The Devil You Know (21 page)

Julian
nodded. “I see. Well, if you change your mind, you know how to get hold of me,
yes? Edgar?” The butler had stood passively by the front doors the whole time
the pair had been meeting with Julian; now he looked in his master’s direction,
his head popping up like a toy suddenly wound up. “See to it that Mr. Sheffield
has my private number, will you?”

Edgar
nodded and reached into an inner pocket, handing Sheffield a card as he
approached the door. Julian admired Miss Nelson’s rear and her ankles as she
followed the old man up the entryway steps and out the door. Neither looked
back at him, and Edgar closed the door after them.

Julian
stared at the door for a moment and then said, “Edgar, make me dinner
reservations for this evening. The gentlemen at the pool will be joining me.” He
paused a moment. “All but one. And get me a girl to join us, would you? One who
looks a bit like the one that just left?”

“Yes,
sir,” the butler said.

“And
I want you to delay a minute in opening the gate for them when they ring.”

“Yes,
sir,” the butler repeated and left the room.

Julian
quickly went to the intercom and called Dick Sheridan to come up. He paced
before the picture window while Dick raced up the stairs. He arrived out of
breath and with a white robe thrown over his still wet body. “There’s a car
just leaving with an old man and a girl in it. Take a quick look outside and
then follow them. Don’t let them see you.”

Dick
looked nonplussed. “Can I get dressed first?”

“Go
now. They may be heading for the airport or a hotel. If they do, that’s fine.
Just come back. But if they go anywhere else—if it seems like they’re not
from out of town, I want to know where they end up.”

Chapter Nineteen

The evening following their failed attempt to wrest the
book of spells from Julian Piedmont, Marie and Jasper discussed their options
at length, including Tom in their meeting around Jasper’s dining table. Tom had
been against their plan to talk their way onto the Piedmont estate, and had
been angry with Jasper for taking five thousand dollars in cash with him. Marie
had spoken to him alone, though, and had convinced him that it was necessary
and that Julian was nowhere near as dangerous as the monsters he had created.
Tom had relented and met them at the door of Jasper’s house when they returned
empty handed, relief written on every bit of his face. Now he seemed glad that
he was being included in their conspiracy, but he had little to offer as Jasper
and Marie brainstormed ideas on how best to proceed without the book of spells.

The
next morning, Marie was at work when the phone rang. She had seen no repeat of
the change in Father Joe’s demeanor toward her, and he had just gone out for
his coffee and walk when Marie picked up the receiver. She answered as she
always did: “Hello, this is St. Lucy’s. Can I help you?”

“Yes,
can I speak to Marie Doyle, please?”

“Speaking,”
she said a bit apprehensively. In all the time she had worked here, she had
received very few personal calls, and all of them from people she knew well.
This voice she did not recognize.

“Miss
Doyle, this is Sergeant Clifford with the Los Angeles Police Department. Do you
have a moment to answer some questions?”

“Well…yes,”
she said, suddenly flustered by the fear that something worse had happened to
Elise at the hospital. “What’s this about?”

“Miss
Doyle, are you acquainted with a Jasper Hollenbeck?”

Her
adrenaline spiked immediately, beads of sweat breaking out on her forehead and
her heart pounding. “Yes,” she said quickly. “Is something wrong?”

“And
his grandson, a Mr. Glass?”

“Yes.
Can you tell me what’s happened?”

“I’m
afraid there was a break-in at Mr. Hollenbeck’s residence during the night. We
haven’t been able to piece together the details, but it would appear that Mr.
Hollenbeck surprised the intruders. I’m afraid to have to tell you this, Miss
Doyle.”

No!
she thought.

“But Mr. Hollenbeck has died. Our assumption at this point is that he
had a heart attack from the shock.”

Marie
fought back tears and could barely speak as she said, “No! He can’t be dead.
There’s got to be a mistake.”

“I’m
afraid not, ma’am.”

“And
Tom?”

“Mr.
Glass,” said the sergeant. “He asked for you. That’s all he’d say. This number
and, I assume, your home number were on a sheet of paper by the telephone
here.”

“All
right. Can I speak to him?”

“Not
at the moment. He’s receiving some medical care right now.”

“Medical
care?”

“Yes,
it might be helpful if you came. Do you know anything about his condition?”

“What
do you mean, ‘condition’?” It was all too much for Marie to make sense of, and
the whirlpool of emotions pulling her down made it much more difficult to
understand what the police sergeant meant.

