The Bullet (21 page)

Forty-three

I
pried the moleskin notebook from Snow's hands. Rotated it so I could read right side up, ran my finger over his words.

I lied
.

“You weren't with him, then? That afternoon?”

He took back the notebook and wrote,
Part.

“Meaning what? You were with him part of the time, but not the whole afternoon?”

A tired nod.

“So he has no alibi,” I whispered. “He never did. He could have been at Boone and Sadie Rawson's house.”

Snow flinched and scribbled furiously:
I don't know that.
He underlined the words, four heavy lines.

“Okay, you don't know where he was. Only that he wasn't with you.”

Rapid nodding. I narrowed my eyes. “You lied for him. Lied to police in a murder investigation. And you never bothered to ask where he really was? How could you not be curious? What did the guy have on you?”

This was met with a shrug.

“Why did you lie?”

If I was not mistaken, Snow rolled his eyes.

“I suppose that you don't think it matters at this point. But, Mr. Snow . . .” My voice tightened with rage. “Mr. Snow, my parents
died
. I was
shot
. If Ethan Sinclare did that—if he was there—he shot a three-year-old girl and left her to bleed to death. You must have heard about it; you must have seen the newspaper account. How could you live with yourself? How could you lie for him?”

All at once Verlin Snow lurched forward in his seat and made a grotesque, rasping noise, halfway between a croak and a howl. He made it again and then was seized by a fit of coughing. I leapt to my feet and searched the room for a glass of water or a tissue. Nothing. Should I find Marie? But he was quieting now, clutching his chest, tears and snot rolling down his wasted face. He wiped his face on his sleeve and groped around for the pen. He wrote steadily for several minutes before looking up and pushing the notebook across to me.

I was sued. Insider trading, securities fraud. I wd have lost everything!! Fought back. But pre-trial discovery turned up evidence. Record of phone call, typed by my secretary. Ethan required to turn it over. You see?

But that night Ethan came to me. He said—Help me I'll help you. I destroy phone note. If you say I was with you. Easy!! No email then. Long time ago. No electronic document trails. Just the one piece of paper. So he burned it. And I told police we spent that day in conference room. A win-win.

I finished reading and looked up in astonishment.

He turned to a clean page and wrote,
I'm not proud.

“I should think not.”

Assumed it was about a woman
.
He needed excuse for his wife, for where he'd been. Ethan was always ladies man.

“And what do you think now?” My voice was like ice.

Ladies man.
He underlined it.
Not a murderer!!!

“You don't know that. That's the point. You don't know where he was, what he did that day.”

Another shrug.

“I need you to make a statement. Tell the police what you've told me. There's an old detective, Sergeant Beasley, who knows this case well—”

Snow shook his head. He wrote,
Goodbye Caroline.

With that he tore the pages from the binding, everything that he had written, crumpled and threw them into the fire. The edges caught. Blue flames licked up. Within moments the pages were ashes.

I breathed in sharply. “I can type up what you've told me. All you need to do is sign your name at the bottom. Just the part about Ethan not being with you. Nobody cares about the rest of it anymore. The statute of limitations has probably run out anyway, on the insider trading charge—”

But Verlin Snow had closed his eyes and sunk back into the La-Z-Boy. He looked tiny and old and ill.

“Mr. Snow?” I tapped his leg. “Mr. Snow?”

He opened his eyes to a slit. Whacked my hand away from his thigh. His lips made no noise but formed themselves into an unmistakable round
O
.

No,
he said, as distinctly as if he'd actually spoken the word aloud. The eyes snapped back shut.

I found my coat where Marie had hung it behind the stairs and let myself out.

•   •   •

NANTUCKET IN LATE
fall is like a ghost town. A silvery, misty, freezing, prosperous ghost town.

I trudged through drizzle from Verlin Snow's house, back past the church on Main Street, then left and up Center Street. My flight out was not until tomorrow morning, 9:05 a.m., so I'd booked at a bed-and-breakfast for the night.

In the room I scrubbed my face with hot water, kicked off my boots, curled up on the bed, and slept again. Four dreamless hours. When I woke it was dark. I threw off the blanket and wondered how a hotel room could manage to feel both boiling hot and dankly damp at once. I needed to get out.

