The Night's Legacy (13 page)

“That’s fine.  I’m not exactly Prince William either.”

He sat down on the lumpy bed that slanted steeply down because the two front legs were broken.  She stood in front of him, arms crossed over her chest.  “So what brings you here?”

“I just wanted to see you. 
Melanie said you were here.”

“You’re still talking to
Melanie, eh?”

“I would have tried calling but you don’t have a phone.”

“Good one.  Blame the victim.”

“Victim?  I’ve already apologized.  What more do you want?”

“Maybe I want a pity fuck right here on the bed.”

“Be serious,
Lois.  I’m really sorry about your mom.  She was a nice lady.”

“She still is a nice lady,”
Lois said.  “She’s not dead.”

“Sorry.”

“Really, why did you take this long to show up?  Didn’t you think I might have needed you?  Do you have any idea how hard it’s been?”  When she began to cry he stood up to take her into his arms.  She punched him in the stomach and then pushed him back onto the bed.  “Don’t think you can sweep me up in your arms like you’re fucking Rhett Butler!”

“How many times do I have to apologize to you?”

“At least be honest.  Why didn’t you come see me?”

He looked down at the grubby motel carpet.  “Because I’m a coward, all right?  I’ve already been through my parents dying.  It tore me up inside.  Thinking about you and your mom, I just couldn’t do it.  I’m so sorry,
Lois.  I really do care about you and your mom.  You’re very special people.  I was just scared.  Can you forgive me?”

Lois
glared down at him, wondering  if he were telling the truth.  She had thought he cared about her before only to have him ditch her at the club.  Maybe he was hoping that by apologizing he could wring a pity fuck out of her.  Yet when she looked into his eyes, she couldn’t help but believe him.

She unfolded her arms and used them to hug him.  She kissed his cheek and then whispered into his ear, “I’ll forgive you.  This time.”

They were kissing when there was a second knock at the door.  Lois didn’t have time to answer it; Melanie was already bursting inside, her face red and tears streaming down her cheeks.  “Oh my God, it’s so terrible!” she wailed.

“What?  Is something wrong with Mom?”
Lois asked.  The hospital had the motel’s phone number and her room number.  They had promised to call if anything changed.  Maybe they were still pissed at her for assaulting Dr. Pavelski.  In which case this was the cruelest revenge of all.

“No!  It’s Dr. Johnson!  He’s dead!”

* * *

There was already a cordon of cops surrounding the Thorne Museum—again.  They had just left and now they were back again, this time for Dr. Johnson. 
Melanie had seen the report on television about another murder at the museum.  The staff grapevine had indicated it was Dr. Johnson the cops had found dead.

Lois
prayed they were wrong.  Or that it was the Dr. Johnson who worked in the zoology department and specialized in the mating habits of birds on the Azores.  She knew Mom would tell her that it was wrong to wish for anyone’s death, but when it was the man she had thought of as her father, her uncle, her mentor and her future husband she couldn’t help herself.

A beat cop stopped them at the yellow tape.  “No one’s allowed in there,” he said.

“My uncle is in there!” Lois shouted.

“Sorry, ma’am.  No exceptions.”

Lois trembled with rage.  Only Tony’s arm around her shoulder kept her from punching out the officer and facing a year or two in jail.  “We’re employees of this museum,” she said.

“Sorry,” the cop said again.

She hadn’t worked with Melanie long, making it amazing how quickly they came up with the plan, all without saying a word.  Melanie simply gave Lois a look and she understood.  She nodded slightly.  If Tony was in on it, he didn’t show any sign.

Melanie
screamed like a girl in a horror movie.  Then she dropped to her knees, hands pressed to her chest.  “Oh my God!” she screamed.  “My pills!  Where are my pills?”

As she began rolling around on the ground, the cop left his position by the yellow tape.  Tony knelt down to take
Melanie’s hand.  She kept rolling around and even got her eyes to roll back in her head; she probably would have started foaming at the mouth if she could manage it. 

Lois
took her cue and ducked beneath the tape.  She broke into a run towards the museum.  No one seemed to notice her yet, all of their attention focused on Melanie.  If she didn’t end up in jail, Lois promised that she would never think of Melanie as stupid again.

She had just reached the top steps when the door opened. 
Lois thought for sure the jig was up, that she was going to be busted before she ever got to see if it really was Dr. Johnson up there.  That was until she saw it was a paramedic opening the door. 

She took a step aside, watching as the paramedics wheeled a gurney out the front doors.  A gurney covered with a white sheet.  “No!” she shrieked.  She pushed one of the paramedics aside to tear the sheet away from the gurney.

