In for the Kill

52

An hour later, Quinn and Pearl met Fedderman in the cavernous lobby of the Meredith Hotel. Aside from poor acoustics, it featured lots of gray-veined marble and darkly polished paneling, a field of maroon carpet, and fern-adorned groupings of brown leather armchairs. You had to look closely to notice the fine cracks in the marble, patched areas of carpet, and that some of the armchairs were slightly worn. The ferns, which were artificial, looked new and not very much like ferns.

"She's not back yet," Fedderman said. He'd informed them by phone on the way over that Myrna Kraft, registered under her own name, wasn't in her room. "The desk clerk's going to give me a nod when she comes in."

Quinn glanced around the lobby. One of the elevators opened and a couple who looked like teenagers emerged and headed giggling for the street exit. Two elderly women were sitting in armchairs and talking on the far side near a closed shop that sold incidentals and travel supplies. The desk clerk, a slender African American man in advanced middle age and going bald unevenly, was standing and leafing through some papers. A uniformed bellhop lounged just inside the revolving-door entrance.

"Let's wait for her here, then let her go up to her room before we confront her," Quinn said.

The three of them sat in armchairs. Quinn's sighed and enveloped him seductively, and a nearby reading lamp warmed one side of his face. If he weren't so pumped up he might have fallen asleep.

"How long-" Pearl began impatiently, and was quiet as a tall, slim woman in tan slacks and blazer with a yellow blouse pushed in through the glass revolving door. Pearl noticed she wasn't wearing heels; she was simply tall. Her long arms swung freely and she wasn't carrying anything. Not even a purse.

Fedderman, who'd looked over at the desk clerk and gotten the nod, said, "That's her."

She didn't notice them among the almost-ferns as she strode past. Though she was well into her fifties, she moved with a natural grace that couldn't be taught in modeling school, and she had the kind of cheekbones and jawline that aged well. Her dark hair was slightly touched with gray. Her eyes were dark, deep, and widely set. Movie star eyes.

"Jesus!" Fedderman whispered.

Quinn and Pearl knew what he meant.

"She looks like the Butcher's victims," Pearl said. "The same type."

"Almost the same damned woman," Fedderman said. "If ever a serial killer was offing his own mother over and over…"

They watched as Myrna stood at the elevators and waited. She didn't seem at all nervous or on guard. Quinn guessed she hadn't seen or heard the news about her son Jeb being arrested.

When she'd entered the elevator and its door slid shut, the three detectives stood up.

"Room six-twenty," Fedderman said.

They crossed the lobby toward the elevators. The desk clerk was back to shuffling though his papers and didn't look up at them.

"He gonna warn her we're on our way?" Quinn asked Fedderman.

"Not unless she's got a third son. This isn't the kinda hotel where the policy is to warn clientele about the police."

Quinn wasn't so sure about that, but he let it go. Myrna Kraft probably wouldn't try to avoid them anyway, even if she knew they now had her identity and her son. She had the appearance of a woman who had never run from much of anything.

They rode the other elevator to the sixth floor. A maid pushing a linen cart with a squeaky wheel passed them with a shy, polite smile. Otherwise the carpeted hall was deserted.

Quinn knocked softly on the door to room six-twenty. Light behind the peephole changed, then the door opened, and Myrna Kraft looked out at them inquisitively.

He was surprised that she wasn't as tall as she'd appeared from across the lobby. It was an illusion because of the way she was built, her regal posture. There was something else about her, a kind of energy that was almost palpable, and her dark eyes were the kind that would hold whatever they were fixed on. Pearl thought that as a younger woman Myrna Kraft must have been quite something.

"Yes?" she said. In that single, drawn-out word was a trace of Southern accent.

"Myrna Kraft?" Quinn asked.

"I am."

"We're police, ma'am." Quinn showed her his shield, which she looked at carefully. Then she looked expectantly at the other two detectives, who also showed her their identification. Only then did she invite them inside. Quinn was hit with a faint acrid scent, almost like insecticide or disinfectant. The room was orderly and spotless. He remembered the maid in the hall.

"We have your youngest son, Jeb, in custody," he said, not mentioning that Renz had only promised he could detain Jeb a few more hours, with Pareta nipping, niggling, and threatening.

