The Ties That Bind

by Warren Adler

  Then she realized the foolishness of her expectation. Farley would never call and leave his own name. She went through her messages again. They were all from people she knew. No unknowns. Could that mean he expected her to call him, was waiting for her call? The more she thought about it, the more powerful became her desire to explore the idea.

  Picking up the phone, she called the Supreme Court and asked for the office of Associate Justice Lipscomb. Even as she waited, she felt out of control, possessed. At length she got a receptionist and announced herself.

  "He'll know me. I promise you. Fiona FitzGerald," she said.

  In a few moments the woman came back on the phone.

  "Justice Lipscomb is in a meeting," the woman announced.

  "Does he know I'm on the phone?"

  "He's in a meeting. I'll be sure he gets the message."

  The woman broke the connection. Knowing the consequences, how could he possibly avoid making contact? She called again a half-hour later, making the request to speak to the justice as soon as possible. Was this compulsion a form of madness? she wondered.

  "I'll give him the message," the receptionist said icily, hanging up. It was apparent that this was not the method that would get the required response. Of course not, she affirmed. Farley would be far too cautious to accept any contact that could be compromising. A telephone was too vulnerable and, even if he met with her in person, he would most certainly want to be sure she wasn't wired.

  A number of alternatives ran through her mind. Finally she settled on an idea whose subtlety he would understand. She would contact Mrs. Lipscomb. Letitia. She called Daisy.

  "Me again," she told Daisy. As always, they would slip into their clever banter and wisecracking mode.

  "Did I do the trick, Fi?" Daisy said breezily.

  "Yes, you did."

  "Any return engagement brewing?"

  "It's business, Daisy."

  "Have you their home number?"

  "The chatelaine, is it?"

  She paused for a moment, then gave Fiona the number.

  "Is this all hush-hush detective work, Fi? Death and intrigue. Sounds so..."

  "Gory."

  "Not before cocktails, dahling. Don't make me queasy."

  Daisy's voice helped dispel Fiona's gloom. She dialed the number, then before the ring began, hung up quickly. The fact was, she had no clear idea of her strategy. She was, she realized, playing this like a jazz pianist, moving ahead with the rhythm, improvising as she went along.

  She spent the next hour fishing in her mind for a starting point, getting discouraged, fishing again. Then her focus began to wander and she considered Phelps Barker and the forces ranged against him. They would be formidable and, despite her antipathy for the type, she felt sorry for him. He had undoubtedly lied out of panic.

  When the phone rang she picked it up quickly, half hoping that it would be Farley Lipscomb. It was Thomas Herbert, asking for Gail Prentiss. Fiona recognized his voice.

  "I'll give her your message, Mr. Herbert," Fiona said, identifying herself.

  There was a long pause.

  "Has she filled you in?"

  "Yes, she has."

  "Tell her I'm at the Hay-Adams."

  "I will."

  "We'll need to touch base first thing tomorrow. I'll be expecting some preliminary information by then." He cleared his throat. "I'll expect you both."

  There was another long pause. She heard the steady whoosh of his breathing as it came through the phone. She debated asking him about the funeral, but thought better of it.

  "We'll get him," he said. "We'll get the evil bastard."

  She hung up, feeling helpless in the face of what was quickly becoming an inevitablity.

  It was growing dark outside, which prompted Fiona to risk the call to Letitia. She could not wait. It seemed important, she told herself, to talk to her alone. A strategy was half formed in her mind. She dialed Letitia's number. Someone, probably the maid, answered and asked her name. She gave it.

  Moments later the person returned and said that Madame was busy, whereupon Fiona told the woman that she was a sergeant in the homicide division and needed to talk to Mrs. Lipscomb immediately or, she threatened, she would have to swear out a search warrant.

  Her tone probably panicked the poor woman and in a moment Letitia was on the phone.

  "Fiona, is that you?"

  Fiona had expected her throat to constrict as it had done the other night. It didn't, the words coming out sharp and clear. She felt surprisingly calm.

