1 Breakfast at Madeline's (22 page)

26

I don't know who or what I expected to find there. When I pulled up across the street from the school it was already past 10:30, and the place was deserted.

I sat in my Camry
and surveyed the darkened build
ing. Nice view, but I wo
uldn't get anywhere by just sit
ting there. I grabbed my flashlight from the glove compartment, planning to smash the window by the front door and break in. Hey, maybe I'd get lucky and find a bottle with a big XXX on the front along with Bonnie's fingerprints.

But when I sneaked through the shadows to the front door, I decided not to break in after all. Mainly because the door wasn't locked. In the excitement of opening night, someone had apparently forgotten to lock up. So I waltzed on inside with my flashlight and commenced operations.

First I checked out the desk in Bonnie's office, where I found a bunch of financial files. The school had failed to turn a profit last year for the first time in eight years; but based on my limi
ted accounting expertise, every
thing seemed on the up and up.

I kept on searching. Tucked away at the back of a drawer I found a paperback book titled
In the Cockpit of the Plane: Women's Sexual Fantasies.
Hmm. I wished I had time to read it.

Behind the book were two other interesting items: a
packet of hypodermic needles, and a prescription. Was Bonnie diabetic? Unfortunately the prescription was in that standard handwriting they teach you in med school, so I couldn't understand a word.

Fascinating stuff. Bu
t I wasn't finding any files la
beled "Donald Penn
" or "Murder" or anything conve
nient like that.

I went in the storeroom and discovered Xerox paper and cleaning supplies. But no gasoline for committing arson with, no books describing how committing homicide could be a positive spiritual experience.

Heading through
the double doors into the dark
ened auditorium, I shone my flashlight over the empty seats and then the stage itself. Bonnie had created a nifty set. Stage left, there were red and orange flames rising up out of a deep pit. This must be good old hell, home of the silver-tongued devil himself... or herself. Stage right, fluffy white clouds were hovering in the air above two tire swings, also painted white. That must be heaven. At center stage was the brick facade of a house—I guess this was where the regular mortals hung out.

It was all very sweet,
but since I wasn't there to cri
tique set designs, I left the auditorium and was already walking down the hallway when suddenly a bell went off in my head. I turned around and ran back inside the auditorium, tripping over a couple of dark steps and then vaulting onstage. I shone my light on the house facade and stared at the bricks.

They were mottled, red and white.

The exact same type of brick
someone had thrown through Molly Otis's window.

My hand trembled with excitement as I felt the brick's surface. So now I had evidence linking Bonnie to the burglary
and
the dea
th threat against Molly. Bon
nie had always been intense as hell—but now she was turning destructive.

Why?

The answer came to me in a rush.
Because she was broke and desperate.
Her school was losing money, and she was going nuts trying to raise funds for t
hat box
ing video. But The Pe
nn was blackmailing her, threat
ening to expose her unethical little grant, smear her name, and scare off any other investors.

And above all this, I realized, Bonnie was facing the overwhelming reality that she was getting older, like me, middle age looming like some horrible hulking Godzilla, but Bonnie's st
ill fighting, she still has des
perate dreams of fame
and fortune, and it's even look
ing like maybe they'll finally come true, she's actually getting some money together for what she sees as her huge breakthrough project... but then, of all the bizarre, horrible things, some total worthless louse, some two-bit blackmailer, Donald Fucking Penn, threatens to rob her of her one last shot at the rainbow, forcing her to resign her
self once and for all to a life
time of endlessly hustling theater gigs on a shoeshine and a smile, struggling to make ends meet...

Was raging midlife crisis enough motive to kill someone?

From stage right came a sudden noise. Someone opening a door. I froze.

As if that would keep whoever it was from seeing me, standing there center stage with a lit flashlight in my hand.

"Who's there?" said a woman's edgy, fearful voice.

It was Bonnie.

"Oh hi, Bonnie," I replied, inanely cheerful, as if I'd just dropped in for tea.

"Jacob? Is that you?"

"Uh, yeah." I shone the flashlight on her, thinking in
some mixed up way th
at it might help her see me bet
ter. It didn't, of course, but I did get a good view of Bonnie squinting against the light... and holding a silver pitchfork in her hand.

She lifted the pitchfork to shield her eyes. "Oh, sorry," I apologized, and shone the flashlight on my own face, for what reason I'm not sure. Then I felt silly doing that and pointed the light down at the floor. I gave Bonnie a nervou
s smile, which made no sense be
cause she couldn't even see my face anymore. This was too weird. Here I'd finally caught the murderer, or thought I had, and the main thing I was feeling was embarrassed.

No, not the main thing. Mainly I was hoping that Bonnie's pitchfork, w
hich I couldn't see in the dark
ness now, was papier-mach
é
instead of the real deal.

"What are you doing here?" Bonnie asked. Since I couldn't see her face either, I couldn't tell if she was merely bewildered or filled with murderous rage.

"Great show, Bonnie," I said as I backed away from her, but trying to go slowly so she wouldn't notice. "Really enjoyed it."

"I didn't see you in the audience."

"I was in the back."

"Jacob, what the fuck is going on?"

I backed up some more, and Bonnie started toward me. Not that I saw her, but I heard her footsteps—and saw her pitchfork prongs gleaming in the shadows as she called out,
"Goddamn you, Jake, what the hell are you trying to do to me?!"

Tapping some hitherto unknown reservoir of either panic, courage, or total stupidity, I stunned myself by shouting into the darkness, "That was your shoe in our backyard, wasn't it?!"

