Revenant in Death

Chapter 09

by Technomad

Eve Dallas

After the Nixie Swisher Fund fundraiser was over, Eve was happy to get back to her routine. She always enjoyed the Fundraiser, but it did disrupt things around her home. She supervised the crews cleaning things up and thought about the party while she did so; the crews knew their jobs and needed very little input from her.

While she had had a good time at the Fundraiser, and she was very pleased at the amounts that had been raised, there had been something niggling at her the whole time it was going on. Again and again, she had had a funny feeling, rather like what she imagined she'd feel if she were swimming in the ocean and suddenly realized that a shark or barracuda was in the vicinity. She had felt uneasy, and had wished for her old police sidearm's comforting weight at her side. Even though everybody at the Fundraiser was vouched for, and she was in one of the safest places in New York, there had been something that just felt a bit wrong.

Eve wished she could talk to her husband about it, but Roarke was out of town. Summerset had had a death in his family back in Britain, and he and Roarke had flown out the night before, to deal with matters there and attend the funeral. It was rather odd to miss Summerset.

Shrugging her shoulders, Eve dismissed the worries to the back of her mind, and concentrated on her next task. She was going to be giving a lecture at the Police Academy next week, and she needed to go over her notes and figure out just what to say. She always enjoyed her time at the Academy, and knowing that she was helping mold the next generation of police into the policemen and –women they needed to be was very gratifying. Not as gratifying as bringing a murderer in and knowing that she was the reason that a vicious killer was going to be spending the rest of his or her life in an off-planet facility, but she knew it was worthwhile work.

Rayleen Straffo

When Mame Burnside awoke, Rayleen was right there, offering her a cool compress for her head and making sure that the light from outside wasn't too bright for sensitive eyes. Mame gave her a grateful smile. "Thank you, Jane," she murmured. "You're a real treasure."

"Just doing my job, Mame," Rayleen answered. During her time in prison, she had been a voracious reader, and one book she had run across was An Actor Prepares, by Stanislavsky. Reading it, she had been converted to "method acting," and she had found the skills that Stanislavsky imparted incalculably useful in helping her endure her confinement, as well as easing her long-term plans to regain her freedom.

She had subsumed herself into the roles she was playing, mainly "rehabilitatable, repentant prisoner," and had found to her delight that Stanislavsky's methods worked just as well to fool her captors as they did on stage or screen. When she had been free, before running into the ever-accursed Eve Dallas, she had harbored ambitions to be an actress, among other things. This, she decided, was the role of a lifetime, and she played it to her uttermost. Increased privileges, and less supervision, were excellent substitutes for the rave reviews she had once imagined herself getting. They also made furthering her real plans much easier, which gave her an incentive to keep the act up.

And now, a free woman, she was completely subsumed in the role and persona of "Jane Mollenbeek," the willing, trustworthy aide to the wealthy Mame Burnside. Nobody watching would have thought for a second that she was really an escaped serial killer, or that she was plotting murder. Right at the moment, she was focussed on her employer, making ready to anticipate, as far as she could, Mame's needs and desires.

Rayleen had put aside her nebulous plans to try to take out Mame Burnside very soon after finding out about Mame's background and skills. For all her flightiness, Mame was shrewd and sharp, and at seventh and last, nobody's fool. In their time together, Rayleen had learned that Mame managed her monies with considerable skill. While she had originally married money, she had done a lot to increase it after her husband had been killed in a skiing accident in the French Alps.

Mame's business empire was not nearly on the scale of Roarke's holdings, but in New York, they were nearly equals. Mame owned hotels, office buildings, apartment houses and single-family dwellings, and had competent, honest people managing them for her. In addition to her real-estate holdings, Mame held shares in many different enterprises, and she spent a few hours every day going over returns and figuring out what moves to make next: which stocks to sell, which up-and-coming companies to buy into, and things like that. While some of her moves lost her money, most of the time she came out ahead.

