Fowl Prey (20 page)

M
AX
R
OTHSIDE CAUGHT
up with Judith just before the path branched off to Smuggler's Point. He grabbed her around the waist with one hand, the other clamped over her mouth to stifle her screams. Judith struggled in his grasp, but Max was tall, strong, and very fit. She saw the smear of blood on the fingers at her waist, and felt her knees buckle.

“Please, Mrs. McMonigle!” His voice held an urgent, even pleading note. “Stop fighting me! I'm not going to hurt you!”

Judith didn't believe him for a minute. Although her body felt limp in his grasp, she desperately prayed for the strength to make one final, forceful effort to break free. Wriggling her head, she looked down: They were right at the edge of the trail that lead out to the point. As far as Judith could tell from her limited perspective and the drifting patches of fog, the dirt track took off along a cliff. She had no idea where—or how far—the drop-off went. The waves were very near; the cliff might plunge into the bay.

Summoning up all her energies, Judith bolted in Max's arms. The unexpectedness of her move loosened his grip, but he did not completely let go. They both toppled over, rolling together on the damp ground. Then, in one breath-catching instant, they were falling. Judith shrieked; Max cried out. The sounds still tore at their throats as they landed on soft, wet sand.

The distance between the upper ledge and the beach had been less than four feet. Max's fedora lay next to Judith's right foot. He was sprawled in an inelegant manner, his expensive overcoat a sodden mess. Judith felt bruised and dazed, but otherwise unhurt. She struggled to a sitting position, and looked around. The fog had lifted on the water to permit a narrow, horizontal view of the bay. A pair of ducks waddled across the sand, apparently intent on inspecting the latest pieces of flotsam and jetsam.

Judith contemplated flight. She had to get away while Max was still unconscious, yet all of her strength seemed to have been drained away in the tussle and subsequent fall. Feeling dull-witted and weighted down, Judith wondered if she were in shock. She blinked, and stared at the ducks. If memory served her from the bird book she had at home, they were blue-winged teals, whose plumage would not acquire its seasonal brilliance until after Christmas. Queer ducks, reflected Judith, verging on hysteria. She tried to check her rampaging emotions: Here she was, battered and filthy, sitting in the fog with a murderer, who, for all she really knew, was as dead as his victim. She had to act, to move, to think. Taking several deep breaths and gathering her strength, Judith watched the ducks watch her.

The fog hadn't lifted any further on the bay, but Judith felt as if the whole world was suddenly, miraculously, filled with light. She threw herself at Max, startling the ducks, who took flight across the beach.

“Max! Mr. Rothside! Are you okay? Please, wake up!”

Groggily, Max lifted his head. There was sand in his silver moustache; a matted piece of seaweed clung to his
hair. He wiped at his face with his bloodied hands, and awkwardly raised himself on his elbows.

“Good Lord, what happened? Where are we?” His eyes were glazed.

“We took a little tumble,” said Judith, now on her knees and helping pull Max up. “Can you walk?”

Max flexed his limbs. “Yes. It's my head that hurts.” He tried to focus on Judith. “Are you all right? Poor thing, you're rather a wreck!”

“I'm okay. We were lucky.” Clumsily, she patted the horse chestnut in her pocket.

Holding on to each other, Judith and Max stood up. His touch was firm, yet gentle. Judith understood why Maria was so anxious to keep his love, no matter what the cost. “Who hurt your hands?” she asked, but she already knew the answer.

Max, who now had his eyes in focus, read her thoughts. “You know, don't you?” he said solemnly.

Judith nodded dully. “Yes. Finally. I was so dense. I was looking at everything the wrong way.”

In silence, they tramped along the beach for a few yards until they found a set of wooden steps sunk into the earth. “Watch your footing,” Max cautioned. “It'll be slippery.”

It was. Judith slipped twice going up, but Max was there to steady her. In the distance, a siren mingled with the foghorns. Judith allowed Max to take her arm as they walked toward the teahouse.

“Where is she now?” Judith inquired as another black squirrel darted across their path.

“I don't know,” Max replied, his rich voice heavy. He paused, listening. The sirens sounded closer. “I tried to go after her, but I lost her in the fog. She ran off through the woods. Deadman's Cliff, I'd guess. It's a very steep drop.”

