What the Fly Saw Read online

  “That’s very true,” McCabe said. “We’ll be sure to speak to Reverend Wyatt.”

  “I’ll have that list of anyone who had business at the funeral home in just a minute. I stopped to tag my son and his wife to let them know I’m all right. I didn’t want them to hear about what had happened on the news stream.”

  “Yes, I’m sure it was better coming from you. Did your son and his wife know Mr. Novak well?”

  “We’re like a family here,” Logan said. “Two or three times a year, Kevin and Sarah have a party or a picnic for the staff and their families.”

  “How many people work here?” Baxter asked.

  “About twenty, but some of them, like the woman who does hair and makeup, are only part time. We have four full-time drivers and their assistants. We usually have a full-time assistant funeral director. But David, our last one, moved to California because his new wife has family out there. That came up all of a sudden, and Kevin had planned to start interviewing people for the job next week.”

  McCabe said, “Could you give us David’s contact information? And, please, include the names and contact information for anyone who applied for the position. Including the people Mr. Novak didn’t intend to interview.”

  “There were only three or four people who applied,” Logan said. “I’ll put them on the list.”

  9

  McCabe said, “Mike, you aren’t going to believe this. I’m looking at it, and I don’t believe it.”

  “I’m not going to believe what?”

  “The last person who tried to contact Novak about a funeral. The message Novak’s secretary found says that this person left a tag on Novak’s ORB and also sent one to the funeral home. You’re not going to believe who it was.”

  Baxter stopped at the traffic light. “Okay, I bite. Who was it?”

  “Ted Thornton’s aide-de-camp, Bruce Ashby.”

  “Ashby was trying to reach Kevin Novak?”

  “He wanted to arrange for a funeral as soon as the body was released. Who do you think Ashby would arrange a funeral for here in Albany?”

  “I’m guessing Lisa Nichols.”

  “My guess, too.”

  “That’s one cosmic coincidence.”

  “Maybe it isn’t a coincidence.”

  “What else could it be?”

  “I don’t know what else. But first Lisa Nichols manages to get hold of enough pills to kill herself. And then Ashby tags a funeral director about burying her, and the funeral director turns up dead.”

  “Come on, partner. You’re beginning to sound like one of those conspiracy theory kooks.”

  “Maybe I am. But there’s something about this whole Lisa Nichols case. She kills three women, and then—”

  “And then, being more than a little crazy, she decides to kill herself, too. And Ted Thornton, her former fiancé, decides he should bury her. And Ashby, his assistant, probably picks a likely looking funeral director from the Web.”

  “And it’s just a coincidence both things happen at about the time someone kills Kevin Novak?”

  “Unless you really believe someone killed a funeral director because Ashby contacted him about handling Lisa Nichols’s funeral.”

  “Okay, that sounds far-fetched. But I’d like to ask Ashby and Ted Thornton about this coincidence.”

  “And you know I wouldn’t mind seeing my favorite robot, Roz, again. But we’d better run a visit by the lieutenant. Anyway, last we heard, Teddy was still down in the City.”

  “We should find out where he is now.”

  “After we clear it with the lou, right? Meantime, we have a grieving widow we’re supposed to be calling on.”

  “Yes. We do. And we should focus on that.”

  “I agree,” Baxter said.

  “This is a change of pace, isn’t it?”

  “What is?”

  “You being the one who reminds me about proper procedure and not going off half-cocked.”

  “Well, you did tell me I’d learn something working with a pro like you.”

  “And it seems you have,” McCabe said.

  * * *

  Sarah Novak looked as if she had been hit head-on by a semi truck and emerged with no visible injuries but deep in shock. She was flanked by two men, one of them wearing a clerical collar, the other in a business suit and tie. The cleric introduced himself as Reverend Daniel Wyatt. He said the other man was Dr. Jonathan Burdett, psychiatrist, family counselor, and member of their church congregation.

  “We’re here to provide Sarah and her children with our support and counsel,” Wyatt said.

  Burdett nodded in agreement. “Although this is something we all find difficult to comprehend.”

