Limits of Justice, The (39 page)

I nodded to his pile of clothes on the bed.

“Get dressed, Jimmy. We’re leaving this place.”

Anna Farthing slipped her free hand into a pocket of her dress and drew out a surgeon’s scalpel. I stepped in, close to the bed, letting her see the crowbar. Then I heard a noise overhead, faintly, just above the music. I listened more intently, recognized the sound of fluttering propeller blades.

“It’s all over, Anna. You hear that? That’s a sheriff’s helicopter.”

Her eyes never wavered, never showed a hint of feeling.

“Open the doors to the balcony if you don’t believe me.”

She drew back the curtains and pulled open the doors, creating a breeze that made the candle flames dance a little. At that very moment, the music ended, and the sound of a chopper coming down out of the sky buffeted the room.

She turned to gaze at her brother, whose eyes were on the move, full of panic. I looked at Jimmy, jerking my head toward the bed.

“Your clothes on, Jimmy. Now.”

He glanced at me only for a moment, then scrambled over the bed, grabbed his clothes, started pulling them on.

Dr. Miller raised his hands imploringly toward his sister, who was slowly buttoning her dress, attempting some dignity. His hands were shaking badly as he stood there, naked and hairy, his penis and scrotum withering with fear.

“Anna, what are we going to do?”

“Pull up your pants, Stanley. Put yourself together.”

While he reached down for them, Anna turned her dead eyes back in my direction. She said nothing, as if giving me the stage.

“You remember the boy who escaped—Chucho?”

“The Mexican boy, the pretty one. Yes, I remember him.”

“We found him. He’s told us everything that went on here, including the details of Ricky’s murder, which he witnessed. I’m sure Jimmy can corroborate a lot of what Chucho told us. You can read all about it in tomorrow’s edition of the
L.A. Times,
along with the names of all your friends.”

The pounding of the blades grew louder as the helicopter circled, and the beam from the chopper’s powerful Nightsun spotlight found the courtyard floor. If anything, Anna Farthing seemed to stand more rigidly against its intrusion, as if nothing could move her.

“Your son is dead, by the way.”

I saw the slightest shift in her gray eyes. Her voice, though, remained steady.

“George is dead?”

“He had a bad accident along the road, trying to run me off. I stayed with him until he was gone.”

She steadied her eyes, lapsed into silence again.

“How many boys did you kill, Anna? How many did you inject with curare over the years so that dear, sweet Stanley could experience his moment of ultimate power while you had yours, ridding yourself of all those troublesome children at the same time?”

Jimmy stopped as he buttoned his shirt, staring hard at me, starting to understand.

“Yes, Jimmy, you were next. The last boy to go. Anna’s crematorium has been working overtime the last couple of weeks. Hasn’t it, Anna?”

Still, she said nothing, so I offered more details.

“The sand I found at Charlotte’s house—that came from Felton’s place, carried in your brother’s pants cuffs. You’d learned from George that he’d told Charlotte the truth, given her the photographs. You killed her with what she thought was a sedative to calm her nerves, then searched her house until you found them. Then you started killing the remaining boys.”

When Anna Farthing finally spoke, there was still no emotion in her voice, nothing human that I could hear. Behind her, out the window, the light from the chopper circled over the courtyard, and the propeller wash stirred the curtains and candles more forcefully.

“Separation for Stanley and me would be unbearable.”

“How touching.”

“Perhaps you’d let us handle this ourselves.”

I glanced at the scalpel that she held in one hand, and the syringe in the other. When I met her eyes again, there was a glimmer of life in them, a distant, buried pleading, the closest thing to humanity I’d witnessed in her.

“Suit yourself.”

I glanced at Jimmy and with a nod of my head, indicated the door. He stepped through it without looking at either of them again, but I paused in the doorway while he waited for me in the hall.

Anna Farthing set the scalpel and the syringe on the bed, then stepped to the record player and reset the needle at the beginning of the old vinyl disc. A moment later the first scratches were heard, then the upbeat music of Artie Shaw filled the room, while the sound of the chopper receded. She listened to the music a moment, bobbing her head slightly, smiling a little. Then she took her brother’s terrified face in her hands and kissed him tenderly on the lips.

When she spoke to him, I could barely make out the words over the swinging music.

“It’s going to be all right, darling.”

Her smile became almost beatific. He stared down at the scalpel and syringe, pale, trembling, but otherwise unmoving. She picked up the scalpel, placed it in his right hand, curled his fingers around it.

She raised her chin and turned her head slightly, her eyes still on him, her smile serene. He hesitated for one long moment, during which I thought he might collapse. Then he brought the scalpel up suddenly, slicing her quickly but deeply under the chin. She sat down with a plop on the bed, her hands at her bloody throat. He was still shirtless, and tightened his fist to make a vein as he sat down beside her. He stroked her hair for a moment, studied her face, seeming to grow calmer. Then he picked up the syringe and inserted the tip of the needle into a bulging vein with a doctor’s practiced skill.

He slowly pressed the plunger. Moments after he removed the spent syringe, he gasped desperately for air, while his sister reached for him, her cries strangled and high-pitched through the blood that choked her. He began to thrash hideously, while her eyes widened and she grasped at him with hands like claws.

I turned from the room then, joined Jimmy in the hallway, and walked with him to the stairs. Away from the music, we could hear the chopper coming in again, and halfway down, we saw dust swirling out on the cobblestones, where the Nightsun was turning everything to day.

I reached over to lay a comforting hand on Jimmy’s shoulder. He pulled away, shrinking, withdrawing into himself like a turtle that’s been poked with a stick.

“Don’t touch me. I don’t want nobody to touch me, ever.”

I continued down the stairs beside him, then out into the widening circle of light, careful not to touch him.