Page 43 of The Six Murders of Daphne St Clair

Chapter Thirty

Ruth was welded to the spot, watching the stream on her laptop.

The story had broken after someone in Abrams had recognized Daphne on the news and contacted the police.

She didn’t know what evidence the police had, but finding out that a victim of an unsolved crime was the stepchild of a serial killer certainly merited the police investigating further.

Her stomach rose up and she ran to the bathroom, gagging. When she was done throwing up, she curled up next to the toilet, feeling the cold porcelain press against her feverish forehead.

Daphne was a murderer. A child murderer.

It all made sense. Daphne had skillfully glossed over the years when her kids had been in high school as being uneventful, carefully maneuvering Ruth away from Robert and Gabrielle Hanks.

She thought back to the picture she had found in Daphne’s things, the dark-haired girl in the photo.

Gabrielle. Ruth realized once again that she was navigating unfamiliar terrain with an unreliable navigator, someone who might actually want to do her harm.

She was putting a podcast out that could be full of lies, no matter how many background interviews she did and how much research she put into it.

Ruth could end up more hated than Daphne herself.

Why did she think she could outsmart Daphne? There would always be another lie, another murder hidden away. Daphne had taken everything from her once before. And now she was doing it again.

StopDropAndTroll:

Scum. Fucking scum.

BurntheBookBurnerz:

This is completely different. I thought she killed MEN. I don’t understand. . .

StopDropAndTroll:

AWW did the serial killer disappoint u?

ShockAndBlah:

She’s lost me. I can’t like her anymore.

StopDropAndTroll:

Ur not supposed to like her, u psychopath.

ShockAndBlah:

Hey, didn’t someone mention that town before? In a discussion about unsolved murders Daphne may have committed?

BurntheBookBurnerz:

Oh yeah. . . you’re right!

PreyAllDay:

It was CapoteParty. . . u/CapoteParty, why did you ask that? What do you know?

ShockAndBlah:

CapoteParty?

After that, people really started to hate me.

When everyone thought I had only killed men, I was interesting to them.

Maybe in their heart of hearts, other people understood why you might like to smile to someone’s face as you slipped poison into their coffee.

Maybe everyone just loved a murder story full of love, sex, and lotsa money.

But a child killer? That was no fun.

I had never felt so alone. And somehow that made me even more worried about stalkers. I’d already given them so much ammunition, but this would push someone over the edge. I was right to worry.

“The front desk wanted me to inform you that there was an incident tonight,” the Coconut Grove attendant said coolly, almost robotically. She handed me my medication, thrusting it into my hand with so much force that my arm ached.

“Is this you informing me? Because you haven’t told me jack shit,” I protested, clutching the pills tightly in my hand. My arthritic fingers ached with the effort. The girl sighed, as if to say: Oh dear, Difficult Daphne is at it again.

“They had a man approach the front desk and ask to leave you a letter. The staff said we didn’t have anyone by that name living here and refused to take the letter.

He became irate, insisting that he knew you were here and that they were lying.

It was only when they threatened to call the police that he left. ”

“Hmmm. . . wonder what was in the letter?” I mused.

“They just wanted to make you aware of this event and caution you again to stay out of sight—”

“Yeah, yeah,” I interrupted, gesturing behind me with the hand that wasn’t holding my medication. “The doors are locked, the curtains are shut. It’s darker than a witch’s asshole in here, don’t worry.”

The attendant’s face hardened and she stepped close, uncomfortably close. I stepped back, my free hand leaning on my walker as my knees wobbled.

“I wouldn’t push us. You know, we’re all getting sick of protecting you, especially now that we’ve heard you killed a child! It would be a real shame if we made a mistake,” she hissed, before walking off. Now I wish I’d gotten her name.

Trusting these attendants was a real concern.

One of the staff could be incentivized (either by money or just pure hatred) to leave a side door unlocked, to point out my window to a person who wanted to harm me.

Or they could slip something in my pills.

After all, they all wanted me gone from here; that was abundantly clear.

I couldn’t trust anyone, and certainly not them .

