Bone by Bone

by Carol O'Connell

  ‘Oh, no, no, no.’ Addison shook his head in an exaggerated loss of patience. ‘You’re muddling my crimes. Why would I kill the dispatcher? She had no idea where her bribe money came from. Her only job that night was diverting you to a surprise party – during a tour of duty – an insignificant crime. When you called in for backup and the dispatcher heard the shots and screams – that’s when she realized what kind of a party it was. And she ran away. I’m told she didn’t even finish out her shift.’

  ‘The dispatcher never called for help? She was the one who left me to die?’

  ‘Yes. I couldn’t have planned for that to happen. However, I am a creature of opportunity. Shame to waste the makings of a good lawsuit. But that woman I found with Josh – well, I have no idea who she was. And who cares?’ He raised the cane and punctuated the beats of an admonition with strikes to Swahn’s shoulders and his head. ‘She has nothing to do with my story.’

  Addison tossed his hair and tilted his head to one side. ‘Where was I? Oh, yes. I was carving up the face of a dead child. And then I found myself a good hiding place in the trees. I wish you could’ve seen Sarah’s expression when she walked into the clearing and found Josh lying there. It was marvelous – insane, yet sympathetic, too. She screamed. She wept. I wondered if she would recognize my handwriting in that bloody scar I carved into the boy’s skin. It was an A just like yours.’

  A cut above Swahn’s eye half blinded him, drops falling to the carpet as if he cried blood tears. The unobscured eye had the glaze of shock.

  But the man was paying attention.

  Addison continued. ‘She started digging his grave. That surprised me. I thought she ’d run – but no. Sarah knelt down beside the boy and tried to scratch out a grave with her bare hands. Well, eventually, she came to her senses and gave up on that idea. She went home and came back with a shovel. Much more practical for grave-digging. I assume she met you on the road and warned you off.’

  ‘I was never there.’

  This time, Addison rained blows on the man’s damaged leg, saying all the while, so calmly, ‘It’s – rude – to – inter – rupt.’

  Swahn cried out.

  So satisfying.

  Sarah Winston stared at the flagstones of the terrace below. Her grip on the rail was tenuous.

  She looked up to the sky, asking heavenly bodies if she should stay or go. She interpreted the blinks and winks of planets and the ponderous movements of stars. Yes, they were all in agreement. It was time to leave the earth.

  ‘The grave Sarah dug was much too shallow,’ said Addison. ‘I came back later and dug a deeper hole, a wider one – so I could bury the woman’s body, too. When I was done, you couldn’t tell there ’d been any digging at all. I scattered the excess dirt so as not to leave an obvious mound. And I spread leaves to complete my camouflage. One last touch – and this is delicious. I left Josh’s camera to mark the grave for Sarah. I knew she ’d come back. How I wish I could’ve seen her face when she found that camera. It must’ve driven her wild.’

  ‘You can’t kill Sarah. She’s an innocent.’

  ‘It doesn’t look that way. I’m speaking as a lawyer now. She tried to hide the evidence of a murder, and I think we both know why. Given that big bloody A carved into the boy’s face, the sheriff would’ve knocked on your door first. Cable Babitt ’s a plodding dolt, but he could hardly miss that connection.’ Addison leaned in close. ‘She must’ve loved you very much. And now I need to hear your confession.’ He looked toward the ceiling, as if he could see through it to the tower room above. ‘I don’t think poor Sarah’s up to it. I want every detail of your affair with my wife.’

  ‘She was my friend,’ said William. ‘I never touched her.’

  ‘Liar.’

  A small voice called down to them, ‘It ’s true.’ Sarah stood at the top of the stairs. Her words were faint, and both men strained to hear her. She looked down at her husband ’s upturned grinning face. ‘Mavis Hardy was the one I met in the woods every Saturday, when she closed the library for lunch. We went birding together. You didn’t want me to have any friends . . . so I never mentioned her. But after I saw what you’d done to Josh . . .’ Her voice trailed off to whispers, and she spoke to the air above their heads. ‘Bad things happen to my friends, so I stopped seeing Mavis. . . . And how could I ever face William again?’