  "Yes, Mrs. Lipscomb. I'm sorry if I frightened the poor woman."

  "Why on earth are you calling? And what is so terribly urgent? It's not Farley, Judge Lipscomb?"

  "He's fine, Mrs. Lipscomb." There was irony in that.

  "Well, then, what is so important that I had to rush to the phone?" Her worry abated, she turned bitchy and imperious. "I don't appreciate this one bit."

  "I must talk with your husband, Mrs. Lipscomb."

  "Call his office. They might put you through if you get as heavy-handed as you did earlier. But I doubt it." She paused. "Fiona, millions of people want to talk with my husband."

  "I know that, Mrs. Lipscomb, that's why I called you at home."

  "And where, may I ask, did you get my number?" she asked haughtily. Fiona reached for a cliché.

  "We have our methods."

  "Well, I, for one, don't like them. May I remind you that we are talking about an associate justice of the Supreme Court."

  "Will you please take this number down, Mrs. Lipscomb?"

  "You were such a charming teenager, Fiona. How could you lower yourself to become a"—her voice became sneering—"a policeman? Your father is probably turning in his grave."

  "Just write the number down please, Mrs. Lipscomb."

  "I'm ready, thank you."

  Fiona gave Letitia her home number and made her repeat it.

  "Are you satisfied now?"

  "I won't be until I talk to your husband. Tell him it's urgent."

  "I warn you, Fiona. It had better be."

  "It is. I promise you."

  Fiona hung up, relieved at last that she had found a course of action. Farley lived, above all, in mortal fear of his wife. During their affair, Farley had been paranoid about her finding out and had taken every precaution. She was betting that he still felt the same terrible fear.

  Hanging up, Fiona put a note on Gail's desk about meeting Thomas Herbert at the Hay-Adams first thing in the morning, then left to await what she fervently hoped was the call from Farley Lipscomb.

  12

  By eleven, she hadn't heard from Farley. It had been a nerve-wracking evening, not only the waiting but a brief and upsetting conversation with Harrison Greenwald.

  Harrison had told her that he was "ravaged" by her treatment of him. "Ravaged" was a word he seemed to fix on, since he repeated it numerous times. It had, as he told her, put him off his feed. There was something quaintly literary about his speech, which used to amuse her and which now seemed forced and pompous.

  "It's not just the libido, Fiona," he pressed. "I'm mentally ravaged by not knowing what's bothering you. Why bottle it up? I care and I want to help. Besides, it 's driving me crazy."

  "I can't discuss it. Can't you understand? It has nothing to do with you."

  "But it affects me. Whatever it is, I'm in it. I thought we were lovers, soulmates. Relationships mean sharing."

  "Please, no lectures, Harrison. I just need some space."

  "I hate that phrase," he said. "It implies deep dark secrets and I also hate secrets."

  "I know."

  "What kind of an answer is that?"

  "An incomplete one. I'll explain it soon."

  "What does that mean, an hour, a day, a week, a month?"

  She was tempted to say "always," remembering a phrase from an old song her mother used to sing.

  He was not a man to be kept in the dark. That much she had learned in the eight months th
ey had been together as lovers. Harrison was one of those men who needed to know, which was, in fact, one of the reasons she adored their time together. She, too, was a woman who needed to know.

  Yet how could she have told him that, for reasons beyond her control, her life was on hold until ... until what? The case of Phyla Herbert? The culmination of the Farley Lipscomb trauma? How? What? Perhaps she would remain in this state forever? Whatever the outcome, she sensed that this was something between herself and herself, that she had little choice but to see it through ... alone.

  The conversation with Harrison ended with pauses and monosyllables. How could she tell him that her heart and body were frozen solid? Telling him that would be far more hurtful than leaving him confused.

  The anxiety of waiting also took its toll. She couldn't sleep, couldn't concentrate on the various mind-numbing shows that populated the television airwaves at that time of night. She took to roaming the house, moving in and out of rooms. This was her parent's home, her inheritance, and she had cared for it with love and money, planning never to sell it, hoping one day that it might be an inheritance for her offspring, a fading dream. Thinking such thoughts made her gloomier.

