Chapter 4 Friday, 12 June 2026
‘Don’t touch her!’ Ms Renee Caldwell, Prescott Academy’s Head of School, stood over Madison’s body, ushering Hannah and the rest of the crowd back.
She was in her mid-sixties now, and stately as ever.
Thick, silver hair flowed down the back of her deep maroon gown, and her lips were stained to match.
She opened her clutch, then frowned and turned to Bash.
‘I assume there is a landline you can use to call the police?’
‘Right.’ Bash spun on his heel and shoved through the crowd towards the bar. His face was impassible.
The hook by the door, where the velvet bag of phones and other devices had previously hung, was now bare.
Someone had stowed their electronics neatly away.
Hannah’s gaze flew to the ceiling, checking the corners – no cameras either.
The club’s motto floated once again through her mind.
Privacy, preserved. Convenient, now that there had been a murder on the premises.
Madison DuPont was dead. And judging by the vomit leaking from her lips, it seemed without question that she had been poisoned. The Queen is Dead. The gala was now a tragedy, the Lenox Club a crime scene.
Elle Harrington was on her knees, as close to Madison’s body as Ms Caldwell would allow, sobbing.
In the library, Theo had his arm wrapped around Alex DuPont’s slim shoulders.
Madison’s younger brother stood stick-straight, his gaze seemingly locked on the stained-glass windows, a Victorian design featuring a dizzying kaleidoscope of golds and royal blues and forest green.
Bruno Alvarez and Ethan Astor, Madison’s one-time devotees who had split up long ago, had reunited – not romantically, but in shared purpose.
The pair scoured the area near the front door, behind the reception desk and under the bar, presumably in search of the missing bag of phones.
The Lenox Club’s butler, conveniently, seemed to have abandoned his post. Perhaps he was currently securing their devices behind lock and key in a back room of the club.
Some guests stood in shocked silence, eyes locked on the corpse of their fallen classmate.
Others had found seats in the lounge and shared in hushed conversations, heads bent together over small marble tables, vases of lilies pushed aside.
In a deep leather wingback chair by the fireplace, Alice St Clair, who Hannah remembered as one of Madison’s many hangers-on in their senior year, sat quietly weeping into a fistful of LC monogrammed napkins.
She was mousy as ever, but had put on weight since high school, and her already sharp nose and chin appeared especially pointy and furtive protruding from her full, pink face.
Several of the Prescott teachers in attendance combed through the crowd, handing out bottles of Acqua Panna from behind the bar and sharing comforting words with shell-shocked alumni.
Hannah spotted Ms Clara Briar, her former AP Biology teacher, and Mr Paul Harris, her one-time senior seminar leader, among the faculty conducting impromptu wellness checks.
Fascinating that even in times of tragedy, everyone assumed their roles.
As Mr Harris approached Alice with a bottle of spring water and a clean bar towel, Hannah met his gaze.
He gave her a small, warm smile, but his eyes were glassy.
He, too, looked on the verge of tears. With a nod, he turned to Alice and pressed the towel into her hands in exchange for her wad of napkins.
Gratefully, she buried her face in the dry cloth.
‘Where’s Winslow?’ Hannah muttered to Oliver Morgan, who had elbowed his way to her side.
He was dressed in flashy, emerald green D&G tuxedo pants, which Hannah suspected he’d picked to intentionally clash with the club’s dark oxblood and forest green décor.
The matching tux jacket hung carelessly from the back of a nearby chair.
The collar on his dress shirt had been popped, and the top two buttons were undone, displaying a diamond chain.
His feet were clad in black velvet slippers, his eyes framed in bright orange Tom Fords.
As he’d matured post high school, Oliver had leaned hard into the ‘Euro or gay?’ paradigm, but the truth was neither.
Oliver was proudly pansexual, and he was killing it as a lifestyle influencer.
His mid-twenties look projected loudly that old money New York could get bent.
‘Slipped out during the speeches,’ he said. ‘Guess supporting Madison isn’t Henry’s forte.’
‘So he doesn’t know she’s dead?’
Oliver shrugged. ‘Someone should probably call him.’
Hannah looked to the bar. Bash was still on the club’s one landline, presumably with the police.
She looked again to the empty hook by the door, then to Bruno and Ethan, who had retreated to a table in the dining room where everyone was meant to be on their second course by now.
