Hope to Die

TWENTY-SEVEN

I was shaving when the call came. An Officer Tillis from the Twenty-sixth Precinct, and could I come in so they could take my statement in the Lia Parkman case? I said I could, and drank a cup of coffee before I caught the train to 125th Street.

The station house is on 126th Street, a block and a half west of Broadway. I walked there and wound up sitting at a metal desk in a room that was otherwise empty, except for a framed photo of the mayor on the wall over the desk. Above it, someone had taped up a headline cut from an American Express magazine ad: DO YOU KNOW ME?

They gave me a yellow pad and let me use my own pen, and I wrote out a sort of Reader's Digest version of my connection to Lia Parkman. I hadn't told Wentworth about my first meeting with the girl, or her initial suspicions of her cousin. Why add to the confusion? With that exception, my statement was reasonably complete. I read it over and signed it, and they told me I could go home.

There's an Episcopal church across the street from the Two-six, and if the doors had been open I might have gone in. Instead I went back to the subway entrance, then kept on going to La Salle and west for a block to Claremont. I didn't know which building was Lia's, but I didn't have to ask too many people before the sleepy-eyed attendant at a coin laundry pointed out the apartment house on the corner. I stood across the street and looked it over, a six-story brick cube with mock-Tudor trim. I didn't go in, didn't try to locate any of her roommates. An official investigation was in process, and I had no business getting in everybody's way. I just wanted a closer look, and I decided this was close enough.

I headed back to Broadway. There was a West African restaurant a few doors up La Salle, and I made a note to try it sometime. Meanwhile I thought of the Salonika, just two blocks away. I was hungry, I hadn't had anything but that one cup of coffee, and I could eat there as well as anywhere else, but I decided I didn't want to share my table with a ghost. I didn't blame myself for her death, I blamed the son of a bitch who'd killed her, but I couldn't help wondering whether the hand might have played out differently if I'd been a little firmer with her the previous afternoon.

And if I had, and if she'd told me in person what she later told my answering machine? Wouldn't she still have gone home, and wouldn't he still have paid her a visit? And wouldn't it have all come out the same?

I rode downtown and had my breakfast at the Morning Star.

When I got home there was a message to call Ira Wentworth, and this time I didn't shortcut the process by ringing Lia Parkman's cell phone. I called the precinct, and he answered his own phone. I told him he was putting in a lot of hours.

"I stayed at it pretty late last night," he said, "and I came in early this morning, because I wanted to see if I could goose the ME's office a little. I got the report. Injuries to the throat are consistent with a choke hold. Cause of death is definitely drowning, water in the lungs, et cetera. Blood alcohol is close to zero. Small amount of vodka in the stomach, unabsorbed into the bloodstream because she died so soon after ingesting it. He was being cute with the vodka, and it's three different kinds of a wrong note."

He'd been cute before, with the brass bolt he'd attached to the inside of Bierman's door.

"And you'll like this," he said. "Skin tissue on the face reveals traces of- and there's a chemical name a yard long I'm not even going to try to pronounce, but it's identified as a propellant frequently added to chemical Mace."

"That's how he took her down."

"Maced her and choked her," he said, "and then took her and drowned her. Must have been quick."

"And quiet."

"Well, it had to be quiet, with her roommates just a few yards away. Poor kid."

"She was on full scholarship," I said. "Taking a summer school course on the French Revolution."

"Maybe she had a classmate named Arden Brill. Wouldn't that be handy?"

But there was no Arden Brill. Wentworth called an hour later to tell me as much. There were no Brills at all registered at Columbia, none at NYU or CUNY or any other colleges he'd checked.

Phone directories for the city and the surrounding tristate area showed a fair number of Brills, about the same number proportionally as we'd found in the Manhattan book. None with Arden for a first name, though, and nothing close- no Alden, no Alton, no Auden. He had a couple of officers on the phones, working their way through the Brills, trying to find an Arden Brill. It was a thankless task, stupefyingly dull, and he didn't expect it to yield anything useful.

"He made up a name," he said, "and she passed it on, and got killed for it. It proves one thing, though it wouldn't prove it in court."

"Oh?"

"Proves you were right about the Hollanders. Case never should have been closed, though you can see why they closed it."

I asked if he was going to try to get it reopened.

"Call up somebody I don't know and tell him he fucked up? That's no way to win friends and influence people."

"It might help get police protection for Kristin Hollander."

"The cousin. You think she needs it?" He answered his own question. "Both parents and a cousin, I guess somebody ought to keep an eye on her. Reminds me, she's on my list of people I'd better talk to."

"Has she been notified?"

"Not by me. Next of kin's her mother, and nobody's been able to reach her yet. Roommate ID'd the body."

"I'll notify Kristin," I said, "and I'll tell her to expect to hear from you."

"Appreciate it."

"And not to open the door for anybody else."

"I'll make sure I'm the one contacts her," he said. "And as far as reopening the case, for now all I want to concentrate on is getting this guy. Once he's good for Parkman, we can add the Hollanders to his tab."

"Plus two in Brooklyn."

