Now You See It Page 12

  “No!” said Max. He tried to pull away from Plum, but couldn’t.

  He stared at the opening bookcase halves, his expression harried.

  I couldn’t see—or feel—my expression, but I wager it was no less distraught.

  Cassandra hitched back with a gasp, and Plum’s grip tightened reflexively on Max’s arm.

  I wanted to gasp, but couldn’t.

  What we were looking at was Adelaide Delacorte.

  Adelaide’s back was turned to us, her hair and dress exactly as they looked in the painting above the fireplace.

  “Holy God,” Plum muttered.

  “God damn it!” Max snarled.

  He jerked loose from the Sheriff’s grip and moved to close the bookcase halves.

  Too late.

  Cassandra had already touched Adelaide’s right shoulder. Adelaide began to turn. Slowly. Like a lifesized doll on a revolving base.

  Which stopped.

  We all stared at her face.

  There was no face.

  It was a faceless mannequin, wearing the dress and a wig. I felt a sense of dreadful pain for my son.

  What had been exposed was a sanctuary to his wife, her dresses and belongings lovingly displayed. Her jewelry. Her hats. Her books.

  Total silence in TMR. Immobility.

  Then Max, breath strained, said in a quiet (bating) voice, “Are you both satisfied now?”

  Hands shaking, he began to close the bookcase again.

  Cassandra grabbed his arm and jerked him around.

  “You made a shrine to her?” she asked, infuriated. “A shrine?”

  Max looked at her in blank surprise (as I did) as she shoved the bookcase halves apart again, so violently that the mannequin began to topple.

  With a hollow cry, Max lunged for the figure to prevent its fall. He stood it up again.

  Cassandra smiled now. It was not a wholesome smile.

  “To the only woman you ever loved?” she asked.

  “What’s going on?” asked Plum. I would have asked the same question had I been able to speak.

  “And she loved you, of course,” Cassandra said. “Adored you. Worshiped you.”

  Max’s face looked carved from stone. Again, he tried to close the bookcase halves to shut away what clearly was a shrine to Adelaide. Again, Cassandra stopped him.

  It was impossible to believe that these two had ever loved each other, so rabid were their exchanged looks. I felt embarrassed to witness it. Plum seemed to feel the same.

  “Time for a little truth, Max,” said Cassandra. “Time to set things straight.”

  He started to speak. She cut him off.

  “You never loved her for a second,” she said.

  He tensed. I tensed (I think). Plum tensed (I guess).

  Cassandra’s smile was ruthless.

  “How could you love her,” she said, “when you loved yourself so much?”

  It seems accurate to say that Max was on the verge of leaping at her, probably to throttle her.

  But somehow, he managed to hold back, his expression suddenly confused. What does that mean? I wondered.

  “Oh, you thought you loved her,” said Cassandra. “Why not? She never asked for a single thing.”

  Her face went hard. “Except a baby,” she added.

  “Stop it,” said Max. His voice was weak and vulnerable now.

  “She spoke to me. You never knew that, did you?” said Cassandra. “During that engagement in New York. The night she died.”

  Her shiver seemed genuine enough.

  “Or should I say the night she was killed?” she added.

  “Stop it,” Max commanded. He seemed to be losing control.

  “Oh, no,” Cassandra said through clenching teeth. “Not now. I’m sure the Sheriff will be fascinated by what I have to say. I’m sure your father would be too if he weren’t a living sponge.” (Gracias, Cassandra.)

  “I’m warning you,” Max told her.

  “Warn ahead,” she said, defying him.

  She turned to the Sheriff.

  “My brother and I were performing at the same theater,” she said. “I got to know Max’s wife. She was pregnant. Oh, so happy to be carrying their first child.”

  “God damn you.” Max’s hands began to flex into fists.

  “And oh, so exhausted because Max wouldn’t let her rest,” Cassandra continued, looking at Max as though daring him to try and stop her.

