The Red Queen Dies (37 page)

McCabe said, “Are you still going to testify for her?”

Redfield got up from the visitor's chair beside her desk. “Or, as long as we're considering possibilities, maybe she has always been a scheming, lying little bitch. And maybe the drugs just brought out what she is. Someone who would do whatever it takes to get and keep what she wants. Her survival, and to hell with anyone else.”

He turned and walked out of the bull pen. They watched him go.

“Think he's still going to testify for her?” Baxter asked.

“Guess we'll have to wait and see,” McCabe said. “Want to have another look at what we have on our arson case before we call it a day?”

*   *   *

McCabe waved to him as she pulled out of the garage. Sitting in his car, the cooling system on full blast, Baxter waved back.

When McCabe was gone, he picked up his ORB, entered the code, and waited for a response.

“Yes?”

“Tonight?” Baxter said.

“Concerning?”

“McCabe.”

“Usual.” The transmission ended.

Baxter put his ORB down on the console and rubbed at the sweat on his upper lip.

The annual UFO festival in Las Vegas had been held in one-hundred-degree weather. Now the November heat wave had spread east.

Baxter reached for his water thermos.

His throat was dry, scratchy. Maybe he was coming down with something.

Or maybe he didn't like the heat as much as he'd thought he would.

*   *   *

McCabe let herself into the house. She dropped her thermo jacket on a chair and stretched. Even with a couple of errands along the way, she'd actually gotten home at a decent hour for once.

And she might want to leave again, McCabe realized as her father stomped into the living room holding one of his leather bedroom slippers.

“Do you see this?” Angus said. “Do you see the teeth marks?”

“Puppies will be puppies,” McCabe said.

“I want that damn dog out of this house.”

“We're keeping him, Pop. It's time we had another dog.”

“When that fluffy ball of fur that your mother called a dog died—”

“You cried,” McCabe said.

“Tears of joy,” Angus said. “I am not going to walk that four-legged—”

“The Wyatt kids down the street have agreed to be our official dog walkers.”

“You've got an answer for everything, haven't you?”

“Not everything. What are we having for dinner?”

“Is your nose broken?”

“Smells like lasagna. But if you're really mad at me, making your world-famous lasagna—”

“He made his world-famous lasagna for your brother.”

McCabe turned at the sound of her brother's voice. Adam was standing in the dining room doorway. He was smiling.

“Hi,” she said.

“Hi, sis.”

“You're wearing … I thought you didn't like wearing the exoskeleton.”

“Mai says I'm stubborn.”

“So, uh, Mai's still around.”

“For now. Maybe for a while.”

“And the next time you come, you can bring her so that I can have a look at her,” Angus said. “But I called you over here tonight to talk some sense into your sister.”

Adam said, “So what are we going to name the dog, sis?”

“Spot?” McCabe said.

“Big Foot more like it,” Angus said. “And we aren't going to name him anything, because you're taking him back where you got him.”

“Where is he, by the way?” McCabe said.

“Asleep out on the porch,” Adam said. “Interesting-looking animal. Seems to be a mix of about half a dozen different breeds.”

“Great Dane on his mother's side, Dalmatian, Lab, and mutt on his father's.”

“And all likely to eat us out of house and home,” Angus said. “The lasagna's ready. One of you make the salad.”

McCabe walked over and tucked her hand into her brother's arm. “If I haven't said it, I'm glad you're here.”

Adam gave her a sideways glance and said, almost awkwardly, “Me, too.”

“So, how's the research going?”

“Coming along.” He looked directly at her now, one eye covered by his pirate's patch. “Someday I'm going to walk on my own two legs and feel them.”

“Of course you will,” McCabe said. “Mai's right. You are stubborn. Once you set your mind to something, you never give up.”

Angus said, “Will you two stop yapping and—”

“Make the salad,” Adam said. “We got it covered, Pop.”

McCabe smiled at her brother. “Let's go get dinner on the table. I'm starving.”

*   *   *

Sitting on his sofa, Beethoven playing in the background, a glass of bourbon within reach, Pettigrew rehearsed what he would say to his ex-wife.

She had called to say she was in town and on her way over.

“But this time, sweetheart,” he said in his best tough-guy imitation, “this time, I'm not going to play the sap for you.”

Pettigrew sighed. He lifted his glass in a toast. “Here's to you, Swede, from one poor sap to another.”

 

Author's Note

 

This book is a traditional police procedural novel that takes place in the near future (2019) in an occasionally altered, or “parallel,” universe. However, the setting will be familiar to readers who have visited Albany, New York, or will visit the city during the next few years. Therefore, I should tell you what is true in this book and what is not.

The historical facts about the city of Albany are true. Abraham Lincoln, president of the United States during the Civil War, and John Wilkes Booth, actor, Confederate zealot, and Lincoln's assassin, did both visit Albany in 1861. Lincoln was en route to his inauguration; Booth was performing at a local theater. They were in the city on the same day, and Booth may have been in the crowd that gathered to witness Lincoln's arrival. A couple of months later, Booth was again in Albany. This time he was performing with a young actress named Henrietta Irving. During a drunken lover's quarrel, Irving stabbed Booth. There is some historical disagreement about where the knife left its mark—on Booth's handsome face or on his neck. Irving went back to her room and tried to kill herself. She survived and later went on to marry and have a successful career. Four years later, Booth assassinated Lincoln at Ford's Theater. The young major and his fiancée who had joined the Lincolns in their box at the theater that evening were from Albany. Their lives, too, were changed forever by the events of that night.

