The Prodigal Son (34 page)

Horrie Pinnerton didn’t try to implicate Uda or any Tunbull in the theft, preferring to concentrate on a mythical parcel of which the Defendant had no proof beyond a letter she said had been enclosed — but where was the parcel, its wrapping, the box lined in cotton wool? And if it had ever existed, why were the ampoules secreted inside paint tubes? He called Davina to testify to all this, and succeeded very well in making the story look manufactured by the intelligent sister to save the handicapped one — who was quite capable of efficiently running a busy household on behalf of her sister, a businesswoman with other interests.

Though no one had seen Uda Savovich put the poison in the water, it was an open-and-shut case, Horrie argued: Uda Savovich had the poison in her possession, and Emily Tunbull, a thorn in her and Davina’s sides had perished of that poison.

Anthony Bera proceeded to tear the D.A.’s case down. First he called Millie back to the stand and pressed her as to why, if tetrodotoxin was so lethal, she hadn’t locked her refrigerator? Her whole little laboratory, Millie said, composure and patience unrattled, was in effect one large safe, and kept rigidly locked. Even if she left it to go to the bathroom, she locked her door, which had a special key not available to cleaning or maintenance staff, who visited while she was in attendance. No, she had no technician, nor did her husband have a copy of her key. What kind of things did her laboratory contain besides tetrodotoxin that made this locking necessary? Concentrated acids and
alkalis. Sodium thiopentone. Morphine. Several other neurotoxins: her work concerned the mechanisms capable of shutting the nervous system down. And no, nothing had ever disappeared until the theft of the tetrodotoxin. Shown the two ampoules in Uda’s possession, she flatly denied having made them, and was able to point out why she was so sure of that.

Bera didn’t call Uda. He called Davina, the intact twin. Who wore a plain black suit, a white blouse, and elegant, high-heeled black shoes. Her hair was piled on top of her head and she bore no resemblance to Medusa.

First Bera demolished what might have been Horrie’s comeback by ruthlessly examining Davina as to why she treated her sister like a servant, and had kept their blood relationship a secret. She didn’t look good at the end of it, but somehow it made a kinky kind of sense; the Savovich girls had lived through perilous times, and had concocted a dual persona that suited both of them.

Davina insisted that the parcel had been real, and that it had frightened them, given the deaths of two men from some rare poison that the accompanying letter said had also been sent to them — sufficient for two deaths. The open box had sat on Uda’s work table for several days, chiefly because Davina, to whom Uda looked for guidance, genuinely didn’t know what to do about it. Why hadn’t she notified the police the moment she had supervised Uda’s opening the box? Because they would look like murderers, Davina explained. The police had not considered them likely suspects, but if they produced this box and it did have poison in the ampoules, they would look guilty.
But when Uda found one ampoule open and used, they panicked.

Why didn’t they go to the police when they found one vial empty? Bera asked. And Davina, looking magnificent, snapped back that if the police doubted the existence of the parcel, what might they have thought of a used ampoule when, a day later, Emily Tunbull was dead? So they had decided not to throw the things away, but not to declare them either. They were guilty of concealing this malign attempt to involve them in a chain of murders, yes! But if in truth Uda had poisoned Emily, they would never have kept a thing.

Then Anthony Bera called Chester Malcuzinski, who didn’t answer. This man, said the hotshot lawyer, was Emily Tunbull’s blood brother, and, he skillfully implied, a bad lot, wanted for questioning in New York for fraud and extortion. A subpoena had gone to him in Florida, but he had vanished, despite the fact that Uda Savovich would go on trial for the murder of his sister. His testimony would help her case, but why wasn’t he to be found? What had he to do with those ampoules that Dr. Millicent Hunter had
not
made? He could have sent the parcel.

Even two thousand years ago in the time of the first of the hotshot lawyers, Cicero, it was keenly felt as a great advantage if, in summing up, the Defense spoke after the Prosecution; in Holloman, Connecticut, in March of 1969, it was no different.

Horrie Pinnerton argued competently and reasonably for a guilty verdict, based on bad feeling between the Savovich twins and the Deceased, opportunity to put the poison in the water
carafe, and the presence of two ampoules, one full, one empty, concealed in paint tubes in Uda Savovich’s work room.

