The Prodigal Son (30 page)

“Damned right I did!” said Davina savagely.

“Where did you get the poison?” he asked, shivering.

“It came in the post with a letter. Two glass tubes with narrow necks, each with about a half teaspoon of liquid inside. In a small box, packed with cotton wool. It sat on the painting desk for days — there was no need to hide anything until after Em died. Then Uda put it in paint tubes, the silly bitch. I had told her to get rid of everything.” Davina smiled sweetly. “Em and Chez threatened our wellbeing, so she had to go.” Her lip lifted in contempt. “Pussycats and horses’ heads! Pathetic!”

Max had sunk into a chair — if he stayed on his feet, he would faint. “What had Emily done to you?”

“Tormented me the way she did Martita. Then she went to blackmail. Once, you see, I was the captive of her brother, who used me as bait. A monster, Chez Derzinsky. Not prostitution, oh, no! He locked my Uda up in a cell and tortured her to force me to work for him. I cheated poor old men out of their
money. It was an infamy. But that was only half of Emily’s blackmail. She told me that she’d spread it far and wide that Jim Hunter is Alexis’s father. A lie! A lie! But people are like starving dogs, they will lap vomit off the sidewalk.”

“You’d let Uda be charged with your crime?”

“Uda will come to no harm if you do as you’re told.” The bottle was empty; Davina rubbed Alexis’s back. “There! Done.”

Downstairs again, she sat at the breakfast table and lit a blue Sobranie Cocktail, then pushed a steaming mug at Max.

“Fresh coffee, Max,” she said. “If Uda comes to trial for this murder, I want Anthony Bera for her defense, is that clear? Phone Bill Wilson right this moment and arrange it.”

The old Davina showed briefly as she smiled at him warmly. “My dear, this is a nightmare. Look at it as that. When it is over, you and I and Alexis and Uda will return to our lovely life. I will be the woman of your dreams again, and we will pray that you never again have to see the Davina Savovich who fought her way to haven in America. She is there, but buried, and Alexis will inherit that from her as well as all his other qualities. I am self-educated. You are self-educated. Alexis will be properly educated at the finest schools. You and I run a printery and design business, but our son will do something far more important. Uda has seen it in his stars.”

“Did she see her own arrest for murder?” Max asked.

Davina stared; then she laughed. “I have no idea! Very possibly she did see it, but she would never put that trouble on my shoulders.”

“Chez deserves to die as much as Emily did.”

“Well, first we had to get him here, that meant Emily. He would have died, Max, my love. Now?” She shrugged. “I will have to reconsider my options.”

Chez arrived while Max was still on the phone to his lawyers, and found Davina in the throes of cleaning the kitchen.

“What’s this?” he asked, sitting down. “Val told me some crap about Uda’s being arrested.”

“That is correct,” said Davina, turning on the dishwasher. “For Emily’s murder. Nonsense, of course, but I suppose the police think her incapable of fighting back. Officials always pick on the defenseless.”

She was looking magnificent, like a snake in the glory of a brand-new skin. As if she’d thrown off a layer she felt she would never need to wear again … For such a feral, acquisitive man as Chez, this flight of fancy was extraordinary, but her image this morning was so strong, so reptilian, so enigmatic. Just how much did she know about what was going on, about the ramifications of these murders?

Casting his mind back, he’d known the right moment to stop with the extortion, yet he hadn’t wanted to let go of Davina and Uda either. Envisioning no place for them in his Florida schemes, he had decided to bank them like any other valuable assets, and that meant introducing them into Emily’s sphere. Em would keep an eye on them, he could trust her for that. It had been Em’s idea to introduce her to Max Tunbull, Chez’s to set her up in a graphic design business; he had good reason to
know that she had talent in that line of work, and would leap at the chance to go legitimate. What neither he nor Em had counted on was a marriage — Em had been bedside herself — but Chez had seen its advantages at once, and Em had been pulled into line. He’d be repaid his loan, and Davina inserted like a time bomb into this rich and eminent man’s intimate life. So that, if blackmail ever became an option, he still had Davina in play.

Only he should have visited to see for himself what this marriage to Max had done to Davina, what kind of person she had turned into. Having her in his mind still as that frightened, bullied young immigrant easily disciplined by a threat to her twin sister. Instead, she was powerful, dominant, brilliant and ruthless. That first meeting at Major Minor’s coffee shop had shown him looming difficulties — and made him wonder about Em’s murder, the one that didn’t fit.

