Part 18 (2/2)

”Thank you, Mr. MacKingsley, but I don't want to give the wrong impression. I am very sorry about Charley, but I must explain that I never even knew he existed until a year ago.”

Jeff listened intently as Robin explained that at age seventeen her mother had given birth to a baby. In a private adoption, she had signed him over to a childless couple to raise. ”My mother's been dead for ten years. Then one day last year, Charley showed up on my father's doorstep and introduced himself. He had his birth certificate and pictures of himself in my mother's arms, so there was no doubt he was who he said he was.

”My father's remarried, so he wasn't at all interested in Charley. In all honesty, he may be my half-brother, but the little I got to know him, I didn't much care for him. I mean he was always whining. He complained that he had to pay too much to his wife when they were divorced. He said he hated landscaping, but that once he got into that business, he was kind of stuck with it.

He couldn't stand most of the people he worked for. He just wasn't the kind of person anyone would seek out to try to make a friend.”

”Did you have much contact with him?” Jeff asked.

”Quite frankly, I didn't want any. Occasionally he'd call and ask me to have a cup of coffee with him. The divorce was fairly recent, and he was at loose ends.”

”Ms. Carpenter, we have reason to believe Charley Hatch was the person who vandalized the house on Old Mill Lane.”

”That's absolutely impossible,” Robin protested. ”Why would Charley do that?”

”That's exactly what we want to know,” Jeff replied. ”Did Charley ever come into your office to see you?”

”No, never.”

”Did Georgette know he was related to you?”

”No. There was no reason to talk about him.”

”Would Georgette or Henry have had any contact with him?”

”Possibly. I mean sometimes the people who are selling houses are away, and of course the houses and properties must be maintained. Charley was a landscaper and also had a snowplowing service in the winter. If Georgette had an exclusive listing on a property, she'd be the one making sure that it was being kept up, so it's entirely possible that she knew Charley if he was working on one of those properties. But his name never came up in the year I worked with her.”

”Then that would be true of Henry Paley as well?” Jeff asked. ”He might have known Charley before last week.”

”Of course.”

”When was the last time you spoke to your half brother, Ms. Carpenter?”

”It was at least three months ago.”

”Where were you between 1:40 and 2:10 this afternoon?”

”In the office. You see, Henry was having lunch with Ted Cartwright. When he came back a little after one o'clock, I ran across the street to get a sandwich and bring it back in. Henry had an appointment at 1:30 to take a client out.”

”Did he keep that appointment?”

Robin hesitated, then said, ”Yes he did, but Mr. Mueller, the potential buyer, phoned to say he was delayed, and couldn't meet Henry until 2:30.”

”Then Henry was in the office with you until that time?”

Robin Carpenter hesitated. Her eyes moistened, and she bit her lip to keep it from quivering. ”I can't believe that Charley is dead. Is that why...?” Her voice trailed off.

Jeff waited, then slowly and deliberately said, ”Ms. Carpenter, if you have any information that would a.s.sist this investigation, it is your obligation to reveal it. What did you just start to say?”

Robin's composure broke. ”Henry has been trying to blackmail me,” she burst out. ”Before I went to work for Georgette, I dated Ted Cartwright a few times. Of course, when I realized how much she despised him, I didn't mention it. Henry's been trying to twist everything around to make it sound as if I was undermining Georgette. That wasn't true, but what is true is that Henry Paley was not in the office today from the time he left at one fifteen until nearly four o'clock. In fact, he had just gotten back minutes before Sergeant Earley came in and told us Charley was dead.”

”His appointment to show a house had been changed from one thirty to two thirty?” Jeff confirmed.

”Yes.”

”Thank you, Ms. Carpenter. I know this has been very trying for you. If you wait just a few minutes until your statement is ready to sign, Sergeant Earley will drive you home.”

”Thank you.”

Jeff looked at his a.s.sistants, each of whom had been quietly taking notes. ”Any one of you have a question for Ms. Carpenter?”

