Daddy's Little Girl

  “Well, the statute of limitations has run out for both you and Rob. But wait a minute. You say this is a copy of the original. Where is the original?”

  “The lawyer tore it up. He said he didn’t want it to fall in the wrong hands.”

  “He tore it up!”

  “He didn’t know Skip had made a copy and given it to me.”

  “I want this,” I said. “I’ll have the cash for you in the morning.”

  We shook hands. His skin felt somewhat grimy, but it was also calloused, which said to me that Alfie did hard, heavy work.

  As he carefully folded the paper into neat squares and put it in his inside pocket, I couldn’t help saying, “With this kind of evidence I just can’t understand why your brother’s lawyer didn’t try to make a deal with the district attorney. It wouldn’t have been hard to follow up on an employee named Jim who drew this diagram. The cops could have squeezed him to give up Rob, and you would have been tried in Juvenile Court. I wonder if your brother’s lawyer sold out to the Westerfields.”

  He smiled, baring stained teeth. “He’s working for them now. He’s that Hamilton guy, the one who’s all over television saying he’s going to get a new trial and acquittal for Rob.”

  35

  WHEN I GOT BACK to the room, there was a message to call Mrs. Hilmer. I’d spoken to her several times since the fire, and she’d been simply wonderful to me. Her whole concern was about my being okay and she was distressed over my almost being trapped in the fire. You would have thought I’d done her a favor by being the reason the garage and apartment had been reduced to rubble. I agreed to have Sunday dinner with her.

  I’d barely hung up when Joan called. I’d also been speaking to her, but we hadn’t seen each other during the week and I was anxious to return the money and clothes I’d borrowed. I’d had the slacks, sweater, and jacket cleaned and the lingerie laundered, and I bought a bottle of champagne for Joan and Leo and another for the friend who was my size.

  Of course that was not Joan’s reason for calling. She and Leo and the kids were going out for dinner to Il Palazzo and wanted me to join them.

  “Great pasta, great pizza, a fun place,” she promised. “I really think you’d enjoy it.”

  “You don’t have to sell me. I’d love to go.”

  In fact, I needed to get out. After my parking lot encounter with Alfie, the paramount thought in my mind was of all the people whose lives had been altered or destroyed by Rob Westerfield and by the Westerfield fortune.

  Andrea, first of course. Then Mother. Then Paulie, who was so afraid he’d be tricked into revealing he knew something about the locket. Whatever his knowledge of the locket turned out to be, I would stake my life that it did not tie him to Andrea’s death.

  Mrs. Stroebel, hardworking and honest, also had been caught in the Westerfield web of misery. It must have been agony for her when Paulie was on the witness stand during the trial. Suppose just one person had believed me when I said that Rob had given Andrea a locket, and then Paulie had been asked about it in court. He easily could have incriminated himself.

  I believed everything that Alfie Leeds had told me. I had no doubt that his brother had been a potential killer. He was willing to take Mrs. Westerfield’s life and had left her for dead. Bad as he was, though, he was entitled to a lawyer who truly represented him. The lawyer he was assigned sold him out to the Westerfields.

  I could visualize William Hamilton, Juris Doctor, seeing that case as his chance to break into the big time. He probably went to Rob’s father, showed him the diagram, and was properly rewarded for his cooperation.

  Alfie was a victim, too. He’d been protected by his big brother and no doubt was left feeling guilty that he couldn’t find a way to nail Rob Westerfield. And then he spent all those years sitting on evidence that he was afraid to show anyone.

  The hardest to swallow for me, of course, was the knowledge that if Rob Westerfield had been convicted of planning the attempted murder of his grandmother, he would never have met Andrea.

  Now I had another person on my list of people I wanted to nail to the wall: William Hamilton, Esquire.

  Anyhow, those were the sad and furious thoughts that were running through my head when Joan called. I definitely needed a break. We agreed to meet at seven o’clock at Il Palazzo.