  Burdett was a large man with a Boston Brahmin accent. Wyatt, on the other hand, had the open-faced look of someone who had grown up in small-town America. The kind of place, McCabe thought, where everyone came out for Labor Day parades and high school football games.

  Sarah Novak did not seem comforted by either man’s presence. She was sitting in her cozy living room on her color-coordinated sofa. And every few minutes, she would draw another little breath that was just short of a sob and that seemed to be forced from her chest.

  Her red lipstick stood out against her colorless face.

  The lipstick reminded McCabe of the blood that had been on Kevin Novak’s mouth. The blood he must have coughed up from his punctured lung as he was dying.

  A teenage boy, the one from the photograph in his father’s office, came and stood in the doorway. When Sarah Novak did not look at him, he said, “Mom, do you want me to go pick Meg up?”

  She drew a deep breath that shook her body. “Yes, please, go and get your sister. Don’t … don’t tell her what’s happened. I’ll tell her when she gets here.”

  “Okay,” he said.

  “Scott, do you want me to drive you?” Reverend Wyatt asked.

  “That’s okay,” Scott said. “I can take Mom’s car.” He glanced at his mother. “I won’t tell Meg anything. Just that you need her to come home now.”

  “Thank you,” she said. “Be careful. The streets are a mess.”

  When the front door had closed, McCabe said, “Where is your daughter, Mrs. Novak?”

  “She’s at a friend’s house. Her friend asked if she could sleep over during the blizzard.”

  McCabe turned to the minister and the psychiatrist. “Gentlemen, we’d like to speak with each of you. But, first, if you wouldn’t mind, we would like to interview Mrs. Novak alone.”

  Wyatt touched Sarah Novak’s shoulder. “Sarah, are you up to this?”

  “I have to be, don’t I?” she said. “Thank you both. I can do this alone.”

  Wyatt glanced at Burdett. Burdett said, “I think some tea and a light snack would be in order. We’ll go out to the kitchen and put something together.”

  When the two men had gone, McCabe sat down on the sofa beside Kevin Novak’s widow. Baxter took the adjacent armchair.

  “I know this is a difficult thing to think about, Mrs. Novak,” McCabe said. “But can you think of anyone who might have wanted to harm your husband?”

  Novak’s body jerked as if she had been punched. “Then it wasn’t…” She paused and then went on. “It wasn’t a break-in? Someone there to steal something or to get in out of the cold or to … Oh, God.”

  She covered her eyes with her hands, head bowed.

  Baxter said, “There was no sign of a break-in. It looks like your husband either forgot to lock the door or opened the door to whoever killed him.”

  Head still down, Novak said, “So it might have been someone he knew?”

  “Yes, it might have been,” McCabe said. “Had your husband quarreled with anyone recently?”

  “Anyone except me?” Novak raised her head. Her lips trembled as she tried to smile. “We didn’t really quarrel. Kevin hated to quarrel. He lived in an orphanage until he was eight, and he always wanted…” She threw her head back. “He always wanted our fami
ly to be like his foster parents, Joe and Beth. Never a cross word between them. So we didn’t really quarrel.” She met McCabe’s gaze. “Does that make sense? Sometimes we would almost quarrel, especially when we were first married. But he would never fight back, and so I stopped trying to get him to.”

  McCabe said, “But there was something you’d wanted to quarrel about yesterday? Last night?”

  “I wanted him to tell me what was wrong. He said everything was fine.”

  “But you thought something was bothering him?” Baxter asked.

  “A wife knows, Detective.”

  “Do you have any idea what might have been bothering him?” McCabe asked.

  “It started when Bob died.”

  She stopped as if she was going to leave it there. Baxter said, “Bob was his best friend, right?”

  “Yes. Bob Reeves. He died in September. He had a heart attack while he and Kevin were playing tennis and died during surgery.”

  “You said ‘It started when Bob died,’” McCabe said. “What started?”

