Jack had won the bet. I agreed that my eyes still looked tired, but insisted that it was because I had a headache, and not because I was so stressed. Instead of paying him one hundred trillion dollars, I took him to lunch at the coffee shop and bought him an ice cream cone for dessert. I kept on my dark glasses and told Jack the light hurt my eyes because of the headache. Did he believe me? I don’t know. I doubt it. He’s a smart and perceptive kid.
After that, we drove into Morristown. Jack had outgrown all his last year’s clothes, and really needed some new sweaters and slacks. Like most children, he didn’t think much of shopping so I stayed with the list of essentials that I had jotted down. What frightened me was that I realized I was anticipating not being with Jack. In case I’m arrested, he’d have these clothes.
We arrived home to find there were two messages on the phone. I tricked Jack into carrying his new clothes upstairs and putting them in his bureau “all by yourself.” As always, I was so afraid it was one of the Lizzie Borden messages awaiting me, but both were from Benjamin Fletcher, with instructions for me to call him immediately.
They are going to arrest me, I thought. They have my fingerprints. He’s going to tell me I have to turn myself in. I misdialed twice before I finally reached him.
“It’s Celia Nolan, returning your call, Mr. Fletcher,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm.
“First thing a client has to learn to do is to trust her attorney, Liza,” he told me.
Liza. With the exception of Dr. Moran in my early days of treatment, and the time Martin’s mind was wandering, I have not been called Liza since I was ten years old. I had always envisioned someone throwing the name at me unexpectedly, and ripping away my carefully constructed persona. The matter-of-fact way in which Fletcher said my name helped to reduce the shock that he knew who I was.
“I wasn’t sure whether or not to tell you yesterday,” I said. “I’m still not sure if I can trust you.”
“You can trust me, Liza.”
“How did you know it was me? Did you recognize me yesterday?”
“Can’t say that I did. Jeff MacKingsley told me about an hour ago.”
“Jeff MacKingsley told you!”
“He wants to talk to you, Liza. But first, I must be absolutely certain that if I allow you to do this, it will be in your best interest. Don’t worry, I’ll be there with you, but I’ll say it again, I am very concerned. He tells me that you left your fingerprints on a doorbell and on a car door where a dead body was found. And as I told you, he also knows you are Liza Barton.”
“Does that mean I am going to be arrested?” I could barely make my lips form the words.
“Not if I can help it. This is all very unusual, but the prosecutor tells me that he believes you had nothing to do with it. However, he does think you can help him find out who did.”
I closed my eyes as relief flooded every inch of my body. Jeff MacKingsley did not believe I was involved in Zach’s death! Would he believe me when I told him that Zach had seen Ted Cartwright cause my father’s death? If he did, maybe, just maybe, he had been right when he said that I’d be all right. I wondered if he had known I was Liza when he made that statement.
I told Benjamin Fletcher about Zach Willet. I told him about my suspicion that my father’s death had not been an accident, that I had been taking riding lessons from Zach so that I could get to know him. I told Fletcher that yesterday I had promised Zach one million one hundred thousand dollars if he would tell the police what really happened when my father went over that cliff.
“How did Zach respond to that, Liza?”
“Zach swore that Ted Cartwright had charged my father’s horse and forced it onto the dangerous trail, and then spooked it by firing a gun. Zach kept the bullet and the casing, and even took pictures of the bullet lodged in a tree. All these years, he’s kept the evidence of Cartwright’s guilt. He told me yesterday that Cartwright has been threatening him. In fact, while I was with him yesterday, Zach got a call on his cell phone. I’m sure it was from Ted Cartwright, because although Zach didn’t refer to the caller by name, he just laughed and sarcastically told him that he didn’t need to live in his condominium because he’d received a better offer.”
“You’re going to be giving Jeff MacKingsley some mighty powerful stuff, Liza. But tell me this: how did your fingerprints get on that car and doorbell?”
I told Fletcher about my appointment to see Zach, about him not answering the bell, and then seeing him in the car and panicking and rushing home.
“Does anyone else know you were there, Liza?”
“No, not even Alex. But I did call my investment adviser yesterday and asked him to be ready to wire the money I promised Zach to a private bank account. He can verify that.”
“All right, Liza,” Benjamin Fletcher said. “What time is good for you to go to the prosecutor’s office?”
“I’ll need to get my babysitter. About four o’clock would be all right.” Or at least as “all right” as going into the Morris County courthouse will ever be for me, I thought.
“Four o’clock, it is,” Fletcher said.
I hung up the phone, and from somewhere behind me, Jack asked, “Mommy, are you going to be arrested?”