical paradise bit for a month, drink rum out of coconut shells, and skinny-dip in the moonlight. How does that scenario grab you, kiddo? What does a thirsty gal have to do to get another drink in this dump?"

  She ate very little, Zoe noted, but she drank at a frantic rate, gulping, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand when liquid trickled down her chin. But never once did she let go of Jack. She hung on to his arm, shoulder, thigh.

  Zoe, remembering the brash bravado of a younger Maddie, was terrified by the woman's dissolution. Frightened not only for Maddie but at what it presaged for her own future.

  For this woman, as a girl, had been the best of them. She was courageous and independent. She swaggered through life, dauntless and unafraid. She lived, and never feared tomorrow. She dared and she challenged, and never asked the price or counted the cost.

  Now here she was, drunk, wild, feverish, her flesh puddled, holding on desperately to a handsome boy young enough to be her son. Behind the bright glitter of her mascaraed eyes grew a dark terror.


  If this woman could be defeated, this brave, free, indefatigable woman, what hope in life was there for Zoe Kohler? She was so much weaker than Madeline Kurnitz. She was timid and fearful. She was smaller. When giants were toppled, what chance was there for midgets?

  They finished their hectic meal and Maddie threw bills to the waiter.

  "The son of a bitch cut off my credit cards," she muttered.

  She rose unsteadily to her feet and Jack slid an arm about her thick waist. She tottered, staring glassily at Zoe.

  "You changing jobs, kiddo?" she asked.

  "No, Maddie. I haven't even been looking. Why do you ask?"

  "Dunno. Some guy called me a few days ago, said you had applied for a job and gave me as a reference. Wanted to know how long I had known you, what I knew about your private life, and all that bullshit."

  "I don't understand. I haven't applied for any job."

  "Ah, the hell with it. Probably some weirdo. I'll call you when I get back from paradise."

  "Take care of yourself, Maddie."

  "Fuck that. Jack's going to take care of me. Aren't you, lover boy?"

  She watched them stagger out, Jack half-supporting the porcine woman. Zoe walked slowly back to her office, dread seeping in as she realized the implications of what Maddie had said.

  Someone was making inquiries about her, about her personal history and private life. She knew who it was-that stretched, dour man labeled "police," who would not give up the search and would not be content until Zoe Kohler was dead and gone.

  She slumped at her desk, skeleton hands folded. She stared at those shrunken claws. They looked as if they had been soaked in brine. She thought of her approaching menstrual period and wondered dully if blood could flow from such a desiccated corpus.

  "Hello there!" Everett Pinckney said brightly, weaving before her desk. "Have a good lunch?"

  "Very nice," Zoe said, trying to smile. "Is there something I can do for you, Mr. Pinckney?"

  He beamed at her, making an obvious effort to focus his eyes and concentrate on what he wanted to say. He leaned forward, knuckles propped on her desk. She could smell his whiskey-tainted breath.

  "Yes," he said. "Well, uh… Zoe, remember that tear gas I gave you? The spray can? The little one for your purse?"

  "I remember."

  "Well, have you got it with you? In your purse? In your desk?"

  She stared at him.

  "Silly thing," he went on. "A detective was around. He's investigating a burglary and has to check the serial numbers of all the cans sold in New York. I asked McMillan and Joe Levine to bring theirs in. You still have yours, don't you? Didn't squirt anyone with it, did you?" He giggled.

  "I don't have it with me, Mr. Pinckney," she said slowly.

  "Oh. It's home, is it?"

  "Yes," she said, thinking sluggishly. "I have it at home."

  "Well, bring it in, will you, please? By Friday? The detective is coming back. Once he checks the number, you can have the can again. No problem."

  He smiled glassily and tottered into his own office.

  Stronger now, it returned: the sense of being moved and manipulated. Events had escaped her power. They were pressing her back into her natural role of victim. She had lost all initiative; she was being controlled.

  She thought wildly of what she might do. Claim an attack by a would-be rapist whom she had repulsed with tear gas? Defended herself against a vicious dog? But she had already told Mr. Pinckney she had the dispenser at home.

  Finally, she decided miserably, she could do nothing but tell him she had lost or misplaced the container.

  Not for a moment did she believe the detective's claim of investigating a burglary. He was investigating her, and what would happen when he was told Zoe Kohler had "lost or misplaced" her dispenser, she didn't wish to imagine. It was all so depressing she could not even wonder how they had traced the tear gas to her.

  That evening, when she returned to her apartment, she did something completely irrational. She searched her apartment for the tear gas container, knowing she had disposed of it. The worst thing was that she knew she was acting irrationally but could not stop herself.

  Of course she did not find the dispenser. But she found something else. Or rather, several things…

  When she had placed Ernest Mittle's engagement ring far in the back of the dresser drawer, she had paused a moment to open the box and take a final look at the pretty stone. Then she had shoved the box away, but remembered very well that it opened to the front.