Something changed in Myrna's eyes, but you had to look closely and quickly to notice. A good actor, Quinn decided, like her son. Probably like both sons. Talent in the family.

"You have my son Jeb? Why? On what charge?"

"Murder." Quinn was still technically correct, still legal, until informed that the warrant was officially withdrawn.

Myrna didn't respond at all to his shock tactic. "That would be impossible. I know my son. Why, Jeb wouldn't harm anyone, much less take their very life." Laying on the southern charm now. The accent was still subtle, but what there was of it was pure molasses and used sparingly. She could turn it on and off. How much of Myrna Kraft was real?

Pearl and Fedderman remained silent, letting Quinn drive the conversation.

He decided to drive right over Myrna.

"Apparently you haven't seen the news lately."

"Tell you true, I'm usually not interested in the news. It's nothing but unpleasantness."

"Jeb Kraft is under arrest for the murders of six women, but the charges will be dropped. We know your oldest son, Sherman, is the killer."

She looked thoughtful rather than alarmed, and took a few steps back then sat down hard in the wooden chair that matched a small desk.

"That can't be."

"But it is, and you knew it before we walked in here."

She aimed her wide-set eyes at Quinn, full wattage. "If we all know that, then why hasn't my Jeb been released?"

"He will be, Mrs. Kraft. His attorney's working out the technicalities."

"Attorney?"

"The court appointed one. She's looking after your son very competently."

"I'll take your word for that, Detective Quinn." She smiled. "You have an honest face."

"Faces can be deceptive," Pearl said.

Myrna turned her head slightly and stared at Pearl. Faces might be deceptive, but Pearl thought the message in Myrna's eyes was clear. It was a kind of detached hatred remote from any kind of empathy, much less mercy; the exterminator observing the insect. It made Pearl's flesh break out in goose bumps.

I slept with this woman's son.

"We know about Sherman's time in the swamp, and your disappearance after he was found," Quinn said. "We know quite a bit about Sherman."

"Not enough to find him, to stop him. You don't know him like his own mother does, Detective Quinn."

"Maybe I know him better."

He thought he might get a rise out of her, but she remained calm. "I do doubt that. Blood ties are the strongest, you know, especially between mother and child."

"Jeb told us about how you and he came to New York, and how he dogged the investigation into Sherman's murders."

Another glance at Pearl with those deep, dark eyes. Maybe a shadow smile. Myrna looked again at Quinn. "You know a lot, but not enough to apprehend my darling boy."

"Why did you desert your darling boy?" Pearl asked, before she might gag. She knew Quinn was supposed to be controlling this interview, but she couldn't stay silent.

Quinn's cell phone beeped. Everyone stared at him as he fished it from his pocket, as if the noise had interrupted a Broadway hit. He saw that it was Renz who was calling.

"Excuse me." He walked toward the far side of the room as he answered the call, keeping his voice low. "What is it, Harley?"

"You made contact yet with the mother?"

"Yes." Quinn moved closer to the window that looked out at an air shaft. Old brick, lots of recent tuck-pointing.

"Okay, can she hear you?"

"Somewhat."

"Jeb Jones has been sprung. Pareta went on a tear and made us drop charges so he could walk."

"Figures."

"Best we could do without evidence, not to mention that he's most likely innocent. Why I called is, I had him tailed and he's making a beeline for Mom. My man called just before I contacted you and said Jeb was getting out of a cab and about to enter the Meredith Hotel."

"Okay, I'll take care of it tomorrow. I'm busy on another matter now."

"I hired you because you're such a nifty liar," Renz said, and hung up.

Quinn folded his phone and slipped it back in his pocket.

And there was a knock on the door.

"Busy, busy," Pearl said.

They watched Myrna go to the door and open it about six inches. "I don't think-"

But an agitated Jeb pushed his way inside.

When Jeb saw the three detectives his jaw dropped, but he recovered his composure nicely. "You don't have to talk to them, Mother."

Myrna ran her fingertips gently down his upper arm and smiled. "I'm afraid I do, Jeb. We both do." Her brow knit in sudden concern. "Did they hurt you anywhere?"

Pearl waited for her to wink, but she didn't.

"No, Mother. They followed the rules."

"We interrupted you," Quinn said to Myrna.

Jeb spread his feet, crossed his arms, and stared at the floor. Fedderman was the only one sitting down, on the edge of the bed. His arms were at his sides, his palms helping to support him on the soft mattress. His loosened right cuff was pinned beneath his hand.

