Obit (43 page)
I am grateful for permission to reprint extracts from the following:
SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY
Words and Music by
BUD GREEN, LES BROWN
and
BEN HOMER
© 1944 (Renewed)
MORLEY MUSIC CO.
and
HOLLIDAY PUBLISHING
All Rights Reserved
KNOCKIN’ ON HEAVEN’S DOOR
by
BOB DYLAN
Copyright © 1973 by Ram’s Horn Music. All rights reserved. International copyright secured. Reprinted by permission.
THE PATRIOT GAME
Words and Music by
DOMINIC BEHAN
Copyright © 1964 (Renewed) 1965 (Renewed) Onward Music Ltd., London, England
TRO
– Essex Music, Inc., New York, controls all publication rights for the U.S.A. and Canada. Used by permission.
LULLABY OF BROADWAY (FROM “GOLDDIGGERS OF 1935”)
Words by
AL DUBIN
Music by
HARRY WARREN
© 1935
(Renewed)
WARNER BROS. INC.
All Rights Reserved
Used by Permission of
ALFRED PUBLISHING CO., INC.
Every effort has been made to locate the copyright owners of material quoted in this book. Any omissions are sincerely regretted, and will be corrected in subsequent editions, if any, if brought to the publisher’s attention.
March 31, 1991
The old woman knew it all. He was convinced of that. And there she sat, smug and hostile in her flat, in possession of the diaries and other secret records that could explain — and expose — the whole sinister affair. He found entertainment for himself that night in the drinking dens of lower Manhattan. But his mind had homed in on a single point: the collection of papers in the old lady’s flat in a rundown house in Brooklyn. He didn’t know how he was going to do it, but he was going to walk out of there with the papers in his hands. No more secrets, no more fear of exposure.
He was in a foul mood by the time he arrived at the house the next morning. What were the chances she would give up, or peddle for an extortionate price, the incriminating papers? The day was hot and bright, but she was not to be seen in her regular spot on the stoop, basking lizard-like in the sun. He rapped on her door. No reply. He rapped again, louder. He did not want to make two trips — he never wanted to see her again — so it had to be now. He tried
the door knob and pushed. The door swung open. He called her name as he stepped into the hallway. Silence.
When he looked into her living room, he reeled backwards in shock. The room was a shambles of blood and chaos; the smell of death overpowered the stale odour of smoke that hung in the room. He fought down the urge to be sick. His first thought — and it shamed him — was: “What did I touch?” His second thought was to look down at his feet to make sure he had not stepped in anything that would show up in a shoe print. The woman was face down on the floor, blood pooled around her head. There was spatter on the walls and the couch. Resting against the top of her head was a heavy marble ashtray. He didn’t have to be a forensic investigator to know it had been used to club her to death. Ashes and cigarette butts littered the floor around her. He remembered some figurines she had displayed in a cabinet; they were nowhere in sight. Books had been yanked from her bookcase in the corner. The scene suggested she had been dead for a while. But not that long: he had been there himself less than twenty-four hours ago. Was that why she had been killed, because he had been there?
Every instinct told him to bolt. But he steeled himself to go through with his plan, to retrieve the papers. To learn the truth himself, and to keep it from the shadowy figures who seemed to be circling around him. He was treading on dangerous ground, interfering with a crime scene and plotting a theft of what would be key evidence for the police investigating her death. But he took a deep breath and told himself to get moving. Then he noticed a pair of worn bedroom slippers sticking out of the hall closet. He removed his shoes and socks, and shoved his bare feet into the slippers. Let those be the footprints they find, if any. As he made his way to the back of the flat, he was relieved to see that the blood and gore were confined to the area immediately around the victim. He peered into the first bedroom. Like the living room, it had been tossed. An old-fashioned jewellery box had been upended on the bed; the mattress was askew as if someone had groped beneath it. On the floor beside the bed was a plastic shopping bag with photographs spilling out of it; he dumped the pictures and wrapped the bag around his right hand before touching any items in the room. No papers. He proceeded to
the other bedroom. Here again all the items had been rifled. Two battered leather briefcases had been wrenched open and left empty. He searched every drawer and shelf but found no documents, no diary. He had just entered the kitchen when he heard a sudden creaking sound, and his heart banged in his chest. He stood perfectly still, covered in a sheen of sweat. Nothing happened. After a few tense moments he resumed his quest but again found nothing. How long till someone came to the flat? He grabbed a paper towel from the holder and left the kitchen. He looked ahead through the hallway to the front door and saw a car slowing down in front of the house. He held his breath. It moved on. Probably just on the hunt for a parking space. He searched the front closet, only to confirm what he already knew: the papers were gone.
Had the woman herself destroyed them before falling victim to a murderer’s hand? Was this a simple break-in, someone preying on a crippled old lady, taking a few keepsakes to be sold at a flea market? Unlikely. The burglar had one purpose and one purpose alone: the retrieval of the records that had been a threat to somebody’s security for forty years. The theft of the woman’s trinkets was a cover-up. Was the murder a by-product of the need to get the papers? Or was it a planned execution?
ANNE EMERY is a graduate of St. F.X. University and Dalhousie Law School. She has worked as a lawyer, legal affairs reporter, and researcher. She lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia, with her husband and daughter. The other books in the Collins-Burke mystery series are
Sign of the Cross
, winner of the 2007 Arthur Ellis Award for Best First Novel;
Obit
(2007);
Barrington Street Blues
(2008);
Cecilian Vespers
(2009); and
Children in the Morning
(2010), winner of the Dartmouth Book Award for Fiction and a silver medal from the Independent Publisher Book Awards.
Copyright © Anne Emery, 2007
Published by
ECW PRESS
2120 Queen Street East, Suite 200, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
M4E 1E2
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any process — electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise — without the prior written permission of the copyright owners and
ECW PRESS
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LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION
Emery, Anne
Obit / Anne Emery.
ISBN: 978-1-55490-280-4
Also published as 978-1-55022-754-3 (cloth); 978-1-55022-905-9 (paperback); 978-1-55490-754-0 (PDF)
I
. Title.
PS
8609.
M
47O25 2007
C
813'.6
C
2006-906827-5
Cover Design: Tania Craan
Cover Image: Chris Amaral/Nonstock/Firstlight
Typesetting: Mary Bowness
The publication of
Obit
has been generously supported by the
Canada Council, the Ontario Arts Council, and the Government
of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry
Development Program.
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