Before I could start gathering up my trove of china and glass, I heard footsteps whicking across the lawn. I gripped the breathing tube between my teeth and slid into the pond, remembering at the last second to switch off my headlamp.
Water amplifies sound. The feet-Catherine Bayard’s? Ruth Lantner’s?sounded as though they were pounding past in hobnailed boots. I waited a long minute, giving her time to clear the pond and head up the lawn to the house. As I was starting to climb out again, I heard another set of feet crunching along the brick walk next to me. I dropped back under water. The steps stopped. A light shone across the pond’s surface.
My heart stood still. I held my breath while the light played through the tangle of reeds, lily pads, dead fish. Surely my breathing tube didn’t stand out in that mess. After a moment, the light swept away; the steps moved on.
It was a windless night. If I scrambled out of the pond now, sound might carry to a suspicious ear. If I stayed where I was, someone might be attacking Catherine Bayard. I lifted my head out of the water, straining to see through the dark. In front of me, up near the house, a flashlight bobbed. I heard voices-an exclamation of surprise?-followed by murmurs. It didn’t sound like an assault.
I’d been standing still in the cold water too long: my teeth were chattering so loudly I couldn’t believe they couldn’t hear me up at the house. The noise couldn’t be louder than I’d make climbing out of the pond. For the third time, I hoisted myself out of the water, moving as carefully as I could. I slipped out of the fins and trotted to the far side of the pond where I’d left my shoes. Before I could put them on, the voices sounded more loudly. I was damned if I was going into that rank and chill water one more time. Grabbing my shoes, I rolled under one o? the stone benches.
“Catherine, you’re lying to me and I don’t like it. Ruth told me the detective who was at Banks Street on Wednesday came out to see her yesterday with a tale of you coming over here in the night with a key belonging to your grandfather. So-“
“I told you, she made it up. I don’t know why. Not Ruth, the detective-“
“No.” Renee Bayard halted a yard from my nose. “I called Darraugh yesterday. I didn’t like the idea that he would send a detective to you who dealt with murder. There’s time, and to spare, for you to delve into human misery, but-at any rate, he said he hadn’t heard from you recently, and nor had his staff. So either you found this woman on your own, or she found you. Why?”
“She found me, she stalked me!” Catherine cried.
Renee was silent for a few beats, apparently collecting her thoughts; when she spoke again, her voice was tired. “Darling, if she were stalking you, why did you support the stories she was telling yesterday afternoon? If she’s blackmailing you, you need to tell me. If you think you need a detective for something, can’t you tell me that, too?”
“I can’t. If I could, I would, but I can’t. Don’t make me say any more because it will only be lies and you’ll know and get angrier.”
“Were you here Sunday night?” Renee said. “Did something frighten you?”
“You mean, if I was out here, did I interrupt whoever killed that journalist? No, Granny: I wasn’t here, I didn’t have a clue a murderer was hanging around here.”
Renee sucked in a breath, as if she was about to dispute Catherine’s repeated claim of not being here, then paused, as if aware that this argument was futile. I clenched my jaws together to keep my teeth from rattling at her feet.
“But now you do know, Trina, you mustn’t come back here. We don’t know who killed that reporter. Someone is taking advantage of Larchmont standing empty to use the house: that’s why your detective was here. Geraldine Graham has been seeing lights in the attic, and while Darraugh thinks she could be making it up to force him to spend more time with her, I don’t agree: she’s a shrewd woman, she doesn’t use petty tricks. A deranged person could be hiding in this house. If you’re coming here to meet a friend or a lover or to use drugs or anything you don’t want me to know about, please-” She broke off, unable to complete the thought.
“No one can get into these buildings, they have a security system,” Catherine said. “An alarm goes off in Julius Arnoff’s office.”
“Do you know that because you’ve triggered it?”
“It’s not like it’s a secret. I mean, we all have alarms on our houses, and we all know what to do when they go off, and everyone knows they ring at the lawyer’s office and at the police.”
Catherine was talking in the breathless run-on sentences she’d used on me yesterday when she wanted to rush me past sensitive topics. What didn’t she want her grandmother to push on here? Renee Bayard clearly was wondering the same thing, because there was another long pause before she spoke again.
“Do you have a key to the alarm system, Catherine?”