The Silent Bride (19 page)

"Tang Ling."

"The dress designer?"

"Yeah. The bride was wearing a Tang gown. Just indulge me a little."

"Okay, can do."

The Schoenfelds had five girls and four boys. April

finished her Dole in record dme and spent an hour in the Schoenfelds' finished basement, talking in turn with all five girls and two of the boys while upstairs more sitdng shivah was going on, and outside a dozen reporters were taking photos of mourners and trying to get them to speak.

April had totally expected to waste her time. Unlike in the movies, investigative interviews were never wrapped up in five minutes. First of all, it took hours of traveling time, across a bridge, two bridges, traffic all the way. When she got wherever she was going, sometimes the person she wanted was available, sometimes not. If she was really lucky, the person was there and willing to talk. But a lot of people thought they didn't know anything worthwhile and didn't want to talk. April had learned a long time ago that she couldn't ever go anywhere cold. She had to do some homework first, had to have some idea of what kind of information she wanted to elicit. And she had to know something about the person she wanted to question so a connection could be made.

Usually it took hours and she went away with a little something, a tiny tidbit that might be important down the line and might not. What April knew about Tovah was that she was spacey, not all there. She wanted to know what that meant.

At the same time Mike traveled to the Ribikoffs' three-story brick house in Flatbush, Brooklyn. He hadn't slept well without April. But after their dim sum dinner last night, he hadn't felt like spending the night with her and took her right home. A first. Now he was wide-awake and focused on his interview with the groom's family.

He'd done some research on the family, and the background check had uncovered an uneventful life. The Ribikoffs were registered Republicans, had traveled to Israel in 1998 and 2000. They paid taxes every year and had never been audited. Their credit cards were far from maxed out. They owned their house and '94 Ford Explorer. No vehicular violations. They had four children of which Schmuel was the second. Their oldest child was a girl, married last year, now living upstate. The wedding had cost in the neighborhood of twenty thousand dollars, about ten percent of what the Schoenfelds had put out for Tovah's. The Ribikoffs' two younger boys were still in high school. Neither of them had ever been in trouble, nor had Schmuel, who was highly regarded by his teachers and classmates. The family business was real estate—not big-time like the Schoenfelds—but the Ribikoffs were not doing badly, either. They were connected to some recent Russian emigres, who hadn't been invited to the wedding. Was that good enough motive to kill the bride? Mike didn't think so.

Unlike the Schoenfeld house, this one was comfortable but had little display of major wealth. Mr. Ribikoff himself answered the door. Thin, balding, sad-looking, and small, he didn't look like the kind of man who would seize a valuable diamond ring off a dying girl.

"I don't know how I can help you. I told the detective yesterday I don't know why anyone would do something like this," he said, reluctantly offering Mike a seat in his living room.

"How well did your son know Tovah?" Mike got to the point right away.

Ribikoff lifted a hand. "The boy saw her picture.

She was a pretty girl." The almost-father-in-law's face became animated for a moment as he thought of how pretty his son's wife would have been. "A nice, quiet girl, not a chatterbox. He liked her; what else did he need to know?"

"How did they meet?"

"My wife's friend, Ruth Lasker, she had the photo. My wife, she liked the girl's face, too. I liked her. Rebecca told Ruth we were interested." He dipped his chin. "Then he came to take a look at Schmuel praying."

Mike frowned. "Who?"

"Schoenfeld. He came to the Yeshiva, looked at the boy, liked what he saw." Mr. Ribikoff had moment of pride for his son, who'd attracted the interest of a rich and important family.

"Then what happened?"

"Naturally my wife wanted to go to the house, have a cup of coffee, eat a piece of cake, and see the girl before they started to date. But Suri Schoenfeld refused. That's the kind of person she is."

"Why?"

"She didn't want us telling Schmuel what to do. She insisted it was up to the children to decide if they liked each other." He rolled his eyes. "My wife is not like Suri Schoenfeld with the airs, but she does have a mind of her own. Why are you asking this? Who do you suspect?"

"We're looking for anything unusual."

"Oh, there was plenty unusual." Ribikoff made a face. "We live in a tight community here. You can get everything you need here. You never have to leave. Everybody understands the rules. My wife complains that the whole world knows your business,

knows your kids' business. They see you coming, they see you going, and the talk keeps up all day long. That's why it's a tradition to find new blood for the children, people outside your own four corners. But new blood that's the same blood. You know what I'm talking?"

Mike nodded. He knew exactly what Ribikoff was talking.

"Tovah was a religious girl and the family would have been good for Schmuel, but they polluted us."

"Polluted?"

"Yes, we do things simply, in a family way. We stick with the people we know. We don't bring in goyim—
shfartzes
from Africa to arrange the flowers. No offense, but you see what I'm saying? Look at the shame they've brought us," he said sadly.

Mike changed the subject. "Tell me about Tovah's ring," he said.

"It was a very costly ring. That's all I'm going to say." His eyes strayed toward the ceiling.

"Why did you remove it from Tovah's finger?"

Ribikoff closed his eyes, opened them, avoided the steady gaze of the detective. "It has nothing to do with this."

"Did you think the girl was dead?" Mike persisted. Did he want the girl dead?

"I didn't know. I wasn't thinking." Ribikoff crossed his legs.