The boy minding the front desk looked barely old enough to
drive. Judging from the full wall of keys behind him, I might be the only guest tonight. He spent a minute reeling off the names of restaurants I should come back in high season to try, and another minute singing the praises of a bar at the tip of the island, if only I had a car to get there.

“Just somewhere close,” I pleaded. “Close and open would be good. My standards aren't high tonight.”

“Brotherhood of Thieves is thirty seconds that way.” He pointed. “Walk out the front door, you're on Broad Street, turn left, and you're there. It's an old whaling bar.”

“Perfect.”

“Awesome beer on tap. Try the Cisco ale. Or the seasonal Pumple Drumkin, if they've still got it. Brewed here on Nantucket. They add chunks of pumpkin and spices. Awesome.” That sounded perfectly vile, but I refrained from saying so.

Brotherhood of Thieves was dark, with low, timbered ceilings and a roaring fire. Lanterns hung from brick walls. Only two tables were occupied, one by an awkward couple who appeared to be on a date, another by four old men who had the air of regulars. Two empty beer pitchers sat stickily on the table between them, and a third looked well on its way to being guzzled. I squeezed into a seat at the bar, caught the bartender's eye, and started to order my usual glass of dry white wine, then reconsidered.

“Double Bulleit, please, neat.”

“Nice.” He pushed a bowl of pretzels my way.

I held a menu up to a candle to read in the dark. For once I could not face meat. “What are quahogs?”

“Clams.”

“Ah. I'll take a bowl of the Island Quahog Chowder then.”

“Good choice. Top you up?” He dangled the Bulleit bottle above my glass. I glanced down. I'd already drained my double.

“Yes. Why not. And a glass of water.” I should go easy. Neither Will Zartman nor my brothers were here to carry me home tonight. My
heart twisted at the thought of Will. The last time I'd been in a bar was the Georgia Grille, the night he surprised me in Atlanta. I held a sip of rye on my tongue and closed my eyes and remembered how it had felt when he touched me, when he had drawn his circles on my wrist, my collarbone, my breast. How difficult it was to breathe when he pressed his hips against mine.

When I opened my eyes, the bartender was placing chowder and a packet of oyster crackers in front of me. “Bowl's hot, watch yourself.”

I took a spoonful. It was peppery and creamy and rich. The old men had a fresh pitcher on their table. The beer was a light, straw yellow; they were steering clear of the Pumple Drumkin, too. The couple had gone. On the TV above the bar were pictures of a jubilant crowd waving Red Sox banners. Confetti filled the air behind them.

“Did the Red Sox win again?” I asked the bartender.

“Did they win again? Where have you been? They won the World Series this week. That's the victory parade, today in Boston.”

He leaned sideways to watch. The screen showed a caravan of duck boats rolling down a street in Boston, Red Sox players riding on top and whooping. They were still sporting their lucky beards, and when I looked closely, I noticed many of the duck boats had been decorated with matching caveman-style whiskers. A band started up playing “God Bless America.” The camera panned to a small girl dancing in the street, her face painted and her blond hair streaked with Red Sox red. Vuvuzelas and car horns brayed.

“Boston Strong,” said the bartender, thumping his chest.

“Boston Strong,” called the stoutest of the old men. They all clinked smeary glasses at the TV.

“On the house,” said the bartender, pouring me what looked like at least a triple. He turned around to grin at the stout old man. “Hey, hey, here we go! Whaddya say, Marty? I think Ortiz and the boys may be going for a swim!” The caravan of amphibious duck boats had turned off the street to take a victory lap in the Charles River.

I sipped my whiskey and watched the men watch the Red Sox. Such
simple things can produce such joy. Tomorrow I would have to think about what Verlin Snow had told me. About Ethan Sinclare, about Sadie Rawson and Boone, about what it all meant. Tonight, I allowed myself to sit in a dark bar with a bunch of happy old men, and to believe that the world might be a decent place after all.

PART FIVE

Washington

Forty-four

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2013

I
felt fine the next day.

