“Well, then, the men in this town should be ashamed of themselves, Helen. May I call you Helen?”
The look on her face said he could call her most anything and she’d like it, but aloud she said, “Helen will be just fine, Marshal.”
“Ted. The name’s Ted.” And he tipped his cowboy hat at her. It would have been over-the-top for me, but Helen ate it up.
“Do you have a preference on what flavor of stronger you would like me to fetch for you, Helen?”
He moved forward, and I moved back so that he was across the table from Helen. She smiled up at him, looking better by the minute. It would never have occurred to me that a little flirting would revive the witness, but then, that’s why I’m still learning from Edward.
She damn near simpered at him as she gave her preferences on Scotch versus rye whiskey. I didn’t drink enough to follow most of it. She was sitting upright, a healthier color in her face, as Edward went off in search of her order.
Newman smiled at Helen and said, “I’d like to be able to wait for your drink, Helen, but we need to know the truth before Bobby runs out of time.”
Her face clouded and her shoulders started to slump, but then she straightened up and forced herself to look Newman in the face. “I hate the idea of you having to kill Bobby, but I think the animal in him just got too strong.”
“What do you mean . . . Helen?” I asked. I’d use her first name if it made her feel better. Belatedly, I wondered if I should offer for her to call me by my first name, but she was answering, so I let it go.
Her face was grim as she looked at me. She gripped her hands together tight enough for the skin to mottle as she said, “First, he started sniffing around Jocelyn, his own sister, and then he lost control and killed his uncle. Bobby was a good person, but he wasn’t strong enough to fight off all the animal urges.”
“When did Bobby stop being a good person, Helen?” Newman asked.
She looked startled. “I didn’t say he wasn’t. It’s the beast in him that’s bad.”
“You used the past tense: ‘Bobby was a good person,’” I said.
“When did you decide he wasn’t a good person, Helen?” Newman asked, his voice gentle.
“I got up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and saw a flash of light coming from Jocelyn’s room. The door was partially open. I walked closer, and Bobby came out, wearing just a pair of underwear. He had his phone in his hand. I remember thinking it was odd.”
“What did he say when he saw you, Helen?” Newman asked.
“He said that he thought he’d left his headphones over in her room. He had insomnia and wanted to listen to music and not wake her.”
“Did you believe him?” I asked.
“No . . . maybe . . . I don’t know.” She wiped at the tears on her face with the crumpled tissue, but it was used up. Newman got a plastic travel packet of them out of his pocket and handed it to her. I’d never thought to add tissues to one of the pockets in the tactical pants. I filed it away for later as a good idea.
“Thank you,” Helen said, and wiped at her eyes and nose.
We waited for her to get control of herself. Sometimes you don’t want witnesses to regain control, because the breakdown helps them spill what they know, but Helen wanted to talk to u
s. She’d come down to the station to tell her story and to bring new evidence. She wasn’t going to clam up on us.
“What happened next?” Newman asked, voice so kind. He had a nice light touch, better than mine.
“I asked Jocelyn if she’d found Bobby’s headphones in her room. If she’d said yes, then I would have left it alone. They’re siblings. Things end up in the wrong room for a lot of innocent reasons, but she didn’t know what I was talking about, so I told her.” Helen gulped hard and tried to breathe deep as if the next part was harder. “Jocelyn broke down and cried in my arms. She’d woken up with Bobby lying in bed with her once, and he’d walked in on her when she was dressing or showering so many times, she tried to keep her door locked, but she’d forgotten the night I saw him. I told her she had to tell her stepfather, Mr. Ray, that he had to know. I tried to ask if Bobby had done more than look, and she broke down completely.” Helen started to cry again.
“What did she say Bobby had done?” I asked, trying to keep my own voice as gentle as Newman’s.
Helen shook her head hard enough that her short hair bounced around her face. “She was so upset that she couldn’t talk, but her reaction let me know it was worse. I told her to go to the police if he’d touched her, and she completely fell apart. I told her that I’d go with her, that she didn’t have to do this alone, but she refused to go to the police. She said if I went to the cops without her, she’d lie and say I’d made it up. She didn’t want everyone to know, and if the police got involved, then it would be courts and lawyers. She was ashamed, said it was her fault, too. I couldn’t convince her that it wasn’t her fault or to go to the police, so I told her to tell her stepfather. I offered to go with her for moral support, but she wanted to do it on her own. She was so brave.”
Helen raised her face and looked at me with an almost radiant expression, as if the memory of that brave moment from Jocelyn had been some magnificent gesture. I let the moment of shining sisterhood fill Helen’s face and make her eyes look even greener.
“Do you know if she told Ray?” Newman asked.
“She came into the kitchen and hugged me that morning, said that Mr. Ray had believed her and was going to talk to Bobby that night. She was so happy. I offered to stay that night, but she said she was going out with friends and that Mr. Ray wanted to be alone with Bobby for the talk.”
I glanced at Newman and our eyes met. I wondered if he was thinking what I was thinking: It all sounded so reasonable. If Olaf hadn’t heard Jocelyn’s voice on the video, if we hadn’t put our ears nearly touching the phone to hear her being seductive with Bobby, we’d have believed Helen’s story. It would have been enough for one of us to go into the cell and end Bobby’s life.