Colleen McCullough - Too Many Murders

“What did you do with the strychnine, Barbara?”

“Threw the bottle in the Pequot.”

“Did you take the cap off first?”

She looked indignant. “Sure I did! I’m not stupid!”

“Why did you pick April third as the day to put strychnine in Peter’s orange juice?”

“Oh, silly, you know that!” she said, eyes widening.

“I forget. Tell me again.”

“Because it only worked on April third! Any other day, and the potion lost its magic. He was very firm about that.”

“Who was?”

“Silly, you know who!”

“It’s my memory again. I forget his name.”

“Reuben.”

“I’ve forgotten his last name too, Barbara.”

“How can you forget what he didn’t have?”

“Where did you meet Reuben?”

“At the bowling alley, silly!”

“What magic worked the potion on April third?”

She was getting bored and tired, or perhaps it was both; her eyelids drooped, then she made an effort and lifted them. “Magic only lives for a single day, Reuben told me.” She began to stir in her chair, agitation growing. “He lied! He lied! He told me that Peter would just go to sleep! I did not get it wrong! April third was the day!”

“Yes, Barbara, you got it right,” Carmine said. “He was the liar. Sit a while and think of happy things.”

The four men endured the silence, too afraid to catch any other pair of eyes, trying not to look at her.

She spoke. “Where’s Tommy?”

Not Marlene, the girl. Just Tommy.

“He’s asleep,” Carmine said.

“I don’t imagine she’ll ever come to trial,” he said later to Commissioner Silvestri, “and the poor little boy solved the case. Can you credit it, John? A starvation diet inflicted overnight on a fat five-year-old who’s been eating nonstop since he started to walk. The girl is three years older, and cunning. She stole from Mommy’s purse to buy food, but she couldn’t steal enough to feed her own appetite, let alone her kid brother’s as well. She was scared stiff of the day Mommy counted her change, but she would have gone on stealing until Mommy did find out.”

Silvestri shook his sleek dark head, blinked rapidly. “Is the girl okay? Are there any relatives willing to take her? The system would turn her into another master criminal.”

“Norton’s parents are taking her-they live in Cleveland. She’s sole heir to his estate, which I imagine will go into a trust until she’s of age.” Carmine found a smile. “Maybe she stands a better chance this way. At least, I have to hope so.”

“A rubber strawberry!” Silvestri exclaimed. “Was it that lifelike?”

“Only to a ravenously hungry little boy,” Carmine said, “though I didn’t see it before he tried to eat it. It wasn’t his, it belonged to the little girl, old enough to know it for what it was. He’d combed the house looking for edibles.”

“I guess it means that if you don’t want fat kids, you have to start ’em off right,” Silvestri said. “That stupid diet turned one child into a thief and killed the other.” His black eyes gleamed at the godless Carmine. “I hope you’re going to have some masses said for little Tommy’s soul-St. Bernard’s can do with a new roof. Otherwise Mrs. Tesoriero will see Our Lady’s face wet next time it rains, and claim a miracle.”

“We’ve all had wet faces today, John. Yes, I’ll see you ten masses and raise you one.”

“I don’t suppose I have any choice,” said Desdemona that evening as they shared their before-dinner drink.

“Choice?”

“I’ve married into a Catholic family, so my children will be raised Catholics.”

Carmine stared at her in surprise. “I didn’t think you minded, Desdemona. You’ve never mentioned it.”

“I suppose that’s because until Julian’s advent I hadn’t thought it important to you. You’re not at all religious.”

“True. That’s my work, it gets God out of the system. But I want a Catholic education for my kids-my old school for the boys, St. Mary’s for the girls,” said Carmine, preparing to do battle. “They should be exposed to a Christian God, and what better one than the original?”

“If we were in England,” said his wife thoughtfully, “I’d plump for Church of England, but there’s really no equivalent here. I like the close-knit East Holloman family network, and I don’t want our children on an outer orbit because their parents failed to agree. I’m the one married into the circle, and the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. But I refuse to convert or go to mass, and I won’t make our children go to mass.”

“Sounds fair,” he said, enormously relieved that there would be no battle. “I only go to mass at Christmas and Easter, though I will go for Tommy Norton. I made a pact with Silvestri.”

“That man is brilliant,” she said, smiling.

“What’s for dinner?”

“Roast loin of pork with crackling.”

“I am putty in your hands, lovely lady.” He looked at her over the rim of his glass. “Why didn’t you fight harder? I expected you to. You did insist on a civil wedding.”

“I was pregnant at the time, and in no mood to fiddle with the bride business. I just wanted to be Mrs. Carmine Delmonico as quickly as I could.”

“It doesn’t answer your attitude tonight,” he persisted.

“Very simple,” she said, draining her glass. “I abominate coeducation, and East Holloman’s Catholic schools are not coeducational. The last thing teenaged children need as they suffer the onslaught of hormones is the presence of the opposite sex in a classroom. Oh, most children survive it, but the cost is dearer. Look at Sophia, tarting herself up every day just to go to school. A dose of uniforms would do her good.”

“There are no limits to your surprises,” he said, following her into the kitchen. “Did you wear a uniform?”

“We mostly all do. I went to a Church of England day school and wore a hideous navy blue tunic over a shirt and tie. My hat was held on by elastic under my chin to keep it from blowing off in a wind-hats were expensive. And I think,” she went on reflectively, bending to lift the roasting pan out of the oven, “that of all the indignities a uniform meant, that elastic under the chin was the worst.” Out came the roast onto a board. “Now it has to rest.” She rapped the beautifully bubbled skin. “Ah! Perfect! All-male schooling is very important for Julian,” she went on without pausing.

“Why him in particular?”

“Because he’s going to be tall, dark, and terribly handsome. If there were girls in the classroom and schoolyard, he’d never have any peace. It would also swell his ego. The St. Mary’s girls can worship from afar.”

“The St. Mary’s girls will find a way.”

Desdemona looked curious. “Is that the voice of experience?”

“What else?”

“You mean I married a high school heartthrob?”

“No, you married a man in his forties with arthritis.”

“Peter Norton’s death proves the existence of a mastermind,” Carmine said to the Commissioner, Danny Marciano, Patrick O’Donnell and his own men. Delia, pleading work, had declined to come.

“We now have four cases closed-Jimmy Cartwright, John Denbigh, Bianca Tolano and Peter Norton-with the three shootings a given. Though we suspected the existence of a mastermind, he hadn’t shown his hand directly until Barbara Norton explained why she chose April third to kill her husband. We’ll never get a description out of her, and the name Reuben is a fiction. My guess is that Pauline Denbigh was conned with some highly sophisticated ploy; again, we may never get anywhere by questioning her. She’s aiming for an acquittal. Barbara Norton needed to be reassured that her husband would just go to sleep, whereas Pauline Denbigh didn’t care what her husband suffered as long as she didn’t have to watch. The cyanide evidence ceases with the murder of the Dean-we have the bottle. If there are to be more cyanide deaths, then the salts have already been taken out of the bottle. How much do you think is gone, Patsy?”