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Seven
The afternoon shadows deepened as, unmindful of time, Elizabeth listened to Alvirah Meehan's tapes. Sometimes she stopped and rewound a segment of the tape and listened to it several times. Her lined pad was filled with notes.
Those questions that had seemed so tactless had actually been so clever. Elizabeth thought of how she had sat at the table with the Countess, wishing she could overhear the conversations at Min's table. Now she could. Some of the talk was muffled, but she could hear enough to detect stress, evasion, attempts to change the subject.
She began to systematize her notations, creating a separate page for everyone at the table. At the bottom of each page she scribbled questions as they came to mind. When she finished the third tape, it seemed to her that she merely had a jumble of confusing sentences.
Leila, how I wish you were here. You were too cynical, but so many times you were right about people. You could see through their facades. Something is wrong, and I'm missing it. What is it?
It seemed to her that she could hear Leila's answer, as if she were in the room. For heaven's sake, Sparrow, open your eyes! Stop seeing what people want you to see. Start listening. Think for yourself. Didn't I teach you that much?
She was just about to put the last cassette from Alvirah's sunburst pin into the recorder when the phone rang. It was Helmut. "You left a note for me."
"Yes, I did. Helmut, why did you go to Leila's apartment the night she died?"
She heard him gasp. " Elizabeth, do not talk on the phone. May I come to you now?"
While she waited, she hid the recording equipment and her pad. She had no intention of letting Helmut become aware of the tapes.
For once, his rigid military carriage seemed to have deserted him. He sat opposite her, his shoulders slumped. His voice low and hurried, his German accent more pronounced as he spoke, he told her what he had told Min. He had written the play. He had gone to plead with Leila to reconsider.
"You took the money out of Min's Swiss account."
He nodded. "Mi
"Is it possible that she always knew? That she sent those letters because she wanted to upset Leila enough to destroy her performance? No one knew Leila's emotional state better than Min."
The Baron's eyes widened. "But how magnificent. It is just the sort of thing Mi
Elizabeth did not care if her face showed the disgust she felt. "I don't share your admiration for that scheme, if it was Min's doing." She went to the desk and got a fresh pad. "You heard Ted struggling with Leila?"
"Yes, I did."
"Where were you? How did you get in? How long were you there? Exactly what did you hear?"
It helped to be writing, to concentrate on taking down word for word what he said. He had heard Leila pleading for her life, and he had not tried to help her.
When he had finished, perspiration was glistening on his smooth cheeks. She wanted to get him out of her sight, but she could not resist saying, "Suppose instead of ru
"I don't believe that, Elizabeth. It happened in seconds." The Baron's eyes widened. "But haven't you heard? There is no plea bargain. It's been on the news all afternoon. A second eyewitness saw Ted hold Leila over the terrace before he dropped her. The district attorney wants Ted to get life."
Leila had not toppled over the railing in a struggle. He had held her, then deliberately dropped her. That Leila's death had taken a few seconds longer seemed to Elizabeth even more cruel than her worst fears. I should be glad they're going for the maximum penalty, she told herself. I should be glad to have the chance to testify against him.
She wanted desperately to be alone, but she managed to ask the Baron one more question: "Did you see Syd near Leila's apartment that night?"
Could she trust the look of astonishment on his face? "No, I did not," he said firmly. "Was he there?"
It is finished, Elizabeth told herself. She put in a call to Scott Alshorne. The sheriff was out on official business. Could someone else help her? No. She left a message for him to phone her. She would turn over Alvirah Meehan's recording equipment to him and get on the next plane to New York. No wonder they'd all sounded so on edge from Alvirah's relentless questioning. Most of them had something to hide.
The sunburst pin. She started to put it into a bag with the recorder and then realized she hadn't listened to the last cassette. It occurred to her that Alvirah had been wearing the pin in the clinic… She managed to extract the cassette from the tiny container. If Alvirah was so concerned about the collagen injections, would she have left the recorder on during the treatment?
She had. Elizabeth turned up the volume and held the recorder to her ear. The cassette began with Alvirah in the treatment room talking with the nurse. The nurse reassuring her, talking about Valium; the click of the door, Alvirah's even breathing, the click of the door again… The Baron's somewhat muffled and indistinct voice, reassuring Alvirah, starting the injection; the click of the door, Alvirah's gasps, her attempt to call for help, her frenzied breath, a click of the door again, the nurse's cheerful voice, "Well, here we are, Mrs. Meehan. All set for your beauty treatment?" And then the nurse, upset, on the edge of panic, saying, "Mrs. Meehan, what's the matter? Doctor…"
There was a pause, then the voice of Helmut barking orders -"Open that robe!"-calling for oxygen. There was a pounding sound-that must have been when he was compressing her chest; then Helmut called for an intravenous. That was when I was there, Elizabeth thought. He tried to kill her. Whatever he gave her was meant to kill her. Alvirah's persistent references to that sentence about "a butterfly floating on a cloud," her constantly saying that that reminded her of something, her calling him a clever author-did he perceive that as her toying with him? Had he still hoped that somehow Min wouldn't learn the truth about the play, about her Swiss bank account?
She replayed the last tape again and again. There was something about it she didn't understand. What was it? What was she missing?
Not knowing what she was looking for, she reread the notes she had taken when Helmut described Leila's death. Her eyes became riveted to one sentence. But that's wrong, she thought.
Unless.
Like an exhausted climber within inches of an icy summit, she reviewed the notes she had made from Alvirah Meehan's tapes.
And found the key.
It had always been there, waiting for her. Did he realize how close she had been to the truth?
Yes, he did.
She shivered, remembering the questions that had seemed so i
Her hand flew to the phone. She would call Scott. And then she withdrew her fingers from the dial. Tell him what? There wasn't a shred of proof. There never would be.
Unless she could force his hand.