"It seems an odd reaction."

Ribikoff clicked his tongue. "It was what it was."

"You just wanted it back?" Mike probed softly.

The man erupted. "Well, of course I wanted it back. The boy couldn't have married her after that, could he?" he said angrily.

Mike frowned. "Even if she'd recovered?"

Ribikoff shook his head as if only a dummy would think otherwise, then jabbed his chin belligerently at Mike. "It was a costly item. They would never have given it back."

Mike was chilled by these answers. He had his suspicions about the whole arrangement. Bad feeling rocketed back and forth between the two families. The Ribikoffs were not sitting shivah with the Schoenfelds. Something was way off the normal about the Ribikoffs, but that didn't make them killers. Mike questioned Schmuel and his mother closely but learned nothing really useful.

Twenty-one

J
ust before noon April, Mike, and Inspector Bellaqua met in the video section at One Police Plaza to view the video of Tovah Schoenfeld's wedding preparadons. It was crowded in the room where usually only one person pored over surveillance tapes of banks, stores, fast-food chains, and the elevators of housing projects where crimes had been committed. This was an eerie first. Not many homicide detecdves got to see their vicdm alive and the murder scene being constructed.

The video opens on the synagogue with its two bloodred azalea bushes out front, then cuts to a Caucasian male, five-ten, heavy build. Distinguishing feature: a blond pompadour that stood up a good three inches. He's wearing a pink silk shirt and fusses with the
huppah,
his lips moving as he waves away the camera.
Get out of here,
he's saying.

There is no audio or time frame. The next sequence shows a good-looking, skinny Latino, five-five, five-six, wearing tight jeans. His thick black hair is in a short ponytail. He's adjusting flowers in the party room, sashaying from table to table, aware of the camera. He sticks a lily stem between his teeth and poses. Cut. Next, waitresses are setting the tables with glasses, silver, napkins, plates. Three women— all have thick curly hair and gold Jewish stars around their necks. Cut to a short take of an African American, black as midnight, a big man, around six-two. He's standing by the exit door between two orange trees with an unreadable expression on his face. Cut to an elaborate ice sculpture on the food table, not yet beginning to melt. Cut to .. .

"There she is," Bellaqua said.

Tovah appears, disconcertingly alive with her hair in rollers under a hair dryer. Her hands are splayed in front of her on a table. Only the back of the manicurist is seen as she bends over her task of painting Tovah's nails are pearl pink. The manicurist has red hair. On the table beside Tovah is the blond wig on a Styrofoam head. Behind her are many colorful dresses hanging on a clothes rack, among them her wedding gown and veil in two plastic bags. Tovah looks at the camera as if she doesn't see it.

"She looks drugged," April commented.

"Mmmm," Bellaqua agreed.

"Weird," Mike murmured.

Cut to a little girl on the floor crying. Tovah leans over to hug her, hands her a hard candy The little girl takes the candy, puts it in her mouth, and stops crying. Tovah smiles.

"There. She looks okay there," Mike said. "Pretty girl. Likes children."

Cut to Tovah and her mother and grandmother arm in arm. Tovah's hair and nails are done. She's smiling here, too.

"She looks fine here. Eyes are okay," April said.

Cut to ...

"Ah," Bellaqua sighed.

"Just look at that!" Mike marveled.

At last, Tovah is wearing her voluminous wedding dress. A small Asian male stoops to arrange the folds of the dress, then steps back and tosses a cloud of white over her. A fog drops over her. The veil makes Tovah look as if she's trapped inside a tent of mosquito netting.

"Jesus. That's something. Who's that guy?" April said.

"Name's Kim. He's from the dress store."

"She sent someone?" April said, incredulous. Tang again. Not good. The presence of Ching's famous friend in this case was beginning to bother her.

"Guess so."

Cut to Tovah in her ten-thousand-dollar tent walking out of the room—not into the party room, but into the corridor on the other side that leads to the elevator that leads to the rabbi's study on the second floor. The camera follows her and her mother into the study, where Rabbi Levi waits with her father and the Ribikoffs. Nothing can be seen of Tovah through her veil as an illustrated scroll of some kind is brought out and displayed. Papers are signed.

It's a long movie. Then the camera follows the bride, her train, and her family downstairs to the corridor outside the sanctuary. Cut. The film ends at the open door of the sanctuary. They groaned and played the video two more times.

"Let's get stills of all the non-family members," April said. "We'll see if anyone saw them."

"Yep. And backgrounds on all of them. It's time to widen the net. Maybe one of these people hates Jews enough to kill one," Bellaqua said. "Ugly," she murmured. "Let's break for some lunch."

They left headquarters and walked across the street for a hamburger at the Metropolitan. While they ate Mike recounted his interview with the Ribikoffs. April did not say a word about going up to COOP City to pee in a cup, but she did describe her visit to the Schoenfelds.

"Tovah was a very nervous girl, probably had an anxiety disorder that was treated with antacids and bed rest. She liked shopping trips in the city with her mother and grandmother, but didn't do well with the strict adherence to rules. Apparently Tovah didn't like controls and direction. Her sisters said she was the only one who consistently wiggled out of tasks and schoolwork and anything else she didn't want to do. She had headaches and tuned out a lot."

Bellaqua shook her head. "So we've got zip on the families and their friends."