EYE OF THE WITCH (Detective Marcella Witch's Series)

by Dana Donovan

“Look! Walk around. Check in the closets.”

  I heard the phone go static a few times as he walked the apartment, reporting his negative findings room-by-room until finally, “Hey, wait! What’s this?”

  “Do you see a panel?”

  “Yes, in the bedroom up in the corner. It looks like an access panel.”

  Great!” I said, pumping my fist in the air. “Can you lift up on it and see where it goes?”

  “Yes, wait. Let me find something. Here’s, a broomstick. Just let me…. That’s it! Yes, it’s quite large up there, plenty of room for someone to move about.”

  “Can you get your head up there to look around?”

  “It’ll take a minute, Tony. I’ll have to stack some furniture up or something. Let me get back with you.”

  “All right, do that. I’ll wait for your call.”

  After hanging up, I called Spinelli. I hadn’t expected him to have near as much luck as Carlos and me, but I wanted to keep him in the loop.

  “Detective Marcella,” he said. “Glad you called. I was just about to phone you.”

  “Why, are you having some luck?”

  “Maybe. I’m here talking with Jake. He’s the security guru here at HP&P. This guy knows the security equipment here like the back of his hand.”

  “So, what can he tell you?”

  I heard a little side talk and then Spinelli coming back to the phone. “Right. Jake tells me that if someone knew what he was doing, then he could easily change the time and date stamp on a video.”

  “How could someone do that? Isn’t it electronically stamped onto the image?”

  “It works a little different with digital, Detective. But with the proper access, the easiest thing one might do is reset the time and date on the equipment before taping a new sequence of video. That way if anyone looked to see if the video had been tampered with, it would look like it wasn’t.”

  “Amazing,” I said, partly because the concept intrigued me, and partly because I actually understood what he said. “Spinelli, listen. If someone provided the police with new video shot after Bridget Dean’s death, then that means the original recordings might still exist somewhere. See if Jake can find it. In the meantime, Carlos and I are working another lead. I want you to drop what you’re doing and meet me here at Karen Webber’s place right away. Oh, and bring a flashlight?”

  “Got it,” he said. “I’ll see you soon.”

  I hung up the phone and almost immediately Carlos called back.

  “Tony. I’m up in the attic now. It’s plenty large enough for a grown man to move around up here. I see more access panels leading to other apartments on the third floor. Anyone could easily come up through one of them to gain entry into Anna’s apartment and then slipped out the same way.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “That’s what I’m thinking might have happened here, too. I’ve got Spinelli coming over now. I’ll have him scoot up there and check it out.”

  “Do you want me to look around some more while I’m here?”

  “No, Carlos. I think we need to send forensics up there to look for evidence linking Piakowski to the scene. The less hair, prints and fibers you leave behind, the better. Why don’t you come meet me here at Karen’s? I have a feeling we’re going to Rivera’s together after this.”

  “Got it, Tony. On my way.”

  Spinelli arrived at Karen Webber’s place about ten minutes after I hung up with Carlos. I gave him a ten-finger boost up into the attic and then tossed him the flashlight.

  “What do you see?” I asked.

  “Someone’s been here. There’s fresh cigarette butts crushed out on the planks.”

  “What brand?”

  “Marlboros.”

  That set off bells in my head. “Hey, isn’t that the brand—”

  “Piakowski smokes? Yes.”

  “Nice. Do you see another way in or out?”

  “Wait a minute, yes, I think I see a small door. Let me check it out.”

  I stood outside the closet with my head craned through the doorway looking up towards the hole. After a while of not hearing from Spinelli, I began to wonder what he was doing up there. I called his name repeatedly, but he wouldn’t answer. Worried, I took my phone out and dialed his number. He answered on the second ring.

  “Spinelli! Where the hell are you? I’ve been calling your name. What did you do, fall through the ceiling into another apartment?”

  “No, I’m right here.” I turned around and there he was, standing right behind me. “I found a door,” he said. “It leads out onto a fire escape and to an unlocked window down the hall.”