”Just one,” Paul Walsh said. ”Ms. Carpenter, what is the number of your cell phone?”

CHAPTER 50.

At quarter of three, Dru Perry received a call from her editor, Ken Sharkey, telling her about the report that had come over the police band. Charley Hatch, the landscaper of the Holland Road house where Georgette Grove had been murdered, had been shot to death. Ken was dispatching someone else to cover the story at the location, but he wanted Dru to attend the press conference MacKingsley was sure to call.

Dru a.s.sured Ken she would wait around for the press conference, but she did not share with him the stunning information she had just uncovered. She had been busy tracing back three generations of Liza Barton's maternal ancestors. Liza's mother and grandmother had been only children. Her great-grandmother had three sisters. One of them never married. Another married a man names James Kennedy and died without issue. The third great-great aunt married a man named William Kellogg.

Celia Foster Nolan's maiden name is Kellogg. One of the New York reporters referred to that fact when he wrote about the vandalism, Dru remembered. I just wrote that she was the widow of the financier Laurence Foster. I think it was the guy from the Post who gave the background about her-that she had met Foster when she was decorating his apartment, that she had her own design business, Celia Kellogg Interiors.

Dru went down to the courthouse cafeteria and ordered a cup of tea. The cafeteria was almost deserted, which suited her well. She needed time to think, and was only just beginning to realize the ramifications of what she had learned.

As she held the tea cup with both hands, she stared ahead unseeingly. Maybe the fact that her name is Kellogg is merely the wildest of coincidences, Dru thought. But no, I don't believe in that kind of coincidence. Celia Nolan is exactly the right age to be the grown-up Liza Barton. Is it really a coincidence that Alex Nolan just happened to buy that house as a surprise? It's a one-in-a-million chance, but it could happen. But if he bought it as a surprise, it has to mean that Celia never told him about her true background. My G.o.d, I can only imagine how shocked she must have been when he drove her up to the house on her birthday, and she had to pretend to be thrilled.

And as if that wasn't bad enough, the day she moved in she was greeted by that writing on the lawn, and the paint on the house, and that doll with the gun, and the skull and crossbones carved into the door. No wonder she fainted when she saw all the media charging at her.

Did it cause her to become unbalanced? Dru wondered. Celia Nolan had been the one who found Georgette's body. Is it possible she was in such a frenzy about being in the house and all that terrible publicity that she would kill Georgette?

It was a possibility Dru did not relish considering.

Later, at the press conference she was uncharacteristically silent. The fact that Sergeant Earley had confiscated the murdered landscaper's jeans and sneakers and carvings meant only one thing to her. They were looking to tie Charley Hatch to the vandalism.

Dru found herself hoping that Celia Nolan had an ironclad alibi for the thirty minutes between 1:40 and 2:10 that afternoon, and then feeling with increasing certainty that she would not have any alibi at all.

It had been a long day, but after the press conference, Dru went back to the office. On the Internet she found a number of articles about Celia Kellogg. One of them was an interview in Architectural Digest that had taken place seven years earlier. When the established designer she had been working for retired, Celia had gone out on her own, and the magazine was calling her one of the most innovative and talented of the new crop of designers.

It gave her background as the daughter of Martin and Kathleen Kellogg. She didn't let on that she was their adopted daughter, Dru noticed. She had been raised in Santa Barbara. Reading further, Dru found the information she wanted. Shortly after Celia moved east to go to the Fas.h.i.+on Inst.i.tute of Technology, the Kelloggs had relocated to Naples, Florida. It was an easy matter to get their telephone number from the directory. Dru copied it in her notebook. It's not time to call them yet, she decided. They're sure to deny that their adopted daughter is Liza Barton. The next thing to do is to get Liza's picture computer aged, then I have to decide if I should share my suspicions with Jeff MacKingsley. Because, if I'm right, Little Lizzie Borden is not only back, but she's very possibly unhinged and on a killing spree. Her own lawyer said he wouldn't be surprised if she came back someday and blew Ted Cartwright's brains out.

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