The Ditto List (46 page)

“The kitchen?”

Her black shape nodded.

He walked, wondering how he would react when Del confronted him, whether he would remain a man till it was over. When he reached the kitchen doorway he stopped and looked for Del, still fencing with his elusive courage.

The room was dark. Its only window was masked by plants and dangling doo-dads and a picture of a cat, its only light was from the halo of a hissing burner. D.T. closed his eyes and opened them and still saw nothing human. He wondered if there was a back door, if Del had simply escaped his crime. He turned on the light and saw him.

Delbert Wesley Finders sailed on a bright red sea, becalmed, incapable of anything, including harm. A carving knife protruded from his chest like a thorn. One hand grasped its handle, a finger curled delicately around the bolster, as though it were a long-stemmed rose. The position was fetal. The eyes were open, as awed as D.T.'s own. The stink was of booze and the heavy sweet smell of puddled blood.

D.T. turned off the light and backed away. The sputtering burner made everything move but Del. He turned around. Lucinda was sitting on the couch, her head dangling into two cupped hands. “How long ago?” he asked her.

“Just before I called you up.”

“Did you phone the police?”

She shook her head. “What will happen, Mr. Jones? Will they take Krystle away? Will they give her to the state?” She raised her head and looked at him. He couldn't meet her eyes.

“I don't know, Lucinda. I don't know what they'll do. I think I'd better call the police.”

She nodded silently, accepting a fate beyond the ken of anyone alive. A thought occurred to him. “But first I'm going to get you a lawyer,” he said, then went to the phone and looked up a number.

The phone rang every fourth time his heart beat. It was answered with a grunt. “Dick? D.T. Sorry to wake you.”

“What the fuck is this? Sabotage? You want me to fall asleep in court tomorrow?”

“This is different, Dick. I'm at the apartment of a client of mine, a girl named Lucinda Finders. She just stabbed her husband. She needs a good lawyer. For some reason I thought of you.”

“Is he dead?”

“Yep.”

“Where are you?”

“Houston Street.” He gave the number.

“I'll be there in ten minutes. The cops been called?”

“No.”

“Call them. But no one says anything till I get there.”

“Okay.”

“She got any money, D.T.?”

“No.”

“Well, we'll work something out.”

“You're making enough off Chas Stone to do this one for free.”

“The hell I am.”

Gardner hung up and D.T. dialed the number for all the world's emergencies, including ones that aren't emergencies any longer, that are only questions without answers, deeds already done.

TWENTY-ONE

“Who're you?” the cop demanded. His brown suit matched his eyes and shoes; his square head matched his manner. “My name is D. T. Jones. I'm a lawyer.”

“A lawyer? Got here pretty fast, didn't you?”

“I'm not a criminal lawyer, I'm a divorce lawyer.”

“Yeah?” The cop glanced at Lucinda. “She getting a divorce from the stiff? That what this is all about? She decided she couldn't wait for the decree?”

“Not exactly.”

The cop rolled his eyes behind their puffy pouches. “Not exactly. You're beginning to interest me, pal. Who is this broad, anyway? Who's the guy she butchered?”

“Her name's Lucinda Finders. The dead man is her husband, Delbert Finders.”

“Yeah? Let me talk to her.”

The cop took two steps forward. D.T. reached out to stop him. “Not right now. She has another attorney coming. Dick Gardner is his name. He's advised her not to say anything till he gets here.”

The cop grunted. “Gardner, huh? I better make sure the boys don't screw anything up in there.”

The big cop turned away and went into the kitchen, where others of his ilk busied themselves with gathering evidence and taking photographs and examining the earthly remains of the ensanguined Delbert Finders. There were occasional bursts of laughter and an isolated curse, frequent explosions of a flashbulb, murmurs. Once one of the men stood in the doorway and stared for a long time at Lucinda, as though to measure her against her deed. Lucinda was heedless of his gaze, as she was heedless of all else. D.T. tried to do something helpful but could only sit and hold her hand. In another room the baby slept as her heritage lay in wait for her.