They sat in a pair of elegant dining chairs with upholstered ivory seats, not talking.
The butler had returned and was now peering through the tiny peephole in the front door.
‘Can we get our phones back?’ Hannah shouted in his direction.
Her voice disappeared into the din.
She began to shove her way through the crowd. ‘Excuse me? Where are our phones?’
Just then, the butler stepped back, opening the club’s front door with a practised flourish.
In walked a man and woman in pressed grey suits and navy ties, flashing gold badges.
They were followed by four uniformed officers.
Bringing up the rear was a tall woman in black slacks and a black windbreaker sporting a logo Hannah recognised as belonging to the Medical Examiner’s Office. The NYPD had arrived.
The uniformed officers ushered the crowd back while the medical examiner and detectives made their way to Madison’s body. A cold hand slipped into Hannah’s, and she started. Ami stood beside her, goosebumps raised across her arms.
‘This just got really real.’ Ami’s voice was strained.
‘Sure fucking did.’ Hannah stood on tiptoe, trying to get a look at what the detectives were doing, but the hallway where Madison’s body lay had been taped off, and two of the officers were hanging a black curtain from the ceiling with heavy silver tape, closing off the scene.
In the minutes that followed, a team of paramedics arrived, and Bash attempted to keep the mood light by setting up an alumna from the class of 1962 at the baby grand and getting behind the bar with his bartenders, taking orders.
Drinks flowed. The club filled with nervous chatter while the detectives and medical examiner worked.
Twenty minutes later, the makeshift curtain had been taken down, and the paramedics wheeled Madison’s sheet-covered body out on a stretcher. The medical examiner walked beside them, mouth set in a hard line.
The room fell silent. Guests stepped out of the way, and three members of the waitstaff rushed to move tables aside and clear a path through the lounge. Suddenly, Elle lurched forward, towards the stretcher, and grasped at the sheet draped over her best friend’s body.
‘You can’t just take her!’ she gasped. ‘I didn’t even get to say goodbye. I need—’
‘Elle.’ Alex was beside her then, taking her firmly by the shoulders and silently imploring the uniforms to stand down. ‘They can’t leave her body here. You need to let them do their job.’ His voice was surprisingly steady for a man who had just lost his only sister.
Elle turned, sobbing, and buried her head in Alex’s shoulder. Hannah’s eyes were fixed on the stretcher. Where Elle had disturbed the sheet, Madison’s left hand was visible. The giant diamond in her engagement ring flashed garishly in the club’s amber lights.
Elle allowed herself to be guided to a high-backed armchair in the library.
Alex propped her feet on a velvet footstool, and the paramedics resumed their short journey across the club.
Then the stretcher was through the door, and the butler made quick work of latching the two locks and securing the deadbolt.
One of the uniformed officers nodded to the butler, dismissing him, then took up his station at the door. Were they being locked in?
‘Excuse me.’ The two homicide detectives had made their way to the front of the bar. Following some throat clearing and hand clapping, the entire crowd – guests and staff – pressed into the lounge.
‘I’m Detective Raina Wellesley,’ said the first detective, a petite woman with pale skin and buttery yellow hair drawn back in a neat clasp.
‘And this is my partner, Detective Randall Crews. We’re with the 19th Precinct, and over the next few hours, we’ll be asking for your co-operation in our initial investigation into the murder of your fellow alumna, Madison DuPont. ’
‘She was definitely murdered then?’ asked a young alum in a Dior gown with a massive tulle skirt. ‘Like, someone here killed her?’
‘We are treating this as a homicide investigation,’ said Detective Crews. He was Black, stocky and muscular, with a neatly trimmed moustache and wire-rimmed glasses. Like his partner, he appeared to be in his late thirties or early forties.
The lounge filled with gasps, as if this was new information. Obviously, Madison had been murdered.
‘She was poisoned, right?’ All heads turned to face Theo Fitzgerald, who stood in the back, leaning against the arch separating the lounge from the dining room. ‘I mean, it sure looked like she’d been poisoned. Can you tell us that?’
The room erupted in chatter then, everyone demanding more information from the detectives. Bash shouldered his way to the front, shouting for everyone to be quiet.
Detective Crews cleared his throat.
‘The medical examiner’s findings are, at this point, preliminary. As this is an active investigation, I’m afraid we can’t discuss the cause of death, but we are treating Ms DuPont’s death as suspicious.’