  She could not face him now. Her eyes were vacant, seeing nothing. Sarah was gone even before she turned around and left him lying there. William stretched out one hand, as if he could reach her that way. He struggled to climb the next step. ‘She ’s going back to the tower. Addison, stop her. She’s in a dangerous state of mind.’

  ‘Stop her?’ The lawyer pressed one hand to his breast in mock surprise. ‘Don’t you believe that the bird queen can fly?’ He fished his wallet from a back pocket. ‘Ah, well, maybe you’re right. She might need a little help, a gentle nudge in the right direction. But can she fly?That’s the question.’ He opened the wallet and pulled out a bill. ‘I’ve got twenty dollars here that says she drops like a stone.’

  ‘She never cheated on you, Addison.’

  ‘Lies.’ He laid down the cane to pull a folded sheet of paper from his inside pocket. ‘I’ve got the proof – one of your old love letters.’ The paper was falling apart in the creases, having been read too many times by a madman. He opened it and held it up and pointed to the bottom line. ‘That’s your signature.’

  Hannah rolled up the driveway and parked in front of the house. Stepping out of the car, she said to the judge, ‘The engine’s sputtering some. Maybe we should have it looked at.’

  ‘Here’s an idea,’ said Oren, with the mildest sarcasm. ‘Why don’t you guys buy a new car?’

  ‘I suppose it’s time,’ said the judge. ‘But you know this old Mercedes runs fine. It’s probably just low on gas.’ He turned to Hannah. ‘That ’s what happens when you spend the night playing taxi driver for every drunken man, woman and child in Coventry.’

  She marched up the stairs and into the house. The screen door slammed behind her, a message to tell him that she was in no mood for criticism tonight.

  The judge called after her, ‘We’ll get a new car, all right? We’ll get two new cars.’

  ‘I called the sheriff ’s office,’ said William Swahn.

  ‘And they laughed at you, right? You told them you saw a man dance with his wife? Something like that?’ Addison Winston tapped his temple with one finger to illustrate a mind at work. ‘I anticipated you.’ Theatrically, he cupped his ears with both hands. ‘Do I hear sirens in the distance?’ He lowered his hands. ‘No, I’m afraid not.’

  ‘I made another call.’

  Isabelle’s limousine was headed homeward, but only moving at the legal limit. She renewed her quarrel with the chauffer. ‘Yes, you can go faster. It’s late, and all the state troopers are asleep by the side of the road. I promise you won’t get a ticket.’ She reached through the opening in the glass partition and emptied her wallet on the front seat beside the driver.

  The limousine sped up, but not fast enough, and she had no more money to buy another twenty miles per hour.

  The screen door was pushed open so hard it banged against the porch wall, and Hannah came flying out. ‘Mr Swahn left a message on the answering machine. There’s trouble at the Winston lodge. No idea when he called, but he said to come quick.’

  Oren snatched the keys from her outstretched hand. When he slid behind the wheel of the Mercedes, the engine would not turn over.

  ‘I misspoke.’ The judge turned to Hannah. ‘The car’s not low on gas – it’s out of gas.’

  Oren never heard this remark. He was running down the driveway.

  ‘Ah, William. Intrepid fellow.’ Addison slowly climbed the stairs beside the crawling man, grinning with encouragement, pausing to beat him with the cane every now and then when he thought his guest’s attention might be flagging.

  ‘Great joke on me, isn’t it?’ The cane rose again and c
ame down. ‘It just keeps getting funnier and funnier.’

  Swahn rolled onto his side, shot through and through with pain. ‘You can’t get away with this.’

  ‘Of course I can. My wife has a history of slashed wrists and sleeping pills. And you’re going to shoot yourself.’ Addison sat down on the steps, a brief respite from his labors – the heavy work of inflicting agony. ‘There ’s only one conclusion that our idiot sheriff will draw – that old cliché of unrequited love. If you can’t have my wife, then no man can. So you pushed her off the deck and then – Oh, allow me one more cliché. You’re going to eat your gun. That’s the time-honored method for an ex-cop’s suicide. I thought you’d like that part – a cop to the end – literally.’