The presence of Booth and Lincoln in Albany and the incident between Booth and Irving is the subject of a fictional play by the fictional third victim in this book. My third victim is a Broadway actress whose roles have included “Alice” and, later, as an adult, the “Red Queen.” Because she was obsessed with all things
Alice
and that may have played a role in her death, there is a strong
Alice in Wonderland
theme in this book. All of the statements about the
Alice
books and Lewis Carroll are based on research.

There are also references to
The Wizard of Oz
because the third victim's body is found off Delaware Avenue, not too far from Albany's own “yellow brick road.” Both avenue and road do exist. The yellow-hued bricks used to construct an old, no longer used, bridge have given Albany its own version of the yellow brick road that L. Frank Baum describes in his book and that appears so famously in the Judy Garland movie.

In this book, Albany has a female mayor. At the time of this writing, all of the mayors during Albany's several-hundred-year history have been male. The reader also will notice some other tinkering with political history and popular culture. When writing a book set in the near future, a writer quickly learns that creating an “alternate universe” or “parallel world” is the only way to deal with changes that may occur in the real world. For the fiction writer, an alternate universe also allows the exploration of ideas and possibilities.

To summarize, the reader may take as fact, the historical aspects of this book. The descriptions of the geography of the city, with the exception of a minor change regarding the location of a crime scene, are generally accurate. However, although a “fast train” to Albany has often been discussed, the trip still requires about two and a half hours. The convention center referred to in the book has been proposed, but does not yet exist. The restaurant with its own attached “vertical farm” cannot be found in Albany. But vertical farming is now seen as one near-future solution to feeding an urban population.

Several scenes in this book occur on the University at Albany campus. The layout of the campus is generally as described. As portrayed here and in reality, the UAlbany mascot is a Great Dane. In the real world, the Department of Theatre Productions at UAlbany offers a minor and an interdisciplinary major. In my book, the UAlbany Theatre Department not only offers a major, but has a graduate program.

The Albany Police Department (APD) in this book bears some resemblance to the structure of the city's police department and to urban police departments in general. But the APD of this book, the officers, detectives, and senior administrators, are fictional. They were not inspired by or intended to represent real people. Even if I have inadvertently used a real-world name of someone who has served in the APD, it is a coincidence. I have done some research in a police department, but that was academic research and did not occur in the Albany PD. The events in this book also did not occur in the department where I did my research. In short, my cops are fictional and so is their Albany PD. The issues that my cops are dealing with regarding crime, police-community relations, police bureaucracy, and city budgets have some basis in the reality of policing in Albany and most American cities. But the context is 2019 and the specific crimes the detectives tackle come from my imagination, as do the personal and professional situations in which they find themselves.

The scenes involving the task force with representatives from the local Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) office and the New York State Police reflect common practice in major cases. However, the characters from the FBI and the State Police are fictional, not based on real people, and not to be taken as the author's commentary about either agency. Interagency cooperation is essential to solving crimes, but the cops in my book get to offer their opinions about turf.

The reader will note the contrast between some advances in technology and some problems that are less easily solved. For example, the drug referred to early in the book is inspired by recent findings regarding treatment of soldiers traumatized in battle. The medical condition discussed at the end of the book is also based on fact. But the reader will note that in this world of the near future, the surveillance technology does not always work as it should. That is because effective use of technology requires financial investment in infrastructure, maintenance, and other budgetary support. It also requires the cooperation of Mother Nature.

For more information about the setting, history, and technology in this book please go to my Web site:
www.frankieybailey.com
.

 

A
LSO BY
F
RANKIE
Y. B
AILEY

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Wicked Albany: Lawlessness and Liquor in the Prohibition Era
(with Alice P. Green)

African American Mystery Writers: A Historical and Thematic Study

“Law Never Here”: A Social History of African American Responses to Issues of Crime and Justice
(with Alice P. Green)

Popular Culture, Crime, and Justice
(with Donna C. Hale)

Out of the Woodpile: Black Characters in Crime and Detective Fiction

 

About the Author

Frankie Y. Bailey is an associate professor in the School of Criminal Justice, University at Albany/SUNY. She is the author of mysteries as well as nonfiction titles that explore the intersections of crime, history, and popular culture. A Macavity Award winner who has been nominated for Edgar, Anthony, and Agatha awards, Ms. Bailey is active in several writers' organizations and has served as vice president of Mystery Writers of America and as president of Sisters in Crime.

 

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.

 

A THOMAS DUNNE BOOK FOR MINOTAUR BOOKS
.
An imprint of St. Martin's Publishing Group.

 

THE RED QUEEN DIES
. Copyright © 2013 by Frankie Y. Bailey. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.