Night Fall

“I’m wondering if you can remember anything unusual that happened regarding the Winslows about five years ago.”

He thought about that, then replied, “I can’t recall anything that’s ever come to the attention of the village police.”

“Any rumors or gossip about her?”

“You mean…?”

“Yeah. Fucking around.”

He shook his head. “Not that I know of. But I don’t live here. Why do you ask?”

I ignored his question and asked him, “What can you tell me about them? I mean, background, lifestyle, stuff like that.”

Sergeant Roberts thought a moment, then replied, “Mark Winslow is from an old Long Island family. She’s a Halley, according to the resident survey, also an old family. They’re well-to-do, but not filthy rich. He works for Morgan Stanley in the city, as you know, and travels a lot for business. She notifies us every time he, she, or both of them are away. They belong to the country club, and he has a club in the city”- he glanced at his computer-“Union League Club. Very Republican. What else do you want to know?”

I wanted to know if this was the Jill Winslow who was fucking on the beach the night of the TWA 800 crash, but maybe she’d be the one to ask about that. I said, “I think I get the picture.”

He asked me, “What does this have to do with being a witness to a homicide?”

Good question. Sergeant Roberts was sharper than I’d expected, which was a good lesson for me to remember. I replied, “There’s more to this, obviously. But for reasons of national security, I can’t tell you what that is.”

We kept eye contact, and he said, “All right.”

His radio, I noticed, had been very quiet, but then his phone buzzed, and he picked it up and spoke to Ms. Wilson out front.

I wanted to say to him, “If it’s the CIA, I’m not here.” I listened for any indication of a problem, but he said to his civilian aide, “Put her on. I’ll handle it.” He said to me, “Loud lawn party.” He took the call and chatted with someone about the loud lawn party.

Truly, this was a different beat, and I tried to get a mental picture of Jill Winslow’s world. As I’d guessed, she was upper-middle-class and had a lot to lose if her husband discovered she wasn’t shopping for clothes every time she went out.

I speculated that Mr. Mark Winslow, investment banker for Morgan Stanley, was a bit boring, probably enjoyed a cocktail or two, golfed at the local country club, and spent a lot of time in the city, at work or with clients. Maybe he had a lady in the city. Boring, busy, and rich men tend to have full-time girlfriends who find them fascinating.

I knew from Sergeant Roberts that Mr. Winslow had a sense of duty to his community and sat on the pla

Mrs. Winslow, in a word, was most likely bored. She probably did volunteer work and went into the city for theater, museums, and shopping, and lunched with the ladies, when not committing adultery.

I tried to conjure up a picture of her lover, but without any information other than Nash’s confirmation that he was married, all I could conclude was that he was fucking Mrs. Winslow.

Don Juan apparently owned the tan Ford Explorer, and one of them owned a video camera that they used to capture a romantic moment on the beach, and maybe other such moments, so they obviously trusted each other, or there wouldn’t have been a video camera to record potentially devastating acts of infidelity. Possibly they came from the same social set, and this affair had begun with a mild flirtation at a cocktail party or a club dance, and progressed to lunch, then di

Another thought: Though they were engaged in reckless behavior, they were not themselves reckless people. This affair was, or had been, very controlled, a calculated risk whose rewards-whatever they were-were worth the risks.

A final thought: The lovers were not in love. If they had been, they would have had an epiphany on the night of July 17, 1996, when they saw that aircraft explode-it would be to them a sign that life was short, and they needed to be together, and to hell with their spouses, their families, and their well-ordered world. And Jill Winslow would not still be living at 12 Quail Hollow Lane with Mark Winslow.

Having said that, for all I knew, Mr. Mark Winslow was an interesting and attractive man, a loving and attentive spouse, and Mrs. Jill Winslow was the town slut, and her lover was the guy who cleaned the swimming pool.

The point of trying to get a handle on Mrs. Winslow and her world was to determine if I could convince her to tell me exactly what happened and what she’d seen and videotaped that night. If she’d told Nash the truth, then that was the end of it, and I could go home to my La-Z-Boy recliner. If there was more to what Nash told me, or something she hadn’t told him, then this was not the end-it was the begi

Sergeant Roberts hung up and said to me, “Typical Saturday night. Lots of house parties-usually the kids when their parents are away.” He used the police radio to call a patrol car and directed the guy to the address of the loud party. He said to me, “I have four cars out tonight. Sometimes I get a call from these central station monitoring companies reporting a burglar alarm, then I get a road accident, then the old ladies who hear a prowler-same two old ladies.”

He went on awhile about the problems of policing a small town where the residents thought the cops were an extension of their household staff. It was not that interesting, but it was giving me an idea.

I asked Sergeant Roberts, “Do you know if the Winslows are out of town?”

He played with the computer and said, “I don’t have any information that they’re out of town.”

“Would you have their phone number?”

He hit a few keys and said, “I have most unlisted numbers, but not all…” He looked at the screen and said, “I have theirs. You need it?”

“Thanks.”

He scribbled the number on a piece of paper and gave it to me. I had to remember to tell Dom Fanelli about local village police, and this neat Orwellian database.

Sergeant Roberts said to me, “If you phone them or pay a house call, you should know that Mark Winslow is the kind of guy who wouldn’t answer a question on a TV game show without his lawyer present. So, if you need to talk to her, you’ve got to gethim out of the picture, unless you want his lawyer there. But you didn’t hear that from me. Okay?”

“I understand.” In fact, I had a more compelling reason for not wanting him around. I said to Sergeant Roberts, “Do me a favor and give them a call.”

“Now?”

“Yeah. I need to be sure they’re home.”

“Okay… you want me to say anything? I mean, their Caller ID will come up ‘Brookville Police.’”

“Tell Mr. Winslow there’s an emergency meeting of the pla

He laughed. “Yeah. That will get the whole town out.”

I smiled at our little shared politically incorrect joke and suggested, “How about telling him there’s a prowler in the neighborhood. Someone’s central station monitoring just went off.”

“Okay…”

He dialed the number, and I said to him, “Put it on speaker.”

He hit the speaker button, and I heard the phone ringing. On the fourth ring, a male voice answered, “Hello?”

Sergeant Roberts asked, “Mr. Winslow?”

“Yes?”

“Mr. Winslow, this is Sergeant Roberts at the Old Brookville police department. Sorry to bother you at this hour, but we’ve got a report of a prowler and a neighbor’s alarm going off in your area, and we wondered if you’ve seen or heard anything.”