Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 152, Nos. 5 & 6. Whole Nos. 926 & 927, November/December 2018
- Автор: Ловси Питер, Зельцерман Дэйв
- Год: 2018
- Язык: английский
- Год: Dell Magazines
- ISBN: 0013-6328
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 152, Nos. 5 & 6. Whole Nos. 926 & 927, November/December 2018». Краткое содержание книги:
“You know she’s going to milk us dry of everything we’ve worked so hard for,” Wanda said, plopping the mop in the bucket and wiping her hands on a tea towel. “The minute you take your oath of office she’s going to have us over a big old barrel, and I don’t mean that kind.”
She nodded at the shotgun that now lay on the kitchen table.
“She’s not like that, Wanda.”
But he could see in Wanda’s face that she didn’t believe him. She was projecting her own mindset on Lizzie, a mindset he’d lived with but never really thought about until tonight. It struck him that an expert witness in his courtroom last week could have been describing Wanda when he’d defined “narcissistic personality disorder.” Wanda checked off all the boxes: lack of empathy, self-righteousness, shamelessness, superficial charm, egocentrism, envy, sense of entitlement, grandiosity, hubris, manipulation, rage, perfectionism, vanity, and the list went on.
How was it possible that Enoch had never noticed before? Had he been blind to it for years? Or had he been in denial all this time? Had she changed so slowly he’d acclimated? Or had Homer’s death flipped a switch to pop it out of her like a jack-in-the-box? No matter. Any way he looked at it, Lizzie’s cynical description of Wanda’s feelings for him suddenly seemed not just plausible but probable.
“I’ve known Lizzie all my life,” he said. “She’s a good person. She’ll be satisfied with a fair shake.”
“The hell she will. I saw her pawing at you. She’s playing you like the rube you used to be, and you’re falling for it. Grow up, Enoch. You’re a statewide politician now. Your next stop can be Congress or the governor’s office, but you’re going to need to thicken your skin and do as I say.”
“Do what, exactly?”
He stuck his pinky in his drink and gave it a stir.
“I’m just saying you have a family and a future that should be your top priority. Your only priority, if push comes to shove.”
He licked the bourbon off his finger, mulling the word “shove.”
“Are you listening to me, Enoch?” she said. “That girl is nothing more than a pothole in the road. You need to hit the gas, grit your teeth, and take the bump or you’ll never get to Jackson.”
“Are you suggesting what I think you’re suggesting?”
“I’m suggesting you be decisive for a change,” she said.
She reached across the kitchen table for his drink and chugged it.
“Because if you’re suggesting what I think you’re suggesting, we’re committing a felony just talking about it. In this state that’s worth twenty years and/or five hundred thousand dollars. So I’m suggesting we end the discussion right now.”
He cracked open the shotgun and pulled the two empty shells out, then tossed them in the trash.
“Do you love me, Enoch?”
This caught him by surprise. “Of course I do,” he said, though he was growing increasingly doubtful.
“Do you love our girls?”
“What kind of a question is that?”
He snapped the gun closed and put it back down on the table, then grabbed his glass for a refill.
“Because love makes us do all sorts of things we wouldn’t otherwise consider. You see that in your courthouse every day, am I right?”
“I don’t think I like where this conversation is going.”
Now it’s his turn to chug his drink. He hears the water stop upstairs, and imagines wrapping a towel and a protective hug around Lizzie’s lovely, wet body.
“Your brother’s dead because of her,” said Wanda, pulling out a whole new set of artillery. “You know he never had the initiative to come up with a prank like that on his own. He’s always had a hankering for Lizzie and she used that to talk him into trouble. Now he’s dead and it’s her fault, not yours. If it wasn’t for her, he’d still be walking God’s green earth, and we wouldn’t be in this mess.”
“That argument wouldn’t stand up for ten seconds in my court.”
“Welcome to the real world, Enoch. Dumb, love-struck Homer paid for that girl’s crime with his life and, unless you want the whole state to know about it and flush this whole family down the toilet, justice can only be served by us right here, right now. Vandals and trespassers are fair game in this state. You had every right to shoot that girl, but sadly you missed, and now she’s looking to profit from Homer’s tragic death. You may have pulled that trigger, but that girl put Homer in your sights. If she goes unpunished, your poor brother will have died in vain.”
Enoch tried to unravel her argument, but by some bizarre, circuitous route, Wanda seemed to have found her way to a logical conclusion, compounding the weight of his guilt.
Lizzie walked into the bedroom feeling clean and comfy in her sweats, but only slightly better. Her head still felt like it was in a vise. She could hear Enoch and Wanda downstairs, deeply engrossed in a discussion she couldn’t quite make out, but she assumed they were talking about her.
She opened Wanda’s top bureau drawer. There was a large assortment of lingerie, including at least a dozen lace panties arranged by color. She pushed them aside and found a jewelry box underneath. How predictable. She pocketed a diamond tennis bracelet, two gold chains, and a Rolex. Her next stop was Enoch’s nightstand. She found a half roll of Certs by the clock radio and popped one in her mouth. Then she opened his drawer and began to rummage.
Wanda struggled to get back in the saddle. Her dire predictions weren’t getting through to Enoch, and she needed to be confident that he was willing to follow her lead. Things had gotten a bit wobbly when he’d discovered what she’d done to Lizzie, but she’d managed to make him face the ugly reality his actions had unleashed. Now she just had to persuade him that Lizzie had to go for them to put this nightmare behind them. He was nodding in agreement, like the toady she’d spent a decade training him to be, but she knew he wasn’t really on board yet. It was going to take some finesse to get him to abandon his morals for the greater good.
“You shot Homer when they were driving away, Enoch. That’s not self-defense, and she knows it. If we don’t bury her in that grave...” She heard movement in the living room that caught her up short. Lizzie walked in.
“Did I miss something?” asked Lizzie.
The women stared at each other, then Lizzie sat down at the kitchen table and turned her gaze to the shotgun lying before her.
“I should pick up that gun and shoot you right now,” she said to Wanda.
“You can’t blackmail me if I’m dead.”
Lizzie picked up the shotgun and aimed it at Wanda.
“Maybe I’ll just blow off a limb or two.”
“That’s not funny,” said Enoch.
“Who says I’m joshin’?”
“She knows it’s not loaded,” said Wanda. “She’s just toying with us.”
Lizzie cracked open the break action and stared down the breech.
“Lookie what I found in Enoch’s drawer.” She pulled two shells from her pocket, and before Enoch or Wanda could react, she slipped them into the chambers and clacked the gun shut.
“Way I figure,” said Lizzie, “you tried to kill me twice. So I got every right to settle that score.” Then, to Enoch, “Ain’t that a fact, Judge?”
“You’ve got every right to be angry,” he said. “But you don’t want to do anything hasty that might land you in prison for the rest of your life.”
“Oh, I won’t do nothin’ hasty. We got work to do first.”
Wanda and Enoch led the way to the grave. Lizzie trailed with the shotgun.