Bonnie's footsteps stopped. She was probably
equally stunned. Sensing I had the advantage, I pressed on. "And you threw that brick at Molly Otis!"

From the darkness
, I heard a low growl. Then Bon
nie snarled, "So what? She deserved it! The little bitch was gonna get us all in trouble!"

"And did I deserve to be burglarized?"

"I had to do that. I was just protecting myself from Penn's stupid book!"

Some silver-tongued devil inside me urged me on. By God, I would get the whole truth at last.
"And is that why you killed him?"

My words hung there in the air. Would Bonnie try to deny it?

No. Instead she sho
uted, "You bastard! You
both
de
serve to die!"

And then suddenly she leapt at me.

I sensed her more than saw her, and dodged wildly to my left. I saw the glint of the pitchfork as it went past me, then heard it
hit the stage with a loud metal
lic clang. Shit—definitely not papier-mach
é
.

Strange guttural noises were coming from Bonnie's throat, like she was foaming at the mouth. As I dodged, the last piece of the Bonnie puzzle came to me:
steroids
. That's what the needles were for—and that's why Bonnie's
natural aggressiveness was spin
ning crazily out of control.

Bonnie had been so sick of being a struggling artist, and so eager to make it big in boxing, that she pumped herself full of toxic levels of weird shit until she had turned herself into Frankenstein's monster.

And now this lunatic was trying to kill me. "What did I ever do to you?!" she was screaming. "Why are you assholes
crucifying
me?! It was just
two thousand dollars!"
I would hav
e pointed out that awarding her
self two thousand bucks was the least of her crimes, except it didn't seem like she'd be interested in my
input. Besides, I was too busy running like mad away from her.

But unfortunately, I'd forgotten all about the hell at stage left. I fell right in. The pit was about five feet deep and I killed my right ankle when I landed, then my head smashed into the side wall. I got an instant wave of nausea, and felt myself starting to pass out. I sank to the bottom of the pit, down for the count.

The sound of Bonnie's pitchfork shocked me back into full consciousness. Hearing three sharp metal prongs jab into the floor right next to your face will do that to you. I rolled to the other side of the pit. But my flashlight was down there in hell with me, still turned on, and pointing right at the spot I had just rolled to. Now Bonnie could see exactly where I was, even though I still couldn't see her. She charged around the pit and thrust the pitchfork straight at me.

I saw a silver prong glittering in a stray beam from the flashlight and rolled away at the last moment. The prongs landed inches from my left shoulder, where my heart had been moments before. I quickly grabbed for the flashlight and turned it off.

Bereft of light, Bonnie made random vicious stabs into the pit. Another struggling artist gone berserk; even worse than disgruntled post office employees. Bonnie was so frenzied, I'll bet she barely knew who I was anymore. I wasn't Ja
cob Burns; I was all of the stu
pid jerks who for twenty years had failed to recognize her greatness as an artist.

And judging by the number of stabs, there had been a lot of stupid jerks.

I stilled my breathing and kept as quiet as I could, as I crouched down low and dodged from side to side, keeping my eyes on th
ose shadowy silver glints, wish
ing I'd eaten my carrots like my mother always told me to.

But maybe I could somehow get this female Mike Tyson to listen to reason. "Bonnie, stop!" I called out between dodges. "You're only making it worse!"

In one way, my plea w
as effective: It told Bonnie ex
actly where I was. With a throaty yell she swung the pitchfork at my head. I jumped backward, but the side of the prongs hit me flush in the forehead. I screamed. Sparks of agony flew through my entire body at what seemed like the speed of light.

I staggered to the far side of hell, away from Bonnie, put my hands against
the edge, and tried to hoist my
self out. But she heard what I was doing and ran around the pit toward me. She swung her pitchfork with another low yell and this time my arms got hit. I toppled back into the pit, landing on my twisted ankle.

I lay on the floor moaning. Bonnie's shadow loomed over me. I was just about finished and we both knew it. I saw the pitchfork glitter as she lifted it up, then saw it streak downward as she plunged it at my face.

Desperately, I rolled away. The pitchfork clanged against the floor. Without thinking, I kicked out wildly at the silver glints with my damaged leg.

Somehow I connected, and Bonnie wasn't ready for it. The pitchfork slipped out of her hand and clattered to the floor of the pit. I dove and grabbed it.

"Give me that!" Bonnie screamed. "Give it back!"

Yeah, right. I struggled up, waving the weapon around in her general direction. "Back off, Bonnie! Back off!"

But she didn't. She went on screaming and feinting for the pitchfork. I started to lose it again, feeling tidal waves of nausea coming on.

So I stabbed her.

In the arm, just as she was taking a swing at me. I felt the pitchfork entering her flesh. I didn't know how
far it went in, but it was far enough that she howled in pain and finally backed off.

I seized the moment and hoisted myself out of hell. Because I couldn't put pressure on my messed-up ankle, I needed to use both hands to get myself out of there. That meant I had to leave the pitchfork behind. If Bonnie just jumped in the pit and grabbe
d the pitch
fork, then came after me, I'd be dead for sure.

But luckily, Bonnie was too busy howling. I dashed offstage, dragging my leg behind me, and found the side door. Somehow I made it into my car and back home.

I looked in on Andrea, who was still snoring away happily, then called 911 and left an anonymous tip about a woman at the Shoeshine and a Smile Theater School who might need medical assistance. I figured she probably did need assistance; and more important, if a cop or EMT showed up at her door, she'd be less likely to come over to my house and start pitchforking me all over again.