It was a shame because they loved me before the whole Warren thing, probably because I was one of the least incontinent people in my age range.

I left the pills in my bathroom and sat in my armchair with my hand on the phone for a moment.

The apartment was completely silent except for the sound of the ticking clock, relentlessly reminding me that I was alone, and my days were numbered.

I stared at the thick swathes of fabric covering the windows.

Curtains should make you feel safer, as if you were shielded from the world.

But there was something about not being able to see outside that made it scarier.

Anyone could be out there.

BurntheBookBurnerz:

Kind of disgusting to be giving a platform to a child-killer.

ShockAndBlah:

Should Ruth even be doing this podcast? Honestly, I’m starting to wonder about her. . .

HauteHistoire: “Hi, guys, I won’t be doing any more Daphne aesthetic videos on my TikTok.

I understand now that my videos glorified and glamorized a senseless murderer and that I was contributing to a culture of violence in our country.

Discovering that she may have killed a child only further confirms this decision, although I’d actually been thinking about this for a long, long time.

These videos have hugely increased my followers, so I hope you’ll all go on a journey with me as we reflect on how it’s wrong to monetize other people’s pain.

I’m still learning every day so thank you all for teaching me.

I’m trying to better myself on this crazy experience called life.

Anyways, stay tuned for tomorrow’s video where I dive into the Nineties heroin-chic craze and how you too can look like a heroin addict, just one with a platinum card! Okay, thanks, peace and love, byeeee.”

Ruth tried to call Daphne, but she wouldn’t pick up, which was incredibly frustrating since Ruth knew that she was confined to her apartment, always in earshot of her phone.

She spent hours watching coverage of the allegations, mainlining sour Skittles and waiting for someone to dig up some concrete evidence that either proved or disproved that Daphne had killed a child.

Should Ruth even continue with the podcast?

It could destroy her career if people were outraged enough.

People might believe she was on Daphne’s side or that she had known that Daphne was a child-killer and did this anyway.

Ruth didn’t do well in high-pressure scenarios.

She felt as if she was back in the Palm Haven police station, staring at a two-way mirror, trying desperately to explain how an innocent person could look so damn guilty.

The Reddit comments online were demanding that she put out an episode, that Ruth provide a full explanation of what she had known and what she might have suspected, that she give them a damn good reason to absolve herself.

Ruth stopped leaving her apartment, stopped opening her curtains, stopped leaving her bed.

All the media wanted to talk about was Daphne and her dead stepdaughter.

The coverage was news releases and rants from outrage magnets.

Gone were all the activists, academics, and rebels who’d previously argued that Daphne deserved understanding, if not a little sympathy.

No one wanted to appear on TV defending a woman who might have killed a young girl.

The public stopped wearing Daphne shirts and SNL stopped doing sketches about her.

Everyone agreed that Daphne St Clair was no longer fun.

It was just so hard to find a truly ethical serial killer, a sympathetic murderer who aligned perfectly with larger societal issues about class, gender, violence, and power.

Ruth had always thought that the central story of Daphne (the Black Widow who had been repeatedly victimized by men and decided to start victimizing men right back) was true.

Now she understood that Daphne would kill anyone who stood in the way of what she wanted.

Just because that had typically been men, the people who held the money and the power, didn’t mean it had to be men.

After all, Robin Hood was just a legend. The true story looked a lot more like Daphne St Clair.

In desperation, Ruth called her mom. When Louise picked up, Ruth explained about the allegations, and how she didn’t know if they were true or not, but that it was giving her second thoughts about doing the podcast. She expected her mom to crow about being right and tell her to abandon it immediately, but her mother surprised her.

“Ruth, at this point, what’s done is done. Quitting the podcast now will only hurt your career. Maybe you’ll be able to get a good job out of this and can move far away. Florida’s not safe for you anymore, so now you just need some money and a reason to go.”

“I shouldn’t have to leave home. I’m innocent,” Ruth protested. Louise sighed. Ruth could hear that she was exhausted, that a long day of work and managing her symptoms had left her depleted and irritable.