  Addison wagged one finger at Swahn. ‘Don’t tell me. I know what you’re thinking. Those bruises on your body. They’ll be blamed on the mob, all those flying bottles and rocks. And the cuts – the blood from your open wounds? Well, of course I tried valiantly to defend my wife, but then you pulled a gun.’ He reached behind his back and under his coattails to retrieve a revolver from his waistband. ‘Unregistered, untraceable. Finest kind. And they say nothing good can come of consorting with criminals.’ He took a handkerchief from his pocket and cleaned the surface. ‘Your prints will be the only ones found. And I have all the proof I need to back up my version of events.’ He waved the yellowed sheet of paper. ‘Your love letter to Sarah.’

  The lawyer laid the weapon on a step beyond Swahn’s reach. ‘The revolver has to be in your hands when it goes off – just in case the sheriff remembers to test for residue from gunfire. This works best if you’re unconscious when I put the barrel in your mouth. So you’ll understand why I have to put you to sleep.’ He picked up the cane and raised it high for another strike. ‘Good night, William.’

  ‘That letter’s going to destroy you. Any document expert can use it against you.’

  The cane stopped mid-swing. ‘I hardly think so. It’s your handwriting. And the wording – so obsessive. Psychotic, I’d say. Love is insane, isn’t it?’

  ‘But I only wrote one letter to Sarah. It was the year she left school to marry you. She was twenty-four, a grown woman. I was barely fourteen years old.’ With his bloodied right hand, he pointed to the letter. ‘That ’s only the lovesick ramblings of a child.’

  Conviction was lacking in Addison’s voice when he said, ‘You’d say anything to—’

  ‘I was only her friend.’ Swahn rested his head on the stairs and left blood there from his wounds. ‘It would never occur to her that I killed the boy. You heard what she said – bad things happen to her friends. Sarah’s own words.’ He touched the scar on his face. ‘When she saw this A carved into Josh . . . that ’s when she knew you were the one who did this to me.’

  The cane dropped from Addison’s hand. He felt a constriction within, a vise that gripped his heart. From without, an invisible force was bearing down on his chest, pressing, pressing.

  ‘I think she knew you were crazy long before that,’ said Swahn. ‘She was sending Belle away to boarding school years before Josh died. She did her best to keep her child away from you. But Sarah could never leave you.’

  Addison sank down on the stairs and gasped for air.

  ‘I was at your wedding.’ Swahn dragged himself up one more step. ‘You might remember me as the pimple-faced little boy in the first pew. I’ll tell you what I remember – the vows, old ones, so traditional. She vowed to stand by you “in sickness and in health, for better or for worse.” So she sent her child away because she was afraid for Belle. But Sarah stayed. Crazy as you are, she stayed to keep you company . . . and she even went insane with you.’ Swahn gripped the staircase carpet and dragged one useless leg behind him as he climbed the steps. ‘She buried Josh’s body to protect you. She did it for love.’

  Addison leaned back against the banister.

  So hard to breathe.

  Pain radiated outward from his heart, traveling upward to his neck and his jaw. Soon the nausea would be upon him; he knew all the symptoms. Bile was rising in his throat. His face wet with cold sweat.

  Swahn was impervious to all these signs as he dragged his ruined body upward. The man’s face was turned toward the next flight of steps, the next round of agony that would lead him to the tower room.

  Only Addison saw Sarah’s body falling past the window. His wife did not cry out. It was Addison who screamed – or thought he did. His mouth opened wide, but he could only manage a hoarse whisper of her name. For one insane moment, he believed that he could call Sarah back before she fell to earth.

  Would that she could fly.

  Oren pushed open the front door and entered the foyer. Addison Winston sat alone on the staircase, tie undone and clutching the breast of his dress shirt. His face was ashen. The lawyer was orating to no one. His mouth only moved in dumb show.

  Using the telephone in the foyer, Oren called for an ambulance. ‘It’s a heart attack,’ he said, last words, as he hung up on the 9-1-1 operator. Joining Addison on the stairs, he picked up the gun on the step behind the man. And then he saw William Swahn’s cane. There was blood on the silver handle, but none on the lawyer.