  Tilting at windmills, I told myself as I drove the short distance into the heart of town. I had the feeling that I was being followed. Maybe I should call Officer White, I thought sarcastically. He’s terribly worried about me. He’ll be here right away, sirens blazing.

  Oh, give him a break, I snapped at myself. He’s honestly convinced that I’m back in this town to make trouble and that I’m obsessed because Rob Westerfield is a free man.

  Okay, Officer White, I’m obsessive on that score, but I didn’t burn my feet or ruin my car to prove my point.

  * * *

  JOAN AND LEO and their three boys were seated at a corner table when I got to Il Palazzo. I vaguely remembered Leo. He had been a senior at Oldham High when Joan and Andrea were sophomores.

  It’s inevitable that when people from those days see me for the first time, the first thing they think about is Andrea’s death. Then they invariably either comment on it or make an obvious effort to ignore it.

  I liked the way Leo handled his greeting to me. He said, “I remember you, of course, Ellie. You were over at Joan’s house with Andrea a couple of times when I stopped by. You were a solemn little kid.”

  “And now I’m a solemn big kid,” I told him.

  I liked him immediately. He was about six feet tall, solidly built, with light brown hair and intelligent dark eyes. His smile was like Joan’s, warm and all-embracing. He conveyed the immediate feeling of trustworthiness. I knew he was a stockbroker, so I made a mental note to talk to him if I ever had any money. I was sure I’d be comfortable taking his advice on where to invest it.

  The boys’ ages were ten, fourteen, and seventeen. The oldest, Billy, was a senior in high school and almost immediately told me his team had played basketball against Teddy’s team.

  “Teddy and I talked about the colleges we’re applying to, Ellie,” he said. “We’re both trying for Dartmouth and Brown. I hope we end up at the same one. He’s a nice guy.”

  “Yes, he is,” I agreed.

  “You didn’t tell me you’d met him,” Joan said quickly.

  “He stopped in to see me at the inn for a few minutes.”

  There was a satisfied look in her eye. I wanted to tell her not to set aside any dates for a grand reunion of the Cavanaughs, but then the menus arrived and Leo was smart enough to change the subject.

  I did a fair amount of babysitting in my teenage years, and I like being around kids. My job in Atlanta certainly didn’t expose me to many of them, so it had been a while. It was a treat to be with these three boys. Pretty soon, over mussels and pasta, they were talking to me about their activities, and I promised Sean, the ten-year-old, that I’d play chess with him.

  “I’m good,” I warned him.

  “I’m better,” he assured me.

  “We’ll see about that.”

  “How about tomorrow? It’s Sunday. We’ll be home.”

  “Oh, sorry, but tomorrow I have plans. Soon, though.” Then I remembered something and looked at Joan. “I didn’t put the suitcase I wanted to return to you in the car.”

  “Bring it tomorrow, and we’ll have a game of chess,” Sean suggested.

  “You have to eat,” Joan said. “Brunch about eleven-thirty?”

  “Sounds great,” I told her.

  The bar at Il Palazzo was a glass-paneled section of the dining room, directly off the entrance hall. When I arrived, I hadn’t paid attention to anyone in the bar. But I had noticed that during dinner Joan sometimes glanced past me, her expression troubled.

  We were sipping coffee when I learned the reason for her concern.

  “Ellie, Will Nebels has been at the bar since before you got here. Someone mu
st have pointed you out to him. He’s on his way over, and from the look of him, I’d say he’s drunk.”

  The warning wasn’t fast enough. I felt arms around my neck, a sloppy kiss on my cheek. “Little Ellie, my goodness, little Ellie Cavanaugh. Do you remember how I fixed your seesaw for you, honey? Your daddy was never any good at fixing stuff. Your mama used to call me all the time. ‘Will, this needs to be done. Will—’ ”

  He was kissing my ear and the back of my neck.

  “Get your hands off her,” Leo said, his voice clipped. He was on his feet.

  I was literally pinned down. Nebels’s full weight was on me now. His arms were resting on my shoulders; his hands were sliding down, groping inside my sweater.

