Little Deaths(82)

Johnny asked for a glass of water, and a bailiff poured one, reached up to hand it to him. He took a sip, wiped his mouth and then his brow.

“My wife was . . . she was away.”

“And the defendant, was she still living with her husband at the time?”

“Yes. At first.”

Murmured voices behind her, rising and falling. Red heat in her face. The line of pain in her palms where her nails pushed into the skin.

She was suddenly aware of Frank on the other side of the room. He didn’t need to hear this.

Hirsch led Johnny through events in the weeks leading up to the children’s disappearance.

“One night, maybe two months before, we went to a steak restaurant on Main Street and Jewel. She was mad that night. Real mad.”

“The defendant was angry?”

“Yeah. Real angry. Frank wanted custody of the kids. She kept saying she wouldn’t let him have them. She said she wasn’t going to let anyone take her kids.”

Johnny took another drink of water.

“What else did the defendant say, Mr. Salcito?”

“Um . . . she said . . .”

“Can you speak up, please? For the jury.”

“Sorry. She—Ruth—she said that she didn’t want Frank to have the children. Then she said she would rather see the children dead than let Frank have them.”

Ruth straightened up, her eyes wide. Shook her head, hard.

Muttered, “No. I didn’t mean . . . No.”

Scott patted her arm. Whispered, “It’s okay. It’s okay. We can deal with this.”

But Hirsch wasn’t done.

“Let’s move to the night the children disappeared. You spoke to the defendant that night, is that correct?”

“Yes sir.”

“You’ve given testimony that you spoke to her at around midnight. That you asked her to join you at the bar you were in.”

“That’s right.”

“Is that the only time you called the defendant that night?”

“No. I called her again a couple of hours later.”

“What time would that have been?”

“Uh . . . around two a.m.”

“And what did you say to her then?”

“Well, nothing. I didn’t speak to her. I called and there was no answer.”

“You called her at two a.m. and”—here Hirsch fixed the jury with a stare—“and she didn’t answer.”

Ruth was scribbling furiously. Took dog for walk, fell asleep. In my statement! Scott nodded, patted her arm again.

Hirsch continued.

“Let’s turn now to the night of April fifth, nineteen sixty-six. Where were you that night, Mr. Salcito?”

Johnny bent his head.

“I was at the Kings Motel. On the Van Wyck Expressway.”

Ruth felt an ache in her chest. That had been private. It had meant something, at the time. It had been for the two of them, not for an entire courtroom to hear.

“Nice and loud, please. Were you there alone?”

“No sir.”

“Will you tell the court who you were with?”

He lifted his head and Ruth had a moment of hope—if he would only look at her!—but he raised his gaze to Hirsch.

“I was with the defendant, Mrs. Malone.”

“And will you tell the court, in your own words, what happened that night?”

Johnny took a breath, dropped his gaze again.

“We had dinner. We had been drinking. And then she—Ruth—started crying. She kept crying. Then she said there was no reason for the kids to be dead. That there was no reason for them to be killed.

“I asked her what she meant, and she kept crying. Then she said ‘They must understand. They know it’s for the best.’ ”

The same words she’d used to him when he’d been crying and humiliated in Scott’s office. When she’d told him that she wouldn’t be able to see him for a while.

Why was he saying these things, using her own words against her? Was he punishing her for pushing him away?

“A little louder again, Mr. Salcito.”

“Yes sir.”

“The defendant said, ‘They must understand. They know it’s for the best.’ And you understood her to be referring to the children.”

“Yes sir.”

“What did you say to that?”

“Uh . . . well, I said, ‘Frankie and Cindy are dead. All we can do for them now is help the cops find who did it.’ ”

“And what did she say?”

“She kept repeating, ‘They will understand, they will know it was for the best.’ On and on, several times.”

His voice grew in strength, as though the significance of what he was saying was giving him courage. She sat straight, shoulders tense and aching, mouth dry.

“And then . . . and then she said to me, ‘Johnny, forgive me. I killed them.’”

The room exploded in gasps, shouts, the judge banging his gavel again and again.

And then, finally, Johnny looked at her, just for a moment, and his jaw was set and his eyes were dead.

Ruth stood with her fists clenched, her eyes fixed on the man on the witness stand, and she screamed as though they were the only two people in the room.