It helped that the clocks had changed during the night, buying everyone an extra hour in bed. Or perhaps I was still drunk. Seven shots of rye and I had slept like a baby, my best night's sleep in weeks. On the plane home I popped two Advil, to relax my neck muscles (liver failure, here I come), and devoured both the
Boston Globe
and the
New York Times
. It had been weeks since I'd focused on the news. Politicians who I didn't even know were sick had died, the United Nations was warning of genocide in the Central African Republic, Twitter was about to go public, Amy Tan had a new book out. I read the headlines with the curiosity of someone who has been at sea for weeks or recently woken from a coma; I had missed whole cycles of scandal and redemption.

At home on Q Street, three pieces of mail had been shoved through my letter slot. Pottery Barn, undaunted by my failure to purchase anything, ever, had delivered a fat pre-Christmas catalog. “Let the Holiday Magic Begin!” it trilled, above a photo of a perfect stocking, hung above a perfect fire, glowing beside a perfect cream sofa and a perfect-looking cocktail.

There were also two letters. The first, a handwritten note from Alexandra James:
Lovely to meet a fellow P.P. addict. Hope your recovery contin
ues. Let me know when I can buy you coffee.
She had enclosed another business card.

The second letter was from a manager at SunTrust. We had exchanged e-mails and phone calls, after I rang to inquire about tracing the savings account and safe-deposit box that were mentioned in Boone and Sadie Rawson's wills. The manager had asked me to forward copies of the wills, and of their death certificates. Also, my adoption papers and birth certificate. For good measure I threw in printouts of Leland Brett's two stories in the
Journal
-
Constitution
. They explained more succinctly than I possibly could why I was suddenly interested in bank accounts that had sat inactive for thirty-four years.

The reply letter that I now held in my hands apologized for having no information on the safe-deposit box. In accordance with the Disposition of Unclaimed Property Act, the box had been drilled after seven years. The entire contents had then been turned over to the state. No bank records survived, nothing to indicate what the driller might have found. I was invited to contact the Georgia Department of Revenue, unclaimed property division, for further information. Here was a handy link to their website.

Tracking the savings account, meanwhile, had taken some effort. The account number that I'd provided didn't match anything in the computer, and files that old had not been digitized. But a retired clerk had been brought in to go through boxes. They were organized by branch, and my birth parents, unhelpfully, had not frequented the Trust Company closest to their house. Their account had been registered at a branch south of the city, out near the airport; Boone must have found it convenient to hit the drive-through teller on his way to and from work.

I was kindly requested to submit for verification the originals of all the photocopied documents that I'd sent. The manager apologized, again, for the inconvenience. He trusted that I understood, given the length of time that had elapsed and the amount of money involved. I
blinked, held the paper farther away, then closer, checking and double-­checking the digits and the decimal point.

Sitting in a dormant Trust Company account, opened under the names Boone W. Smith and Sadie R. Smith, was quite a significant sum of money.

Forty-five

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2013

T
he executor of my birth parents' estate was dead.

This news tidbit came courtesy of an e-mail from Jessica Yeo, which I read in the kitchen, perched on the countertop in pajamas and slippers, sipping my morning mug of Darjeeling. I had done a quick search online for Everett A. Sutherland, after his name turned up in Sadie Rawson's and Boone's wills, but hadn't found much. My dad had also professed ignorance, said he'd never looked into the Smiths' estate.

“You're a
lawyer
,” I had pressed him. “Weren't you curious about the legal loose ends?”

“No,” Dad had answered firmly. “We wanted a clean break from the past. We confirmed, of course, that no guardian had been named for you, that there was no legally enforceable relationship with any biological kin. But as for the question of an
inheritance
”—he had pronounced the word with distaste—“darling, your mother and I were more than capable of providing for you. There was no need to paw around after their money.”

Jessica Yeo, however, appeared to have quite enjoyed pawing around the Smith family finances. Somehow she learned that Everett Sutherland had been Boone's elderly godfather, a family friend from North Carolina. He had died of cancer only a few months after Boone's and Sadie Rawson's murders. Sutherland's funeral had been held at Second
United Methodist Church in Charlotte, and he'd been buried beside his wife of forty-seven years.