“His
medical condition, ma’am. He said your name, and that’s it. Just stares into
space, almost completely unresponsive.”

“I
don’t—” she began. “He’s…” She thought of Elise and how the word
“unresponsive” perfectly described her. Immediately, she knew that the break-in
had not been a random burglary. Julian Piedmont had been suspicious of her and
Jasper; he had no doubt had one of his lackeys follow them when they had left
his estate. Once they’d seen where Marie drove him, it wouldn’t have taken a
genius to see that Jasper’s story about being a San Francisco book dealer was a
sham. Piedmont had had his thugs break in, either to scare the old man away or
actually to steal from his library. If Tom was in a state similar to Elise, the
only thing Marie could imagine was that one of the incubi had been set loose on
him, that it had done unimaginable things to him, leaving him more broken
inside than he had been at the end of the war. The thought was more than she
could bear. “I’m coming right now. They’re not going to…take him away or
anything?”

“Mr.
Glass? I don’t believe so. There’s one other thing, Miss Doyle.”

Fearful
of what it might be, she simply said, “Yes?”

“Mr.
Hollenbeck’s grandson appears to be in no condition to make a positive
identification of the body, and we haven’t been able to establish if there’s
any other family nearby. Since you’re coming here anyway, could I impose on you
to make the identification?”

“My
God,” Marie half-whispered. Then she said, “Yes, of course.”

She
did not bother trying to find Father Joe on his walk of the church grounds, but
just scribbled a quick note telling him she had an emergency to deal with and
that she would phone him to let him know when she would be able to come back to
work. Then, almost forgetting her coat and purse, she rushed out the door,
through the church, and out to her car.

* * * * * * * *

There
were four police cars in front of Jasper’s house, along with an ambulance and a
black and white station wagon from the coroner’s office. Marie had to park two
houses down, and she ran the distance from her car to Jasper’s front door. A
uniformed officer barred her way, and she could see several people moving about
inside the house’s dark interior.

“I
was phoned,” she explained to the policeman. “Sergeant…damn it, I forget his
name. I’m Marie Doyle. Please. Whoever’s in charge will…”

“All
right,” the officer said. He was tall and imposing, but when he held up a hand
to signal that he needed her to be patient for a moment, she felt that he was
going to listen to her. “If you’ll wait here just a minute, I’ll see the
Sergeant.” He took a step into the house and then stopped, turning toward her
and pointing a finger in her direction. “But if you set one foot in this house
before I come back, I’ll have you arrested for interfering with an
investigation.”

“I
understand,” Marie said, her voice husky. She had wept most of the way here, a
free hand alternately wiping at her tears and fingering the little wooden cross
Jasper had given her. She felt frightened, sad, angry and terribly alone all at
the same time, and being threatened with arrest now did not help. Once the
officer went into the house, she could not help leaning forward and trying to
peer past the usually darkened front room and through the doorway that led to
the kitchen and dining area where she had spent so much time with Jasper and
Tom. Everything was silhouette and shadow, now. It was impossible to make sense
of anything she saw.

About
a minute later, the officer who had been guarding the door returned with
another policeman in plain clothes. He was a bit overweight and looked to be in
his fifties, with close-cropped hair going gray at the temples. “Miss Doyle,
I’m Jim Clifford. We spoke on the phone.” He held out a hand, and she shook it.

“Yes,”
she said. “I got here as soon as I could.”

“And
we appreciate it. I hope Chuck here didn’t give you too hard a time?”

Marie
smiled weakly. “No.”

“Come
in then. Please. And if you could refrain from touching anything.”

Marie
followed the detective through the front room and into the kitchen area. She
had expected and hoped to see Tom at the dining table, but everyone here was in
uniform.

“It
looks like they came in this way,” said Sergeant Clifford. He pointed to the
screen door that led out to the back yard. The intruders had slit the screen
and broken the window in the back door.

Marie
saw that the detective was leading her toward the library, and she knew that
Jasper’s body would still be there. She did not want to see it. Nearly
panicking, she said, “Where’s Tom? Is he any better?”

Sergeant
Clifford turned to her with a kindly smile. “He’s out there,” he said, pointing
toward the gazebo in the backyard. Before Marie could make a move toward the
door, though, he said, “But before I send you out there, I’ll need to have you
come in here with me. Please.”