  “She should have been in bed that night,” she went on. “She was afraid she might miscarry. But did that mean a thing to Max? No. Not him. He didn’t want the baby anyway.”

  “God damn you,” Max broke in again.

  “He couldn’t stand the idea of Adelaide loving any other person in the world but him.”

  “Stop it!” shouted Max; it was the agonized protest of a man who knew he was hearing the truth. (A genuine shock to me.)

  “You knew she shouldn’t have been working that night!” Cassandra shouted back. “You didn’t give a damn, though! You made her work, regardless! She miscalculated, had the accident—and you’re the one who killed her!”

  chapter 20

  Max lunged at Cassandra, hands clutching for her throat.

  Only Plum’s alert move prevented him from succeeding.

  “You didn’t want a wife!” Cassandra raged at Max. “You wanted a slave! A smiling, bowing, scraping, worshiping slave! That’s why Adelaide was your dream woman! Because, unlike me—”

  She broke off breathlessly and turned away from him with a convulsive shudder.

  “Let me go,” Max told the Sheriff quietly.

  “Not if you intend to harm your wife,” said Plum.

  Max replied, “My wife is dead.”

  My eyeballs shifted as I looked at Cassandra.

  Not surprisingly, she was staring at Max with as much pain as venom.

  Once again, I was compelled to sympathize with her. Whatever she’d done to harm Max—and it was considerable (she’d certainly gone beyond the bounds in her accusations)—she did not deserve his last remark. Good God, what a murk of hate and counter-hate befouled that room.

  Enough to make a person ill.

  Max had pulled loose from the Sheriff’s relaxing grip and was now closing Adelaide’s shrine, returning the bookcase to its original position.

  He looked around in startlement as Cassandra suddenly lurched toward the fireplace.

  She stopped in front of it and put a trembling hand across her eyes.

  “Why did you rush over there?” the Sheriff asked.

  She didn’t answer.

  “Mrs. Delacorte?”

  “No reason,” she said, struggling for composure.

  Plum looked at her in disbelief. It was a wonder the man believed anything by then, there’d been so much deception since he’d arrived.

  He moved to where she was standing.

  “Is there something over here?” he probed. “A hiding place or something?”

  “No,” she muttered.

  “Why did you come over here, then?” he asked.

  “No reason!” She was still fighting to regain herself. “No reason at all,” she said.

  Clearly, Plum was not convinced. Who could blame him?

  He ran his hands across the uneven surface of the fieldstone wall above the fireplace. He looked carefully at the mantelpiece.

  “If I knew where the body is,” Cassandra said, “do you think I’d have been searching with you all this time?”

  “Frankly, I don’t know,” the Sheriff said disgustedly. “I don’t know whether to believe either one of you at this point.”

  Bravo, Grover, I thought gloomily. So far, this had been a little less than the happiest day of my life.

  Plum could find nothing. With an irritated sound, he turned toward the entry hall.

  “That’s it,” he said. “I’m not wasting any more time here.”

  “I’ll show you the body,” said Cassandra.

  Plum whirled to glare at
her. “You just said you don’t know where it is!” he cried.

  “I don’t!” she responded. “But I know how to find it without wasting any more time!”

  She started toward Max, a vengeful look on her face.

  “I told you I’m not without means,” she told him.

  “Get away from me,” he muttered.

  “You’d best cooperate, Mister Delacorte,” Plum said, “or I’ll take you in right now.”

  Ambivalence flickered on my son’s face, indecision; should he go or stay?

  It wasn’t much of a contest, as it turned out.

  “What do you want?” he asked Cassandra.

  Her answer was to grab his right wrist.

  He jerked it free.

  She grabbed the wrist again. Again, he pulled away.

  “Make him do it, Sheriff,” she said.

  Plum looked agitated. “Do what?” he demanded.

  “Lead me around the room while I’m holding his wrist.”

  The Sheriff scowled. “Why? What’s that supposed to do?”

  Her smile was cruel. The woman had a cruel smile, that was certain. Now I wondered just how much of what she’d said about Adelaide was true and how much concocted.