This explained a lot. Namely, why Everett Sutherland had never tried to track me down. Why safe-deposit boxes and bank accounts had simply been forgotten. Judging by the balance in the Smiths' account, he had steered the proceeds from the sale of the house on Eulalia Road into the right place. But then Sutherland must have gotten sick and been too worried wrapping up his own affairs to put in place proper arrangements for my birth parents' estate. I could only assume he'd meant to contact the Cashions at some point, but had run out of time.

Jessica Yeo didn't apologize for disobeying my request to back off. On the contrary, she pitched a few ideas for what she wanted to look into next.
Pretty, pretty please?
she wrote.
This is soooo much more interesting than the fact-checking junk that Leland keeps assigning me. Do NOT tell him I said that.

My next e-mail was also from a journalist. Alexandra James reiterated her invitation to coffee, and then, almost as a casual aside, inquired about the bullet.
Did you keep it? I made a couple of calls, and Atlanta police won't comment. But they must be interested, right?

Reporters. Honestly.

What an exhausting profession, to be professionally trained to be relentless. In the last five days, Alex James had doorstepped me at my house, delivered a handwritten note, and reached out via e-mail. Next she would be in the street out front, shouting questions through a megaphone.

I nearly sent the last message in my in-box straight to spam. It was from an address I didn't recognize, [email protected]. A guest-satisfaction survey from the bed-and-breakfast? An electronic copy of my receipt?

But it was a personal note. The front-desk minder, the teenager who had looked barely old enough to drive, hoped that I'd had a pleasant stay on the island. Housekeeping had found a phone charger and my iPod in the room. Did I want them shipped? He gave the phone number for the front desk.

“So that's where they went,” I said when he answered.

“Oh, hey! Yeah, I wouldn't have written if it were just the charger. But I figured the iPod you might want.”

“Thanks. That'd be great.”

“How was dinner at Brotherhood of Thieves? Did you try the Pumple Drumkin?”

“No. But thanks again for the recommendation. Nice place.”

“No problem. That guy ever reach you?”

I frowned. “What guy?”

“Guy called a couple times looking for you, while you were at dinner. Didn't leave a name.”

I frowned more deeply. Other than Marie and Verlin Snow, I had told no one I was going to Nantucket. No one else had known I was there, and certainly not where I had stayed. I hadn't wanted my family to worry about my traveling so soon after surgery.

“Older guy,” said the front-desk clerk. “Maybe a Southern accent? I wrote down the number from caller ID, after he called the second time, in case it was important. Hang on. Let me see if I can find it.”

I chewed the stem of my glasses and listened to him shuffle papers around. When he came back on the line, he read out a number I did not recognize. It began with a 404 area code. Atlanta. I hung up and scrolled through my contacts. Not Beamer Beasley. Not Cheral Rooney. Not Jessica Yeo or Leland Brett. I reached for my wallet. From the fold where I keep receipts, I removed a business card, printed on heavy Crane stock, and checked the cell number.

How had Ethan Sinclare known I was on Nantucket?

•   •   •

I COULD HEAR
the bad news in Beasley's voice. Something in his tone, even as we were exchanging pleasantries. “What's wrong?”

“We heard back from FBI forensics this morning. Just got off the phone with the lab. The bullet is inconclusive.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning they can't match it. Meaning it's in too poor condition. They can't do anything with it. I'm sorry, Ms. Cashion.”

“Nothing at all? Did they agree with the techs in Georgia about the caliber, what kind of gun was used?”

“Yes. It's a .38, all right. But too mashed up and scratched to compare with the evidence samples. Not to any degree of certainty. Not even looking at it under a good microscope.”

“I can't believe this. What happens now?”

“Well . . .” Beasley let out a deep breath. “FBI's going to send down their complete report. I only got the headlines over the phone. Gerry Flee­man and I'll go over everything and compare notes. But without the bullet . . . It was the possibility of new physical evidence that prompted reopening this case, as you know. Without that, without a bullet match, I'm not sure how much farther we can go.”

“So that's it?” I was struggling to take this in. “You're done?”

“I've been over these old files a dozen times, Ms. Cashion. We would need new evidence to justify—”

“Ethan Sinclare didn't have an alibi for that day.”

