Skeleton Key(129)

“It occurred to you.”

“That’s what I’m called in to do,” Gregor said. “That’s my job. Anyway, you left the Jeep in the Fairchild Family Cemetery, turned over on its side for good measure. You went back to the access road and got back into the Testarosa. Fortunately, it still ran. So you just went home. The next morning, you took the car into the shop and got yourself a rental. And the rest, as they say, is history.”

Peter Greer stirred his scotch, very carefully. It occurred to Gregor that he really did not like the look of unblended scotch. It was clear, and it looked thick, like anisette. Gregor really did not like anisette. Peter Greer took a long drink and put his glass back on the table.

“The thing is,” he said, “it isn’t history. That’s the point. It’s a nice story, but you haven’t any proof of it. Not really.”

“You must have deposited the money,” Gregor said. “There’s that. And there’s the car, and the Jeep, which should yield some interesting results, once they’ve been tested.”

“I suppose so. But you know, I’m not a fool. I know you can’t use most of this as evidence. You can’t even use anything I say here as evidence. You haven’t given me my Miranda warnings, and you’re employed by the police.”

“Do you want me to give you your Miranda warnings?”

“No.”

“Did you kill Kayla Anson?”

“Oh, yes,” Peter said. “And Zara Anne Moss and Margaret, too. But I’ll deny it if it ever gets to court, and you know I will. I should have killed Margaret first. She was something worse than a bitch. She liked to destroy things just for the sake of destroying them. She wanted to destroy me.”

“She may manage it, in the end.”

“Maybe. But not without a fight. Never without a fight. I’ve fought all my life, to have money, to have status, to be here. I’m not Sally Martindale. I won’t confess and make it easy for everyone. I won’t indulge in one of the cheaper forms of repentance.”

“Connecticut has the death penalty these days. Repentance might not come cheap.”

“I’ll take my chances. You would, too, if you were in my shoes. Anybody would.”

“Possibly.”

Peter finished the rest of his scotch and stood up. “I’ve got to go down to the locker room and have a shower and change,” he said. “I’m an escort at that party tonight. When I was in high school, the debutantes wouldn’t even talk to me. Now they line up to see who I’ll deign to escort to the country club ball. I’ve planned it all very carefully. I don’t intend to give it up.”

“And if you get arrested?”

“I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it. Good evening, Mr. Demarkian. I hope you have a nice trip back to Philadelphia, whenever it is you intend to go.”

Peter had not been gone from the table for a full second before Mark and Stacey rushed up. They were too frustrated-looking to have been able to hear any part of that last conversation, or they had only heard Gregor’s own part of it, which of course would be of no use to them at all. It was what Peter had said that they needed to hear. All Gregor could do was tell them, knowing that they would know, just as he did, that the information was useless.

“Well?” Mark Cashman demanded.

“Well,” Gregor said. “It’s time we found me a way to get back to Philadelphia.”





3


In the end, they drove him all the way down to Bridgeport to catch the train. It was all they could do. Gregor thought about hiring a limousine, but he couldn’t find a limousine company willing to take him all the way to Pennsylvania. Mark Cashman checked into commuter flights, but there was nothing leaving Hartford until eight o’clock the next morning, and Gregor didn’t want to wait that long. He also didn’t want to ride in a little commuter plane, but he didn’t say anything about that. It made less than no sense to tell everybody on earth just how much he was afraid of flying.

Stacey couldn’t go, since resident troopers were required to be available at all times, through radio connections if in no other way. Mark had only to wait half an hour until he was officially off-duty. In the meantime, Stacey drove Gregor back to the inn and gave him a chance to pack.

“I’m going to be sorry to see you go,” he said, while Gregor piled shirts into his suitcase in a jumble. “You were the first really interesting person I’d had to talk to in months.”

Interesting, Gregor thought. And then he let it pass. He let everything pass. Now that he was sure about Peter Greer, he had nothing on earth to think about but how worried he was about Bennis.