suggests either that the victim knew her killer, or else she was somehow tricked into allowing him into her apartment. And lulling his victims into a false sense of security before he strikes is the thing at which Doyle’s oh- so-helpful enemy excels.
Except that this time he wasn’t helpful, was he? No phone calls for Doyle to reject. No phone number on the victim’s arms. No pretending to be Doyle in a call to the victim. Nothing.
Not that Doyle wants any of that. He’s glad to be out of it. He wanted a conventional murder case and now he’s got it. He should be celebrating. He should be running around this corpse, singing and clapping.
But he’s not. And he knows why. It’s because a part of him is saying, Maybe you could have prevented this. If you hadn’t slammed the door on your only source of information, maybe you could have listened to the clues and interpreted them correctly for once and prevented the death of this pretty young girl. For the others, the clues were there every time. You just didn’t know how to read them. And now people are still dying and you have no clues at all. Is that really what you wanted?
He has no answer. He is being pulled in opposite directions simultaneously. To listen to the helper or to ignore him. He has to decide, because right now it’s tearing him apart.
‘Who found the body?’ he asks Kravitz, ducking the homicide detective’s question.
Kravitz gives him a long look, and Doyle wonders whether the man is going to give him a hard time. He is mildly surprised when he gets a straight answer.
‘Roomie. Even better-looking than this one. She’s in quite a state.’
‘Where is she?’
‘With the landlady downstairs. Apartment 1A.’
‘Thanks.’
‘Yeah,’ says Kravitz, and it seems to Doyle that there is almost a hint of respect there. He tells himself that Kravitz must be having an off day.
After the problems he’s had with Holden, it occurs to Doyle that he should at least mention to him that he intends talking to the roommate. But Holden is already engaged in conversation with a thin bald man — presumably one of the tenants.
Fuck it, thinks Doyle.
He trudges down the stairs to the first floor. When he knocks on the door of apartment 1A, it opens within seconds.
He guesses that the woman before him is about sixty, even though her over-tanned skin has the appearance of antique leather. She wears a dazzling flower-print dress that Doyle thinks is far too short for a woman of her advanced years. Her hair, sculpted into a gravity-defying beehive, has been dyed a shade of red not found in nature. Minus the hair, she’d struggle to hit the five-foot mark. She reminds Doyle of the little old lady in
‘Police,’ says Doyle as he shows his shield.
‘Big surprise,’ says the woman. ‘The building is crawling with them right now. Where were you when I got burglarized last Christmas?’
‘This is a little more serious than that, Mrs. .’
‘Serafinowicz. With a z.’
‘With a z, huh?’ says Doyle, wondering where it goes.
‘Yes. And don’t tell me how serious this is. I know how serious this is. There’s a beautiful young girl lying dead in one of my apartments up there. You better catch the son of a bitch who did that, or else you’ll have me to answer to.’
Doyle decides that answering to Mrs Serafinowicz with a z is the last thing he wants.
‘That’s why I’m here. I need to talk to the roommate who found the body, and I’m told she’s here with you.’
‘She already spoke with the other cops.’
‘That’s okay. I just want to make sure that we’ve covered everything.’
‘She’s upset. She can’t stop crying, the poor girl. Can’t you come back later?’
‘Time is of the essence, ma’am, as I’m sure you appreciate.’
She studies him for a while. Listening to the demonic voices in her head, no doubt.
‘All right,’ she says. ‘Just go easy on her.’
She opens the door wide, and Doyle steps into a room that seems to be filled with junk. Almost every available surface is covered with items that look like they’ve come from all corners of the globe. Swiss cuckoo clocks, bears dressed in London Beefeater outfits, Japanese fans, Mexican sombreros, Australian boomerangs — she’s got them all. Doyle notices that there’s even a section of a shelf devoted to all things Irish, including a bobble-headed leprechaun exactly like the one he has on his desk in the squad-room.
Sitting on a chintz sofa in the center of this organized chaos is a young woman. She has curly blond hair and is wearing a very low-cut brown top. Her eyes and nose are red from crying. She looks frightened and vulnerable.
‘Hi,’ says Doyle. ‘My name’s Cal Doyle. I’m a detective with the Eighth Precinct. You mind if I ask you a few questions?’
The girl shakes her head and wipes her nose with a tissue clutched tightly in her fist.
Doyle takes out his notebook and flips it open. ‘That’s great,’ he says. ‘Let’s start with your name.’
She answers him honestly, but what Doyle doesn’t yet appreciate is how significant that answer is.
‘Tabitha,’ she says. ‘Tabitha Peyton.’
NINETEEN
‘I’ll make some tea,’ says Mrs Whatever-with-a-z, and she toddles off to the kitchen.
Doyle is relieved to be apart from her for a short while, but at the same time he feels a little awkward. Tabitha Peyton looks like she could break down at any second, and he is not good at dealing with females who go to pieces on him. He never knows what to say or do. He wishes now that Holden or one of his other male colleagues had come down here with him, so that at least if she did start bawling he could join with the other cop in a manly show of rolling his eyes at the weakness of the female sex.
‘You mind if I sit down?’ he asks.
She nods, and he takes his seat.
‘Your roommate,’ he says. ‘Helena, isn’t it?’
‘Yes. Helena Colquitt. I’ve known her a long time. I still can’t believe she’s. .’ She wipes her nose again.
Don’t cry, thinks Doyle. Please don’t cry.
‘It’s okay to be upset. I understand,’ he says. And then he thinks, Why the hell am I saying that?
‘It’s just that. . I don’t know why anyone would do this to her.’
Doyle doesn’t comprehend it either. The logic — if there is any — still escapes him.
‘Tell me what happened here tonight.’
She stares at her hands while she casts her mind back. ‘We were in the apartment together — Helena and me. I ordered a pizza and then I asked her to run a bath for me while I came down to see Bridget — Mrs Serafinowicz. She’s been suffering with her arthritis lately, and so I wanted to see if there was anything I could do for her. She’s been so good to me since I moved here. She’s looked after me like I was her own daughter. I only intended to stay for a few minutes, but we got talking, you know? Maybe if I’d gone straight back upstairs. .’
Her voice starts to break, and so Doyle urges her on before the floodgates can open: ‘So eventually you did go back up. Did you pass anyone on the stairs? See anything unusual?’
‘No. Everything was normal. I got to the apartment, I opened the door. Everything was as it should be. I didn’t suspect a thing. Only there was no sign of Helena. I called her, but there was no answer. And that’s when I went into the bathroom.’
The word ‘bathroom’ comes out as a squeak that is so high-pitched it is almost inaudible. Doyle thinks it’s not going to take much more to make her lose it altogether, but he has to press on.