  “Nice work.” I patted him on the shoulder. “This changes everything. Now we have a means for the killer to have gained access and egress through the apartment. I talked to Carlos a few minutes ago, and he’s found a similar way in and out of Anna’s place, as well.”

  “So, what does this prove?”

  “By itself, not a lot. But it shows that Piakowski could have gained access to Karen Webber and Anna Davalos right up to the times of their deaths.”

  “And to Bridget Dean, too, if someone with a key to the building let him in.”

  “Someone like Ricardo Rivera?”

  “Exactly.”

  “That’s what I’m thinking.”

  “So, what do we do now?”

  “We don’t do anything,” I said. “Carlos—”

  “Someone call?” Carlos poked his head through the door, smelling suspiciously of burger and fries.

  I looked at my watch. “Where were you? You should have been here ten minutes ago.”

  “I stopped for gas.”

  “Gas?”

  His eyes darted between Spinelli’s and mine. “Yeah.”

  I decided not to call him on it. Besides, I’ve ridden with him after he’s had a burger and fries from one of those quickie McDrive-thrus. He wasn’t lying. It does give him gas.

  “Carlos and I are going to pay a little visit to Ricardo Rivera,” I told Spinelli. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and find Piakowski there. In the meantime...” I dug into my pocket and handed him the flash drive I found tucked among Karen’s bed sheets. “Take this.”

  He took the device and examined it closely. “It’s a four-gig flash drive. Where did you get it?”

  “That’s not important. Take it back to the box and see what you can learn. I suspect it holds all of Karen’s notes and maybe some more pictures. Give me a call as soon as you find something.” Spinelli took the devise and headed out. I turned to Carlos. “You ready to go?”

  “Sure, let’s get it.”

  “You want to stop on the way and get a bite to eat somewhere?”

  I saw his eyes bulge, as though an eruption deep inside his belly had swelled to the top of his throat and then settled back down. “Ah, no, I’m good,” he said, thumping his chest with his fist. “Maybe later.”

  “Ah-huh. That’s what I thought.”

  On the way to Rivera’s I asked Carlos if he could take a little detour first so that I could get something off my chest.

  “No problem,” he said. “Where to?”

  “Just drive. I’ll give you directions.”

  I didn’t want to tell him where we were going, not right away. If I had, I knew he would want to know why. That would have been a tough one to answer because, frankly, I didn’t really know myself. Carlos is a funny guy sometimes, sharp about some things, a little dim about others. I couldn’t recall if I had ever taken him to Lilith’s with me before. My few visits there still spark memories too dramatic to include such details. But I believe I shall never forget his reaction when we pulled up in front of her house this time. After pulling into the driveway, he took one look over the steering wheel and said to me, “Tony, that gnome behind the windmill, he just gave me the finger.”

  “So?” I said.

  He answered back seriously, “Tell Lilith to expect his resignation in the morning, because I’m going to kick his little green ass from here to Ip
swich.”

  “Carlos.” I grabbed his wrist and squeezed it until I forced his eyes off it. “That gnome is smaller than you, but trust me, you don’t want to do it. Now, maybe you ought to wait out here for me. I’ll run in and have a chat with Lilith while you sit here and…”

  “Guard the car?”

  “Yeah, that’s it. You keep an eye on the car. I’ll be right back.”

  I walked up the pathway to the front door, tripping over a stepping stone that maybe, just maybe, that rat bastard gnome had caused to lurch upward just as I approached it. For now, however, I’ll say that it was my fault.

  I knocked on the door, hesitantly, as I had never been to Lilith’s at night before. A full moon over my shoulder cast a shadow on the door, a shadow of me, though its moves seemed almost independent of my own. A faint light quivered through the window, which I recognized as candlelight. But for that dim luminance, no others shined within the house.

  Lilith opened the door, cloaked in a long black robe with cords of black beads draped loosely around her neck. She carried in her cupped hands a single candle. Its orange light danced like a gypsy ghost upon her face. Her eyes, sunken in artificial sockets cast by faltered shadows, gleamed with brilliance and beguiled my senses.