She dropped to her knees, knowing there was no need to go any farther.  It was Dr. Johnson on the gurney, his body pale, his chest and hands smeared with blood, and two holes in his abdomen.  Clutching the sheet in her hands, she curled into a ball against the front of the museum. 

He was dead.  Her surrogate father, her surrogate uncle, her mentor, and her future husband were all dead.  Him and Aunt
Betty were dead and Mom was in the hospital, probably crippled.  It was as if a vengeful God were getting even with her for running away from that diner seven years ago.

She felt a hand on her shoulder.  A woman’s voice said, “
Lois Locke?”

“Yes,” she said without looking up.

“We need to talk.”

“I don’t give a—”  She stopped when she saw the gold badge in the woman’s hand.

* * *

They held the interrogation in the cafeteria.  The woman with the gold badge introduced herself as Detective
Allison Murphy of the Ren City Police Department.  She wore a weather-beaten green army jacket and jeans with holes in the knees.  That along with the sloppy dark brown ponytail made her look more like a transient than a cop.  Maybe they’d gotten her out of bed for this. 

“You want a coffee or anything?”
Murphy asked.

“No, I’m fine.”

“Then you won’t mind telling me how you got past the barricade?”

“I waited until the officer was looking away and then I ran inside.”

The detective shook her head.  She reached into her pocket for a cigarette.  “You mind if I smoke?”

“Yeah, I do,”
Lois said.  “My mother runs this museum, you know.  Or she did.”

“I do know that.  She was shot about a week ago, right?”

“Yes.”

“And you got a bump on the head too, right?”

“Yes.”

“What’s your relation to Dr. Johnson?”

“He’s a family friend.  A really close family friend.”  Lois wasn’t about to tell this stranger, especially not a cop, about her relationship to Dr. Johnson. 

“Now he’s dead.”

“You think I did it?”

“I’m not saying that.”  The detective stuffed the cigarette back into her jacket.  She took out a pad of paper.  She made a show of consulting this, although
Lois figured the cop probably already knew what was written on it.  “You came back just a few days before the robbery, didn’t you?  I see they got you in Texas for reckless driving and assault.”

“Good to know you’re doing your homework.”

“Where were you about two hours ago?”

“In my room at the Palladium Motel.  You can ask them if you want.”

“Anyone vouch for you?”

“My friends outside.  They told me what happened.”

“But were they in the room with you at that time?”

“No.”

“So you were alone in there?”

“I was trying to sleep.”

“I’m sure.”  Murphy took the cigarette out again and tapped it on the table.  Lois wanted to snatch it away and smash it, but she knew she couldn’t.  “What about the other night?  How’d you get that bump on the head?”

“One of the thieves knocked me out.”

“They knocked you out but didn’t kill you like the guard?  Or like they tried to do to your mom?”  Murphy smiled, which on her gaunt face looked anything but friendly.  “And they were so considerate that they tucked you away in the gift shop until someone could find you.”

“What do you want me to say?  That I knocked myself on the head?”

“Not at all, Miss Locke.  I think that robbery was an inside job.  I think you helped them get inside.  They were supposed to cut you in on the take, but they got greedy.  So they knocked you out.”

It was
Lois’s turn to smile.  “Just one flaw in your theory.  If I let them in and they got greedy, why did they leave me alive?  Why not kill me so I couldn’t roll on them?”

Murphy
was sharp enough to already have an alternative in place.  “So maybe the little genius planned the whole caper.  You had one of them knock you out so it would look as if you were innocent.  But your dear old friend Dr. Johnson got wise to the scheme and you decided to cover up by putting a couple of bullets in him.”

“I could never shoot Dr. Johnson.  Or let anyone hurt my mother.  I love them.”

“You love them so much that you ran away from seven years and only came back when someone caught up to you.”

Lois
glared at the detective, but Murphy was far too hardened for this to have any impact.  “Fine, make me a suspect.  Haul me down to the station if you want.  Then I’ll call my lawyer and we can do this all by the book.”

Without looking,
Murphy flicked the cigarette into a trashcan, which Lois found most impressive of all.  The detective stood up.  “I’m not taking you in.  Not yet.  But I’m sure you know not to leave town.  I’ll be keeping an eye on you.  In the meantime, you want to get something off your chest, give me a call.”  She flicked a business card just as deftly against Lois’s chest.  “See you around, kid.”

A uniformed officer motioned for
Lois to stand up and then escorted her back outside.  She looked all around, but Dr. Johnson was already gone.