“Forget about the past and focus on your future. This podcast won’t bring him back and you’ll never see a cent of that inheritance. So just use it as a springboard to something else.”

“But I worry that it sends the wrong message. Giving her this platform,” Ruth explained, trying to make sense of all the mixed-up emotions inside of her.

“Ruth, you can’t pay the rent on a moral high ground.

So, hold your nose and do it for the money because you sure as shit know there’s nothing noble about being poor,” Louise said, her voice frosty.

Her mother had always worked minimum-wage jobs, bouncing from offices, restaurants, factories, anything she could get her hands on.

There was no time for academic debates in Louise Robinson’s world; there was no time for anything really.

She was sick, and she was tired, and her daughter was being a coward.

“But—” Ruth began.

“Ruth, I’m exhausted. This whole thing has been hard for me too. You made your bed, so now, you’re just going to have to lie in it,” Louise said. “Finish this.”

Ruth woke in the middle of the night to the sound of a gentle rapping on her front door. It was so quiet that Ruth wasn’t sure that it was real. Was it a dream? A tree tapping on the wall of her building? No. There it was again.

Ruth sat frozen in bed, unsure of what she should do. It was past midnight, and her apartment was pitch-black since the curtains were all shut. Ruth turned the flashlight of her phone on and sat there, listening to the knocking, frozen, unsure what to do.

“Ruth. . . Ruth. . .” a voice called from the door. Ruth slowly, quietly, slipped out of bed, carefully skirting the creaky spot on the floor. She crept along the little hallway, past her kitchen, where her appliances seemed to gurgle and groan in their slumber.

“Ruth. . . Ruth. . .” The voice again.

A man’s voice. Quiet. Cajoling. Ruth edged over to the door and carefully checked that both locks were in place.

She clutched her phone, ready to call 911 if he came crashing through the door.

Slowly, painfully slowly, she raised her eye to the peephole.

She held her breath, aware that there was a man just inches away from her, a man who seemed determined to find her.

The hallway was shadowy, and the figure was wearing a dark green sweatshirt with the hood up. But then he turned, and the dim overhead light caught his face.

It was Officer Rankin. But he wasn’t wearing his uniform, and he was alone. Ruth eyed the loose sweatshirt. There was no way to tell if he was armed.

“I can hear you through the door. I know you’re there. . .” he murmured.

Ruth stepped back from the peephole, covering her mouth in terror. She glanced down at her phone, suddenly aware that she had no one to call—certainly not the police. She was alone in an apartment where the only exit was being blocked by a strange man.

She couldn’t go back to bed, not when he was still out there. Instead, she slowly slid down the wall, taking hot, shallow breaths through her clasped hands. How long would he stay out there?

“You’ve had a good run. But it’s time to end this,” he said with a smirk in his voice.

Ruth didn’t say anything, so he tried another tack.

“You’ve drawn too much attention to yourself. You want to plaster yourself all over the Internet? Well, I’m listening, Ruth. And it’s time you told us the truth.”

She tried to keep breathing, even though her chest was getting tighter and tighter.

“You can’t keep doing this, Ruth. We won’t allow it. Nobody gets away with murder. You should know that by now, you stupid bitch.”

He hasn’t come here as a cop, not tonight.

This wasn’t the kind of thing an officer on duty would do, and there was no partner in sight.

Ruth knew that Officer Rankin was working for the Montgomerys and it was obvious that he was here on their business.

Was he going to kill her? Anything seemed possible in the middle of the night.

“ Ruth . . . Ruth . . .” he whispered, his voice barely passing through the door. She shivered and held herself even tighter.

Ruth sat there for ages; her body paralyzed with fear.

At some point he stopped talking, stopped threatening and cajoling.

She sat there longer, afraid that he was only lulling her into a false sense of security, so that she might do something stupid like unlock the door to check if the coast was clear.

Finally, she worked up the courage to look out the peephole.

The hallway was empty, still bathed in shadows.

It was only the next morning, when Ruth finally ventured out that she found the picture taped to her door. It was an old picture of her with the Montgomerys, arm in arm with all the people who now wanted her gone.

Standing next to the man Daphne had murdered .