“You knew all along,” I said. “You sent me the letter and the plane tickets and paid for my stay here in Charleston.”
“Yes.”
“And you sent me to Gillon one day, then to the admiral the next. You wanted them scared. You wanted them to panic at what I might discover.”
“I wanted them alone, here, with you, at sea. It took me six months to think through this plan. Simple, wouldn’t you agree? You were the baying hound that spooked them from the underbrush.”
“Why?” Gillon asked Helen. “You’re as guilty as we are.”
“In a way,” Helen said. She stood, derringer still in hand. “And in another way, not. This is your moment, Gillon.”
“My moment?”
“You get to be the center of attention. Nick will lead the way up the stairs to the deck. The admiral will remain with you and your wheelchair, with me following. If the admiral lifts either hand from the wheelchair, I will shoot him in the back. Am I clear?”
Gillon said, “Helen, this does not make the slightest bit of sense.”
“Probably not, Gillon. I hope you find it ironic that one other impulse with no glandular origin has pointed me toward the complexities of the human soul.”
She smiled. “And that impulse would be revenge.”
Chapter 39
A spotlight threw a harsh glare across the back deck of the yacht. The rain had slowed as the storm moved inland, but the lines and railing and canvases were soaked and drops of water glittered. The yacht pitched with the waves, and Helen was careful to keep her distance from the three of us in front of her.
“All of you,” she shouted. “Into the lifeboat.”
It sat at the very rear of the yacht, sideways, from bow to stern as long as the yacht was wide. Slowly, with a backward glance over his shoulder, the admiral pushed the wheelchair forward.
“You too, Nick,” she said. “Into the lifeboat.”
Helen watched carefully as the admiral and I pulled the canvas back off the top of the lifeboat. It hung in a cradle from steel arms that extended over the water.
“Lift Gillon,” Helen told the admiral and me. “Both of you. Lift Gillon into the boat.”
“There is no dignity in this,” Gillon said. “You are a perverse woman.”
“No,” she said. “Just angry.”
The rain stopped completely. A temporary calm fell over the yacht. The only sounds were the slap of waves against the hull and its powerful engines driving it forward to the open ocean. Eight or nine miles behind us, the lights of Charleston glowed off the bottom of the cloud bank heavy above it.
Gillon clutched at the side of the lifeboat to keep his balance.
“Now you two,” Helen told me and the admiral. “Both of you inside the boat. I will shoot if you try anything differently.”
Once we were inside the lifeboat, Helen moved closer and inspected the interior. The spotlight behind her made it impossible for me to read her face.
“Throw the life jackets out,” she said. “And the flares.”
“Just put a bullet in us,” Gillon said. “If you want to kill us, save all the work.”
“I don’t want to kill you,” she said. “But if you would prefer the bullet over an opportunity at freedom . . .”
The admiral threw the life jackets into the dark water. They bobbed in the phosphorous wake of the yacht, then were lost immediately from sight as the yacht continued to power forward. Next, he tossed out the flares.
“Thank you,” Helen said. “Nick. You come out now.”
“What?”
“Out of the boat. I needed you in there so you wouldn’t try to stop me from setting Gillon and Robertson loose. But come out slowly. I don’t want to have to shoot you if you try to stop me.”
Helen kept her distance from me as I clambered out of the bow of the lifeboat.
“Good,” she said. She pulled a lever, and electric motors began to whine, lifting the lifeboat away from the yacht. She let the motors run for thirty seconds, pulling the lever to stop position when the lifeboat had completely cleared the yacht and hung above the water.
“Good-bye,” she called out to Gillon and the admiral, her hand still on the lever.
“Helen,” Gillon said, “this is insanity. You are stealing my yacht. Piracy at sea.”
“You think that matters?” she said. “If you survive, I’m sure you won’t press charges. I know too much. As does the admiral. Remember how Layton played us each against the other. We all knew too much for any of us to come forward with our story. Tonight will be no different.”