  “When we reach the place where Harry Kendal’s body is hidden,” she told the Sheriff, “my husband’s pulse beat will speed up.”

  So that was it; I should have known.

  The Sheriff’s scowl had not abated. “I’m tired of—” he started.

  “Sheriff,” said Cassandra. “I’m telling you. It will work.”

  The Sheriff sighed. He looked at Delacorte and nodded once.

  With a smile equally cruel, Max extended his right hand and Cassandra grabbed the wrist again, squeezing as hard as she could. Max winced a little, then chuckled softly.

  “Where to?” he inquired.

  “Just lead me around the room,” she said.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he replied.

  He led her to the globe and stopped. “Here?” he asked.

  “Go on,” she muttered.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  He led her to the fireplace and then along the fieldstone wall. He gestured toward the fireplace with his left hand.

  “Here?” he asked.

  She gestured irritably for him to keep on moving.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said.

  “I’m not going to wait too long on this,” the Sheriff told her.

  “Hold on,” she said.

  Max led her to the desk and gestured toward it.

  Cassandra grimaced and shook her head.

  He led her to the suit of armor, stopped.

  She shook her head.

  He led her to the guillotine.

  She shook her head.

  With a bored sigh, he led her to the casket, stopped.

  He waited, then began to move again.

  She released his wrist, a look of sweet revenge on her face.

  “I knew his pulse beat wouldn’t change,” she told the Sheriff. “He’s too good at controlling it. He forgot his muscular reaction, though.”

  She is clever, I thought uneasily.

  As she finished speaking, a roar of thunder sounded in the distance. Lightning flashed.

  The storm was getting closer.

  “Mrs. Delacorte,” said Plum.

  She pointed at the casket.

  “He never keeps it closed,” she said.

  “But you can see inside,” Plum told her.

  Cassandra’s pointing finger shifted toward the lower portion of the casket.

  “Not down there,” she said.

  Max spluttered with contemptuous amusement. His distress at the uncovering of his shrine to Adelaide seemed ended now; he had his equanimity back.

  “You can’t be serious,” he said.

  He looked at Plum.

  “I could conceal the body in a dozen different places, Grover,” he said. “But in a casket right in front of you?”

  He directed a hooded-eyed smile at Cassandra.

  “Nom de Dieu, ma petite,” he said.

  His voice grew harsh.

  “I’m referring to the size of your brain, of course,” he added.

  Cassandra was trying in vain to open the casket.

  “Make him unlock it,” she said to Plum.

  Plum looked at Max as though he really didn’t see the point in this but felt compelled to try it anyway.

  “You have the key, Mister Delacorte?” he asked.

  “Ah, it’s Mister Delacorte again,” said Max. “Things are picking up.”

  “Will you just unlock it, please,” Plum told him.

  “Sheriff,” Max explained, “that casket is my final resting-place-to-be. It has a deep significance—”

  Plum didn’t let him finish.

  “If you force me to get a warrant,” he said, “I swear to God I’ll break it open with an axe.”

  “You-will-not,” said Max, offended.

  Even so, he hesitated for several moments more before removing a key from the right-hand pocket of his smoking jacket and tossing it to Plum, who, startled, was barely able to snatch it from the air.

  Was this it, then? I wondered. Trepidation held me tight.

  Cassandra edged closer to the casket.

  “Anxious to view your lover’s remains?” asked Max.

  The look she gave him was now as apprehensive as malign. I could not believe that he could sound so casual if this was really it. Unless he had surrendered inwardly already.

  They watched (I watched) as the Sheriff unlocked the casket’s upper lid and opened it.

  Reaching in, Plum lifted out the partial replica of Max and set it on the floor, then rejoined Cassandra, who was looking down into the casket.

  Their reaction made it obvious that they were seeing nothing.

  Max chuckled again. “I told you,” he said.

  Moving to the Sheriff, he removed the key from Plum’s fingers and dropped it back into his pocket.

