A Farewell to Yarns

hour to make sure he was sound asleep, then I went over there. I knew my way around the house from helping take care of the old lady who used to live there. I almost went into the wrong room, but the boy was talking in his sleep, so I knew he had the big suite. I went in the small bedroom and killed her with a knife I’d picked up in the kitchen. I had one of my own with me, but I didn’t want to use it.“ She leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes for a long moment. The only sound in the room was her breathing.
    “Did you tell your husband what you’d done?“ Mel asked.
    “Tell Richie? No, of course not!“
    “What about the boy? Bobby. Did you kill him, too?”
    Fiona nodded. “I didn’t want to. At first I didn’t think it was necessary. Richie said the woman told him she’d never revealed to the boy who his father was. I thought that was probably true, but I couldn’t be sure.”
    Jane shivered. Fiona was talking in a bleak but rational tone, as if they were discussing something serious but mundane, like the house needing a new roof.
    “But then,“ Fiona went on, “then he started playing the music. It was all Richie’s songs. Everybody thought he was just being a nuisance, but it was a message. I knew what it meant. He was saying that he knew who he was and who Albert was, and he was going to blackmail us. Richie had been so happy to find out that he had a son, but the son had no feelings for him at all. He—he was a blackmailer. He called after the police made him turn the music off and asked Albert if he’d heard it. I was on the extension, but they didn’t know. He said he wanted to see Richie the next day and talk about an ‘allowance.’ That’s what he called it. Richie was crushed. Absolutely crushed. So I called the boy back that night and told him Albert would meet him at the mall.“
    “Is that what you husband told you to do?“
    “No, he didn’t know I’d done it. Why do you keep asking me if he knew? I didn’t tell him anything. I took the same knife, and I got there early. He’d been drinking again, fortunately. I could smell it on him. If he hadn’t, I don’t think I could have surprised him so easily. I killed him.”
    Mel frowned. “If you’d like to get your coat, I’ll have to take you in, Mrs. Howard. Once again, you understand that this tape will be entered in evidence at the trial—”
    Fiona stood up. “There won’t be a trial. I’m telling you I’m guilty. You don’t have to prove anything. Nobody has to know why I did it.“
    “You can’t continue to protect your husband’s real identity,“ Mel said.
    “Oh, yes I can. That’s why I killed two people. I’d have killed twenty if it was necessary. Richie hated the slavering fans, the vultures, the mobs that wanted to pick him apart. Do you know—once, when he was Richie Divine, he went to arestroom in a hotel. Some horrible man rushed in and mopped up the urinal with a sponge and sold bits of the sponge. She shuddered with disgust. “I’d do anything to protect him from going back to being that kind of public figure. I’ve confessed. That’s all you need, a confession. You have no reason to stage a circus for the press. I’d like to pack a few things. May I go upstairs and get them?“
    “Yes. Do you want Mrs. Jeffry to help you?”
    Fiona’s spirit reasserted itself for a second. “No, I think Mrs. Jeffry has already done quite enough.”
    Mel cast Jane a quick sympathetic look and spoke again to Fiona. “By the way, I have men posted on all sides of the house. Don’t think about escaping.”
    She smiled at him as if she pitied him. “It wasn’t and isn’t my intention, Detective Van-Dyne. I’m fully prepared to pay the price for what I’ve done. I knew I might have to before I did it. Just so Albert doesn’t pay. It will only take me ten minutes or so to pack.”
    As soon as she was gone, Jane jumped up and rushed to the sliding door. Stepping outside, she took several long, deep breaths, trying to stave off the nausea that had been about to overcome her. Mel was with her in a second. “You’ll freeze to death out here.“
    “I hope so.”
    He led her to a patio chair and made her sit down on the hard, cold metal. “Put your head between your knees.“
    “I’m not going to faint.“
    “You’re sure?“ he asked. She nodded and watched as he pulled a small walkie-talkie unit out of his pocket and mumbled into it.
    The man’s a walking electronics store, she