While she had been with Mame, Rayleen had unobtrusively moved into the role of her aide in financial matters. Agnes Gooch had willingly conceded that job, preferring to concentrate on the social side of things, and on running Mame's mansion. While she had few or no equals at planning and putting together a memorable party, and kept the staff of servants on their toes and doing their duties, financial matters bored and confused her.

Rayleen, on the other hand, had been a top student at mathematics, before and during her incarceration, and picked up quickly on the ins and outs of financial manipulation. Mame was delighted to have an assistant as enthusiastic and interested as "dear Jane" was, and eagerly imparted her wisdom to her new pupil. Rayleen thought privately that had she not married into money, Mame could have done worse than to go into teaching. She was endlessly patient explaining things that Rayleen didn't understand, and generous with praise when one of Rayleen's suggestions was good.

Of course, Rayleen never lost track of what she was really about, and who she really was. While she was (so to speak) sitting at Mame's feet and learning all the financial wizardry Mame could impart, there was always a part of her mind figuring out how this could be best turned to her own uses. She did have a nest egg, small though it was at the moment, and thanks to Mame's teachings, it was already measurably bigger than it had been when she had regained her freedom. She fully intended to make it bigger yet.

"Could you set up my screen, dear?" Rayleen nodded, pulling the screen over to where Mame could see it from where she sat up in bed. "Turn on the financial channel, please. I want to see what's been happening." Nothing loath, Rayleen did as she was told, and while Mame was absorbed in the news, she allowed herself a few personal thoughts.

Willow was due to be out very soon. They had set up procedures to communicate, using innocuous-looking messages on social media, and Willow already knew where to go when released. She had sent Willow a letter at the asylum, signed "Jane Mollenbeek," and filled with innocuous chatter about things of no importance. However, the letter contained a code-phrase alerting Willow to pay close attention to the return address at the top of the letter. That was the address of the mini-apt that Rayleen had rented, and Willow had been told the phrase that would unlock the security.

When Willow was out, she would send Rayleen a message on social media, and Rayleen would make up an excuse to take the afternoon off. While Rayleen saw others as tools to be used, she did find Willow sympatico, and she was looking forward to catching up with the only other person she'd ever found who thought more-or-less like she did.

Willow would be very interested in everything Rayleen had learned, particularly about their mutual target. When Willow was focussed, she was one of the few people Rayleen had meet whom she considered an intellectual equal, and Rayleen was looking forward to letting her hair down and discussing things with someone she knew she could trust.

Eve Dallas

Eve was putting the final touches on the lecture she intended delivering at the Police Academy when one of the household droids announced: "Sir, Captain Peabody wishes to see you."

This was always good news. "Well, show her on in!" The droid shimmered on out of the room, and came back in with Peabody in tow. Eve smiled broadly, putting her work aside to welcome her longtime partner and friend.

"Good to see you, Dallas! Wasn't the fundraiser wonderful?" As always, Peabody radiated enthusiasm, and her smile seemed to light up the room.

"Yes, it certainly was. A lot of crime victims are going to be very glad we had it." Which was nothing but the truth. The Nixie Swisher Fund did a lot for crime victims, and several other cities had started similar funds in imitation of it. "I had a good time at the fundraiser, but I kept having the oddest feeling of danger lurking somewhere. I felt like I was swimming and there was a shark nearby, or something like that."

"Really?" All of a sudden Peabody was all business. She had worked with Eve Dallas for more than long enough to respect Eve's intuition. Longtime police often developed what seemed to be a "sixth sense" about criminals, somehow perceiving their presence where civilians would not notice anything wrong. Eve had thought about it, and had decided that it worked on a basis of a policewoman's subconscious picking up on clues that the conscious mind did not perceive, sending out a feeling that danger was afoot.

"Yes. The back of my neck kept prickling, and I kept feeling like something was out there. Something prowling, waiting its chance."

