Dorothy Mcintosh - The Witch of Babylon

Bleach had been poured over every one of my precious Turkomen carpets, eating through the fabric in places. On the floor in front of the cabinet it looked as if a mirror had been smashed into tiny shards. All my CDs had been taken out of their cases, broken to pieces, and dropped on the floor.

It made me sick to see what they’d done. I bent down and found fragments of my Steve Vai DVD. I gathered them up in my hands, wishing them back together. This was his performance two years ago at London’s Astoria; one cut, “Whispering a Prayer,” was one of the best guitar solos ever recorded. A personal anthem for me.

“Watchtower” on the Ali soundtrack, Jimmy Page and John Mayall with Mick Taylor on lead. What a travesty. Some of those disks were irreplaceable.

I wandered from room to room. The kitchen counters of Brazilian black slate and the stainless steel cupboards had been criss-crossed with lurid green spray paint.

My bedroom was a similar mess. Scrawled on my mirror with Magic Marker were the words Dear John, Thanks for your hospitality. Sorry for leaving things in such a mess … The Rap. It would be impossible to tie him to the crime, of course, safely stashed away in jail as he was. His friends had done this job.

There was no way to set things right in three days. Our insurance had terminated with the sale. I assumed the new owners had some and hoped it would cover the damage. Visions of lawsuits danced before my eyes. I was heading for bankruptcy anyway—this would just get me there a bit faster. My emotional reservoir had already been drained dry, but I seemed to find room for another wave of despair.

I wasn’t sure I had the guts to open the door to Samuel’s suite. I pried it open a crack and peered in. More graffiti was sprayed on the walls, but their energy must have flagged at this point because other than the books pulled from the shelves, I couldn’t see too much damage.

I hauled my treasure chest from the closet. All the items were still inside. Samuel’s secretiveness about the engraving and the condo sale had blown a hole through my trust. Was the story about my origins perhaps a little too neat? There had never been any photographs, no long-lost relatives showing up at our door. Samuel and I didn’t resemble each other at all.

I picked up the golden key. What was it meant for? What beautiful woman had inspired the portrait on the cameo? With Samuel gone, who could fill in these blanks? I pushed the chest back again, wondering how I’d ever find the answers now.

I stripped off and stood under the shower in Samuel’s bathroom, turning the hot water to steaming and letting it cascade over me for as long as I could stand it. A map of my tribulations was etched all over my body. The cartography of my failures. Reddish welts still demarcating the ribs hurt in the accident, the burn and tenderness of my arm, yellowing bruises in the various places Shim had laid hands on me, blemishes on my lip, scrapes on my face, the herringbone scar the surgeon made when he sewed up my leg. I scrubbed hard to wash away my sins.

I had no choice but to put my old clothes back on because Samuel’s were too small. All the garments in my dressing room had been torn to shreds. Using my landline, I called the police. The new owner’s insurance company would expect me to report the vandalism right away. The clerk assured me someone would be sent over immediately.

An emphatic knock on my door came half an hour later. The police don’t have to be buzzed up like the rest of us common folk. I opened it to see the detective built like a wrestler with pockmarked cheeks standing beside Vernon, his uniformed sidekick. “I see you’re back from your travels, Madison,” Gentile said and walked in.

He held up his hand. “Don’t panic. I’m not here to arrest you.”

He placed himself in the middle of my living room and revolved slowly as if he were at the Louvre and wanted to take in all the masterpieces while standing in one spot.

“Somebody doesn’t like you,” he said. “Why am I not surprised?”

“I came home to this. You’ve been demoted, I guess,” I replied. “Chasing after B and Es?”

“Ever the smartass, Madison. That’s healthy, actually. Meeting adversity with humor or something like that.”

I swallowed a stinging retort. There was no point adding any more problems to my catalog of misery. “Why are you here?” I asked. I was afraid to hear his answer. Was he really telling the truth about not arresting me? Had they been asking questions about Laurel and suspected me of being involved?

“Just cleaning up some details,” he said. “Let’s have a talk.”

We went into Samuel’s study and sat around the worktable he’d used when he wanted to spread out maps or illustrations. Gentile asked to hear my version, again, of the events on the night Hal had been killed. I decided to tell him the whole story of the past weeks with two exceptions. I mentioned nothing about Laurel. If he wanted to raise it I’d answer truthfully, but I had no intention of offering myself up on a platter. Nor did I reveal the true nature of Tomas’s discovery.

Occasionally Gentile would ask me to repeat something, but in the main he listened quietly. Vernon scribbled in his notebook. The detective seemed shocked only once when I described the cataclysm at the North Gate Cemetery. But he appeared to believe me; that surprised me.

“So he’s dead then, Ward,” he said.

“I don’t know. They flew him to a burn unit. He’s still in Kuwait.”

“That reporter Ari Zakar died. It was all over the media here. He filmed his own death apparently.”

His words brought back the image of Ari falling, the camera toppling off his shoulder. I pressed my hand to my eyes in a vain attempt to obliterate the sight.

Gentile took out a tissue and patted his forehead. I’d noticed earlier it was growing shiny with sweat. He got up and walked over to the window, stood there with his back to me.

“I did some looking into the woman, Eris Haines or Hansen. She’s had a checkered history. She was the subject of an outstanding warrant for a criminal assault on another matter. And I believe she was likely responsible for your car accident.”

If I’d been asked earlier whether anything else could shock me I would have laughed in disbelief. But this did. I pushed back my chair and rushed over so I could look him in the face. “How did you find out?”

“Our people working the stolen vehicle rings. They seized a pickup in a body shop raid. Matched the paint and the collision marks to our alert. Your car was deliberately driven off the road. It was traced to her.” He paused. “Mind you, your speed was excessive. Whether that was a contributing factor or not, we’ll never know.”

I wasn’t responsible for Samuel’s death. A huge sigh traveled through my frame and left me, as if an exorcist had just banished a demon. “Thank you for telling me,” I said.

“We’ll write this up. I’ll want you to come in tomorrow to sign off on the report.”

“That’s fine,” I said. “I’ll do anything you want. What about Hal’s murder?”

“It will probably end up in the cold case docket. I’ve got nothing but suspicions and your story at this point.”

As I walked him to the front door Gentile pointed to the mess. “Vernon will stay for a bit and document the damage. Give your insurance company my name. I wouldn’t hold my breath on finding the vandals.”

The ensuing weeks were busy ones. A wire transfer arrived, authorized before Ari’s death, for about seventy thousand, the amount he’d persuaded Tomas to part with from the proceeds of the condo sale. A fraction of what our place was worth. I hadn’t expected to hear from Tomas, but I imagined his sorrow over Ari was extreme.