New York Dead

Chapter 41

Frank Woodman was at his desk, dictating something into a recorder, but, when he saw Stone at the door, he waved him in. “How are you, Stone?” he said, pointing at a chair.

Stone sat down. “I’m fine, Frank. There’s something I want to ask you about.”

“First,” Woodman said, “there’s something I want to say to you, and I’m sorry I didn’t seek you out and say it sooner. Stone, only Bill Eggers, Charlotte Harkness, and I have seen that tape, and I’m the only one who knows you knew Cary Hilliard. I want you to know that it won’t go any further than that.”

Stone nodded. He couldn’t think of anything to say.

“You did a fine job for us, and I’m sorry the result had to cause you pain.”

“Thank you, Frank.”

“Enough said about that. What can I do for you?”

“I was wondering if you have the effects of Sasha Nijinsky that the NYPD took.”

“They sent them back to me a couple of weeks ago. After going through them myself, I sent them to Sasha’s father.”

“I see.”

“Why? Did you want to see them again?”

“Yes, I wanted to get a look at her handwriting again.”

“Why?”

Stone handed Woodman a copy of the letter.

Woodman read it through twice, and his expression revealed nothing. “What do you make of this?” he asked at last.

“I’m not entirely sure what to make of it. A friend of mine at the 19th Precinct is getting it looked at by the lab, but I wanted to compare the handwriting to something of Sasha’s.”

“That’s no problem,” Woodman said, rising and going to a file cabinet. “Sasha didn’t type. She told me once that she refused to learn, so that she wouldn’t get shunted aside into ‘woman’s’ work.” He flipped through a folder, extracted a letter, and handed it to Stone. “She did all her correspondence by hand.”

Stone laid the two letters side by side on the desk, and both men bent over them. Woodman produced a magnifying glass, and they examined them closely.

“They’re a lot alike, I’d say, but the one sent to you looks a little cramped,” Woodman said.

“The lines are not as straight, either,” Stone added.

“This is over my head,” Woodman said, picking up the phone. “Sophie, please find the name of that handwriting man we used on the mineral rights case last year, then see if you can get him over here right away.” He hung up. “When did you get this, Stone? It’s not dated.”

“Friday. It was posted the day before at Penn Station.”

“It must be some kind of crank who read your name in the papers as being associated with the case.”

“That seems more than just possible. Still, there’s the handwriting.”

“I suppose someone who knew Sasha might have had a letter of hers and used that to make a forgery.”

“But why?”

“Maybe someone who isn’t satisfied with the outcome of the case. A lot of people aren’t; I’m one of them. Maybe someone’s just trying to get you interested again.”

“The letter certainly had that effect,” Stone said.

The phone rang, and Woodman picked it up. “Good,” he said, then hung up. “Man’s name is Weaver. His office is only a couple of blocks away; he’s coming over.” Woodman looked uncomfortable for a moment. “Stone, I get the impression that you are at least considering the possibility that Sasha might still be alive. Is that right?”

“Yes,” Stone replied. “I think it’s just possible.” He explained the circumstances of Sasha’s fall and his terminal velocity theory.

“Jesus Christ,” Woodman said.

Weaver was a tall, thin man in his sixties. He looked at both letters carefully. Woodman had folded the letters so that the signatures did not show. “This is a Xerox copy, I presume,” he said, holding up Stone’s letter.

“Yes, I don’t have the original at the moment.”

“I’d like to see it, but it probably wouldn’t make much difference in my opinion.”

“What is your opinion, Mr. Weaver?” Woodman asked.

“I’d say there’s about an eighty percent chance that the same person wrote both letters.”

“Why can’t you be sure?” Stone asked.

“Well, the similarity in the shaping of the letters is pro-found, but there’s anomaly that could mean it’s a forgery. You see, here, the spacing in the more recent letter is closer; it has a cramped quality. Its lines aren’t as straight, either.”

“We noticed that,” Woodman said. “Could there be some other reason than forgery for the difference between the two letters?”

“Well, yes. The recent letter doesn’t have quite the vitality of style that the earlier one exhibits. That’s a common trait of forgeries, but it often turns up, too, when the writer is ill or injured or is convalescing.” Weaver held his right elbow close to his side and demonstrated. “A person who is weakened or in pain would characteristically hold his arm in like this, restricting the movement of his hand. This would especially be true in the event of injury – say, a broken arm or ribs. That could quite easily account for the cramped nature of the second letter.”

Stone and Woodman exchanged a look. Woodman raised his eyebrows.

Weaver continued. “In my experience, this characteristic of what you might call the ‘wounded writer’ would be more evident in the writing of a woman, but both these letters were, of course, written by a man.”

“By a man?” Stone asked, incredulously.

“In my opinion, yes; definitely,” Weaver replied.

“Anything else you can tell us?” Woodman asked.

“That’s about it, I think, though I would like to see the original of the second letter.”

Woodman escorted the man to the door. “Thank you, Mr. Weaver, and please send me your bill.” Woodman came back to his desk and sat down. “This is the goddamndest thing I ever heard,” he said.

“Frank, are you certain that Sasha, herself, wrote you this letter?”

Woodman went back to his file and extracted a small sheet of paper. “I watched her write this,” he said. “She was sitting where you are now.”

Stone picked up the paper. It was the address and phone number of Sasha’s new, Fifth Avenue apartment. He compared the note with the first letter, then the second. “The handwriting seems identical to me,” he said, handing Woodman the papers.

“Me, too,” Woodman said, poring over them.

“Now, why would Weaver think the writer was a man?”

“Well,” said Woodman, “for a lady, Sasha always had incredible balls.”

At home, Stone built a fire in the study, poured himself a drink, and stretched out on the leather sofa before the fireplace. He sipped the drink and cast his mind back over the events surrounding Sasha Nijinsky’s dive from the terrace, letting them run though his mind without hindrance, comparing one event with another, listening to fragments of conversation from people he had interviewed. Something nagged at him, something he should be remembering. The phone rang.

He reached out to the extension on the coffee table. “Hello?” he said.

“Hello.”

Stone tightened his grip on the phone. Images flew before his eyes – a breast, a wrist. He felt her body against his, her hair in his face, her legs locked around him, her mouth on his penis.

“I want to see you,” she said.

Stone wanted to speak, but his throat tightened.

“I want to see you tonight,” she said.

He made a huge effort to control himself, to make his voice work, to tamp down the rage and hurt inside him. It didn’t work. He hung up the phone.

He lay on the sofa through what should have been dinner, until past midnight, waiting for a knock on the door or another call. Neither came.