Anthony Bera admitted freely that the circumstances could be interpreted as guilt on Uda Savovich’s part, but that the Prosecution had not satisfactorily proved it, even remotely. It all hung on two ampoules that at some stage had been manufactured by hands other than Dr. Millicent Hunter’s — were they Uda Savovich’s hands? He led the tiny woman past the jury enclosure so that they could inspect her hands at close quarters: tiny, crabbed fingers that shook with a fine tremor. This was also an ideal ploy to have the twelve good people see into her little black currant eyes, discover how small her size, and how pathetic her condition. Uda didn’t make the mistake of trying to appear mentally retarded; she seemed bewildered, not sure what was happening, and very, very afraid.

He painted the story of their lives, the trek across the alps that started when they were twelve and ended in Trieste at fourteen, and the Davina who used her sister as a servant was also seen as a sister who had never, never forgotten her duty to her handicapped twin. He was frank about the role of Chez Derzinsky/Malcuzinski in forcing the model Davina to work as his bait by imprisoning and torturing Uda when she didn’t obey, and he asked the jury why, having achieved respectability and a haven, either sister would dream of upsetting their status quo by indulging in murder? The motives Horrie Pinnerton had tried to make urgent and compelling were seen as no more and no less than the usual frictions that appeared between women in any extended family situation. The alternative was
to see Emily as her brother’s cat’s-paw threatening to expose their activities in New York City, but why would Emily imperil a shady, shifty brother?

The Savovich sisters were seen as refugees from Communism, a strong point in Uda’s favor, and Uda herself as a poor little woman without malignity or power.

The jury believed the Defense. It returned with a verdict of “Not Guilty” in less than an hour.

Carmine and his detectives were mightily relieved at the verdict. The wrong sister had been tried; the right sister never would be now. Every last one of them had come to the same conclusion, that between them Davina and Uda had forced the police hand and the D.A. had fallen for the ploy, even though he had been warned. The consolation was that the sisters would commit no more murders.

Abe for one didn’t believe the motive lay in events in New York City years ago. “Emily had some evidence of some other deed,” he said to Carmine, “and we haven’t a hope in hell of learning what it was, especially now Chez Malcuzinski is in the wind. I find that a mystery in itself, by the way.”

“I’m betting he’ll turn up in San Diego or Phoenix in a year or so doing the same kind of thing he did in Orlando,” Carmine said. “He doesn’t matter, he’s out of our loop beause you’re right, Abe, Emily was murdered for reasons having nothing to do with Chez. Ask any detective involved in the case, and the answer will be that she knew something about the baby, Alexis.”

“That Jim Hunter is the father? Yeah.”

“Is he? I’m not so sure. It’s all in the eyes, nothing else. Before his plastic surgery, Jim Hunter’s looks were far different — he genuinely did resemble a gorilla. People of African origins vary in physical type even more than Caucasians do, and Alexis’s African blood seems — I don’t know, thinner, very dissimilar. I’m not ruling Hunter paternity out as a motive, but I have a feeling the motive is something more personal between Davina and Emily. Emily’s obsession was her son, Ivan. With her history, I doubt she had enough influence over Max to estrange him from Davina, even by alleging that he isn’t Alexis’s father. Frankly, I don’t think Max cares who Alexis’s father is. He’s a very happy man in his domestic arrangements — a son and heir he adores, a wife he knows is strong and smart enough to carry on the business if anything should happen to him, a brother and nephew who are loyal to him and the business as well as on good terms with Davina — he’s never been a suspect, but I don’t think he’s ever been a patsy either. He looked and acted a bit rocky for a few days around the time that Chez left for parts unknown, but recovered quickly. No, Emily never got at him, I’m sure. Davina and Uda were her targets.”

Abe sighed. “Water under the bridge, huh? So if it was aimed at Davina and Uda through the person of the baby, no one is ever going to enlighten us.”

“Exactly.”

“Well, Bera managed to make the situation between the sisters look as logical as necessary, which shot a part of Horrie’s
case down in flames. Poor old Horrie! He’s not used to a Bera.”

“He’d better get used to a Bera,” Carmine said grimly.

Delia came in, shaking snow off her monkey-fur coat and setting the gold threads aglitter. Underneath, her tubby body was sheathed in scarlet wool appliquéd with weirdly shaped patches of shiny plastic in black-and-white checks. Even Abe blinked; it was definitely one of Delia’s loonier days. Thank God she had not been called during Uda’s trial! It had brought out the most manic side of her dress sense ever.