Helen lowered the lifeboat until it was almost touching the water. She kept her derringer trained on me, making sure I wouldn’t try to stop her.
“Edgar Layton is dead,” she told the two men in the lifeboat, raising her voice to be heard above the yacht engines. “The doctors give me four weeks, five weeks at the most. That means when I am gone, there will only be the two of you.”
The breeze whipped at her black dress as she leaned forward. “Think about it. If one of you is dead, the other is totally free. With Edgar gone, and me gone, and one of you gone, there will be nobody to testify against the final survivor. Nothing that Nick or Amelia do can prove you had anything to do with the murder of Carolyn Barrett.”
She lowered the lifeboat another two feet, so that the water pushed against it, hungry to carry it away.
“Don’t waste your energy trying to start the motor. No spark plug. You are only seven miles offshore. If you work together, you can make it back safely. On the other hand, if one of you goes overboard and drowns, I’m sure the survivor can come up with a good story when the Coast Guard finds the lifeboat in the morning.”
“Helen—”
“You understand, don’t you?” Helen interrupted Gillon’s plea. “This is what I planned, what I wanted. Not justice of the courts. I could have gone to the police myself for that. But I wanted Nick to bring you here so that I could send the two of you into the night. For a different kind of justice. Call it survival of the fittest. My bet is only one of you makes it back. May the best man win.”
The yacht rose and fell again. A wave hit the lifeboat, throwing water on Gillon and McLean. Already each was eyeing the other, edging apart as she spoke.
“By the way,” she shouted, “if you’re wondering why I wanted this revenge so badly, it’s simple. She was my sister.”
Helen hit the lever a final time.
Released from its cradle, the lifeboat dropped into the water.
The yacht surged forward, leaving the two men to disappear into the night, alone together, in a tiny boat on the big cold waters of the Atlantic.
**
“After we return, you can tell the authorities what you like,” Helen said. “I really don’t care what happens now.”
We stood on the back deck of the yacht, the lifeboat now out of sight. With the storm completely inland and the clouds starting to break, pinpricks of stars began to show. Helen tossed her derringer into the water.
“Revenge,” I said. “You told them you wanted revenge. For what? What do you know about my mother?”
“She didn’t abandon you, Nick.”
Helen was tired. Her words slurred slightly. She couldn’t make the effort to keep her lips tight as she spoke.
“Finally, Nick, I can tell you.”
Chapter 40
This is the story of my mother’s final night:
On that night, with Amelia alone and afraid in her father’s police cruiser, Edgar Layton took my mother farther into the darkness. He had handcuffed her wrists in front of her belly, and he pushed her along with one heavy hand, and with the other hand shone a flashlight on the ground before them. The beam was powerful; it was a flashlight that held eight batteries, almost as long as a billy club, something he had used it for before.
The beam showed long woven grass of a rarely used path. Insects fluttered toward the beam. Bushes on each side of the path plucked at my mother’s
legs.
Their walk took five minutes. Except for the rasp of Layton’s breathing—like a bull plodding across a pasture—each walked in silence. My mother did not give in to her fear and ask questions about her fate or beg for release.
They reached an old shack. The flashlight beam showed a buckled doorway—no door—bent hinges with a couple of screws remaining where the door was once attached.
“It’s me,” Layton said.
A young man stepped through the doorway. He warded off the beam of the flashlight with upturned palms, squinting against the harsh light.
My mother would have recognized him immediately. Jonathan Britt, the admiral’s young assistant, dapper in a leather bomber jacket, smiling nervously.
Layton took the flashlight beam off the young man and turned it to my mother. The admiral’s assistant gasped at the sight of her handcuffed hands.
Layton unholstered his pistol and placed the end of the barrel against my mother’s head. This, too, was obvious in the flashlight beam.
Layton cocked the hammer. A click of iron against iron.
