Mary Robb - Down the Rabbit Hole

“God. About a month after her parents died—she and Marcus were in grief counseling, but she stopped going. I asked her why she’d stopped, and she told me she wanted to explore another avenue. She hadn’t been able to say good-bye, had questions she needed to ask them, so she’d gone to a sensitive. A friend of a friend had a friend, that sort of thing. I was . . . tolerant. I probably showed how fucking tolerant. The sensitive she went to didn’t have the capabilities to communicate with the dead.”

He waved his hand by his ear as he used the phrase. “But she had some recommendations. I said something like I thought grief counseling would be more beneficial than tossing time and money at some gypsy with a crystal ball.

“I don’t believe in that sort of thing, so I dismissed it all. I—I dismissed her . So she hid all this from me because she felt I wouldn’t understand or approve.”

“Was she going to someone?” Louise asked.

“We’re looking into that, but we do know she withdrew cash weekly from a new private account she set up a few months ago.”

“A new account?”

“A new account in a different bank. Every week she withdrew nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine dollars.”

“Ten thousand a week?” The stricken guilt on Henry’s face shifted to puzzlement. “For how long?”

“Including the withdrawal she made yesterday morning, eighteen weeks. Do you know of any reason she’d want or need that much cash?”

“No. Just no. She’d have some cash, sure, but Darlene preferred using plastic. She’d have a clear record monthly that way. She was generous, and she didn’t deny herself either, but she was raised to know where her money went.”

He pointed to the evidence bag. “One of them. One of them was scamming her. Scamming her.” He shoved forward in his seat. “Marcus must have found out and threatened to go to the police. That could be why he wanted to hold the intervention, Louise. Because he found out some fake medium was scamming Darlene.”

“Henry, he would’ve told me,” Louise said.

“But it makes sense,” Henry insisted. “It finally makes sense. This medium got into Marcus’s apartment somehow, and killed Marcus. When Darlene got there, he forced her onto the terrace, pushed her over. You have to find him,” he said to Eve. “You have to find whoever she was paying. That’s who killed her, killed Marcus. You have to find them.”

“I intend to. Do you know if she took any trips, did any traveling in these last eighteen weeks?”

“I know she didn’t. She was supposed to go to East Washington last month and to London, ah, about six, eight weeks ago—both trips she sent her assistant in her place, and handled her part via ’link conference. She said she didn’t want to leave home. Just couldn’t leave home.”

“One more thing. You’ve all said she didn’t use—and that’s bearing out—but did you notice any changes in her behavior, any signs she seemed impaired over the last weeks?”

“She started sleepwalking.”

“Henry, you never told me.”

He shook his head at Louise. “She asked me not to say anything. The first time—maybe three months ago—I found her downstairs, in the kitchen, middle of the night. She was making these pouring motions. I asked her what she was doing, and she looked at me. Through me, I guess, and said she had to pour the tea for the tea party. It was kind of funny, really, and she woke up as soon as I touched her. She didn’t remember getting up.”

He set his untouched coffee down. “A few weeks later, I woke up, heard her talking. She was crawling under the bed, calling out to someone to come back. I thought she meant her parents—that she was having a stress dream about them. I tried to coax her out at first, and she laughed. She laughed, and said she wanted to go down the rabbit hole. She wanted to see where he’d gone. She woke up again when I took her hand.”

“And didn’t remember?” Eve prompted.

“No. She was baffled, and a little embarrassed. It happened one more time about two weeks ago. I woke up, and she was sitting on the side of the bed staring at me. I asked her what was wrong. She said—it was like a riddle. Ah, she said: Why is a crow like a desk? I think.”

“A raven?” Louise asked. “Why is a raven like a writing desk?”

“Yeah, that’s it. A raven.”

“It’s from Alice in Wonderland , the book. And the riddle has no answer. The rabbit hole, that’s an Alice reference, too. And the tea party could be the Mad Hatter’s tea party.”

“Was she a big fan of that story?” Eve wondered.

“I don’t know,” Henry told her. “Not that I know of, especially. Maybe it’s something she read as a kid, or her parents read to her. So it reminded her of when they were alive, when everyone was safe? I don’t know.”

“All right.” A question for Mira, Eve supposed, the department’s head shrink. “We’ll get back to you,” she said as she rose.

“Isn’t there something I can do?”

“We’ll go be with the family,” Louise told Henry. “In a little while we’ll go be with the family. I’ll walk you out,” she said to Eve and Peabody.

Eve waited until they were out of Henry’s earshot. “There were sedatives and hallucinogens in her system. A bunch of long, complicated names, and some elements we have to wait for the lab to ID. Being as you’re a doctor, I’m telling you I’ll clear you to talk to Morris and Berenski if you think you can be any help putting that part together.”

“She might have taken a sedative, but I can promise you, she wouldn’t have taken a hallucinogen, not knowingly. The sleepwalking—three incidents Henry knows of, which doesn’t mean there weren’t others when he didn’t wake up. That’s a concern. As is the money, and the fact she hid all those cards from Henry, didn’t tell Marcus. She didn’t tell him, or he’d have told me when he asked us to come over, possibly talk with her.”

She gripped Eve’s hand, then Peabody’s. “Someone manipulated her, fed her drugs, caused her to kill Marcus and herself. Why?”

“Find out what she ingested. Leave the rest to us.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

Considering the herbs and sleep aids, Eve made the psychic nutritionalist the first stop. Doctor Hester housed her business in a street-level shop in Soho, tucked between a health food store and a bakery.

She’d go for the bakery every time.

The reception/retail area held shelves full of apothecary-style bottles, instructional and motivational discs, candles and crystals.

The girl at the counter sported multiple visible piercings: ears, eyebrow, nose. And a tat of a winged dragon on the back of her right hand.

“A bright and healthy morning,” she said, each syllable heavily weighted with the Bronx. “What service can we provide for you?”

“We’re looking for Doctor Hester.”

“Doctor Hester is preparing for a consultation. If you’d like to book—”

Eve pulled out her badge, held it up.

“We’re fully licensed in accordance with all city, state, and federal laws.”

“That’s not my worry right now. Get your boss.”

“Hang a minute.” She slid off the stool and went through a door behind the counter area.

Eve watched Peabody ease over toward a section of metabolism boosters.

“Don’t even think about it.”

“Easy for you when your metabolism runs like a rabbit, and mine’s a slug on Zoner. Besides, they’re all natural products.”

“Nature’s a vicious bitch.”