“So Sirhan Sirhan admitted he shot Robert Kennedy,” she said, sitting down with numerous squeaks from the plastic patches.

“That was last Monday, Deels,” Abe said.

“I know, but I haven’t exchanged more than a hello with you since Uda’s trial started.”

“Sirhan couldn’t very well claim he was innocent. He stood right next to Kennedy and shot him in the head.”

“That doesn’t stop them pleading not guilty.”

Carmine flung his hands in the air and went home.

Desdemona’s mood was improving; winter was almost over, the crocuses had come and gone, the forsythia was a mass of yellow, and Master Alexander James Delmonico was walking and talking. Desdemona had had an inspiration stemming out of her own childhood and the inevitable fate of the eldest child: she was going to get rid of her Julian blues by making him mind Alex.

“And I don’t care how much he grizzles,” she said to her husband triumphantly. “He can grizzle up hill and down dale, but he is still going to get rid of his excessive energies by minding his baby brother. I am in the process of brainwashing him.”

“You awful woman,” Carmine said, staring.

“Yes, I am, aren’t I? Nessie O’Donnell rang me to say that the trial of Uda was a complete fizzle.”

“Grizzle, fizzle — where do you get these words?”

“Ask Delia. Her potty papa was a don in English etymology or some such thing. A fizzle, yes?”

“Yes, but justice of a kind was done. She’s innocent.”

“Good. Nessie also told me that the reviews of Jim’s book are appearing.
Publisher’s Weekly
and — um — the
Kirkus Review
, I think she called it.”

“And?” Carmine asked eagerly.

“Raves. The twenty-thousand copies have all gone already, Max is printing twenty-four hours a day,” Desdemona said, sitting to enjoy her one drink. “Oh, Carmine!” she burst out, “in three months we’ll be sitting on the deck to have our drinks, sniff the air and watch the ships in the Harbor!”

“Yeah, winter is a bummer, but it does get itself over. What else were you going to say about Max and Davina?”

“Dreadful man, dragging me back to the straight and narrow. Max and Davina have it sewn up, I’d say. Netty Marciano told me that Max has a network of smaller book printing firms lined up to help produce Jim’s book if Tunbull Printing can’t keep up with the orders.”

“Millie looks blooming,” Carmine said, deflecting her from grasshopper mode. “She was a great witness — cool, logical, right down on the jury’s level — they liked her. She’s put on enough weight to be curvy, and she wore a different dress every day. Things that suited her. Nice shoes, nice bags.”

“Was Jim there too?”

“Of course, though he wasn’t called.”

“Millie’s coming to have coffee with me next Wednesday.”

Carmine’s head lifted. “Why?”

“Cooking tips.” Desdemona’s lovely smile transformed her plain face. “When it comes to cooking, I am the East Holloman sybil. Millie will turn up with a fat notebook and several pens, and take notes on everything I say. Scientists make excellent cooks, at least the female ones.”

“Where are our kids?”

“Outside in the snow. Cat and dog on guard duty.”

“I did an imprudent thing back in January,” Carmine said.

“Who and how many are coming to dinner when?”

“You are a sybil! Date not set, nor urgent. M.M. and Angela, Doug and Dotty Thwaites, John and Gloria Silvestri. Eight, including us. I know you like that number.”

“Why not the Hunters?” she asked. “I don’t mind ten.”

“Best not,” he said easily.

“I hope she’s writing her tetrodotoxin paper. Millie may not be Jim Hunter, but her research is illuminating, speaking as the ex-administrator of a neurological research institute. I’m looking forward to seeing her next week.”

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 12, 1969

M
illie did indeed arrive at the house on East Circle bearing a fat notebook and several pens. She was driving her own car, a new Monte Carlo, and wearing a casual pantsuit in deep blue; her beauty left Desdemona feeling, as she told Carmine later, like a six-foot-three lump. The brainwashing of Julian was proceeding apace, and he was under strict instructions to keep Alex occupied elsewhere. It hadn’t proved as difficult as Desdemona had imagined; perhaps Julian was the kind of child who needed a job he felt important? His feelings toward his little brother were genuinely loving, and his ego enjoyed the assumption of power. As Carmine explained to Desdemona, it would last until the day Alex grew physically bigger than Julian: then they’d have a battle royal and readjust the parameters of childhood.