Looking at her now, his inchoate doubts suddenly crystallized into a rock-hard conviction: one of the Savoviches had killed Em!

“Uda killed Emily?” he asked. “
Uda?
”

“The police think so.”

“Where’s Max?”

“On the phone, arranging Uda’s defense.”

“He should be arranging your defense. You killed my Em.”

“As bait to get you here, yes,” Davina said coolly. “You’re the real target, Chez. Payback for using Uda and me, torturing us like animals, which is all women are to you. But I have lost Uda temporarily, so for the moment you’re safe,” she said, fearless and vicious. “Don’t sleep too soundly. You
will
die.”

“It might be you who dies,” he said, snarling, putting on his most menacing face.

She laughed. “Rubbish! Your nasty glances don’t work on me any more, Chez. I’m kill-proof. All men have to sleep. Hurt me or mine, and you’ll wake up singing soprano — if you wake up at all. Emily is dead and I killed her to get at you. Don’t hang around, climb into that hired Cadillac and drive to La Guardia or Kennedy, then climb on a plane for Florida.”

“Cops don’t frighten me,” he said, trying to swagger.

“This isn’t Florida. These are very smart cops, if you like that word. I prefer police.”

Max appeared, shuffling, quenched: Chez stared, astonished.

Davina helped her husband solicitously to a chair, gave him coffee. “Is it arranged?” she asked.

“Yes. I waited until Bill Wilson called me back. Anthony Bera will be at Uda’s arraignment.”

“Excellent!” She didn’t sit. “Chez is just going, darling. He came to say goodbye. Some urgent business in Florida has come up, and he must leave immediately.”

“I’ll be watching,” Chez said, following her.

She held the door open, saw him into the tiny foyer where coats resided and the cold outside air stopped.

“I’ll get you for killing Em,” he said.

“It’s snowing,” was her answer. “Zip your jacket, you sad, ageing thug. You couldn’t operate in a cold climate.”

His last memory of her as he trudged away was of a figure radiating power, triumph, invulnerability. Like a victory goddess he’d seen in a movie. He’d be driving I-95 out of
Connecticut as soon as he packed his bags. Only the arrival of the cops had saved his neck; Vina and Uda had killed Em to lure him here so they could kill him. All his schemes of exacting revenge didn’t matter a scrap; Vina had called him a has-been, and she was right. He couldn’t hold a candle to this new and snaky Davina Savovich. Kill her for killing Emily? It would be far easier to go to the Moon.

Back inside her beloved home, the unmasked Davina went about mending poor Max. It wouldn’t be done in a day, but it would be done. Max was a mere sixty years old; he would last long enough to see Alexis grow to manhood, the competent and crafty head of Tunbull Printing. The breaks in him were of her making and could be camouflaged. Right at this moment he didn’t believe it, but when this business was over, he’d go back to being a creature full of confidence and self-esteem. A suitable father for Alexis.

The hearing before Judge Thwaites was brief. Ably argued by Anthony Bera, bail was eventually set at $50,000. This pathetic and obviously damaged little woman was no poisoning mastermind, that was clearly written on His Honor’s face. Released into the custody of her sister, Uda went home to wait for her trial, not yet scheduled.

“You can never tell with Doubting Doug how he’ll go at arraignment,” said Carmine to Abe, “but how His Honor goes at arraignment is often how the jury goes at trial.”

“I wonder who’s responsible for Bera?” Abe asked.

“My guess is, Davina. She’s been expecting something to happen for some time, I wish I knew why.”

“She’s not the brains, though, is she?”

“No. She’s too enamored of the life she’s living, and she wants it to continue. That predisposes people away from murder unless murder is the only way to achieve it. Which makes her only target Emily. I have a creepy feeling that the Savovich sisters have cooked this whole thing up to have Uda tried for the murder Davina committed. Because if one sister is exonerated, no D.A. in his right mind would try the other. So set the sad little one up as the culprit,” Carmine said.

“I wish I didn’t believe you, but I do. However, it’s out of our hands. As detectives, we’ve found a suspect with motive in possession of the poison. Horrie wants to try her.”

“Wrong sister.”

“Wrong sister.”

“I hear the Hunters have moved to East Holloman,” Abe said.

