Witness in Death (In Death #10)(85)

Her eyes hardened, her hand dropped once more into her lap. "I will never forget how he looked at me. He told me it was my problem, and that if I expected him to pay for a termination of the pregnancy, I should think again. I wept, of course, and pleaded. He called me a few vile names, claimed that my sexual skills had been mediocre at best, and that he was bored with me. He left me where I was, on my knees. Weeping."

She sipped her chocolate again with no apparent distress. "You can understand, I hope, why I don't mourn his death. He was quite the most detestable man I've ever known. Unfortunately, at that point in my life, I didn't see that so clearly. I knew he was flawed," she continued. "But with that blind and beautiful optimism of youth, I'd believed, until that moment when he turned from me, that I could change him."

"Then you stopped believing it."

"Oh yes. I stopped believing I could change Richard Draco. But I thought I couldn't possibly live without him. I was also very frightened. Barely eighteen, pregnant, alone. I had dreams of becoming a great actress, and these were dashed. How could I go on?"

She paused for a moment, as if looking back. "We're so dramatic at eighteen. Do you remember when you were eighteen, Lieutenant Dallas, how you believed, somehow, everything was acute, vital, and the world, of course, revolved around you? Ah well."

She shrugged again. "I tried to end my life. I fumbled that, thank God, though I might have gotten it right if Kenneth hadn't come. If he hadn't stopped me, gotten me help."

"Yet you didn't terminate the pregnancy."

"No. I had time to think, to calm. I hadn't thought of the child when I took the razor to my wrists. Only of myself. It seemed to me that I'd been given another chance, and the only way to survive now was to do what was right for the life I'd started inside me. I might not have gotten through that without Kenneth."

She shifted her eyes, eloquent eyes, to Eve's. "He saved my life and the life of the child. He helped me find the clinic in Switzerland and the child placement attorney. He lent me money and a supporting arm."

"He's in love with you."

"Yes." Her agreement was simple, and sad. "My deepest regret is that I couldn't, and can't love him back, in the way he deserves. His attack on Richard all those years ago was an aberration, and one that cost Kenneth dearly."

"And after you placed the child?"

"I got back to my life. I never picked up that dream of becoming an actress again. I didn't have the heart for it any longer."

"As birth mother, you have the right to make regular inquiries about the child you placed."

"I never executed them. I had done what was best for her, best for myself. She was no longer mine. What interest could we have in each other?"

"She had an interest in Richard Draco. Carly Landsdowne was onstage the night he was killed."

"Yes?" Surprise, consideration flashed over her face. "She is an actress? Here in New York? Well, how many circles run within the circle of one life? And she was in the play with Richard and Kenneth. How strange, and how apt."

Eve waited. Watched. "You don't ask any questions about her."

"Lieutenant, you want me to pretend some connection, some spiritual bond? Your Carly Landsdowne is a stranger to me. I wish her well, of course. But the link between us, a tenuous and temporary one, was broken years ago. My only connection with those days is Kenneth."

"Were you acquainted with Areena Mansfield?"

"Slightly, yes. She was very promising, even so long ago. She's done quite well for herself, hasn't she? I believe Richard toyed with her as well at some point. Why do you ask?"

"She was also in the cast. Natalie Brooks?"

"Natalie Brooks?" A little smile curved her mouth. "There is a name I haven't heard in many years. Yes, I remember she had a small part in the play Richard was in when he and I were lovers. She was very young, too. Pretty, fresh in a country girl sort of way. And, of course, easy prey. He seduced her when he turned from me. Perhaps even before. It's difficult to know. Was she, too, in this play?"

"No, but her son was Draco's understudy."

"Fascinating." Her eyes danced with amusement. "Please, you must tell me who else."

"Eliza Rothchild."

"But yes! A delightful woman. So dignified and acerbic. She had no tolerance for Richard. Of course, she was hardly his type and he took no pains to disguise that. Yes, this is fascinating. So many ghosts of the past moving like shadows on the stage. And Richard in the center, where he liked it best.

"I no longer follow theater, but if I'd known, I might have bought a ticket. Yes, I might very well have paid to see that final performance."

"You've had no contact with any of these people in the last twenty-four years?"

"But for Kenneth, no, as I've already said. I realize Kenneth told you that he hadn't seen or spoken to me over the years, didn't know where I was. The lie was not for himself, but for me. And now that you've told me all who are involved, it comes even more clear why he did so. He would have worried that these ghosts would haunt me. I assure you, and will assure him, they don't."

"Did he tell you that Richard Draco and Carly Landsdowne had been lovers?"