„You’re one to talk,“ said Robin Duffy. „When Kathy was eleven years old, she cleaned you out once a week.“ He turned his wide smile on Nedda. „Poor litde kid. She used to list to one side with the weight of all of Edward’s money in her pockets. And Lou laughed so hard he cried.“

The doctor ignored this. „Charles, did you know that Nedda’s father saw the shoot-out between the cops and Two-Gun Crowly on West Ninetieth Street?“

„My father and thousands of other West Siders,“ said Nedda. „My grandfather was with him that day. He said the shoot-out went on for three hours. When Two-Gun Crowly gave up the fight, he still had a pistol stuffed in each sock.“

Rabbi Kaplan picked up the deck and dealt out the cards. „My father only took me to baseball games. I had no idea the Upper West Side could be so exciting.“

Nedda, Charles, Edward and Robin fell silent.

„What if the massacre started at the top of Winter House?“

„That’s not the way the cops figured it at the time.“ Riker stepped back from the cork wall to take in the reconstruction of his grandfather’s work. „But I think they got a lot of things wrong.“

He added more pages from the old man’s files. „Check this out. Granddad made these notes in an interview with the lead detective. This was right before Fitzgerald died of cancer. Now this was maybe ten, fifteen years after the murders. It helps if you know that Fitzgerald ruled out murder for hire. The lawyers told him that the uncle knew the terms of Edwina’s will twelve years before the massacre. James Winter always knew that he could never inherit. Well, that killed the only money motive. If there’s no adult who stands to gain, then who hired the hitman? That’s why the cops settled for a lunatic on a killing spree. Fitzgerald figured it this way. Stick Man starts on the first floor and works his way up. Then he runs out of steam when he gets to the nursery. Or maybe something scares him off before he can finish the job and kill the baby.“

„But your grandfather always figured it was a pro. Why?“

„Fitzgerald’s theory hung on what the lawyers said. They’re the ones who killed the money motive. But Granddad never trusted lawyers.“

„Nine people. That’s a lot of killing, a lot of risk. Maybe Stick Man wasn’t working alone. Three generations of hitmen. What if there was a fourth – an up-and-comer?“

„A fledgling killer?“

Most of the poker chips were in neat stacks in front of Nedda Winter. „This is so embarrassing.“

Her comment was met with a chorus of encouragement. The other players had been so eager to teach her the game that they had helped her to beat them at every hand. Eventually she did manage to lose all the money back to them, but she had to fight them for the privilege.

The telephone rang, and Nedda glanced at her watch. „I’ll get it. I’m sure it’s forme.“

Four gentlemen rose to their feet as she left the room.

David Kaplan turned to Charles. „She’s a charming woman. How did you meet?“

Charles made a slight stumble in his mind. So many confidences to keep. „She sat next to me at a dinner party.“ That was the truth, was it not? Well, no. And now, he could feel the heat rising to his face, and how would the rabbi read this sudden blush?

David Kaplan’s head tilted to one side. He must find it odd and disconcerting to catch a friend in a lie. His beard framed a sweet smile, and his eyes were both forgiving and more, telling his host that he could only believe the best of him. David, the master of cryptic logic, had apparently deduced that honor must lie in the direction of falsehood – and the new player was not what she seemed.

Nedda returned to the table, saying with regret, „I have a hired car waiting for me downstairs. I’ll have to say good night. And thank you all. This was the most fun I’ve had in years.“

„Send the car away,“ said Charles, rising from his chair. „I’ll take you home.“

„No, no. You stay right where you are. I’ll be fine. We always use this driver. My niece has a car service.“

„Then I can at least walk you down to the street. I insist.“

When the apartment door had closed behind them, Charles said, „Maybe it’s unwise right now. I mean – hashing this out with your brother and sister. After what you’ve been through in the past few days – “

„I should’ve done this the day I came home. Don’t worry about me.“

Charles opened the door to the waiting car and handed Nedda into the backseat. And then he gave her a set of his house keys. „Promise you’ll come back tonight – no matter how late.“

He watched the taillights of the car disappear as it rounded the corner onto Houston, then turned back to see Mallory in shadow, leaning against the wall of the building.

„This is getting out of hand, Charles. Suppose you gave your house keys to a mass murderer?“

„You don’t expect me to believe that,“ he said. „You don’t.“

„I know she’s killed before.“

„Self-defense,“ he said. „And that man was a serial killer.“

„Nedda didn’t know that. And he wasn’t holding a weapon when he died. Could you stab an unarmed man in the heart? Could you even imagine it? I don’t think you could ever kill another human being. You’re just not made that way.“ She followed him inside the building, close on his heels, saying, „What’s Nedda made of? Don’t you wonder? Imagine her sticking that ice pick into a man’s chest. She ‘d have to be fast – no hesitation, one clean strike. No fear.“

„That’s enough.“ He walked past the elevator and opened the door to the stairwell.

„And she did it in the dark.“ Mallory climbed the stairs behind him, chasing words with pictures she planted in his head. „He never saw her coming for him.“ She followed him through the stairwell door and down the hall to his apartment. „And what about that man in the park last night? What if she’d killed him, too? Would we still be talking about self-defense?“ They stopped outside his door, but the poisoning went on relentlessly. „When we found her in the park, she had an ice pick in her pocket. Remember that, Charles.“

How could he forget – ever?

„Nedda will always be welcome in my house.“

Mallory looked as if he had struck her. „And I’m not. I’m just annoying you.“

Oh, no, on the contrary. He could never encounter Mallory without feeling a sudden lightness of the head, a fullness of the heart and a gang of birds fluttering inside his rib cage. He reached out to touch her, but his hand dropped back to his side. Never did they truly connect, and they never would, for his nature had made him incapable of two things for a certainty: he could never kill a human being, and he could not tell this woman that he would love her until he died.

How sad was that?

The door to his apartment opened.

„Finally!“ A grinning Robin Duffy took Mallory by the arm and pulled her inside. „Edward’s winning streak is back. You have to stop him, Kathy. He’s murdering us.“

Lying on the floor, her head pressed to the wood, Bitty awakened to a shrill sound from the telephone receiver, an alarm to remind her that the phone was off the hook. Rags was running about in circles, shrieking to hold up his end of the conversation with this mechanical noise.

Bitty struggled to raise herself up to a sitting position, then cracked the bedroom door to listen for the sound of Aunt Nedda’s voice, but she was not there, not home yet. The other voices were growing more distant, fading off to another room with a door they could close for privacy.

Aunt Nedda, where are you?

Any more delay could cost dearly. If she closed her eyes one more time, she might never wake again.

Robin Duffy had found the only flaw in Mallory’s gift, a hole in one of the struts that branched out from the table’s pedestal. It had been drilled by the previous owner, a ship’s captain, so he could run a chain through the wood and secure the table in rough weather.