  When she found it, the box was turned around in its hiding place. Now the hinge was to the front, the box opened from the rear.

  When she had put away her nylon wigs, wrapped in tissue, the blond wig was on top, the black beneath. Now they were reversed.

  The stacks of her pantyhose and lingerie had been disturbed. She always left them with their front edges neatly aligned. Now the piles showed they had been handled. They were not messy; they were neat. But not the way she had left them.

  Perhaps someone less precise and finicky than Zoe Kohler would never have noticed. But she noticed, and was immediately convinced that someone had been in her apartment and had, searched through her possessions.

  She went at once to her front window. Drawing the drape cautiously aside, she peeked out. She did not see the white-shirted watcher in the shadows of the apartment across the street. She did not see him, but was certain he was there.

  She made no connection between the voyeur and the search of her personal belongings. She knew only that her privacy was once again being cruelly violated; people wanted to know her secrets. They would keep trying, and there was no way she could stop them.

  When Ernest Mittle called, she made a determined effort to sound cheerful and loving. They chatted for a long time, and she kept asking questions about his job, his computer classes, his vacation plans-anything to keep him talking and hold the darkness back.

  "Zoe," he said finally, "I don't, uh, want to pressure you or anything, but have you been thinking about it?"

  It took her a moment to realize what he meant.

  "Of course, I've been thinking about it, darling," she said. "Every minute."

  "Well, I meant every word I said to you. And now I'm surer than ever in my own mind. This is what I want to do. I just don't want to live without you, Zoe."

  "Ernie, you're the sweetest and most considerate man I've ever met. You're so considerate."

  "Yes… well… uh… when do you think you'll decide? Soon?"

  "Oh yes. Soon. Very soon."

  "Listen," he said eagerly, "I have classes Friday night. I get out about eight-thirty or so. How's about my picking up a bottle of white wine and dropping by? I mean, it'll be Friday night and all, and we can talk and get squared away on our vacation. Okay?"

  She didn't have the strength to object. Everyone was pushing her-even Ernie.

  "Of course," she said dully. "Friday night?"

  "About nine," he said happily. "See you then. Take care of yourself, dear."

  "Yes," she said. "You, too."

  He hung up and she sat there staring at the phone in her hand. Without questioning why, she called Dr. Oscar Stark. She got his answering service, of course. The operator asked if she'd care to leave a message.

  "No," Zoe Kohler said, "no message."

  She wandered into the kitchen. She opened the cabinet door. She stared at the rows and rows of pills, capsules, ampules, powders, medicines. They all seemed so foolish. Toys.

  She closed the door without taking anything. Not even her cortisol. Not even a salt tablet. Nothing would make her a new woman. She was condemned to be her.

  She thought vaguely that she should eat something, but just the idea of food roiled her stomach. She poured a glass of chilled vodka and took it into the living room.

  She slouched on the couch, staring into the darkness. She tried to concentrate and feel the workings of her body. She felt only deep pain, a malaise that sapped her spirit
and dulled her senses.

  Was this the onset of death-this total surrender to the agony of living? Peace, peace. Something warm and comfortable. Something familiar and close. It seemed precious to her, this going over. The hurt ended…

  She was conscious that she was weeping, surprised that her dried flesh could squeeze out that moisture. The warm, thin tears slid down her cheeks, and she did not wipe them away. She found a glory in this evidence of her miserableness.

  "Poor Zoe Kohler," she said aloud, and the spoken word affected her so strongly that she gasped and sobbed.

  What she could not understand, would never understand, was what she had done to deserve this wretchedness.

  She had always dressed neatly and kept herself clean. She had never used dirty words. She had been polite and kind to everyone. Whom had she hurt? She had tried, always, to conduct herself like a lady.

  There may have been a few times, very few, when she had forgotten herself, denied her nature, and acted in a crude and vulgar manner. But most of her life had been above reproach, spotless, obeying all the rules her mother had taught her.

  She had moved through her days refined and gentle, low-voiced, and thoughtful of the feelings of others. She had worked hard to succeed as dutiful daughter and loving wife.

  And it had all, all, come to this: sitting in the darkness and weeping. Smelling her body's rot. Hounded by unfeeling men who would not stop prying into things of no concern of theirs.

  Poor Zoe Kohler. All hope gone, all passion spent. Only pain remained.

  July 23-24; Wednesday and Thursday…

  Delaney had to see her; he could not help himself.

  "You can learn a lot about people by observing them," he explained to Monica. "How they walk, how they gesture. Do they rub their eyes or pick their nose? How they light a cigarette. Do they wait for a traffic light or run through traffic? Any nervous habits? How they dress. The colors and style. Do they constantly blink? Lick their lips? And so forth."

  His wife listened to this recital in silence, head bowed, eyes on the mending in her lap.

  "Well?" he demanded.

  "Well what?"

  "I just thought you might have a comment."