  “Lilith?”

  “Detective.”

  “What do you…have something going on here? Am I interrupting?”

  “If you must know, I’m conducting a ceremony.”

  “Alone?”

  “Yes, alone. But if you’re here because you brought my witch’s ladder with you, that’s good. I can use it now.”

  “Oh, it’s a witchcraft thing. No, sorry. I don’t have it. What kind of ceremony are you conducting?”

  “Detective, I really could use that witch’s ladder.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m working on it. What’s the big deal?”

  “The big deal is that I am initiating a rite of passage, a sort of self-dedication thing. It’s very important and very personal. The ladder was supposed to be an integral constituent of the dedication. Unfortunately, this affair is time sensitive and I can’t put it off any longer. Thanks to you, I’ll have to conduct the ceremony without it.”

  “Why don’t you just make another one? Hell, a year ago you made so many, you have thought they grew on trees.”

  Sometimes you have to watch what you say to Lilith, and more importantly, how you say it. I’ve always found that a bit of a contradiction with her. For someone who lives by the sharpened tongue, she doesn’t take it as well as she dishes it out. I watched her eyes squint keenly, though her brows crooked high like gnarly fishhooks. Anyone else, I suppose, might have felt her wrath and found himself leaving her place on four legs with a newly sprouted tail pinched between them. But for our special kinship, or perhaps just because I’m old now, she spared me the sparks and spells and refrained from turning me into anything that could lick himself in places God never meant man to lick.

  “This is not about making witch’s ladders, Detective,” she said, coldly. “This dedication is something I’ve been preparing for years. It’s most serious I assure you. After tonight, I’ll have renewed myself, accepting the ways of witchcraft in the eyes of my ancestors and embracing the secrets they hold. To do this, I must atone and commit myself completely. That ladder, which regrettably connects me to Doctor Lowell through Leona, is the last relic associated with that dark part of my past. Tonight the stars align. It’s been a year and a day since I constructed that ladder, and in so doing, forever tied its energy to the circumstances surrounding the events of that unfortunate episode in my life.”

  “Unfortunate episode?”

  She shook her head. “Forget it. Listen. I really need to get started. So, if you don’t mind.”

  “Lilith, please. Before you shut me out, may I have just a minute more?”

  “A minute? Can you make it quicker?”

  “Oh, sure. I’ll make it quick.” I stole a peek over her shoulder and pointed inside. “Do you think we could, ahh….”

  She threw the door open the rest of the way. “Fine. Come in, but you’ve got one minute.”

  I followed her inside, where I noticed more candles burning than what I could see from out on her stoop. She didn’t offer to turn on the lights. I supposed she wanted to stay in the mood for whatever voodoo thing she had planned. She pointed to the kitchen table and uttered, “Sit,” which I did. Then she pulled up a chair opposite me and said, “This has nothing to do with voodoo, Detective.”

  I remembered then, all the little secrets I lost to her in the past. “No, of course, not,” I said. “I know that witchcraft and voodoo are two separate things. I don’t want you to think for a minute that I—”

  “Spill it, Marcella. Why have you come?”

  “Fine.” I pulled the wrinkles from my jacket and folded my hands neatly on the table. “You told me earlier that you had a hard time reading Benjamin Rivera, that you felt like he was two different people.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Did you know he suffers from MPD?”

  “Multiple Personality Disorder?”

  “Yes.”

  “I didn’t, but it makes sense now.”

  “How so?”

  “Well, a part of him believes he can bilocate. That’s the Benny side. Another part, a somewhat weaker though darker side, tells me he can’t. I guess the Benny side was in control when I read him. That’s why I told you he could. Why? Have you found out now that he cannot?”

  “No, that is to say I haven’t found out either way, although his subordinate, who may soon become the dominant personality, insists he can’t.”

  “Leo?”

  “He calls himself Le…. How did you know that?”

  She reared a guilty grin. “Sorry.”

  I scolded her with a glare. “Yes, he calls himself, Leo, and unlike Benny, he doesn’t stutter. In fact, he’s as articulate as you or I. And nasty? Shoot, this guy’s a regular Attila the Hun.”