  In the ground-floor den, she poured herself a straight Scotch and drank it in one gulp, feeling the heat of the liquid sting as it went down. As she started to move out of the den, her attention was diverted by something happening in the front of the house.

  A man was walking up the driveway. He was walking slowly, a yet unknown figure, moving almost soundlessly. It was every cop's nightmare, a confrontation with someone they had caught, a psychopath bent on revenge.

  In a desk drawer, she kept a piece for emergencies, a police-issue .38, always fully loaded. Lifting it out of the drawer, she gripped it and waited, watching the man move forward. He continued up the driveway, which seemed odd for a stalker bent on murder.

  The security system was triggered, but she knew that anyone bent on forced entry would have considered that and taken steps to circumvent it. Short of a bomb thrown into a window, she had the present situation well covered.

  The man continued to move forward. He reached the front door. Chime sounds ripped through the silence, startling her. The .38 still in her hand, she moved to the door and looked into the side window normally used for identifying visitors. She flicked on a switch, which showered the visitor in a blaze of light.

  Turning off the security system, she unlatched the door. Farley Lipscomb stood in the doorway.

  "May I come in?" he asked.

  "Of course," she replied, thrusting the pistol in the front pocket of her robe. Her heart was fluttering and she was conscious of her own effort to keep herself under control, as if an eruption was brewing inside of her. Yet she had expected him to react, hadn't she? Now that he had, she wasn't sure she was up for it.

  He was wearing a raincoat and an old-fashioned snap-brim hat low over his forehead. Obviously, he had parked elsewhere, probably a good distance from the house, and his costume was designed as a disguise. Same MO, she thought, as he came into the vestibule. He would have taken every conceivable precaution not to be recognized and this nocturnal visit assured him that his conversation would not be recorded.

  Knowing the drill, he knew how to avoid the pitfalls. Obviously, he had carefully checked out the house, assured himself that she was alone and made his move.

  Fiona led him to the den, where he sat down on one of the leather wing chairs, his raincoat open, his hat on his lap. She was conscious of him watching her as she moved into the room behind him trying to overcome the rubbery feeling in her legs.

  "Haven't been here in years," Farley said in his deep voice, the tones measured and cadenced. Even in his odd get-up, he looked elegant and handsome. "Your father and I spent many happy hours in this room going over the momentous events of the times. He was quite a man, quite a man."

  "Yes, he was."

  "His courage has been a constant source of inspiration to me." He had, Fiona noted, retained, even embellished, his ability to impress. Yes, she remembered, her father and he had been friends. What made it even more ironic was that they were ideological allies as well, and Farley had brought these attitudes to the Supreme Court. He was the quintessential moralist and all his opinions stressed the moral implications of the law above all else. But he was best known for his compassion, which threaded through his decisions and other writings. To Fiona, who had experienced his compassion first hand, it represented the quintessential hypocrisy.

  "Would you like a drink, Farley?"

  He shook his head. Only a lamp beside the couch was lit, a three-way bulb, at its lowest illumination. She did not make a move to turn it up.

  For a few moments, they just stared at each other. Both she and Farley had crossed their legs, but Farley had put his hand on his chin as he contemplated her. Despite the many years since they had been alone together, she still felt diminished in his presence. After awhile her initial shock had dissipated and she felt her nervousness retreat.

  "Well, I did get your attention, Farley," she said, offering a thin smile. He did not smile back.

  "I rather resented your involving Letitia."

  "I was hoping you would," Fiona said.

  His face was in the shadows and it was difficult for her to interpret his expression.

  "Still playing it safe, aren't you, Farley? You seemed to have really worked it out. Frankly, I expected you to call, not show up in person ... until I realized that you might think the telephones had been bugged."

  "Why are you doing this?" he said, shaking his head. "Considering that our so-called experience happened more than a decade and a half ago."