"Yeah, I forgot those. What's that come to, five in all? He's beginning to look like a poster boy for the death penalty, but I wouldn't count on it. Still, five life sentences should keep him on ice for a while. Now if only we had some idea who he is and where to find him."

"You'll find him," I said. "He's good, but he's too cute to stay hidden."

"You know," he said, "I got the same feeling myself. There's one more thing he did, besides the vodka bottle."

"What's that?"

"Well, you gave her your card, didn't you? Your business card?"

"Yes."

"And she must have had it out to dial your number. So where is it?"

"Gone, I gather."

"And it didn't walk off by itself. One more thing to confirm what we already know, which is that she didn't just slip beneath the water's surface and drown of her own accord. Of course there's something else it tells us."

"What's that?"

"Well, he picked up the card. He knows who you are."

Kristin hadn't looked at a paper or listened to the news, so I got to tell her that her cousin was dead. It might have been gentler in person, but I was more interested in saving the time it would take to get from my place to hers. So I didn't see her face when I gave her the news.

"He tried to make it look like accidental death," I said, "but he didn't do a very good job of it, and there's a damn good cop running the investigation. His name's Ira Wentworth, and he'll be in touch with you."

"He'll want to talk to me?"

"Definitely."

"But I don't know anything," she said. "What can I tell him that he doesn't already know?"

Probably nothing, I allowed, but he'd want to establish that for himself. I told her he might be getting someone higher up to authorize police protection for her, and that she should accept a police guard if he offered it. "I don't think you're in danger," I said, "but I didn't think your cousin was in danger, either, and it turned out I was wrong. In the meantime, I don't want you to open your door to anyone but me or Detective Ira Wentworth." I described him, and told her to make sure he showed some ID in that name. "And can you screen your calls? I'd advise you to do that, if only to avoid the press. It's a miracle they haven't learned yet that Lia was your cousin, but they'll get the word before long, and they'll start calling and turning up on your doorstep. Don't talk to them and don't answer the door."

"I won't."

"I mean it, Kristin. It's not just that they'll upset you and waste your time. There's also the fact that one of them could be the man who killed your cousin."

"And my parents."

"Yes."

"I won't let anyone in. Oh."

"What?"

"Well, I'm expecting someone this afternoon."

"Who?"

"His name's David Hamm. He's the man who gave me the ride home the night I found… the night it happened."

He'd waited at the curb, making sure she got in all right.

"It couldn't be him," she said, anticipating my thought, "because he was there all evening, at my friend's house. And the police investigated him thoroughly before they found the two dead bodies in Brooklyn."

"Whose idea was it for him to come over this afternoon?"

"Well, he called. I invited him. He called once before, after the funeral, all concerned, and…"

Her voice trailed off. I said, "Call him now and tell him something's come up, you won't be home, you can't have company."

"All right."

"If he calls back, don't take the call, and don't return it."

"But… all right."

"Call him now, and then call me back."

"All right."

He was probably perfectly all right. He couldn't have been in two places at one time, and the police would have checked him inside and out during the early stages of the investigation. I didn't give a damn. I didn't want him getting close to her, him or anybody else.

I was just starting to wonder what was taking so goddam long when the phone rang and she said it was all taken care of, and was there anything else?

"Yes," I said. "As a matter of fact, there is. Do you know anyone named Arden Brill?"

" Arden Brill."

"Yes. Does the name ring a bell?"

"No, should it?"

"Did anyone ever get in touch with you, recently or in the past, with the explanation that he was doing a doctoral dissertation on your mother?"

"On my mother?"

"On her writing."

"Gosh, no," she said. "I can't imagine that anyone would. I mean, she was serious about her work, and I think she was a fine writer, but she wasn't important to the extent that anyone would write a thesis about her."

"But someone could have been interested in her work."

"Well, sure. I mean, she was an interesting writer, so why wouldn't people be interested?"

"Could you see if she had any correspondence from Arden Brill?"

"Is that who- "

"I don't think he exists," I said, "but I think that's one name that he used."

"I could check her files," she said. "She filed all her correspondence in a cabinet in her studio, and there's a pile of miscellaneous papers, and I could go through those. And I could check her computer, too, and see if his name comes up. First name A-R-D-E-N, last name B-R-I-L-L? I'll call and let you know if I find anything."

I'd tried T J a couple of times earlier but he was out. The second time I remembered to try him on his cell phone- it's never the first thing I think of- and it rang unanswered. I took another shot when I got off the phone with Kristin, and this time he picked up right away.

He already knew about Lia. He'd been on the Columbia campus, and there were a lot of conflicting stories going around- that she was the latest victim of the man the tabloids had dubbed the Dorm Rapist, that she had killed herself, that the boyfriend of one of her roommates had killed her accidentally in some sort of rough sex play involving water.

"The last part's right," I said. "The part about the water." I filled him in, then asked if he was home.

"You just called me," he said, "and I picked up. Where else I gonna be?"

"You could be anyplace," I said. "I called you on your cell phone, didn't I?"

"Oh," he said. "So you did."

"I think I did, but I suppose- "

"No, must be you did," he said, " 'cause here I be, talkin' on it."

"You didn't answer when I tried you before."