“Jonathan,” Layton said to the admiral’s assistant, turning his flashlight back again into the young man’s eyes, “have you told anyone about our little land deal?”
“No,” he said. The flashlight beam hit his eyes directly. He squinted, bewildered. “I could have told you that before you dragged me out here.”
“Listen carefully,” Layton said. “You know this woman.”
Jonathan nodded. His hair was shaved short, navy style. Tiny white crescents of scalp showed where the razor had gouged too deep.
“This woman knows about it,” Layton said. “This is not good.”
“You can’t kill her. We’ve gone on a few dates. That’s it.”
“I’m going to shoot her if you don’t tell the truth. Was it you who told her about the naval base deal?”
Jonathan gulped a few times. He was trying to weigh his options. “Some, all right? I mean, she’s one of you. Don’t kill her for what I did wrong.”
Layton dropped his hand, taking the gun away from my mother’s temple.
“Have you told anyone else?” Layton asked Jonathan. “Think carefully. You see how serious I am about this. If I find out later that you told someone—and I will find out—then I’ll shoot you.”
“No. No. I swear. I’ve told no one else.”
The flashlight was unwavering on Jonathan’s face. Because the light was squarely in his eyes, he didn’t see Layton lift the gun again. He didn’t see Layton pull the trigger.
My mother saw. All of it. The bullet caught Jonathan high and left in his leather jacket. It made a neat hole. His face puckered in surprise. He sagged to his knees, deflating like a balloon.
**
At the gunshot, four others stepped from the shack where they had been hidden spectators to Edgar Layton’s brutal dispatch of the naval assistant.
Geoffrey Alexander Gillon, casual slacks and a sweater.
The admiral himself, the creases of his uniform crisply ironed.
There was also her sister, Helen deMarionne, who wouldn’t meet my mother’s eyes. And Lorimar Barrett, father of Pendleton and my mother’s brother in-law. He was built like an Ivy League football player, now with a rounded belly and the beginning of a stoop to his back. Once he was handsome like David, his dead war-hero brother. Now Lorimar Barrett was a man content with middle age—round spectacles, balding. My mother loathed him. Knew that he was having an affair with Helen deMarionne.
“Are you crazy?” It was Gillon, screaming.
Cordite was heavy in the air. My mother must have known by then that she would die. They would not let her witness murder and walk away.
“I shall miss him,” the admiral said. “Few could handle paperwork like he did.”
“Are you crazy?” Gillon screamed again.
Lorimar Barrett placed a hand on Gillon’s arm. “We are not playing for marbles,” Lorimar said. “He was the weakest link. And now he is gone.”
“But this . . . is . . . murder . . .”
“Shut up,” Layton told Gillon. “Or we’ll bury you with him.”
Gillon shut up. In the light given by the edges of the powerful flashlight beam, he could not help but stare at the body near his feet where Jonathan had fallen face forward. Although the entry of the bullet was like a neat punch drill, the exit through his back tore apart the leather like shrapnel.
“Now,” Layton said to my mother, “does anyone else know what you told Gillon this afternoon?”
“No. I only mentioned it to Gillon because I wanted the settlement for Nick.”
“I will kill Nick myself if you have lied.”
Her wrists were still handcuffed in front of her. She brought up her hands in prayer. Nothing had broken her in the past ten years. She had grown strong and tough. But this broke her. She begged for me and my life.
“Please. Believe me. I know you are going to kill me. But don’t kill Nick. I haven’t told a soul.”
The flashlight was now shining squarely in her eyes. She tensed, waiting for the impact of the bullet.
**
“Don’t kill her,” Lorimar said. “Killing her was not part of this.”
“You can’t kill her,” Helen said. “I will not allow it.”
The body of Jonathan Britt lay between them as they argued.
“Shut up,” Layton said. “There is no other choice.”
“There is a choice,” Lorimar answered. “She knows we will kill her boy if she doesn’t keep this a secret. You can let her live.”
