Never Buried: A Leigh Koslow Mystery (28 page)

Mellman turned red-rimmed eyes to her and talked through a wheezing cough. "You think so?"

"Of course!" she swallowed. "My dad was the greatest, but you're giving him some stiff competition."

The trembling lips turned into a smile, the face calmed. "I'll quit now, then," he said serenely, scooting away. His arm lifted the gun to his head as he nodded. "Now's the time. They'll remember me fondly, then."

It was a reflex, she would claim later, nothing more. Maura sprang at her adopted uncle with catlike quickness, her outstretched hands targeting his forearm. At impact, her heavy body rolled over his, one deafening shot blasting in her eardrums.

***

"Dale!" a man shouted. "We need the oxygen over here!"

Fuzzy figures buzzed around Leigh as she fought her way back into consciousness. She was lying flat on the ground. Her arms, fingers, and back throbbed with pain, and every breath brought daggers to her chest. "Maura?" she choked, bringing on a violent bout of coughing.

"Don't try to talk," the uniformed man beside her insisted as he bandaged her bleeding right arm, "Just lay still. You're going to be fine."

A second figure came into focus, sitting beside her on the grass. She looked up into the concerned face of the blue-eyed security guard.

"Thank God you got out all right," he said with relief, his voice hoarse from the smoke. "I’d have never forgiven myself." He looked up at the house, which no longer puffed out billows of gray ash so much as tongues of flame. "I still probably won't."

A bandage was swathed around his head, and when he turned Leigh could see that the dark hair on the back of his crown was clumped with dried blood. She raised her already bandaged left arm and pointed. "Yeah, I know," he replied, embarrassed. "Stupid, huh. Never saw it coming. Who'd have thought—"

Leigh's eyes widened in horror as she noticed that the window she had come out of was now no more than an outline in a glowing sea of red. She sat up, her throat raw, and croaked, "Maura! You have to get her out!"

The uniformed man pushed her back down, and the arriving paramedic quickly covered her face with an oxygen mask. "Take it easy," he said firmly. "The firemen have everything under control. There's nothing you can do now except make yourself worse. Now, breathe."

Tears formed at the edges of Leigh's eyes, burning their way down her cheeks. Her lungs felt as though there were fire inside them, and the plastic mask made her claustrophobic. Nonetheless, the fogginess in her brain began to clear. She looked at the blue-eyed guard. Remembering the strong arms that had broken her fall, she pointed at him, then at the window. It was a question.

Understanding, he smiled a small, sad smile. "Wish I’d been that useful. But until just now, I've been lying here unconscious myself."

Her brow furrowed as she heard footsteps approaching behind her head. A fourth figure dropped to its knees behind her and gently brushed the hair from her forehead. "She's going to be fine," the blue-eyed security guard assured. "Thanks to you. That was some catch, for a woman."

Leigh craned her neck up, and Mary Polanski's ash-blackened face smiled back at her.

Chapter 24

As Maura rolled off Mellman, she saw the first lick of flame fighting its way up the attic staircase. Before she could move, another arose from nowhere and attached itself to her pant leg. She pulled off her shirt, buttons flying, and suffocated the orange tendrils against the dusty floor.

Holding her body off the hot floor as much as possible, she crawled close enough to run her fingers over Mellman's bloodied head. His hair was damp and sticky, but her fingers found only a shallow track across the back of his skull. He would live.

If, of course, she did.

Flames now leapt unencumbered through the attic door and against the nearby walls, and Maura turned her attentions to the nearest window. She had already heard sirens—the firemen were probably there, and ready. Though it seemed like hours since she had stepped into the burning house, only a few short minutes had passed. She didn't have many more; the heat alone would soon be unbearable.

Mellman stirred, then began to thrash and howl in pain as the scalding boards underneath him singed his prone body. Maura drew her gun from its holster and heaved it, with every ounce of strength she had, at the nearest pane of glass.

The sound of the separating shards falling to the roof ledge outside was followed by that of several voices, shouting. The rush of oxygen into the steamy attic gave the nearby flames a temporary rally, but as Maura lay with her face covered, an ax pounded its way through the remainder of the window, and she was promptly drenched with a thick stream of water. She smiled and looked up.

A man in a heavy yellow suit jumped through the opening. Maura tried to move towards him, but instead doubled into a coughing spasm. Two pairs of heavily clad arms hoisted her up and over window ledge, where a third man waited. He held her down on the roof ledge while she caught her breath, then led her carefully to a ladder. She couldn't remember how far up she was, but she didn't care. The ladder led down, and that's where she was going.

***

Mary touched the deep cut on the side of Leigh's forehead. "You should look at this, too," she told the paramedic. Then she smiled again at Leigh. "Maura's going to be fine, dear. They just put her in the ambulance."

Leigh's heart warmed. Maura was all right. Mary was all right. But how—

Mary shook her head at Leigh's confused expression. "Everything's going to be all right now, dear. Mr. Mellman may even make it, if he's lucky."

"But where—" Leigh sputtered barely recognizable words into the oxygen mask.

"Shhhh." Mary corrected, her finger to her lips. "Don't talk. You're wondering where I've been? No wonder. Apparently everyone did." She sighed. "I suppose I wandered again, I've been told I do that from time to time. I've no idea when or why I left home, but I do remember being out walking, and coming to Donald's front door. I said hello and asked if he could remind me how to get home. But then I got even more confused. It happens sometimes, as you know. People tell me things, and they just go out of my mind.

"Anyway, Donald told me that Maura and Judith and Charlotte were all sick, and that I had to stay with him for a while. I didn't remember their being sick, but I figured I had just forgotten."