“Yeah, yesterday. Patsy says Millie is like a kid with a new toy. The families all contributed some furniture, which she is shoving around when she’s not painting the woodwork. Her lab is shut until she’s satisfied the new house is fit for Jim.”

“Who wouldn’t notice if he ate off an orange crate.”

“Yeah, well …”

“You have to talk to Millie again, Carmine.”

“That’s why I’m picking her up and taking her to lunch.”

His choice was the Lobster Pot, on the shore of Busquash Inlet in close proximity to Carew. Knowing that Jim had their car, he called by the new house shortly before noon to pick Millie up. She came bouncing down the short path from the front porch looking wonderful, Carmine thought, on the sidewalk and holding the passenger’s door open. If she was as thin as ever, she had somehow managed to look a trifle fatter: the new dress, he divined. Flattering, miniskirted to display her shapely legs, a blend of soft sage green and a dark lavender blue, it did wonders for her skin and streaky blonde hair, long enough to reach the bottom of her shoulder blades. Thirty-three? She looked twenty-three.

She was still chattering about the house when they slid into a booth overlooking the water.

“A king-sized bed!” she was marveling. “I can’t thank Jake Balducci enough for donating it. Jim and I had never even slept in a queen-sized bed before. Jim says it’s like being a horse in a huge, grassy field.”

“So he approves of the fleshpots, Millie?”

Patrick’s blue eyes widened in Millie’s inimitable way. “I think everyone gets Jim wrong,” she said. “He’s not by nature one of those awful people who wear shirts made of scratchy hair and lash their own backs. That would indicate masochism, and he is
not
a masochist! It’s just that he’s indifferent to external things because he never notices them — his mind’s too busy elsewhere. But when I put a silk shirt on his back this morning, he was thrilled. He’d never worn anything silk before, and had no idea how good silk would feel. That’s Jim. From now on, he
will probably demand to wear nothing but silk shirts.” A smile grew. “A tiny scrap of vanity appeared, would you believe it? When he looked in the mirror, he was intrigued at the way the fabric showed off his physique.”

“It’s a magnificent physique,” Carmine said.

“Yes, but normally he’s inside his body as if it were a mere peanut shell. This morning he liked what he saw.”

“What else does he like?”

“The size of his study. He’s actually taking time off to make bookshelves for its walls — imagine Jim taking time off! I’ve always known he lusted for a study completely lined in books and journals, but I didn’t expect the carpentry.”

“Is he skilled with his hands, Millie?”

“Tremendously. We’ve lived in some awful dumps over the years — broken everythings. He taught himself carpentry, concrete work, plumbing, plastering. Electrical wiring was always left to me, I’m as skilled as any electrician. The thing is, he’s such a perfectionist that the bookshelves will look hand-carved — he found some beautiful molding he can glue on the edge of each shelf, so it really will look like a high class library. And Mario Cerutti gave him a wonderful old desk — you know, huge, lots of drawers, a great work surface, room for In and Out trays — Jim’s so orderly.”

Millie looked at the waitress. “I’ll have lobster bisque, a lobster roll, and thousand island dressing on my salad,” she said, smiling, idyllically happy.

“Double that,” Carmine said as the waitress poured coffee. He looked at her sternly. “Have
you
got a study, Millie?”

Scarlet flooded into her skin, she looked adorably confused. “Oh, Carmine, I hope not to need one,” she said. “I want a nursery and bedrooms for kids, a basement play den.”

“Sounds as if you’re buying.”

“Yes. Jim agreed the moment he walked through the door. A good price for a reasonably large house, Dad says. C.U.P. is going to give us our royalties as they’re earned instead of sitting on them for the customary twice-yearly payments. If they adhered to that, it would be more than another year before we saw any money at all.”

“Didn’t they give you an advance?” Carmine asked.

She looked hunted. “If they did, I wasn’t told, and Jim ploughed it into his work as usual.”

“That’s got to stop, Millie.”

“Yes, it must.”

Carmine let her eat; she was hungry enough to devour a parfait for dessert, and perpetually thirsty for coffee.

Finally he could delay the serious talk no longer.

“Millie, I need more about the tetrodotoxin,” he said.

Her light went out. “Oh. That.”

“Yes, that. I’m sorry to resurrect the misery, believe me I am, but enough time’s gone by for both of us to see it in a far different way than when you reported its loss. Why did you?”