Layton laughed at Lorimar. “You’ve called her a problem for years. Why wouldn’t you want it ended?”
Blinded by the flashlight in Layton’s left hand, my mother made a guess about where Layton’s right hand was, the hand with the pistol. She dove for the gun. Her hands bounced off Layton’s forearm. She clutched for his wrist, clutched for the gun.
But another explosion ripped through the blanket of insect noise. Followed by a gurgle of disbelief.
Layton threw my mother off his arm as casually as if discarding a piece of clothing. He threw her to the ground. He stepped on her neck to hold her in place. He pointed the flashlight beam at the source of the agonized gurgling.
It showed Geoffrey Alexander Gillon. On his back, holding the lower part of his belly. Blood crawled over the tops of his fingers.
There was another click of iron against iron. Layton kneeled and pushed the barrel into Gillon’s temple, as dispassionately as if about to put down a horse with a broken leg.
But Gillon was a smart man. He was thinking, even as he fought the spasms of pain that came after a bullet had torn out a piece of his lower spine and the nerves that connected his brain to his legs. He knew what the click of iron against iron signified.
“Don’t shoot me,” he gasped. “If I die, a sealed package gets opened in Washington.”
With that simple statement, Gillon saved his own life. Layton decided against the kill and eased the hammer back into place without shooting.
“We need to get him to a hospital,” Lorimar Barrett said. “We can’t let him die.”
“What about the woman?” the admiral asked.
Layton reached down and pulled up his pants leg. He had a smaller pistol in an ankle holster. He tossed the pistol to the admiral.
“No!” Helen screamed.
Helen tried to take the gun away, but Layton held her off with one hand.
“You shoot her or I shoot you,” Layton told the admiral. He had his own pistol trained on the admiral’s head. “You shoot her. I keep the gun with your fingerprints. That’s our insurance.”
My mother saw it clearly. The admiral nodded.
And that was my mother’s death sentence.
Chapter 41
Helen turned to me, keeping the good side
of her face in profile.
“I was part of the group in on the land deal, through Lorimar. I had no idea until later
that your mother had made the threat she did. Lorimar took me out into the country that night. It was Edgar Layton’s plan to involve all of us, so that none of us would ever dare reveal what had happened.”
Helen’s voice became dull, as if keeping herself from feeling her story would lessen its impact. “I believe I lost my soul that night. Going to Lorimar after having an affair with the man who did what he did with my sister, who was there that night—was a way, I know now, to punish myself. And, in a way, to punish him. He was bound to me by the evil we shared, and I never let him forget it. You cannot imagine how much I loathed who I became over the years. It no longer mattered how much I debased myself in pursuit of distractions to rid myself of that pain. And you . . . you were always a reminder of my sin. I hated you because of that, even as my guilt forced me to try to protect you by forcing the Barretts to look after you.” If possible, Helen’s voice became even duller. “All I can say in my defense is that by the time I figured out what Layton meant to do, it was too late. I watched as the admiral shot her. I didn’t have a chance of stopping them. When she was dead, there was nothing I could do. Layton drove me back to the train station, left Lorimar to take his own car. I never knew what Edgar did with the bodies.”
“Layton drove you back to the train station. Not my mother?”
Amelia had heard two women get in and out of the car that night. Not one. My mother first. Helen second.
“We wanted someone of her build and size. That way, Layton could find witnesses to testify that she had boarded the train with the tickets she had purchased earlier.”
When Amelia had heard her father in the car, he had been speaking to Helen, not to my mother. “Listen, you tramp. I know where you came from. I think I even know who killed your father. White trash.”
“Layton left me at the train station, then went to bury your mother. I am so, so sorry, Nick. Sorry for everything. There is no way I could expect your forgiveness. I can’t even find a way to forgive myself.”
Out of the Shadows (Nick Barrett Charleston series) Page 23
