“Approbation from Sir Hubert is praise indeed.” Nona stretched and tried to decide whether or not to call Emma Barnes in Lancaster again. She’d already tried three or four times. Admittedly, Liz was smart to suggest having Barnes appear on the program to talk about her missing daughter who had answered personal ads. Liz was bright and imaginative. But she was trying to skunk me when she discussed Barnes with Hamilton, Nona decided. She wants my job. Let her try.
She gave one last, long stretch, sat at her desk, and dialed the Lancaster number. Once more the Barnes household did not answer.
* * *
Vince arrived promptly at seven. He was wearing a well-cut gray pinstriped suit accompanied by a brown and beige tie. It’s for sure no woman picks out his ties, Nona thought, remembering how fussy Matt had been about what tie went with which shirt and what suit.
* * *
The restaurant was on Broadway, a few blocks from Nona’s apartment. “Let’s save the serious stuff for dessert,” Vince suggested. Over salads they briefly sketched their personal lives. “If you were placing a personal ad, what would you say about yourself?” he asked.
Nona reflected. “Divorced White Female, age 41, cable television producer.”
He sipped his scotch. “Go on.”
“Manhattan born and bred. Think anyone who lives anywhere else is mentally ill.”
He laughed. She noticed that caused friendly creases in the corners of his eyes.
Nona sipped her wine. “This is terrific burgundy,” she commented. “I hope you’re planning to have some when the steak comes.”
“I am. Finish your ad, please.”
“Barnard graduate. I didn’t even leave Manhattan for college, you see. I did have a year abroad, and I do like to travel as long as I’m not gone more than three weeks.”
“Your ad’s getting expensive.”
“I’ll wind it up. Clean but not particularly tidy. You’ve noticed my office. Do not have green thumb. Good cook but hate fussy food. Love jazz. And oh, yes, I’m a good dancer.”
“That’s how you got friendly with Erin Kelley and Darcy Scott, in a dance class,” D’Ambrosio commented, and then watched as pain darkened Nona’s eyes. Hurriedly he added, “My ad’s a little shorter. I work for the government. Divorced White Male, 43 years old, FBI agent, brought up in Waldwick, New Jersey, graduated from NYU. Can’t dance without tripping over my own feet. Like to travel as long as it isn’t Vietnam. Three years there was enough. And last, but certainly not least, I have a fifteen-year-old son, Hank, who’s a swell kid.”
* * *
As she had promised, the steaks were superb. Over coffee they talked about the program. “We’re taping it in two weeks,” Nona said. “I’d like to save you for last so people are left with a sobering warning about the potential danger of answering these ads. You’re going to show the pictures of the missing girls, aren’t you?”
“Yes. There’s always the chance a viewer may have information about one of them.”
It was biting cold when they left the restaurant. A frosty winter wind made Nona gasp. Vince took her arm as they crossed the street. He did not remove it the rest of the way to her apartment.
He accepted her invitation to come up for a nightcap. Nona remembered happily that her cleaning lady, Lola, had been in. The place would look presentable.
The seven-room apartment was in a prewar building. She could see D’Ambrosio’s eyebrows raise as he took in the large foyer, the high ceilings, the long windows on Central Park West, the paintings in the living room, the massive Jacobean furniture. “Very nice,” he commented.
“My folks gave it to me as is when they moved to Florida. I’m an only child, and this way when they come up to New York, my father feels comfortable. He hates hotels.” She went to the bar. “What’ll it be?”
She poured Sambuca for both of them, then paused. “It’s only quarter past nine. Do you mind if I take a minute to phone someone?” She reached in her purse. As she looked up the Barnes’s number, she explained why she was calling them.
This time the phone was picked up immediately. Nona froze as she realized the sound she was hearing was a woman screaming. A man’s voice gave a distracted greeting. In shocked bewilderment he said, “Whoever this is, please get off the phone. I must call the police immediately. We’ve been away all day and just opened the mail. There was a package addressed to my wife.”
The screams were now a shrieking crescendo. Nona motioned to Vince to pick up the portable telephone on the table beside him.