Chapter 11

Lois didn’t bother with changing, showering, or putting on any makeup the next morning.  She bought a coffee on the way to the hospital, hoping that it would pick her up, but one look at the morning’s newspaper and she knew nothing would help.  The
Renaissance City Daily News
didn’t give out Dr. Johnson’s name in their description of the murder at the museum, for which Lois was grateful.

Still, she didn’t dare bring the paper with her into the hospital.  Dr. Pavelski had warned
Lois that Mom wasn’t to read anything, especially not something as upsetting as the newspaper.  Knowing Mom, she would tear out the tubes and wires and then drag herself back to the museum, up to the office.

When
Lois got to the hospital, she found her mother still asleep.  It was hard to tell this until Lois crept around to the other side of the bed to see Mom’s face.  As she always did, Lois sank down on the chair to wait for Mom to wake up.  Sometimes that would happen right away or other times it would take hours.

During the long periods of waiting,
Lois wished for a newspaper, book, or even some cards to entertain herself.  But she didn’t want Mom to see her goofing off, as if she were just passing the time until her shift ended like back at the diner in Durndell.  She wanted Mom to know how much she cared, how dedicated she was.

As
Lois waited, she saw Mom’s left cheek twitch.  This was followed by the left side of her lips.  Lois took her mother’s hand and gave it a squeeze of reassurance.  At the same time she wondered if her mother were having a stroke and if she should press the button to call for a nurse.

Her hand seemed to be enough to calm Mom down.  Her mouth stopped twitching and pulled into a slight smile.  Her eyes fluttered before finally opening all the way. 
Lois smiled at her mother and said, “Hi, Mom.  I’m here.”

“Hi, sweetheart.  I was dreaming about you.”

“A good dream?”  Lois reached for the pitcher of water to pour some into a cup.  She placed the straw in Mom’s lips to let her take a pull.  This was part of their ritual, Mom usually being thirsty after she woke up.

“No.  A nightmare.  Until I felt your hand.”

“Mom, you’ve got to stop this,” Lois said.  For days Mom kept having nightmares about something terrible happening to Lois.  She didn’t give much detail, just saying that Lois needed to get out of town and go back on the road.  “No one’s going to hurt me.  It’s you we need to worry about.  We have to focus on you getting better.”

“I don’t think I’ll be getting much better.”

“Don’t talk like that, Mom.  You’ll get through this.  I’ll help you.”

Mom’s Glare wasn’t what it had been, but still enough to make
Lois cringe.  “What have you been up to, young lady?  You look a mess.”

“I haven’t been sleeping well.”

“It’s more than that.  You’ve been crying.”

“So?  I think I have reason to cry with you in bed, like this.”

“You weren’t crying all the other times you’ve come to visit.”

“I was just putting up a brave front.”

Mom shook her head a little, as much as she could with her neck in a brace.  “It’s Richard, isn’t it?  He’s the one who died.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about—”

“One of the nurses had the radio on for me last night.  They said on the news report that a man was killed in the Egyptology department.  Only Richard would be up there at night.”

“It could have been a janitor.  Or a guard.”

“Lois—”

“All right, Mom.  It was him.  Someone shot him.” 
Lois began to cry again.  Mom squeezed her hand, which was about all she could do at this point.  “Why would someone do that?  Richard would never hurt anyone.  He was so nice and caring, like a father.”

“I know, sweetheart.  I cared for him a lot too.”

“But he’s not my real father, right?”

“No.”  Mom sighed.  “There was a time when I thought he would be, but things didn’t work out between us.”

“Why not?”

“It’s complicated.  Then he and
Betty started dating and they hit it off.”

“And you weren’t jealous?”

“Maybe a little at first, but then I met your father.”

“Oh.” 
Lois wiped at her eyes, not daring to tell Mom about seeing Dr. Johnson’s body or being interviewed by Detective Murphy.  “I wish I could have gotten the chance to work with him, like we always talked about.  I wish—”  She couldn’t say the rest, how she wished she could have made him proud of her.  Instead she was a screw-up working at the gift shop.  He would never get the chance to prove herself to him, not anymore.  Someone had taken that chance from her.

“I know it’s hard, sweetheart, but remember how much Richard always loved you and all the good times you had with him.  Remember when he took you to the beach?”

Lois nodded and couldn’t help smiling.  She had been four at the time and had spent the whole afternoon with him, building a pyramid in the sand.  She had insisted on complete accuracy, forcing him to keep smoothing down the sides until they were just right.  Later he let her bury him in the sand and “discover” him after a half-hour of playing archaeologist.  “I miss him so much already,” she said.

“So do I,” Mom said.  Her mouth twitched as if she were having another nightmare.  She gave
Lois’s hand another squeeze.  “It’s getting too dangerous for you here.  You should get out of here.  Go back to Texas.  Or wherever you want.”