“I'm scared, Mr. Jones,” Lucinda said suddenly. “I'm scared and I'm cold.”

D.T. looked around the room for something that would warm her, saw only a nylon windbreaker draped over the back of a butterfly chair across from the TV. He walked over and picked up the jacket. As he started to drop it across her shoulders he noticed the writing on the back: “Larry's Lounge—Coors on Tap.” He swore and tossed the satin shell aside and went into the bedroom Del and Lucinda had so improbably shared.

The bed was mussed, its linen wrinkled and limp and stained, its center springs collapsed. Clothes were scattered everywhere, men's clothes, greased and giving off the smells of garages and grease pits. On the wall above the bed was a stylized rendering of a single word: LOVE. On the opposite wall was an 8 X 10 of Delbert and his Ford. On the tiny dressing table in the corner a jumble of jars and bottles testified to Lucinda's efforts to please her man.

D.T. entered with trepidation, almost stepping on a scant and filmy nightie that lay like a fallen cloud in the center of the doorway. He was more interested in the room than he cared to admit, was unable to stop himself from imagining what must have occurred in it despite all the rest that had occurred between the pair, the flower of sex a miraculous bloom in the desert of the relationship.

The bulb in the lamp on the bedstand was red, the light in the ceiling was on a track that directed it at the center of the bed, the dresser mirror directly opposite was tilted to capture what the light revealed. Del apparently liked to stage his sex, to admire his thrust and ebb, to confirm his wife's impalement. He wondered if Lucinda enjoyed display as well, decided she must, why else would she do it? He was tempted to open drawers and probe the closet, to look for further secrets, but he grabbed a thin blanket from the foot of the bed and returned to the living room instead.

The blanket bore the heavy smell of talc. When he wrapped her with it Lucinda had no reaction. Excessively appreciated for what he had done for her previously, D.T. was hurt now by her indifference to his need to comfort her.

He was trying to think of something sane to say when Dick Gardner walked in the open door, surveyed the scene, and moved briskly to the couch, the tails of blue pajamas flapping from beneath his short red jacket. If he was tired he kept its leavings secret.

“Is this Mrs. Finders?”

D.T. stood up. “Thanks for coming, Dick.” He performed the introductions. Lucinda barely acknowledged her second lawyer's presence. After shaking her hand Gardner drew D.T. to the other side of the room. “She say anything to the cops?”

“No.”

“Did you?”

“Only her name and that the dead guy was her husband. And that you were on your way.”

“Okay. The woman's in shock. She should go to a hospital. She got any friends in town? Someone who can take her there and stay with her?”

D.T. shook his head. “I don't know of any. She told me once she didn't know anyone here in the city.”

“She was married to the guy, right?”

“Right. She filed for dissolution, then called it off.”

“She's a sexy little thing. How about the brain department?”

“Ignorant, maybe. Far from stupid. Came from Reedville. Parents don't want anything to do with her, at least her father doesn't.”

“This her first marriage?”

D.T. nodded. “The guy's been jailed for assault. A drunk. Typical punk.”

“Good. Where's the body?”

D.T. pointed to the kitchen. Gardner told him to stay where he was, then went to see the scene. D.T. looked over at Lucinda. She was blinkless, breathless, as though her soul had gone to join her husband's.

He went to her side. “We're going to try to get you to a hospital, Lucinda. Is there anyone who can go with you?”

She shook her head silently.

“Is there anyone who can come stay with the baby?”

She shook her head again, then suddenly jerked erect. “I want Krystle with
me
. Where is she?
Where's my baby?
” Her voice rose wildly, to a screech that alarmed him. D.T. patted her as he would a startled dog.

“She's still sleeping, Lucinda. She's in the other room. Now just relax.”

“What will they do to me? Will they kill me? They kill murderers in this state, don't they? Don't they kill people like me, Mr. Jones?”

He squeezed her arm. “Listen to me, Lucinda. You're not a murderer. What you did was fully justified. You stabbed Del to save your child. That's clearly self-defense.”