Silence. Then, sounding annoyed: “Yes, he did. I told you. He was at his office, with his client—”

“His client Verlin Snow. I know. Except he wasn't. I went to see Mr. Snow this weekend.”

“You
what
?”

Beasley yelled at me for a good five minutes after I told him about my meeting with Snow. I had put myself in danger, I was interfering with an investigation, was I
completely
out of my mind?

“I'll have to see if he'll make a statement,” Beasley huffed at last.

“He won't.”

“Have to try.”

“Sure. Okay.”

“And I'll keep trying to get hold of Mr. Sinclare. His secretary says
she expects him in later today. Says he's got a bad habit of turning off his cell on the weekend, drives his family crazy, probably hasn't even seen my messages.”

I knew that wasn't true. Sinclare's cell phone had not been switched off on Saturday night. He had somehow tracked me down and found the time to call my hotel on Nantucket. Twice. I kept this piece of information to myself. Instead, I asked, “Beamer?”

“Yes, ma'am?”

“The evidence bullets that you collected from the two suspects' guns. Back in '79. Were either of them .38s?”

Beasley hesitated before answering, “Both of them. Different-model handguns. One Colt, one Smith and Wesson. But both were .38 Special. Thing is, so were maybe half the revolvers in Atlanta in 1979. Doesn't prove a damn thing.”

•   •   •

MADAME AUBUCHON STOPPED
by at lunchtime to collect her soup pot.

As before, she turned up with no warning. Thankfully I was dressed this time, had even put on earrings and makeup.

“Très belle,”
she said, smiling as she took me in. “You're looking like yourself again. The soup must be working.”

“Ça doit être ça.”
That must be it. “
C'est délicieux
.”
It was true. Her soup was delicious, so long as you resigned yourself to stinking of garlic for the rest of the day.

I led her into the kitchen.
“Un café? Un thé?”

“Non, merci.
Perhaps something stronger?”

Something stronger? It was half past noon. On a Monday. I walked to the liquor cupboard in my living room and returned with several bottles.

She pointed. “That one,
s'il te plaît.
”

I poured Madame Aubuchon a glass of Armagnac and watched, bemused, as she knocked it back.

“Yes?” Her voice haughty.

“
Rien. Rien du tout.
Nothing. It's just . . . we've worked together for
a long time. Ten years,
n'est-ce pas
? But I'm, um, realizing I don't actually know you very well.”

She smiled. Shook her head when I made to refill her glass. “Just the one.
Pour la santé.
For good health.” She produced an embroidered handkerchief from her purse and dabbed delicately at her lips. “I find it easiest to keep my personal life private. Not to discuss it at the office.
”

“A wise policy.”

“For example, you may not know that Jean-Pierre is my second husband.”

“Oh?” I said, to be polite.

“He's only fifty-one,” she said with a touch of pride.
“Il n'est qu'un garçon
.
”
Just a boy.

“I'd love to meet him someday.”

“I think not,” she sniffed. “He's enough trouble as it is. I don't need him to see the likes of you,
pour l'amour de Dieu.
He would eat you up.”

I raised my eyebrows in amusement. “He sounds very . . . French.”

She shot me a sharp look. I thought she had taken offense. I was opening my mouth to apologize, when she spoke again. “Jean-Pierre is my second husband because my first one beat me. He nearly killed me. Several times.”

My expression changed to one of shock. “Hélène. I'm so sorry. I didn't know.”

“No one does. This finger still doesn't straighten properly.” She held out a heavily veined but beautifully manicured hand. The pinkie drooped at an unnatural angle.

How had I never noticed?

“And my ribs, cracked three separate times. A punctured lung. Concussions.” She said this matter-of-factly, as through she were reciting a list of groceries she planned to pick up on the way home. “After I found the strength to kick him out, I locked myself in the apartment and did not come out for seven weeks.”

I didn't know what to say.

“Sept semaines,”
she repeated.

“How awful.”

“Sometimes, to heal, we need time alone.” Madame Aubuchon dipped back into her purse and withdrew a heavy ring of keys. “Go to Paris, Caroline. Go hide. Get strong again.”