"Well, we have the surveillance vids of the fundraiser itself. Why don't we go over them and see what was making you nervous?" Eve had to admit that Peabody had a good point, and soon they had the videos running up on a screen, as they relaxed and began to watch.

Watching the videos, Eve couldn't see anything at all wrong. People were mixing and circulating, just as they always did at these events. Drinks were being passed around by attentive servants, hired for the evening to supplement Roarke's own staff. The sound had been turned off, but up on a stage, musicians were visible, playing the latest tunes to entertain the guests and put them into a generous mood.

"Those servants. The temporary ones. Where did they come from?" asked Peabody. "We know all the guests, and they're none of them the sort of people who would put you in danger. Who vetted those servants?"

"Summerset took care of that end of things, and he's good. I don't think a bad'un could slip in past him." And that was nothing but the truth. Before she and Summerset had met, he had spent years on the shady side of things, as Roarke's father-in-all-but-name, right hand, and most trusted confidante. He had met, and dealt with, all sorts of criminals, and she figured he could spot an ill-wisher a hundred miles away. Even before they had made a peace between them, Eve knew that he would have died before he allowed any harm to come to her.

"If it isn't the servants, then who could it be?" Peabody wondered. They watched more videos, but nothing jumped out as a sign of danger to Eve. After a while, they gave it up as a bad job and got around to other subjects, discussing the manifold excellences of their children, the shortcomings of some of the people on the force, and the chances for promotion of various people they both knew.

Even as she gossiped with Peabody, Eve couldn't quite get rid of the feeling that danger had lurked at the Fundraiser. She wished that Roarke was back, so she could discuss it with him. And, she decided, before she went to sleep that night she would personally check the security systems to make sure they had not been compromised.

Rayleen Straffo

When Rayleen got the signal on social media that Willow Mackie was free and had reached the mini-apt she had rented, she was ready to act on that information. She had been working hard and doing an excellent job, so when she asked for an afternoon to herself, Mame was more than accomodating.

"Of course, darling! You've been such a love, being so patient with your old boss, that I can't really deny you anything within reason! You go on right ahead!" Mame grinned. "Is it a young man, by any chance?"

"'Fraid not, Mame," Rayleen answered, grinning right back. In her time as Mame's assistant, she had found out that Mame Burnside was an enthusiastic amateur matchmaker, never happier than when she was bringing a couple together. "If I find someone like that, though, I'll make sure you're the first to know! And I'll want you to run the ruler over him, to make sure he's all right!" Oddly enough, that was nothing but the truth. For all that she was planning to use Mame as a stalking horse to get close to the woman she intended to kill, she respected Mame's sharp mind, and knew that she had ways of getting information that were denied to less wealthy, less well-connected people. If she had had a boyfriend, she would have valued Mame's input about him.

"Well, you run along, and have a wonderful time! This city has so many interesting things to do, you at least won't be bored!" And with that benediction, Mame sent Rayleen off. As she left, Rayleen smiled to herself. Oh, little do you know…

Rayleen still didn't have the money for a rental car, and she was new enough to driving to not really be comfortable doing it in the thick traffic of New York, but that was no problem. There was more than enough public transpo around for her purposes. She had chosen the mini-apt she had partly for its convenience to the public transportation system.

Very soon, she was on a subway train, heading out of Manhattan to the far corners of the great tri-state metro. It occurred to her that the jurisdictional boundaries she was crossing might just be useful; the New York City authorities had little or no power outside of New York City itself, and she had heard that New York State, Connecticut (where her accursed birth family lived) and New Jersey were often less than cooperative with New York City police, unless the crime in question had also occurred within their own bailiwicks. She filed that thought away, figuring that it would come in useful.

After a transfer or two, she was getting off a bus a couple of blocks away from her former mini-apt. The neighborhood was mainly working people, who minded their own business and paid no attention to their neighbors unless the neighbors in question were noisy or disruptive. And she knew better than to be any such thing. She was dressed like she belonged in that neighborhood, and nobody paid her a second's worth of attention, save to give her admiring glances for her beauty. While she didn't mind that, she did have other things on her plate that day, so she ignored the looks.