She sighed again and moved out of the way as the paramedic leaned over to treat Leigh's bleeding scalp. "I tried to call home, but the phone was dead and the door was always locked. I mostly just sat tight and enjoyed the chocolates and Chinese food Donald kept bringing me. It was only a couple of hours, I guess." She smiled slightly. A sad, bittersweet smile. "He didn't mean any harm."

The blue-eyed security guard watched Mary in amazement. "You were at Mellman's? How did you get away?"

She smiled again, this time proudly. "Donald always did underestimate women. The phone was dead, and I finally got tired of it and decided to try and fix it myself. The plug was just out of the jack, is all. I plugged it back in and called home. Judith answered and went hysterical."

Leigh surprised herself with a chuckle. It hurt her chest, but it was good for her soul. "Okay, men," said an authoritative voice in the distance, "let's take her in the next one. Go ahead and get her on the stretcher. Ma’am? You come, too."

Mary followed the stretcher without protest. Strapped on safely and covered with a blanket, Leigh looked up at the bugs circling the ambulance's blinking lights. They flitted about energetically, apparently uninterested in the more dramatic glare of the burning house. Leigh thought of her finches, and smiled. Now, at last, she knew where they were. Mellman had set them free.

***

Never one to obey silly rules, especially those delivered by militia-like emergency room nurses, Leigh pulled off her oxygen mask, swung her legs over the side of the hospital bed and shuffled into the next cubicle. Maura, unfortunately, was not so mobile. She had minor burns on her hands and legs, and was lying restlessly with an IV line feeding into her arm. Mary sat in a chair beside the bed, her own arm wrapped in a sling.

Leigh looked sadly at Maura; then, seeing Mary's state, drew in her breath, horrified. "Did I do that?" she whispered.

"It's just a hairline fracture," Maura answered hoarsely. "But yes, you did. I told you to go on the roof, not roll off it."

Leigh smiled at her friend's brusque attempt at humor. Maura looked well enough, albeit understandably irritable. "I owe you both a lot," Leigh said softly.

Maura tried to wave her hand, but only succeeded in making a small, jerky motion. "I was only doing my job. It's Mom you owe. She says you were heading right for the concrete patio—you'd have broken both legs, or worse, if she hadn't been there."

Leigh preferred not to think about that, but she thanked Mary profusely, offering a silent prayer to the rowing machine in the sewing room.

"So spill it, Leigh," Maura interrupted suddenly. "Why the hell were you up there in the first place?"

A blank stare was all Leigh could return as she tried to figure out what Maura already knew. "To get the journals," she said finally.

"What journals?"

"Paul Fischer's journals. Specifically, the one that said what happened in 1949."

Maura's eyes grew wide. "Then there
was
something hidden in the house?"

Leigh nodded, then looked incredulous. "Don't you know all this already?"

"How could I?"

"You were there."

Maura rolled her eyes. "I got a frantic call at the station from my aunt, screaming that Mom was at Mellman's place. I busted down his damn door getting her out, and then she started telling me some crazy story about how she was staying with him because we were all sick. I didn't know what was going on, and I still don't. I want to know why Mom was at Mellman's, why he lost it in the attic, and, most especially, why he was holding a gun on you. Now are you going to explain or am I going to rip out this freakin' IV line and beat it out of you?"

Leigh looked at Maura in amazement. "But how could you just walk in there and..." she trailed off. "What made you go to the house, then?"

"I got a message from Cara's husband," the policewoman explained, with visible restraint. "He wanted to let the department know that you had broken into the house and were screwing around with something in the attic. He said that the security guard had been instructed to boot you out—but I knew that with you, that meant trouble. I was on my way out the door when Charlotte called. After I found Mom and heard her story, I got more than a little nervous about what might be going on at that house—and with good reason. When we got there, the guard was passed out on the patio, and I could hear Mellman ranting and raving up above. Now"—her restraint broke—"s
pill it
!"

Leigh sat down on the foot of the white-sheeted bed and explained the story of 1949—or at least Paul Fischer's version of it. Maura listened with fascination. Mary was visibly disturbed.

When Leigh had finished, Maura looked up at her mother. She tried to keep her voice steady, but was not completely successful. "Did you know, Mom? When it happened?"

Mary, who had been pacing restlessly most of the time Leigh talked, narrowed her eyes at her daughter. "Of course not," she snapped. "You think I'm so far gone I'd let all this nonsense happen without saying a word?"

Maura shriveled. It was an effect Leigh did not witness often.

"No, Mom," she soothed. "I just thought maybe—"

"You thought I was protecting Donald? Ridiculous. Not that I blame him for killing Norman Fischer. That man had to be a monster—even more so than I thought. But I wouldn't put my daughter's safety in jeopardy to protect anybody. I always knew that Donald suffered horribly as a child; I knew that he had some emotional problems from time to time. But if I thought for one minute that he was capable of killing another human being—. It scares to me to think about it."

Maura breathed deeply. "Do you think...did Dad—"

"Don't even ask that!" Mary raged, her eyes flashing. "Your father would never let a man he knew was guilty of murder serve on his police force. No matter what the circumstances. Do you understand me?"

Maura nodded quickly. "I'm sorry, Mom. We're all a little stressed out here. I think maybe it would be better if we got some rest. Could I get somebody to take you home? Charlotte and Judith are anxious to see you."

Mary's temper cooled. The word "home" seemed to strike a cord with her. "Yes," she said softly, "As long as you're all right. I'd like to go home."

***

After a thorough chastisement from the hospital staff, Leigh was escorted from Maura's cubicle and discharged into her parents' care with several prescriptions and a laundry list of do's and don'ts, tediously collected and penned by Frances. As Randall pulled their car around to the exit, Leigh pleaded a bladder emergency and slipped away long enough to find the room Maura had been moved to for the rest of the night.

"Did you see Mellman down there?" Maura asked without greeting.