Judith shivered. They resumed walking, but now at a brisker pace. To the lone jogger who huffed and puffed as he passed by, they should have looked like a strange pair,
bloodstained, mud-stained, and filthy. But the sinewy young man was plugged into his Walkman, totally self-absorbed.

“When did you know for sure?” Judith inquired of Max.

He was brushing sand from his fedora. “Not until just now. I went to Robin's bank. She'd changed her name, of course. But there it was, listed as a joint account. Strange as it may seem, I had never met her. She had some phobia about visiting her mother in New York. Still, I wonder why Sylvia chose such a plain sort of name for herself.” He gave Judith a rueful little smile. “I've always found ‘Doris' quite dull, don't you?”

 

“Listen, Birdbath,” bellowed Desiree in a voice made even huskier by three gimlets, “the bitch was your wife. She set me up! Why shouldn't I want to take you apart and put all the pieces back in the wrong places?”

Birdwell de Smoot stood so close to Desiree that his glasses almost touched her green crepe de chine blouse. “She set all of us up! Anyway, I haven't seen the wretched woman in almost thirty years! She left me, and ran off and married somebody else! Then she married that idiot, Robin! His imitation of a downy woodpecker was a disgrace!”

“How could you know, Birdwell?” chimed in Alabama, fiddling with his pipe while trying to juggle a glass of bourbon. The entire Rothside party, including the cousins, had gathered for farewell cocktails in Suite 800. The fog had all but lifted, with word coming down that the airport would reopen by three p.m. Angus MacKenzie was supposed to be there, but the press of business had detained him. “Let's face it, Birdie,” Alabama went on, “you can't see your hand in front of your face. Why don't you get some decent glasses?”

“Stop that!” raged Birdwell. “You're spitting on my head! And don't you dare light that horrible pipe! Where's my atomizer?” He wiped at his bald pate, then allowed
Mildred to feed him a piece of pickled herring. Her ministrations seemed to have a calming effect. “All right,” muttered Birdwell, “I'll admit I didn't recognize Sylvia. But my poor eyesight doesn't prevent me from being one of the world's most perceptive critics! Your new
glasnost
thoroughbred racing play,
Boris's Horse Is Behind
is…” For once Birdwell seemed at a loss for words. “…
poopy!
” he declared. “So there!”

“You just don't understand the social and political nuances,” retaliated Alabama, finally giving up on his pipe and giving in to his bourbon. “Wait until you see a full production.”

“I couldn't stand it,” remarked Birdwell, as Mildred tugged timidly at his arm. “The script was enough to make world peace seem like a bad idea.” But his words were less heated, and he brightened at Mildred's offer to fix him a nice cheese plate.

Judith watched him strut off in the direction of the buffet, Mildred close to his side. Maria, clinging to a rejuvenated Max, smiled tremulously at both cousins. “I can't believe how clever you were, Judith! and how brave Max was! However did you figure it all out?”

Spud, with his arm around Evelyn, had moved into the circle. “You ought to tell all of us how you did it. I got to admit, I'm still pretty confused.”

Judith, who was feeling the effects of her terrifying morning in the park, began to demur. Renie, however, waved a strip of lox at her cousin. “Go ahead, this will be your only chance to take center stage with a crew like this. Besides,” she mouthed in Judith's ear, “you took so long in the bathtub that I still haven't heard all of it.”

Judith looked around the suite with its art deco furnishings and sea of curious faces. She owed it to them, she supposed. Or perhaps she owed it to herself. As if on cue, the others had seated themselves, and grown remarkably quiet. Judith allowed Max to pull out the white piano bench so she could sit in the middle. Alabama handed her a fresh scotch.

“I made a terrible mistake,” she confessed. “I got it in my head right from the start that one of you had to be the killer. It was those photographs, I suppose, and the fact that Bob-o was probably shot on the seventh or eighth floor. The evidence could have pointed to all of you, though it began to narrow down to Desiree.”

“No sweat,” said Desiree, hoisting her glass. “I might have enjoyed playing the unjustly accused murderess.”