  “And pretty little Andrea. With my own eyes I seen that retard go in that garage carrying that tire jack. . . .”

  A waiter was pulling at him from one side, Leo and Billy from the other. I kept trying to push his face away, but to no avail. He was kissing my eyes. Then his moist, beery mouth was pressing against my lips. My chair started to tilt back as we struggled. I was terrified that I was going to slam the back of my head against the floor and end up with him sprawled over me.

  But men from nearby tables came rushing over, and strong hands caught the teetering chair before it reached the floor.

  Then Nebels was forcibly dragged away and the chair lifted up. I dropped my face into my hands. For the second time in six hours I was trembling so violently that I could not respond to the concerned inquiries coming from all sides of me. The couple of pins that anchored my hair had pulled loose, and it was spilling around my shoulders. I felt Joan stroking it, and wanted to beg her to stop—compassion at that moment would undo me. Maybe she sensed my feeling because she withdrew her hand.

  I could hear the manager sputtering apologies. You ought to apologize, I thought. You should have stopped serving that drunk long ago.

  That flash of anger was all I needed to get me back on course. I raised my head and began to smooth back my hair. Then I glanced around the table at the concerned faces, and shrugged. “I’m okay,” I told them.

  I looked at Joan and knew what she was thinking. She might as well have been shouting it.

  “Ellie, now do you understand what I said about Will Nebels? He’s admitted he was in Mrs. Westerfield’s house that night. He was probably drunk. What do you think he would have done if he saw Andrea go into that garage alone?”

  * * *

  A HALF HOUR LATER, after a fresh cup of coffee, I absolutely insisted on driving myself home. But on the way I wondered if I had been foolish. I was now positive that I was being followed and was not about to risk being alone again in that parking lot. I therefore did not turn off at the inn but drove past it and called the police on my cell phone.

  “We’ll send a car,” the cop at the desk told me. “Where are you?”

  I told him.

  “All right. Circle back and turn into the driveway of the inn. We’ll be right behind whoever is tailing you. Under no circumstances get out of the car until we come for you.”

  I drove slowly, and the car behind me slowed down as well. Now that I knew a squad car was coming, I was glad the car on my tail was still there. I wanted the police to find out who was in that car and why I was being followed.

  I was approaching the inn again. I turned into the driveway, but the car behind me kept going. A moment later I saw a domelight flashing and heard the wail of the police siren.

  I pulled over to the side of the driveway and stopped. Two minutes later the squad car, its light no longer flashing, drove up behind me. A cop got out and came up to the driver’s door of my car. As I rolled down the window, I could see that he was smiling.

  “You were being followed, Ms. Cavanaugh. The kid says he’s your brother and was making sure you got back here safely.”

  “Oh, for goodness sake, tell him to go home!” I said. Then I added, “But thank him for me, please.”

  36

  I’D PLANNED TO CALL Marcus Longo on Sunday morning, but he beat me to it. When the phone rang at nine o’clock, I was at the computer, with my second cup of coffee on the table beside it.

  “I have you pegged as an early starter, Ellie,” he said. “I hope I’m right.”

  “As a matter of fact, I slept late this morning,” I said. “Seven o’clock.”

  “That’s about what I would have expected of you. I’ve been in touch with the office at Sing Sing.”

  “To see if they learned of any recently discharged convict or prison guard who might have had a fatal accident?”

  “That’s right.”

  “You’ve heard something?”

  “Ellie you were outside Sing Sing on November first. Herb Coril, a convict who at one time was in the same cell block as Rob Westerfield, was discharged that morning. He was staying at a halfway house in lower Manhattan. He hasn’t been seen since early Friday evening.”

  “I got that last call on Friday night about ten-thirty,” I said. “Whoever called me was afraid for his life.”

  “We can’t be sure it’s the same person, and we can’t be sure that Coril didn’t just break the conditions of his release and take off.”

  “What’s your guess?” I asked.

  “I’ve never been strong on coincidences, especially one like this.”

  “Neither am I.”