  “I don’t know,” Sarah Novak said. “Kevin was … I thought at first it was Bob’s death. Kevin blaming himself. But I think there was more to it than that. And for the past few days, there seemed to be something else. I don’t know what. He didn’t want to tell me what was wrong.”

  McCabe asked, “Do you think your husband’s death might be related to what was bothering him?”

  “He said he was going to spend the night at the funeral home to keep an eye on a leaking pipe. If it wasn’t someone who came there to burglarize the place and found him there…” Sarah Novak closed her eyes for a moment. “If it wasn’t that … then, yes, I think it might have been related to what was bothering him. We tell … told … each other everything. We never kept secrets. But whatever this was, he couldn’t tell me.”

  “Did he seem frightened? On edge?”

  “No, not frightened. More distant and distracted.”

  “Had that ever happened before?” McCabe asked.

  “Sometimes he would be preoccupied. But not like this.” Novak’s hands clenched in her lap. “He had never deliberately shut me out before.”

  Baxter asked, “How long had the two of you been married?”

  “Eighteen years.”

  “And in all those eighteen years, he always told you everything?”

  “Sometimes he didn’t have to,” Sarah Novak said. “Sometimes I could almost hear my husband’s thoughts. But something happened. Something he couldn’t share with me … that he couldn’t tell me about.”

  McCabe said, “And if the two of you were so close, he must have realized you knew something was wrong.”

  “But he wouldn’t tell me what it was. And that’s why I was so worried. Kevin would never have shut me out unless whatever … unless it was too awful to share.”

  “If he couldn’t talk to you about what was bothering him,” McCabe said, “is there anyone else he might have confided in?”

  “Bob was his closest friend. He had other male friends, but no one he was as close to.” Novak frowned. “But he … he was so depressed after Bob died that he did speak to Reverend Wyatt. And Reverend Wyatt suggested he see Jonathan.”

  “See him for therapy?” Baxter asked.

  “Yes. For counseling. I don’t know what they talked about. Probably about how guilty Kevin felt about Bob’s death.”

  “So we should talk to Reverend Wyatt and Dr. Burdett to see what they can tell us about their conversations with your husband,” McCabe said. “Is there anything else you can think of, Mrs. Novak?”

  “No. I can’t really think right now. I don’t want to think right now.”

  “Then we’ll let you get some rest, and we’ll talk to you later if we have any more questions.”

  Baxter said, “Just for the record, were you here at home all last evening?”

  Novak’s head came up and she fixed him with a hard stare. “No, Detective. I followed my husband to the funeral home and killed him. And I’m a terrific actress.”

  “Mrs. Novak,” McCabe said. “It isn’t a good idea to make statements that might be misinterpreted. If you want to make a statement about your husband’s death—”

  “Yes, I was here at home all last evening. No, I didn’t kill my husband.”

  “What about your son?” Baxter said. “Just for the record.”

  “My son was here as well. Upstairs in his room. Neither one of us went out.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Novak,” McCabe said. “I know this is difficult and our questions may seem offensive. But once we’re able to eliminate the people close to your husband as suspects in his death, we can focus on finding the person who killed him.”

  Sarah Novak nodded. “I understand. That doesn’t make me like being asked if I killed my husband.” She drew a deep breath. “I loved him. I don’t know what I’m going to do now … I don’t know how I’ll…”

  McCabe said, “Maybe you should go upstairs and lie down for a while.”

  “My daughter’s coming home. I have to tell her what’s happened. Tell her that her father is dead.”

  “Maybe your minister or Dr. Burdett could help you do that.”

  “No, I have to do it on my own.”

  McCabe stood up. “We’re going to go out to the kitchen and talk to Reverend Wyatt and Dr. Burdett. That will give you a little time to get your thoughts together.”

  “Thank you. You’re being kind.”

  * * *

  When the kitchen door opened, Wyatt and Burdett broke off their low-voiced conversation.

  McCabe said, “Were you able to make the tea? I think Mrs. Novak could probably use a cup.”

  “Yes, it’s ready,” Reverend Wyatt said. “I’ll take it in to her.”