But Judith smiled wryly and shook her head. “No, you wouldn't. None of you wanted to be involved. That was perfectly understandable,
given the fact that you were all innocent
. I should have seen that. You knew each other so well, and for such a long time. You're close enough that you can even fight with one another, just like a family. Surely if one of you had killed Bob-o, the others would have been suspicious. But you weren't.”

“They're not
that
clever,” put in Birdwell. Desiree thumped him on the head. But softly.

“Doris—or should I call her Sylvia?—was
very
clever,” Judith went on. “From what Lui told my cousin a little while ago, she's worked here for several years. Her second husband died of cancer in 1979. That was Mr. Teel. She married him after she left England, I think. I don't know why she changed her first name, unless it was to disassociate herself completely from her Finch-Pitkins family ties after Dame Carmela disinherited her. Maybe, like a bird, she wanted a change of plumage. I'm guessing that her hair was dyed.” Judith glanced at Birdwell for confirmation.

“What? Oh, yes,” agreed Birdwell. “She was a mousy blond. Like Mildred here.” Mildred giggled.

Judith took a sip of scotch and continued: “Over the years, she must have talked to, or been talked at, by Bob-o. She learned that he had a lot of money. It was, she discovered, money that should have been hers.” Judith turned to Max. “It was, Max,
your
money.”

For once, Max was faintly disconcerted, even embarrassed. “Well, yes. I'd never felt right about inheriting
that obscene sum from Dame Carmela. I was doing very well on my own. When Helen died, and Robin became unstable, it occurred to me that I could use that windfall to help feather Robin's nest. So to speak,” he added with a self-deprecating smile. “After all, Robin was my brother-in-law through his marriage to my half-sister, Estelle. My other sister, Suzanne, had married well, and didn't need any extra income. But I worried about how Robin would get along in his new life. I set up a trust fund for him at a New York bank, and checks were sent every month.” His face was touched with irony. “Maybe I shouldn't have done it. Robin didn't seem to want the money.”

Evelyn broke in, turning to Maria. “Did you know about this?”

Maria's long lashes fluttered. “My, no! Max never troubles me with that sort of thing! I might worry.”

There was a pause. The Sacred Eight turned its collective attention back to Judith. “Somewhere along the way, Doris—I really can't stop calling her that—figured out the connection with all of you. Maybe it was last year,” Judith said to Max and Maria, “when you visited and helped Bob-o sort out his invoices. It was shortly afterward, at any rate, that she and Bob-o were secretly married.”

Alabama had resumed fussing with his pipe. “How did Robin ever keep a secret?”

“Maybe he didn't,” answered Judith. “But he jabbered so much, who would listen to him? And if he told five hundred tourists he had a wife name Doris, who would have cared?”

“What about Mrs. Wittelstein?” asked Evelyn, holding Spud's hand.

Judith shrugged. “I suspect she probably turned a deaf ear, too. And I'll bet Doris rarely went near the Tudor Arms.”

Desiree was looking skeptical. “Sure, Robin was an old geezer, but how could Doris keep him from moving in
with her? Or asking her to live with him in his ghastly little hovel?”

“She stalled him,” replied Judith. “She would have been good at it. Anybody who's coped with all kinds of irate guests over the years wouldn't have any trouble talking around a poor old addled popcorn vendor.” Judith shifted her weight on the piano bench. She was growing stiffer by the minute. “No doubt she hoped he'd keel over of natural causes. But he didn't, and then she saw a golden opportunity. All of you, people he'd known in London, including his ex-son-in-law and his brother-in-law, were coming to the Clovia. You'd make prime suspects. All it took was setting the scene. She began by sending strange notes to Maria, knowing her…ah…artistic temperament would be unsettled. Birdwell might resent Bob-o because he'd gotten the money that should have come to him and Sylvia in the first place.”

Quibbling, Birdwell pointed a finger at Judith. “I would have killed Max, not Robin!”

Max's gaze was humorous. “But you didn't. You only tried to sue me.”

Behind his glasses, Birdwell lowered his eyes. “And lost. But you must admit, I was a good sport about it, Max.”

“So was I,” said Max, his expansive nature never more in evidence.

“Then,” Judith went on, “there were Desiree and Alabama. If Helen's death hadn't been an accident, they were the logical suspects. Bob-o might have known that one—or both—had killed Helen. If so, they would want to silence him.”