"I was explaining about Sherman," Myrna said. To Jeb: "You might as well hear."

Jeb didn't look at her. She faced Quinn, her main inquisitor, and began:

"When Sherman was a boy he liked to spend time in the swamp, right near where we lived. From time to time he'd come home with dead things."

"He hunted?" Quinn asked.

"Sometimes, but other times he'd just find things already dead. For some reason he liked to dismember them. Tell you true, it gave me the creeps, but I told myself it might be natural boy curiosity, like maybe he'd grow up to be a doctor. The thing he'd do was cut up these creatures in the bathtub, then clean their parts real well and kind of stack them up, doing the same things to them that Butcher killer does. I'd already told Jeb about Sherman, about him doing this, and when we saw on the news about the Butcher, we both knew it had to be Sherman, all grown up."

"Detective Kasner asked why you deserted Sherman," Quinn reminded her in a neutral tone.

"I didn't desert him. I was talking to him about what he was doing to those animals, why he even wanted to do such a thing, and he attacked me with his skinning knife. I managed to fight him off and he ran away into the swamp. I didn't know what to do. Didn't want to contact the sheriff's department, knowing he might do harm to Sherman."

"What about Sherman doing harm to somebody else?" Pearl asked.

"I didn't think he would. Far as I knew, I was the only person he ever attacked. I decided to wait, a few days if necessary. I kept a shotgun nearby and didn't sleep for two nights. Then it became three days, and I knew it was too late to contact the law because they'd have too many questions. Sherman knew the swamp and I figured he'd be okay for quite a while there, but when a week had gone by, I gotta say I figured him for dead."

"Didn't you go looking for him yourself?" Pearl asked.

Myrna shook her head no. "Nothing didn't wanna be found in that swamp ever got found. Besides, Sherman took the knife with him when he ran." Myrna drew a deep breath and touched her fingers to her eyes as if they were tearing up, but no tears were evident. "About a month passed, and I saw on the TV news that Sherman had been found. They were calling him the Swamp Boy, didn't know who he was, and he was traumatized, they said, and wouldn't speak. I decided I'd keep my silence, just like Sherman. But next night on TV news they showed a photo of him, and even wild-looking like he was, I knew somebody'd surely recognize him." She glanced at Jeb now, and maybe those were tears glistening in her dark eyes. "Tell you true, I was pregnant by a man who'd recently deserted me. I wanted that child to have a chance in life, so I ran. I admit I panicked, but thinking back it mighta been the best thing I coulda done. I moved to Courtney, Louisiana, got a waitress job, and sacrificed for Jeb. I don't regret a second of that time." Jeb was looking at his mother now, his own eyes moist. "My boy Jeb was bright as a new dime, a scholar, and 'cause he was a brilliant student he went to the best schools even if I only made a poor working woman's wages."

"What about Sherman?" Quinn asked.

"I never knew. Tell you true, I made it a point to avoid watching or reading the news entirely in those Louisiana days. Never learned a thing about his whereabouts nor whether he recovered his memory. Far as I was concerned, that time was past. I had to look ahead, for myself and for Jeb. But I knew I'd hear about Sherman someday, and when I just happened to look at a New York paper in a store near a motel in Louisville, right there on the front page was a story about the Butcher, about what he did to his victims. I knew it had to be Sherman, so I phoned Jeb and told him everything. We decided the two of us best come to New York and try to find Sherman before you people did. We were gonna try to stop him from what he was doing and have him give himself up."

"Why?" Quinn asked simply.

Myrna stared at him as if he must be insane to ask the question. "He's my own flesh and blood."

"He's also police business."

"Blood's much more important than business."

"Not if that business is to keep more of it from being shed."

"You are twisting my words, sir."

She bowed her head and the tears came, dropping and leaving trailing marks on the front of her yellow blouse. Pearl wondered if Myrna could will herself to cry; Pearl had seen people who could.

Jeb moved over and stood close to his mother, making cooing sounds, and very near tears himself. The doting son. He lovingly put his arm around Myrna, then hugged her and rocked her gently.

Pearl remembered that same arm around her and shuddered.

Unmoved by the scene before him, Quinn wondered what the Butcher would think when he learned his mother was in town.