Dr. Abel stepped forward, concerned that Ruth might become agitated, but instead she looked at him calmly, her eyes showing more comprehension than he had seen so far. He nodded encouragement to her and returned to the sidelines.
Nita laid the necklace on the bed, where Ruth could reach it, and prompted her. “Would you like to tell me how you know that?” She held out a hand, and Ruth took it gratefully.
“Yes, it’s coming back. I’m still a bit hazy, but seeing Edie’s necklace made me remember when I saw her wearing it after she got dressed to go to the concert. I told her how pretty she looked, in her blue dress and the necklace, blue like her eyes. That’s what Nick said when he gave it to her—blue to match your eyes. She told me everything about their affair, and of course I understood her problem, since I was seeing a married man, too. We were both in the same boat, except that Jackson said he was going to divorce Lee and marry me. Not like Nick, who wasn’t about to leave his wife and kids.”
Nita wondered if Edith had been putting pressure on Nick, maybe threatening to rat him out to his wife if he didn’t ask for a divorce. Could Nick have decided to solve that problem once and for all?
Ruth reached out to the necklace and ran her fingers over the beads.
“She was all ready to go, but Jackson was taking a nap and I had to get dressed, so I told her she should wait for us downstairs. When I went in to wake Jackson up, he . . . ah . . . didn’t want the coffee I brought him.” Her look softened, and she glanced at Abel before confiding in Nita, one woman to another. “He wanted to make love.” She hesitated, and her gaze turned inward.
“I loved him so much, I couldn’t refuse him anything. Certainly not that, even though Edie was waiting. I knew we’d be late for the concert, but I didn’t care. It was beautiful, and afterward we lay in each other’s arms and swore we’d never let each other go.”
She spoke directly to Nita again. “And I won’t. He’ll be with me forever, for all eternity.” Despite her condition, her gift for self-dramatization was intact.
Nita continued to encourage her. “But you decided to go to the concert after all?”
“Yes. We washed up and got dressed and went down to collect Edie. By then it was ten o’clock. We figured that even if we missed the music we could go to the reception after, and she could see Alfonso’s fancy mansion and meet some of his famous friends. That’s how I sold her on the idea of going. At first she said she wanted to stay home.”
“Why? Didn’t she like music?”
“Well, the truth is she was afraid to go in the car with Jackson because he’d been drinking. But I convinced her that he’d be okay after he’d had some sleep, so she agreed to go after all.”
“So you started out for the concert. Then what happened?”
Ruth frowned and shook her head slowly. The fog was lifting, as if daylight had broken through.
“No, that’s not what we did. When we went down, the radio was on but Edie wasn’t there. I went into the parlor and turned off the radio, and I knocked on the powder room door in case she was in there, but she wasn’t. The back door was open. Jackson said she’s probably in the yard, so we . . .”
She broke off. A look of distress crossed her face.
“We didn’t see her at first. It was really dark out. She was lying on the ground, over by the studio, clutching at her throat, gasping for breath. Jackson thought she was choking on something. He pushed on her chest a few times, like a lifeguard would do, but nothing came up. He said we’d better get her to the hospital, so he picked her up and carried her to the car. I locked up the house and got in the backseat with her, and Jackson drove off even faster than usual. But he was cold sober, I swear.
“When we got down to the end of Fireplace Road there was a streetlight, and I saw bruises on her neck. She gagged, then she stopped breathing. She died with her head in my lap! Oh, God, I was so scared! I screamed at Jackson to stop the car. He pulled over, and I told him. He looked at her throat, with the pretty blue necklace and ugly red welts around it. We were both just dumbfounded.
“I climbed into the front seat with him and we sat there for a few minutes, trying to figure out what to do. Too late to go to the hospital, and if we did, how would we explain what happened to her? We didn’t say it out loud, but we both knew somebody had strangled her. If we took her body to the hospital, they’d think Jackson did it. I couldn’t let that happen. I had to think straight.
“I told him we should take her home and put her back in the yard, maybe somewhere more hidden than where we found her. Then call the police and tell them she’s missing. That way when they found her, they’d think someone outside assaulted her while we were in the house. We didn’t hear anything because the radio was on. And anyway, that’s what we thought did happen.
“So Jackson turned the car around and headed home. But he was driving way too fast, and he lost control on that curve.” With a theatrical gesture, she put her hands to her ears and closed her eyes tight. “I can still hear the tires squealing, and the branches snapping as the car crashed through the woods!”
Ruth sighed deeply, lowered her hands to her lap, and seemed drained of emotion. Apparently her recollection had been a cathartic experience.
“After that,” she concluded, “I don’t remember anything until I woke up here.”
“Of course not,” said Nita. “You were thrown out of the car and hit your head. You were in shock and nearly unconscious when we found you on the road. My husband and I saw the accident happen. We stopped, and I gave you first aid at the scene until Dr. Abel arrived and took charge.”
“You did? Oh, thank you. But are we finished? I feel a bit faint.” Her eyelids fluttered, and Abel stepped up to the bedside and checked her pulse.
“You’re doing fine, Ruth,” he said, “in fact you’re doing extremely well. You’re making progress every day. The very fact that your memory has returned is a sign that your brain is healing rapidly.” He patted her hand reassuringly. “Now, you get some rest, young lady. Would you like Iris to come back in, or would you rather sleep for a while?”
“I think I’ll take a nap now. Please ask Iris to come back later. And tell her I love her,” she added as Abel handed her a Percodan tablet with water, cranked down the bed, and adjusted her pillows and blanket.
“Of course. I think she knows how much she means to you, especially now.”
Nita stood, and took Ruth’s hand again. “You’ve been extremely helpful, Ruth. I can’t thank you enough. We already knew that Edith didn’t die in the crash. Now we need to find out who killed her, and why.”