  She supposed the use of the word "decade" was meant to push the event even deeper into the past.

  "That's history, Farley. My interest in you is professional and has to do with what happened just a few days ago in the Mayflower Hotel."

  "That's the part that confused me," he said. "What the devil are you talking about?"

  "Phyla Herbert."

  "Phyla Herbert?"

  He seemed genuinely puzzled. But Fiona had seen hundreds of suspects portray themselves as genuinely puzzled, many of them without the thespian talents of Farley Lipscomb.

  "Thomas Herbert's little girl," Fiona said, not taking her eyes off him, trying to interpet every tiny nuance of his facade.

  "Herbert?"

  "From Chicago, Farley. Come now, don't be coy."

  "Thomas Herbert, the lawyer?"

  He said it slowly, his forehead wrinkling. Was it genuine puzzlement or dissembling? Perhaps both.

  "He says he knows you," Fiona said, taking a stab in the dark.

  "Actually, it could be the Tom Herbert I know. He was three years behind me at Yale Law."

  She knew he was being scrupulously cautious, like a man walking on a newly frozen lake. But her play had drawn him out.

  "Did you know his daughter Phyla?"

  "Phyla? Oh yes. She had an odd name," Farley said with cool aplomb. "Yes, you might say I knew her. Letitia and I have been house guests at their lakefront place in Minnesota."

  Bingo, Fiona said to herself. It was a connection she knew in her pores existed and the validation was comforting. She was satisfied that she was on track.

  "Have you seen her recently?"

  "No. Should I have?" He shrugged and tipped his head in a show of ever-deepening confusion.

  "Farley, you've always been a magnificent actor. But I find myself now seeing beyond the performance."

  "Are you sure?"

  It seemed a challenge. And she took it.

  "Phyla Herbert was found dead in the Mayflower Hotel on Saturday night. I'm surprised you didn't see it in the papers."

  Deep frown lines knitted his brow and he shook his head.

  "How awful. I do have the vaguest recollection, but only in passing. I hadn't noticed the name. I never associated it with Tom Herbert's daughter." He shook his head and clucked his tongue. "Poor Tom."
r />   "Yes, poor Tom."

  "I must tell Letitia to pass along our condolences."

  "Shall I tell you how she was found?"

  "Can I stop you?"

  "She was naked, trussed up with ropes on the bed, a blindfold over her eyes, a gag in her mouth, obscene graffiti written in lipstick over her body and her anus ripped apart by a large instrument."

  As she spoke, she watched his face, the features unchanging, the eyes leveled on her face. Other than attention, no emotion showed. Not anxiety either and certainly not guilt.

  "I assume she was murdered," he said.

  "In a manner of speaking."

  "What does that mean?"

  "Her death was a by-product of the trauma she underwent."

  "What was the cause of death?"

  She wondered if this was a clue to his culpability. Would it be, she asked herself, a logical question for a perpetrator to ask, knowing that he hadn't caused her death deliberately? She decided to answer his question.

  "She was an asthmatic. The episode must have brought on an attack and the fact that she was gagged probably killed her."

  He shook his head.

  "Poor woman," Farley said. "And you think that I did it?"

  "It's your MO, Farley," Fiona said. It was, she realized, a direct accusation. "I was there, remember."

  "How can I ever live that one down? I tried for years to erase it from my memory. In fact, I thought I had succeeded until you popped back into my life the other night. I was what the shrinks might call a negative dominant," he said. "I've made my own diagnosis, of course. In this business, one can't be too careful. Such an incident hadn't happened before nor has it since. We were consensual, remember. I went too far. I admit that. It was terrible, clumsy."

  "And painful, but then, you enjoyed that part."

  "It was meant to be an erotic experience, Fiona. Not traumatic. A game. We were supposed to be playing at harm, not inflicting it. Believe me, I have regretted that day. I was too ashamed to face you at the time. I don't know what came over me." He sucked in a deep breath and looked genuinely contrite.

  "A sadistic sickness is what came over you. You should have sought professional help."