Page 61 of A Talent for Murder

I returned to the basement and found that Henry had already dragged Saltz’s body into the hole. He saw me in my new outfit, holding the garbage bag containing my clothes, and said, “Shower feel good?”

“You have no idea.”

We added my clothes to the grave, plus the sheets from the cot and the shackles that had crusted blood on them, then covered everything with the quicklime. I found a bottle of bleach and we cleaned up the rest of the basement as best we could. On a worktable I found the bag I’d taken with me when I’d gone into the Shepaug town center. In it was the granola my mother liked, plus my wallet and house keys.

“We should really cement over this floor, and that way he’ll never be found,” Henry said.

“I’m not too worried about it,” I said. “He’ll be found eventually, but I don’t think it will be for a long time. And when they find him, I don’t think they’ll make a connection with either Ethan Saltz or with Robert Charnock. Maybe they will, but I don’t think it will matter much at that point. And there’ll never be a connection to either of us.”

“It’ll be a mystery,” Henry said.

We did put the tarp back over the floor and both of us stood and looked at it for a moment. “Any last words?” Henry said.

“Good riddance to bad rubbish.”

Henry said, “At least he dug his own grave for us.”

“That’s true.” Neither of us immediately moved, and I said, “Got a limerick for the occasion?”

Henry thought for a moment then said, “There once was a killer named Ethan, who murdered without a good reason. Now he’s dead in a hole, both the man and his soul, having excreted his final excretion.”

I didn’t say anything right away, and Henry said, “The excretion is the blood.”

“No, I got it. I liked it. You do have a real talent.”

Henry smiled, but when I took his hand in mine I could feel that it was trembling.

Before leaving, we went through the entire house, wiping any spots where we might have left prints. Then we locked the house behind us, and Henry said, “We should drive the Jaguar back to Philadelphia and park it. When they start looking for Charnock they’ll also be looking for his car. Can you drive a manual?”

I told him I could and followed him back to Philadelphia. Henry kept to the exact speed limit the whole way. It was just before dawn, the sky beginning to fill with streaks of pale orange light, and there were not a lot of cars on the road. We left the Jaguar about a quarter mile from the gallery, wiped clean and unlocked. I threw the keys in a dumpster.

After getting back in Henry’s car, I said, “There’s one last thing I have to do.”

“What’s that?”

“Ethan Saltz made a list of everyone he killed. He kept it in a fake book in his library and he told me which book. I need to get that list.”

“Why?”

“He kept that list in the hopes that someone would find it after he died. He wanted to be famous, to be known as one of the most prolific serial killers in history. That was his real dream.”

“So why do you need to get it first?”

“Because I promised him I’d burn it, make sure that no one ever knew his name.”

“You promised him that?”

“It was when he was dying,” I said.

Henry paused, then said, “Do you think it matters?”

“What?”

“Do you think it matters if you keep that promise, I mean. He’s dead now. Maybe it’s enough that he died thinking he’d never be remembered.”

“No, it matters,” I said. “I know it’s risky and stupid, but I want to get that book. I made a promise.”

“Okay,” Henry said.

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