“I won’t leave you, Mom.  Not this time.  Not like this.”

“There’s nothing you can do for me.”  Tears dripped down Mom’s cheeks.  “I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you too.”

“I’ll be fine.  I can take care of myself.”

“I know.  That’s why you should go.  You don’t need me.”

“Yes I do,”
Lois said.  “You’re all I have left.”

Mom sighed and then said, “You have to make me a promise.  If you hear Richard or
Betty or even me in your dreams telling you to find something, you mustn’t do it.  Understand?”

“Not really.  What do you mean?”

“I can’t explain.  Just promise me.  Please?”

Lois
gave her mother’s hand another squeeze.  She didn’t know what Mom was talking about, but it couldn’t hurt to make an idle promise.  “I promise, Mom.”

“Good.”  With that Mom’s eyes closed and she went back to sleep.

* * *

Rahnasto leaned back in his chair and looked out the window.  The previous night he had slept for six hours, the longest in one stretch in thirty years.  He hadn’t even needed any antacids to get through the night.  Before long he might even risk trying spaghetti with wine to see if his acid reflux were really cured.

He owed it all to that strange man calling himself Set.  With the Silver Seraph gone, Rahnasto had been able to bring in a shipment of heroin unmolested.  According to his soldiers at the museum heist, that other do-gooder had escaped unharmed, but he remained hidden at least for the time being.  Not that he could ever be more than an inconvenience without the woman to back him up.

From the latest reports, Dr. Jessica Locke remained in serious condition at the hospital.  Rahnasto’s spies said she was paralyzed from the waist down with extensive burns that had necessitated a double mastectomy.  He had considered paying her a visit to finish the job, but the thought of her lying there deformed and crippled was far more pleasing than the idea of smothering her.  Let her suffer, wallow in her failures for what remained of her pathetic life.  In the meantime he was back in business.

On cue someone knocked on the door.  His latest lieutenant Andropov stuck his head inside.  “Mr. Dominguez is here to see you, sir.”

“Good, show him in.”

A little Puerto Rican in a white linen suit shuffled in moments later.  Rahnasto waved him to a seat.  He took a cigar from the case on his desk and offered it to Dominguez.  “That’s a real Cuban,” Rahnasto said.  He hadn’t smoked one in five years, but decided to take one from the box for himself.  A victory cigar would be just the thing at the moment.  “Is everything ready for tonight?”

“The shipment is on schedule.  Will you have the payment?”

“Of course.  What kind of businessman would I be otherwise?”

“And will there be any
entanglements
?”  

“Our mutual friend has been taken care of.  She’s in intensive care if you want to pay her a visit.”

“I had heard such was the case.  What of the other?”

“There’s nothing he can do to us.”  Rahnasto lit his cigar and then took a puff on it.  He held the smoke in until tears came to his eyes, savoring the flavor of it.  “We’re free men.”

Dominguez nodded and blew out a cloud of blue smoke from his cigar.  “These are good.  Been a long time since I had one of these.”

“Me too.”  Rahnasto motioned to the box.  “Take a few more while you’re at it.  I can always get more.”

“Thank you, Senor Rahnasto—”

The door exploded then, splinters of wood flying everywhere.  Rahnasto ducked beneath his desk, reaching for the pistol he kept taped underneath the drawer for emergencies.  He smelled the same odor of charred flesh from the museum robbery and then heard a heavy thump.  From beneath the desk he could see Dominguez lying dead on the floor, the smoking cigar still clenched in his mouth while the hole in his chest smoldered.

Rahnasto peeked over the desk to find Set standing at Dominguez’s feet.  The staff pointed at Rahnasto’s head.  “You and I have business to discuss.”

“What business?  You got your stick and your headdress.  That was our agreement.”  Rahnasto summoned the courage to plop onto his chair again.  He set the pistol in front of him, knowing it wouldn’t do much good against Set.  “Did you have to kill him?  We have a shipment worth thirty million coming in tonight.”

“Your petty enterprises do not concern me.  I have much greater things in mind.”

“Like what?”

“You will find out.  You and all of your minions.  Gather them tomorrow night at the old Kunzel Building.  Then you will know what you are to do.”

“Wait a minute—”  Rahnasto broke off, seeing the dog’s head staff pointed at him, its red eyes glowing.

“Do not attempt to betray me, fool.  Do you understand?”

“I get it,” Rahnasto said.  As quickly as he had appeared, Set was gone, leaving Rahnasto alone with the corpse.  He sighed and then reached into his desk for a bottle of Maalox.