Walking up, she first gave the coded knock that she and Willow had used to signal each other in prison, to let Willow know who it was that was at the door. She could have just unlocked the door and walked right in, since she was still the legal tenant, but she didn't think that possibly startling someone as good with weapons as Willow Mackie was a good idea at all. After a minute, she let herself in and looked around.

Willow came in, and smiled to see her. "Rayleen! Good to see you, cellie!" They had celled together for quite some time, before Rayleen had put her plans for their freedom into action, and in prison, that made for a bond between convicts. Even people who hadn't celled together recently would react positively to an ex-cellmate.

They embraced and then let go, smiling to see each other again. As they sat down, Rayleen said: "Good to see you too, cellie, but keep in mind, I go by 'Jane' these days. 'Rayleen' is in a coma in a prison hospital, and that's how it's got to be. Even after we do what we got out to do, 'Rayleen' has to stay deep in the past. I have to stay in-character every minute. Maybe once we're done with our work here, and can relocate somewhere else, I can be 'Rayleen' again. But that time is not now."

"Gotcha, cellie!" Willow winked at her. When she had first been locked up, Willow had been rebellious, fighting her captors in every way she could. Once she had hooked up with Rayleen, though, she had learned that an outward show of acquiescence and remorse was a far better route to getting what she wanted. Rayleen had been an excellent teacher, both by example and in long, low-voiced conversations in their cell, during the many hours a day they were locked up together with an iron door between them and the rest of the facility. And Willow was far from stupid, for all that her interests and Rayleen's didn't coincide. Once she saw the advantages of the path Rayleen was pointing out, she followed it quite willingly, and soon she, too, was gaining privileges and perquisites.

Whatever her other faults, Willow was a considerate hostess. She had managed to obtain some real coffee somewhere (like Rayleen, she was a teetotaler; illegals and alcohol messed up one's marksmanship) and had put together a snack tray for them to share. They filled their coffee cups, put together plates of chips, crackers, and other goodies, and settled back to catch up on what had happened since they'd parted ways in a medium-security facility some while ago.

Willow was very interested indeed in all that Rayleen had learned about the woman they both hated more than anybody on earth, and agog to hear that Rayleen had dared to walk straight into Roarke's mansion and shake Eve Dallas' hand, as well as attend the Nixie Swisher Fund fundraiser at that house.

Shaking her head in rueful admiration, Willow said with a smile: "Cellie, you have ice water for blood! I don't know if I could do that myself!"

"Oh, it was scary, at least at first, but I was totally submerged in my role, and just became 'Jane Mollenbeek,' Rayleen answered. "That book, An Actor Prepares, was a real lifesaver. Since you're legally out, you don't have to come up with an alternate persona, but it might be a good idea to change your appearance, the way I did."

"You sure did!" Willow shook her head ruefully. "You really startled me with that new look! I didn't recognize you, and I think I know you better than anyone!"

"As women, we do have advantages over men, at least in this area." Rayleen put her head on one side, studying her best friend appraisingly. "Your hair is middling-length right now. Cutting it short, the way I did, would make throwing a wig on over it easier, should you need to change your appearance in a hurry. Like me, you're pretty fair-skinned, so laying in a supply of skin-darkening makeup would likely be a good idea. And getting clothes suitable for several different roles would also not hurt anything."

"Another thing I need is range time," Willow pointed out. "I used to be one of the best, but I'm 'way out of practice. Do you think we can set me up with some target practice somewhere?"

"I was thinking about that. Here in the metro it won't be easy, but I've found some ranges that have rental lasers, out in the countryside. The laws are laxer there, and with some false ID, we should be able to give you all the time you need to be back up to the top of your form."

"Excellent!" With that, both women applied themselves to the snacks, and the talk turned to people they'd known in prison and where they had gone.

END Chapter 09