"Had the sound turned off when I was in the classroom. Professors get all hinky when they're in the middle of a sentence and some fool's phone goes off."

"But you're home now. Don't go anywhere, I'm on my way over."

"Can't wait."

"Force yourself," I said. "And while you're waiting, start looking for Arden Brill."

There was an Alden Brill in Yreka, California, and an Arlen Brill in Gadsden, Alabama, and their names popped up without much effort on his part. I was impressed, but he frowned and shook his head.

"Ain't gonna find him this way," he said. "Even if we do, we don't be findin' nothin'. This ain't about some dude flew in from California an' killed a bunch of people. Guy we lookin' for is homegrown."

"That's true, but- "

"An' his name ain't Arden Brill, neither."

"Still," I said, "it's a place to start, and it's all we have."

He was nodding. "What you said before," he said, "that Elaine said. Why'd he pick a name like Arden Brill?"

"That's the question."

"Maybe that's where we ought to go."

"How?"

"Let's see something," he said, bending over the keyboard. "This here'll take a minute. Y'all just talk amongst yourselves."

I put the TV on but muted it so the sound wouldn't distract him. When I found myself trying to read Judy Fortin's lips I gave up and turned it off. I reached for a magazine and got one called MacAddict, which wasn't, as I might have guessed, for people who filled up regularly on Happy Meals and Egg McMuffins, but for users of Macintosh computers. I was trying to find an article I could make head or tail out of when he said, "Arden Brill."

"You found something?"

"Coulda called himself Abe," he said, " 'less he thought it was too ethnic. Or AA, only then you'd likely go lookin' for him at a meetin'."

"What are you talking about?"

" 'Bout Arden Brill. Could called himself Carl Young, an' then we never woulda got nowhere 'cause we never woulda knowed how he spelled it. You don't see what I'm sayin', do you?"

"Not a clue."

"Thing is," he said, "I heard the name Brill, an' I knew it was familiar. But there's this Steven Brill, started Court TV and all."

"I think we can rule him out."

"Yeah, well I know that. But there was another Brill naggin' at my mind, but 'tween Steve an' Arden I couldn't get him sorted out. An' when I typed in Brill on Google I got about a million hits, and most of 'em had to do with Contentville, which is this Web site he started. Steven Brill, I'm talkin' about."

"And?"

"Let me print this out," he said, "and you can read it for yourself."

"If it's as crystal-clear as this magazine- "

"No," he said, tapping keys. "It's real simple. You'll see."

He switched on the printer, and in less than a minute a sheet of paper scrolled into the tray. He picked it up and handed it to me.

I read:

BRILL, Abraham Arden, 1874-1948. Born in Austria, came to United States alone at age 13, resided in New York City. Graduated NYU 1901, MD Columbia University 1903. Studied in Switzerland with Carl Jung, returned to US in 1908. An early and outspoken advocate of psychoanalysis, Brill was one of the first to translate Freud and Jung into English, and did much to make their theories accessible in the United States. He taught for years at NYU and Columbia; publications include Psychoanalysis, Its Theories and Application (1912) and Fundamental Conceptions of Psychoanalysis (1921).

"Could be a coincidence," he said.

"No."

"You still see his books on reading lists. That's what rang a bell. Arden, though, that kept the penny from dropping. It's usually A. A. Brill, or Abraham Brill."

He'd dropped the hip-hop speech patterns, and sounded like someone who'd know about Freud and Jung, and Abraham Brill.

I said, "It's not a coincidence."

"It really couldn't be, could it?"

"He picked the name because it meant something to him, and he was confident it wouldn't mean anything to her."

"To Lia, you mean."

"No one else was ever supposed to hear the name. He went to Lia's dorm and killed her to keep her from repeating it. He was too late, but not by much. 'Arden Brill' were two of the last words she ever spoke."

"Good thing you had your machine on."

"If I'd been home to take the call- "

"Good thing you weren't."

"How do you figure that?"

"Because she'd have said she thought of something, that it might be important. And you'd have said, 'No, not over the phone, I'll meet you in twenty minutes at the Salonika.' Only you'd have been waiting a long time at that restaurant, because she'd be floating in the bathtub, and you never would have heard the name Arden Brill."

I thought about it, agreed it was possible.

"Or," he said, "she hears your voice, and she gets flustered and hangs up."

"She could just as easily have hung up on the answering machine."

"But she didn't," he said.

"If I'd questioned her a little more intensively at the Salonika- "

"Maybe she'd have said then and there."

"Maybe."

"And maybe not," he said. "Maybe she'd have clammed up tight, and not made a phone call later, because of how hard you pressed her."

"Maybe."

"And he would have shown up right on schedule," he went on, "and she'd be just as dead as she is now, same as if we never even made the call and went up there yesterday in the first place. This way we got a name, Arden Brill, and otherwise we wouldn't have a thing."

"Arden Brill," I said.

"Figure it's him?"

"It pretty much has to be."

"Yeah," he said. "I guess."

"I suppose," I said, "when you turn around and take a good long look at it, it all becomes very obvious. But I was right in the room with the son of a bitch and it never even occurred to me. For Christ's sake, it was his gun. The son of a bitch used his own gun!"