“I'm guilty, Mr. Jones. I killed him, so I'm guilty.”

“Sssh. You're not guilty of
anything
. Dick Gardner's the best lawyer in town, and he'll prove it if he has to. In the meantime, don't say anything like that to the police or to anyone else. Just leave the talking to Mr. Gardner.”

He tried to get her to meet his gaze, but she was looking at a place beyond him, perhaps to see how someone who always tried to do right had somehow managed to commit the biggest wrong there was.

Dick Gardner came back in the room and D.T. went to join him. “Any doubt that she did it?” Gardner asked.

D.T. shook his head.

“What'd she tell you about it?”

D.T. told him the story, trying to remember her every word, trying to capture the madness of the evening, the innocence of the girl, the wickedness of the man she'd slain. Gardner absorbed it all, but was not visibly moved. “Where's the baby?”

“Sleeping.”

“I want it checked out at the hospital, too. Detailed exam, everything recorded. I'll call a pediatrician I know and have her there.”

“Okay.”

“The cops will want a matron to go along. Who's going to take her?”

“I am, I guess.”

Gardner looked at him skeptically, then shrugged. “They'll want someone to take formal custody of the kid or the matron will have to take it to social services. You know anyone who'll want it?”

“No.”

“Well, she should be out on bail in a few days. If you want to chance it, you can just disappear with the kid at some point, let them track you down, play dumb when they find you, and hope by that time they've let her out on bail. It's not strictly legal, but it's the only alternative to social services if there aren't any relatives around.”

D.T. nodded. “I'll do it if I can.”

Dick Gardner smiled. “Who the hell's going to teach
you
how to change a diaper?”

“I don't know,” D.T. admitted.

Dick Gardner looked over at his client. “What's the story of the marriage? Why'd she want to shed him?”

“He drank and beat her up.”

“Lots?”

“Yes.”

“Bad?”

“Fairly.”

“Arrests?”

“Not for that. Just for clubbing a guy with a pool cue.”

“Was she ever hospitalized?”

“Once that I know of. I took her there myself. He broke her nose, messed her face up pretty good. It was while she was pregnant. He also punched her belly. He threatened to do worse if she went through with the divorce.”

“So she didn't.”

“Right.”

“Who was the doctor?”

“Faber.”

“A good man, but not a good witness. Too goddamned precise.” Gardner eyed D.T. closely. “I don't suppose you got any pictures?”

D.T. smiled, quickly pleased. “As a matter of fact I did. They're still in the camera in my trunk. They're not developed.”

Gardner slapped his back. “You old devil-dog. I knew that despite your performance in the Stone case there was some reason people claim you're a good lawyer.”

D.T. ignored the jibe. “When I was taking her to the hospital he tried to run us off the road.”

Gardner raised his brows. “You're kidding. You saw him?”

“I'll testify to it.”

“That's not exactly what I asked.”

“Right,” D.T. said. “But it's what you want to know.”

Gardner only smiled and nodded. “You report it to the cops?”

D.T. shook his head. “She asked me not to.”

Gardner thought it over. “Well, partner,” Gardner began, slapping him again on the shoulder, “I don't think this little lady has too much to worry about. Battered women have been killing their husbands all over the country, and most of them have been getting off scot-free. It's the modern crime of passion. Been wanting one to walk in my office for a long time. The publicity alone should take care of the fee. Come on. I've got a question I want to ask our charming client.”

They walked over to where Lucinda sat. “Lucinda? How are you feeling?” Dick Gardner asked.

“Okay. I'm just cold.”

“That's natural, Lucinda. In a few minutes Mr. Jones is going to take you and your baby to the hospital. To make sure you're both all right. Understand?”

“Yes.”

“Then, if you are all right, the police will want to question you. So Mr. Jones will bring you downtown to the police station. I'll meet you down there, and I'll be with you when the police talk to you. I may or may not want you to answer their questions. In the meantime, I don't want you to say anything to anybody about what happened in the kitchen. Do you understand that? It's very important.”

“I understand. But I killed him. I—”