  The lawyer’s gun in one hand and the cane in the other, he traveled up the stairs to the second-floor landing, following a trail of small bloody dots and long smears. Swahn had collapsed on a second staircase, a narrow one. Oren laid down the cane, freeing one hand to roll the man over and check for a pulse. It was there, weak and thready.

  Swahn’s eyes opened.

  ‘Ad Winston did this to you?’

  ‘I have to get to Sarah.’ Swahn pointed to the top of the narrow staircase, and then his hand dropped. His eyes closed.

  Oren climbed the stairs to enter a circular room, where he found a shattered cocktail glass and melting ice cubes on the floor, but no sign of Mrs Winston. A smashed answering machine lay on a rug beside the bed. He passed through an open glass door and crossed the outside deck to look over the rail. Her body lay sprawled on the terrace below, and a blood pool spread around her head.

  ‘Sarah,’ said Swahn, weak and whispery, as Oren walked past him on the stairs. ‘I promised to—’

  ‘Lie still,’ said Oren, though he doubted that this man would ever move again. ‘An ambulance is coming.’

  He ran down the stairs, skipping every second step, passing by the lawyer, who was laughing at some private joke that he had told himself. Oren sprinted across the front room and rounded the line of potted trees that hid the terrace doors. He opened them wide, and there she lay, animated by the wind lifting long strands of pale hair and playing with them, but the former soldier could not be fooled.

  He would know death anywhere.

  This time, the journey was longer as he made his way back up to the top of the lodge. The fallen man was no longer lying on the tower staircase. He had underestimated Swahn’s mission to get to Mrs Winston. There was no one inside the circular room. Once again, Oren stepped out onto the deck, and there lay the cane.

  The man was gone.

  The corpses were in body bags when the coroner’s team carried them from the back terrace to the front of the lodge. They were laid on the ground side by side. This strange reunion of Swahn and Mrs Winston was the first thing Addison saw when his gurney was carried out the door.

  The circular driveway was choked with police vehicles, and a path was being cleared for the imminent flight of the ambulance. Its lights were spinning and the engine running. The rear doors hung open, awaiting the coronary patient.

  A civilian vehicle was parked a short distance away. Hannah sat in the backseat of the limousine, breaking the sorry news to Mrs Winston’s daughter. As if by explosion, the car door flew open, and Isabelle touched ground at a dead run, aiming her body like a bullet and streaking up the driveway toward the gurney that held Addison Winston. The lawyer wore a maddening grin as he lifted one hand to wave to her.

  Though the redhead was slender, one burly deputy was not
up to the job of thwarting her forward momentum. She was only slowed down a bit when she stopped to send her knee into the man’s crotch.

  On the other side of the yard, Oren winced in sympathy and wisely elected to stay out of her way.

  Isabelle’s assault on the deputy bought Hannah time to close the distance, and now she stopped the younger woman with only one leaf-light hand and a few low-spoken words that did not carry. By some trick of flashing ambulance lights and body language, tiny Hannah seemed to grow larger in Oren’s eyes, and Isabelle became smaller and smaller, shrinking to the ground in tears. The housekeeper’s arms enfolded her, and Oren moved closer to hear Hannah say, ‘Patience, child. It won’t take long.’

  One of the paramedics left the ambulance and ran to the sheriff. The coronary patient, earlier pronounced stable for transport, was now dead.

  Spooky Hannah.

  And there was no question of bringing Ad Winston back to life. The medic held one hand pressed to his own heart, illustrating his story of a body part broken beyond repair. ‘The second attack hit him like a bolt of lightning. The guy had to be in agony, but I swear he was laughing when he died. Weird, huh? Like he thought the pain was just so damn funny.’

  Cable Babitt was beyond the reach of his jeep radio, though he could hear the faint static of chatter behind him. By flashlight, he made his way to the grave at the center of the clearing. The crime-scene tape had been removed, and the hole had been filled in. He dropped the large plastic bag at his feet, needing both hands for the digging. When he steeped his shovel into the earth, he was blinded by a brilliant flash of light.

  Sally Polk’s voice came out of the darkness. ‘Can we take that picture again? I think you moved.’