Chapter Forty
Present
There was a woman coming up from the gardens.
She had on running shorts and a T-shirt, her short salt-and-pepper hair tied back at the nape of her neck.
Detective Church watched her from the top of the terrace as she ascended the steps.
She had AirPods in, so she didn’t notice him until she was almost to the top and just a few feet away.
“Detective Church,” she said pleasantly enough, though she looked slightly puzzled to see him. Her forehead was sweaty, and she was out of breath.
“Mrs. Towers,” he said.
“Please,” she said, “you can call me Elena.”
“Elena,” he said.
“Are you looking for my husband?” she asked. “I believe he’s up at the house.”
“Actually, I was looking for you.”
“Me?” Elena asked, sounding surprised.
“I’ve been looking for you for quite a long time, actually,” Church said. “Or, should I say, I’ve been looking for Ana Rojas.”
He heard her breathing alter, but her face remained unchanged. He pulled a picture from inside the breast pocket of his jacket.
“This is you, is it not, sitting there next to Ransom, at table two?” Church said, holding the picture out to her.
Elena looked but didn’t move to take the photo from him.
“Would you like to sit down?” she asked. She raised a hand to shield her eyes from the bright sun and squinted at him. It was a hot and sunny day. “I’m parched, and if I don’t get out of this heat, I think I might pass out.”
“Lead the way,” Church said.
They settled at a table under a shaded part of the terrace. A maid brought them a giant pitcher of lemonade and two tall glasses full of ice.
“Did you grow up around here, Detective?” Elena asked as she poured him a glass.
“Not far,” Church said. “Just south, in Morro Bay.”
“Ah, so you’re familiar with the house, then?” Elena asked. “Of that feeling of looking up at it from a distance?”
Church nodded. “When I was a boy, I used to think that King Arthur and his knights lived here, in this castle on the hill.”
Elena chuckled. She poured a glass of lemonade for herself and took a sip, settled back into her chair.
“I can tell you it’s a completely different experience from the inside,” Elena said.
“There are leaky faucets and creaky stairs; sometimes, the toilets run. This house is just a house, however big it may be. And the people in it are just people. Skin and bone. Flawed, just like anybody else.”
“Did you know Ana Rojas?” Church asked. “The real Ana Rojas, I mean?”
“No, not really,” Elena said, setting down her glass. “She was a friend of a friend.”
“So she was aware you were impersonating her that summer, that you had taken her identity?”
“She was more than aware, Detective,” Elena said. “It was her idea.”
Church leaned forward in his seat. “What do you mean?” he asked.
“Well, it’s a funny story, really,” Elena said.
“Ana applied for this caretaker job as a summer gig, but when she got the request for the interview, she didn’t want to go.
She’d met a boy; he was in a band. Young love, you know?
” Elena said, waving her hand, as if all this were obvious.
“She wanted to spend the summer traveling with him, but her mother didn’t approve.
Ana still lived at home, you see. They were a very Catholic family.
So she came up with this idea to cover her absence, that someone else would go in her place.
My friend told me about her predicament, and I volunteered.
I needed a job that paid well. We struck up a deal. And the rest, as they say, is history.”
Elena took a sip of her drink.
“And when did Mr. Towers come to learn the truth?” Church asked.
“A few weeks before Saoirse’s party, I came clean to him,” Elena said. “We’d started to spend a lot of time together by then. We’d become quite close, and I felt guilty lying to him.”
“And how did he react when you told him that you weren’t who he thought you were?”
“He was upset at first. Shocked. But he eventually got past it.”
Church thought for a moment, considered this. “The night of the party,” Church went on, “did you go to Mr. Towers’s room then?”
“Yes,” Elena said without hesitating.
“At about what time?”
She bit her lip, looked around. “I don’t know,” she said. “After dinner, after the dancing had started.”
“Around ten o’clock?”
“Yes, that sounds right.”
“And what was the nature of your interaction that night?” Church asked. “In Mr. Towers’s room?”
Elena raised her eyebrows. “Really, Detective?” Elena said. She shifted in her chair. “We talked. We enjoyed each other’s company.”
“And when did you leave?”
Elena thought for a moment. “Late,” she said. “Maybe one or two in the morning.”
“So you weren’t with your husband the entire night?”
“No,” Elena said.
Church pondered this. “Did he seem off at all to you the next morning, when you saw him?” Church asked. “Was there anything unusual about his behavior?”
“Just what are you suggesting, Detective?” Elena asked.
“I’m not suggesting anything,” Church said. “I’m simply asking a question.”
“No,” Elena said. “Nothing seemed unusual about his behavior. He seemed tired, agitated. He didn’t care for large social events, and he’d taken great care to make sure the evening had been perfect.
He had more duties to carry out that morning before everyone left.
It drained him. Everything seemed perfectly within the realm of normal. ”
“And what of his appearance?” Church asked. “Were there any scrapes, cuts, or bruises on his arms or face? Any odd abrasions?”
Elena laughed. “Detective Church, do you think I would marry someone I thought was a murderer?” She leaned forward.
“You don’t know my husband’s character as I do,” she said.
“Despite what people may say or what the public perception of him may be, he is a good man. An ethical man. He feels things very deeply. He is steadfast and loyal. He would never harm his sister. Ever. And that’s the end of it.
Whatever happened to Saoirse, my husband had nothing to do with it. ”
Church’s phone rang in his pocket.
“I apologize,” Church said. “I thought I’d shut this off.” He pulled out his phone and went to silence it, but when he saw the name on his screen, he paused. “Excuse me, just one moment,” he said to Elena. “I have to take this.”
Elena watched Detective Church get up from the table and move a little way off, the phone pressed to his ear, his voice too low for her to make out. His forehead creased, and at one point she heard him mutter, “Jesus Christ.” A few minutes later, he returned to the table, looking rattled.
“Everything all right, Detective?” Elena asked.
Church put his phone back in his pocket and rubbed his chin. “That was Detective Leland,” he told her. “He’s just identified the second body.”
Elena’s eyebrows shot up. “Really? That’s wonderful,” she said. “Who is it?”
“I’m afraid I can’t say—not just yet, anyway,” Church said. “Thank you for your time, Elena,” he went on. “I appreciate your candor, but there’s one more person I need to speak with before I go.”
“My husband?” Elena asked, already scooting back her chair. “Shall I go get him?”
“No,” Church said. “I’d like to speak with Florence Talbot.”