18
There have been so many of them. Run-down rooms in tiny mountain-country stations, smelling of mold and feet; sitting rooms crammed with flowered upholstery, simpering holy cards, all the shining medals of respectability; council-flat kitchens where the baby whined through a bottle of Coke and the ashtray overflowed onto the cereal-crusted table; our own interview rooms, still as sanctuaries, so familiar that blindfolded I could have put my hand on that piece of graffiti, that crack in the wall. They are the rooms where I have come eye to eye with a killer and said, You. You did this.
I remember every one. I save them up, a deck of richly colored collector’s cards to be kept in velvet and thumbed through when the day has been too long for sleep. I know whether the air was cool or warm against my skin, how light soaked into worn yellow paint or ignited the blue of a mug, whether the echoes of my voice slid up into high corners or fell muffled by heavy curtains and shocked china ornaments. I know the grain of wooden chairs, the drift of a cobweb, the soft drip of a tap, the give of carpet under my shoes. In my father’s house there are many mansions: if somehow I earn one, it will be the one I have built out of these rooms.
I have always loved simplicity. With you, everything’s black and white, Richie had said, like an accusation; but the truth is that almost every murder case is, if not simple, capable of simplicity, and that this is not only necessary but breathtaking, that if there are miracles then this is one. In these rooms, the world’s vast hissing tangle of shadows burns away, all its treacherous grays are honed to the stark purity of a bare blade, two-edged: cause and effect, good and evil. To me, these rooms are beautiful. I go into them the way a boxer goes into the ring: intent, invincible, home.
Jenny Spain’s hospital room was the only one I have ever been afraid of. I couldn’t tell whether it was because the darkness inside was honed sharper than I had ever touched, or because something told me that it hadn’t been honed at all, that those shadows were still crisscrossing and multiplying, and this time there was no way to make them stop.
They were both there, Jenny and Fiona. Their heads turned to the door when I opened it, but no conversation cut off in mid-sentence: they hadn’t been talking, just sitting there, Fiona by the bedside in an undersized plastic chair, her hand and Jenny’s clasped together on the threadbare blanket. They stared at me, thin faces worn away in grooves where the pain was settling in to stay, blank blue eyes. Someone had found a way to wash Jenny’s hair—without the straighteners, it was soft and flyaway as a little girl’s—and her fake tan had worn away, leaving her even paler than Fiona. For the first time I saw a resemblance there.
“I’m sorry to disturb you,” I said. “Ms. Rafferty, I need a few words with Mrs. Spain.”
Fiona’s hand clamped tight around Jenny’s. “I’ll stay.”
She knew. “I’m afraid that’s not an option,” I said.
“Then she doesn’t want to talk to you. She’s not in any state to talk, anyway. I’m not going to let you bully her.”
“I don’t plan to bully anyone. If Mrs. Spain wants a solicitor to be present during the interview, she can request one, but I can’t have anyone else in the room. I’m sure you understand that.”
Jenny disengaged her hand, gently, and put Fiona’s on the arm of the chair. “It’s OK,” she said. “I’m fine.”
“No you’re not.”
“I am. Honestly, I am.” The doctors had dialed down the painkillers. Jenny’s movements still had an underwater quality and her face looked unnaturally calm, almost slack, as if some crucial muscles had been severed; but her eyes were focusing, and the words came out slow and thin but clear. She was lucid enough to give a statement, if I got her that far. “Go on, Fi. Come back in a bit.”
I held the door open till Fiona got up, reluctantly, and pulled her coat off the chair. As she put it on I said, “Please do come back. I’ll need to talk with you, as well, once your sister and I are done here. It’s important.”
Fiona didn’t answer. Her eyes were still on Jenny. When Jenny nodded, Fiona brushed past me and headed off down the corridor. I waited till I was sure she was gone before I closed the door.
I put my briefcase down by the bed, took off my coat and arranged it on the back of the door, pulled the chair so close to Jenny that my knees nudged her blanket. She watched me tiredly, incuriously, like I was another doctor bustling around her with things that beeped and flashed and hurt. The thick pad of bandage on her cheek had been replaced by a slim, neat strip; she was wearing something soft and blue, a T-shirt or a pajama top, with long sleeves that wrapped around her hands. A thin rubber tube ran from a hanging IV bag into one sleeve. Outside the window, a tall tree spun pinwheels of glowing leaves against a thin-stretched blue sky.
“Mrs. Spain,” I said. “I think we need to talk.”
She watched me, leaning her head back on the pillow. She was waiting patiently for me to finish and go away, leave her to hypnotize herself with the moving leaves until she could dissolve into them, a flicker of tossed light, a breath of breeze, gone.
“How are you feeling?” I asked.
“Better. Thanks.”
She looked better. Her lips were parched from hospital air, but the thick hoarseness had faded from her voice, leaving it high and sweet as a girl’s, and her eyes weren’t red any more: she had stopped crying. If she had been distraught, howling, I would have been less frightened for her. “That’s good to hear,” I said. “When are the doctors planning to let you go home?”
“They said maybe day after tomorrow. Maybe the day after that.”
I had less than forty-eight hours. The ticking clock, and the nearness of her, were hammering at me to hurry. “Mrs. Spain,” I said, “I came to tell you that there’s been some progress in the investigation. We’ve arrested someone for the attack on you and your family.”
That ignited a startled sputter of life in Jenny’s eyes. I said, “Your sister didn’t tell you?”
She shook her head. “You’ve . . . ? Arrested who?”
“This may come as a bit of a shock, Mrs. Spain. It’s someone you know—someone you were very close to, for a long time.” The sputter caught, flared into fear. “Can you tell me any reason why Conor Brennan would want to hurt your family?”
“Conor?”
“We’ve arrested him for the crimes. He’ll be charged this weekend. I’m sorry.”
“Oh my God— No. No no no. You’ve got it all wrong. Conor would never hurt us. He’d never hurt anyone.” Jenny was struggling to lift herself off the pillow; one hand stretched towards mine, tendons standing out like an old woman’s, and I saw those broken nails. “You have to let him out.”
“Believe it or not,” I said, “I’m with you on this one: I don’t think Conor is a killer either. Unfortunately, though, all the evidence points to him, and he’s confessed to the crimes.”
“Confessed?”
“I can’t ignore that. Unless someone can give me concrete proof that Conor didn’t kill your family, I’ve got no choice but to file the charges against him—and believe me, the case will stand up in court. He’s going to prison for a very long time.”
“I was there. It wasn’t him. Is that concrete enough?”
I said gently, “I thought you didn’t remember that night.”
That only threw her for a second. “I don’t. And if it had been Conor, I’d remember that. So it wasn’t.”
I said, “We’re past that kind of game, Mrs. Spain. I’m almost sure I know what happened that night. I’m very sure that you do. And I’m pretty sure that no one else alive does, except Conor. That makes you the only person who can get him off the hook. Unless you want him convicted of murder, you need to tell me what happened.”
Tears started in Jenny’s eyes. She blinked them back. “I don’t remember.”
“Take a minute and think about what you’ll be doing to Conor if you keep that up. He cares about you. He’s loved you and Pat for a very long time—I think you know just how much he loves you. How will he feel, if he finds out you’re willing to let him spend the rest of his life in prison for something he didn’t do?”
Her mouth wobbled, and for a second I thought I had her, but then it set hard. “He won’t go to prison. He didn’t do anything wrong. You’ll see.”
I waited, but she was done. Richie and I had been right. She was planning her note. She cared about Conor, but her chance at death meant more to her than anyone left alive.