He
moved so that they could step into the converted garage side-by-side. Marie
realized she was holding her breath and made herself let it out as they crossed
the threshold. In the nearest corner of the room lay the body covered by a
white sheet. The shape that the body made under the sheet somehow looked far
too small for it to have been Jasper, Marie thought, but her heart sank at the
sight of it nonetheless. Other officers moved about the room, some in uniform
and others in suits, but Marie was oblivious to all of them. She trembled as
she neared the body.

Detective
Clifford moved ahead of her and got down on one knee. Gripping a corner of the
sheet, he looked at Marie and said, “I’m going to pull this back a little. All
you have to do is say yes or no, and I’ll cover him up again. You ready?”

She
nodded almost imperceptibly, and then watched as Clifford lifted the sheet. It
was Jasper. He lay on his stomach, one hand stretched out past his head, the
other still hidden under the sheet. She was grateful that his eyes were closed,
but his mouth hung open in a strange, unnatural way. She gave the detective
another quick nod, and he covered the body again, but the image of Jasper’s
face stayed with her. At the same time, a picture of Julian Piedmont came into
her mind—smug, good-looking, arrogant Julian Piedmont who had made her
walk around him as they ended their meeting at his house. She wished he were
here now, and she clenched her jaw at the thought.

“Do
you have any idea who broke in?” she asked as the detective got up on his feet
with some effort.

He
shook his head. “We’ll have to work from prints. Unless the grandson saw
something and just hasn’t been able to tell us yet. You don’t know of anyone
who was maybe after some of Mr. Hollenbeck’s things? I assume some of these
books are valuable.”

Marie
looked around now for the first time. Dozens of Jasper’s priceless volumes had
been dumped onto the floor. The burglars—if that was what they were—seemed
not to have been concerned about being quiet. “Yes,” she said. “Some are very
valuable.”

“Perhaps
when this is cleaned up after we’re through dusting, you could take a look to
see if anything’s missing?”

“It
would be hard,” Marie said, taking a few steps toward the nearest shelf. A very
old and fragile edition of
Just So
Stories
caught her eye. “I don’t know everything he had. Jasper wasn’t the
type to write it all down. Not even in his store.”

“I
see. The store hasn’t been touched, by the way. We sent a car over, and there’s
no sign of trouble.”

Marie
wondered if any of Julian’s sycophants had police records that would yield a
match for the detective’s fingerprint experts. If so, it would only help the
investigation if she told him now about the trip she and Jasper had made to the
mansion on Tuesday afternoon. Her mind raced as she considered ways to tell Clifford
that Piedmont was behind the break-in without telling him everything about the
incubi, the book of spells, and all the rest. He would think she was crazy. No,
she thought, still pretending to look at the books. Unless she was completely
wrong about who had broken into the house—whether to scare Jasper or to
steal his books—Marie would have to rely on herself to get justice.

She
turned toward the detective and said, “I have no idea who could have done this.
Jasper never mentioned any rivals in the book-buying world. Do you think it’s
possible it was just a random burglary?”

Clifford
exhaled sharply. “Could be,” he said. “Could be. Hopefully we’ll be able to
rule a few things out once these prints are done.”

“Yes,”
Marie said. “Now, do you mind if I talk to Tom?”

The
detective waved his hand toward the door. “Be my guest,” he said.

As
she made her way through the damaged screen door and across the backyard, Marie
saw that Tom was not alone in the gazebo. A uniformed officer stood off to one
side, and a nurse sat beside him on the white bench. Near the gazebo, two more
men in white suits stood beside a stretcher; the ambulance drivers, Marie
thought, reasoning that the nurse had been called in with them. Another
detective wandered around the garden; he poked aimlessly at branches and leaves
with a pen, seemingly waiting for the situation to change. When Marie got close
to the gazebo, the policeman in uniform turned toward her, and she feared a repeat
of what had happened at the front door of the house. But behind her, she heard
Clifford call out that she was here at his request, and the policeman’s
demeanor changed. He stepped aside with a smile, and she rushed into the
gazebo.

Tom
looked dazed, but she was relieved to see that he did not have the same
complete lethargy that Elise had exhibited. He blinked and made eye contact
with her, and she could sense some recognition in his gaze. “Oh, Tom,” she said
as she took one of his hands from his lap and held it between both of hers for
a moment before pressing it to her lips. Then more tears came—both out of
grief for Jasper and from the relief she felt in her certainty that Tom had not
been taken from her in the same way as Elise.