  Cassandra had backed off, frowning, but the Sheriff still looked down into the interior of the casket.

  Max looked inside with him.

  “Satisfied?” he asked.

  Does he feel as sick inside as I do? I wondered. I’m sure he did.

  The Sheriff remained silent, peering into the casket.

  “All right if I put my quarter-duplicate back in?” asked Max.

  Plum did not respond. He reached down into the casket, feeling at the padding.

  “Grover?” Max put his hand on the Sheriff’s shoulder. Plum shook it off.

  Abruptly then, he raised the bottom lid of the casket, hinging it aside. He poked at the interior padding once again. What is he looking for? I wondered.

  Max wondered, too.

  “What are you doing?” he asked, his tone a rather obvious attempt to sound casually curious.

  Still the Sheriff didn’t speak. He began to press both hands against the padding now. He was on to something, I could see.

  Also seeing it, Cassandra returned. “What is it?” she asked.

  “Sheriff?” Max inquired.

  Plum remained quiet, pressing harder at the inside padding of the casket, poking it and plucking at it.

  The approaching thunder rumble sounded ominous to me. Like a drumroll prior to some explosive finale.

  Now Plum reached into his right-hand trouser pocket and removed a folding knife.

  “What are you doing?” Max asked quickly.

  Plum opened the knife.

  “What are you doing?” Max repeated, now more urgently.

  Plum reached into the casket, the open knife in his right hand.

  Max grabbed his arm. “You aren’t going to do this,” he declared

  “Let go of me,” Plum said. His tone was threatening.

  Max swallowed and withdrew his hand. “You’ll regret this,” he said.

  Ignoring him, Plum began to cut away the padding on the bottom of the casket.

  “You’re going to
pay for this,” Max told him.

  Cassandra watched in silence as the Sheriff hacked at the casket padding, pulling it up in handfuls.

  Suddenly, Cassandra looked inside the casket in shock.

  “Oh, my God,” she murmured.

  What is it? cried my mind.

  The Sheriff was pulling something up from an apparent cavity in the bottom of the casket.

  Something heavy.

  Oh, no, Max, no, I thought.

  The Sheriff hauled up what appeared to be a cloth sack.

  Cassandra (and I) choked on breath as the Sheriff yanked the heavy bag up higher and it toppled from the casket, landing on the floor with a soggy thump.

  Dripping blood.

  chapter 21

  Cassandra made a sickened noise; somewhere in my vegetated bowels, I did alike.

  The Sheriff swallowed, throat dry.

  Bracing himself, he reached down with both hands and cut open the sack with his knife.

  He pulled apart the edges.

  And cried out hoarsely—simultaneously with Cassandra—as a giant paper moth flew upward from inside the sack, flapped around in erratic circles, then performed an abrupt nosedive to the floor.

  “I told you you’d regret it,” Max reminded the Sheriff.

  What was that hollow sound inside my chest? Could it have been a chuckle? I felt like chuckling. From relief. From (damn my magicianly hide!) appreciation and delight at a trick well done.

  “The weight is dirt,” Max told them. “The blood is fake.”

  Both looked at him with virtually the same expression—one of incredulous revulsion.

  “I also told you it was my casket,” Max continued blithely. “It is. I had a few small gimmicks put in, that’s all. To entertain the audience at my funeral. Why let them sit there morosely when I can do a postmortem performance?”

  “Morosely?” Cassandra responded, glaring at him. “Don’t you mean joyously?”

  “Only you,” said Max.

  To their surprise (and mine, need I add?) he started climbing into the casket.

  “Let me demonstrate,” he said. He closed the lower lid, locking it into place.

  “You’ll get a boot out of this, Grover,” he told the Sheriff.

  He lay back against the padding, his head on the sewn-in pillow.

  “I’m in my casket, see?” he said. “Laid out in my finest bib and tucker, hair combed, beard trimmed, teeth all brushed; why not?

  “The service is near concluded. Get the picture? Lights are dimmed. All heads are lowered reverently.”