  I told Marcus about my meeting with Alfie.

  “I only hope nothing happens to Alfie before you get that diagram,” Marcus said grimly. “I’m not surprised to hear this. We all thought that Rob Westerfield planned that job. I know what that must be doing to you.”

  “You mean the fact that Rob might have been in prison and therefore not around here to meet Andrea? That’s all I’ve been thinking about, and it’s been torturing me.”

  “You do understand that even with the copy of the diagram and Alfie making a statement to the D.A., you’ll never get a conviction. Alfie was involved himself, and the diagram is signed by someone named Jim whom nobody has ever met.”

  “I know.”

  “The statute of limitations on that crime has run out for all of them—Westerfield, Alfie, and Jim, whoever that is.”

  “Don’t forget Hamilton. If I could prove that he destroyed evidence that might have gotten his client a lighter sentence by implicating Westerfield, the ethics committee would be all over him.”

  I promised to let Marcus see the diagram that Alfie was bringing me. Then I said good-bye and tried to get back to work. It was slow, though, and after getting only a little more done, I realized it was time to drive to Joan’s for brunch.

  This time I remembered the suitcase and the plastic cleaner’s bag with the slacks, sweater, and jacket.

  Even before I was near the Franciscan Friars monastery at Graymoor, I knew that I was going to stop there. All week a memory had been slowly emerging from my subconscious. I had visited the place with Mother after Andrea died. She had called Father Emil, a priest she knew. He was going to be at Saint Christopher’s Inn that day, and they arranged to meet there.

  Saint Christopher’s Inn, on the grounds of the monastery, is the friars’ home for destitute men who are alcoholics or drug addicts. I had a vague memory of sitting with a lady, a secretary probably, while Mother was in the office. Then Father Emil took us into the chapel.

  I remembered that there was a book on the side of the chapel where people could write petitions. Mother wrote something and then gave the pen to me.

  I wanted to go there again.

  The friar who admitted me introduced himself as Fr. Bob. He didn’t question my request. The chapel was empty, and he stood at the door as I knelt for a few minutes. Then I looked around and saw the stand with the ledger-sized book.

  I went over to it and picked up the pen.

  Suddenly I remembered what I had written that last time: Please let Andrea come back to us.

  This time I could not force myself to stop crying.

  “There have been ma
ny tears shed in this chapel.” Fr. Bob was standing beside me.

  We talked for an hour. When I got to Joan’s, I was on speaking terms with God again.

  * * *

  JOAN AND I respectfully disagreed with each other about Will Nebels’s performance the night before.

  “Ellie, he was just plain drunk. How many people shoot off at the mouth when they’ve had too much to drink? My point is that’s not when they lie—it’s when they’re more likely to let slip the truth.”

  I had to admit that Joan was right on that point. I’d investigated and written about two cases in which the killer would never have been caught if he hadn’t loaded up on scotch or vodka and poured his heart out to someone who immediately called the cops.

  “That’s not the way I see it, though,” I explained to her and Leo. “To me, Will Nebels is a spineless, gutless loser. Think of him as the stuff you pour into a gelatin mold. You plan the shape you want, and then, you have it. He wasn’t too drunk to remember that he once fixed my seesaw and that my father wasn’t born with a tool in his hand.”

  “I agree with Ellie,” Leo said. “Nebels is more complex than he appears to be on the surface.” Then he added, “That, of course, doesn’t mean that Joan isn’t right. If Nebels did see Paulie Stroebel go into that garage that night, he got smart enough to figure that the statute of limitations had run out and that it was safe for him to make a buck out of it.”

  “Only he didn’t figure this one out himself,” I said. “They came to him. He agreed to tell the story they needed, and they paid him to tell it.”

  I pushed my chair back. “Brunch was wonderful,” I said, “and now I feel like winning a chess game from Sean.”

  For a moment I paused to look out the window. It was the second beautiful Sunday afternoon I’d been in this room at this exact same time. I was aware again of the spectacular view of the river and the mountain from this spot.