  “Thank you. If you wouldn’t mind, that would give us a chance to speak to Dr. Burdett privately.”

  “Of course,” Wyatt said. He filled a mug and reached for the tray one of them had found and set out on the counter. Two shortbread cookies were already on a plate.

  “Nice touch,” Baxter said.

  Wyatt blinked at him. “What?”

  “The tray and the cookies.”

  Burdett said, “Rituals are important to a woman like Sarah at a time like this.”

  Although, McCabe thought, Sarah Novak had presumably never experienced “a time like this.” Murder was a bit different from life’s other distressing events.

  “Let me know when you’re ready to talk to me,” Wyatt said. “I’ll keep Sarah company until you need me.”

  McCabe left it to Sarah Novak to tell her minister she wanted some time to herself. They needed to get Wyatt out of the kitchen.

  As he left, McCabe gestured toward the table in the breakfast nook. “If you’d like to sit down, Dr. Burdett…”

  “Actually, I think I’d rather stand. I’m feeling a bit restless.”

  Baxter leaned back against the counter. “We understand from Mrs. Novak that her husband has been seeing you professionally.”

  McCabe said, “She told us Mr. Novak was having a hard time dealing with his friend Bob’s death. That he spoke to Reverend Wyatt and then came to you for therapy.”

  “I prefer to call it ‘counseling,’” Burdett said.

  “But you are a psychiatrist,” Baxter said. “Right?”

  “Yes, but I find the church members that I see are more comfortable with the term ‘counseling.’”

  “Whatever you prefer,” McCabe said. “Are you able to tell us anything about your conversations with Mr. Novak?”

  “As you must know, Detective McCabe, such conversations between psychiatrist and patient are confidential.”

  “Yes, but in this case, since your patient is dead, I think his family would appreciate anything you could tell us.”

  “No, I’m afraid not.”

  “Then could you tell us if anything Mr. Novak told you might conceivably have played a role in his murder?”

  “To the best of my knowled
ge, no. There was nothing.”

  “Aside from your sessions with Mr. Novak as a psychiatrist, could you give us a little background on his activities and his involvement in your church?”

  “Reverend Wyatt is the best person to tell you about Kevin’s involvement in the church. But I can tell you that he was well respected and well liked by the community at large and by the members of our congregation.”

  “Even though he was an undertaker?” Baxter asked.

  “The responsibility of burying the dead and consoling the living is an important one, Detective,” Burdett said. “And Kevin was hardly a somber, brooding type. Nor was he some hovering ghoul waiting for people to die.”

  “Good to hear that,” Baxter said.

  McCabe asked, “Dr. Burdett, did you and Mr. Novak ever socialize?”

  “We played squash now and then. An occasional game of chess.”

  “So you knew him well enough to consider him a friend.”

  “Yes, I would say that.”

  “But neither of you found the psychiatrist-patient relationship uncomfortable?”

  “We both knew it was a transitory relationship. Kevin needed to talk through his feelings about his friend’s death. Since I had known them both, I was ideally situated to listen and understand.”

  “I see. So that was the topic of your discussions? Bob’s death?”

  “I seem to have admitted as much,” Burdett said.

  McCabe said, “And is that all you’re willing to tell us about that?”

  “It is.”

  “Any other topic you’re willing to talk about?” Baxter asked.

  “Kevin has a wonderful family. A loving wife. Two beautiful children. He loved his family and was extremely proud of them.”

  “His wife told us that he had been an orphan,” McCabe said.

  “And that childhood experience made it important to him to create and maintain a solid family unit.”

  “Was he concerned about his family?” McCabe asked. “Was there anything that threatened their solid family unit?”

  “Kevin was a good husband and father. He felt his own emotional state might be having a negative impact on his family.”

  “And his emotional state was related to his friend’s death?”

  “Sometimes the death of a friend or relative—even of a stranger with whom we identify—can send us into a tailspin. Can get us thinking about our own mortality and the ways in which we’ve failed to be the person we wanted to be. Kevin had very high standards for himself.”