  “Leo is the sign of the lion.”

  “Yeah, go figure.”

  “So, what do you think?”

  “I’m not sure. After learning about Carol Kessler stepping in front of that train, I felt certain Benny was behind it. Then the other shoe hit the floor.”

  “Greg Piakowski?”

  “Gregoroy Pia…. Lilith! Stop that!”

  She covered her mouth, so that I might believe she merely slipped. But I knew then that she was really starting to enjoy it. “Forgive me,” she insisted. “Please, go on.”

  I no longer bothered to give her the scowling brow, figuring it would only encourage her further. “Yes, Piakowski. We learned not long ago that he was at the train station when Carol stepped off the…well, when she stepped off.”

  “You think he did it.”

  “Yes. No. I don’t know.”

  “Detective….”

  I leaned my head back in resignation and let it thump against the backrest of the chair. I saw shadows on the ceiling thrash in twisted shades of black and gray, fleeting like the wind and as impossible to grasp as the doubts that fueled my indecisiveness. “Lilith,” I said, though I fear it came out more as a cry. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I’m filled with hostility and indecision. Everywhere I turn, I’m making mistakes.”

  “Welcome to the human side of life, Detective.”

  “No, it’s more than that. I mean it. I can’t seem to pull things together like I used to. I feel like…like my life has no meaning, no direction.”

  She reached across the table and patted my folded hands. “You’re adjusting to retirement. That’s all.”

  “No. It’s more. Ever since the Stalker case last year I….” As I spoke, a warm sensation radiated through my hands and up my arms. It startled me at first, but then it sort of melted into the rest of my body and dissipated like a fog. I pulled my hands away gently and sat up straight in my chair. “Oh, hell, will you listen to me?” I said, feeling suddenly embarrassed. “I must
sound like a silly old coot. I’m sorry I bothered you. I know you’re in the middle of something. I just wanted to ask you about Benjamin and his personality thing. I’ll let you get on with your…ceremony, or whatever.”

  “Wait,” she said, and she sprang from her chair and hurried across the room to one of the kitchen cupboards. Opening it, she reached up and removed a small wooden box from the top shelf. She then set it on the counter, fingering through its contents briefly before returning to the table. I looked at her curiously, as she held out her hand and presented me with a dark colored diamond-shaped object.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “It’s the eye of the witch,” she said. “It’s made of obsidian, but more important is the spell cast upon it. Simply by possessing this, one reaps the benefits of its incantation.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning that merely by carrying it on your person you will master the insight and discretion of a witch much wiser than your years could otherwise allow.”

  “You want me to have it?”

  She smiled proudly. “You’ve earned it, Detective. I of course, don’t need it, therefore yes, I would like you to have it. Let it serve you well.”

  I took it from her, my hand trembling like a child’s. “Lilith, I don’t know what to say.”

  She folded her arms at her chest, and through the pleating in her robe I could see her weight shifting onto one hip. “You can start by saying good bye.”

  I stood, resisting the urge to hug the shit out of her. “No. I can start by thanking you, which I will. Thank you, Lilith. Thank you for everything.”

  I started for the door, clutching my newfound confidence with humility. I could feel her presence following me closely and stopping just a split second before I did. I turned to her and asked, “Do I have to do anything to make it work?”

  She laughed dully. “No, Detective. It works all by itself. You just slip it into your pocket and forget about it.”

  “Great. I can’t think of how to thank you enough.”

  She opened the door and showed me out. “Oh, you will,” she said, and before I could give that any thought, she shut the door on my heels.

  I skimmed down her walkway on a strip of air, feeling suddenly invincible and ready to take on the world. Carlos had gotten out of the car to take up a defensive position against the enemy gnome, whom almost certainly had crafted an ingenious plan of attack and was about to launch it as I came out the door. I tapped Carlos on the shoulder and pointed to the car. “You getting in or should I ask the gnome to drive?” I saw him shake his fist at the little puck before climbing in behind the wheel.