“Our daughter,” the bewildered voice went on. “She’s been missing for two years. That package has one of Claire’s own shoes and a high-heeled satin slipper in it.” He began to shout, “Who sent this? Why did they send it? Does this mean Claire is dead?”
Darcy was handed out of the cab by the doorman, entered Le Cirque, and felt herself begin to unwind. She had not realized how much energy she had put into the meeting with Len Parker. Her head was still buzzing with the realization that he had met Erin. Why had he denied it? Erin had walked out on him. Certainly, she’d never dated him again. Was it simply that he didn’t want to be questioned and have to admit the lies about his background?
Every time her mother and father were in New York they dined at Le Cirque. It was a wonderful restaurant. Darcy found herself wondering why she didn’t come here more often. How ever did two such stunning people manage to produce that mousy-looking child? And how could one sentence remain so imbedded in memory?
The bar was to the left. Small and charming, it was not a hangout but a place to wait for a guest or a table. A young couple was standing near it, chatting animatedly. A single man was at the end. The most ordinary-looking person you’ll see.
Michael Nash had not been kind to himself. Dark blond hair, a face that was saved from being conventionally handsome by a rather sharp chin, a long, trim body, dark blue suit with faint pinstripes, silver and blue tie. As he looked at her with obvious recognition and pleasure, Darcy was aware that Michael Nash’s eyes were an unusual shade, somewhere between sapphire and midnight blue.
“Darcy Scott.” It was a statement, not a question. He signaled to the maître d’ and put his hand under her elbow.
They were seated at a prime table in full view of the entrance. Michael Nash must be a frequent and valued customer of Le Cirque.
“A drink? Wine?”
“White wine, please. And a glass of water.”
He ordered a bottle of Pellegrino with the Chardonnay, then smiled. “Now that for the moment we’ve taken care of the necessaries, as an old friend puts it, Darcy, it’s good to meet you.”
For the next half hour, she realized that he was deliberately steering the conversation away from Erin. It was only after she had begun to sip the wine and pick at a roll that he said, “Mission accomplished. I think you are finally starting to feel safe.”
Darcy stared at him. “Whatever do you mean?”
“I mean that I was watching for you. I saw the way you hurried in. Everything about you suggested a high level of tension. What happened?”
“Nothing. I’d really like to talk about Erin.”
“I would too. But Darcy . . . ” He stopped. “Look, I can’t get out of the business of doing what I do all day. I’m a psychiatrist.” His smile was apologetic.
She felt herself at last begin to relax. “I’m the one who should apologize. You’re absolutely right. I did feel pretty tense coming here.” She told him about Len Parker.
He listened attentively, his head slightly tilted. “You’ll of course report this man to the police.”
“The FBI, actually.”
“Vincent D’Ambrosio? As I told you when you called, he came to my office on Tuesday. Unfortunately, I could tell him very little. I met Erin for a drink several weeks ago. I had the immediate feeling that a girl like her had no need to answer personal ads. I challenged her with that and she told me about the program her friend is putting together. She mentioned you.
Said her best friend was answering ads with her.”
Darcy nodded, hoping that her eyes were not going to fill with tears.
“I don’t usually explain that the reason I’m going this route is because of a book I’m working on, but I did tell Erin. We exchanged some stories about our various dates. I’ve tried to remember everything she said, but she didn’t give any names and they were funny stories. Certainly, I had no hint that anyone worried her.”
“ ‘Close encounters of the worst kind,’ she used to call them.”
Nash laughed. “She told me that. I asked if we could plan dinner soon, and she agreed. I was trying to wrap up my book and she was completing a necklace she had designed. I said I’d get back to her. When I tried, there was no answer. From what Vincent D’Ambrosio said, it was already too late.”
“That was the night she thought she was meeting someone named Charles North. I still think that even though he didn’t show up, her death has to do with a personal ad she answered.”
“Thinking that, why are you answering personal ads now?”
“Because I’m going to find that man.”
He looked troubled but did not comment. They studied the menu, both selecting the Dover sole. As they ate, Nash seemed to be deliberately trying to keep her mind off Erin’s death. He told her about himself. “My father made his money in plastics. Literally lived out that famous line from The Graduate. Then bought a rather garishly ornate mansion in Bridgewater. He was a decent, fine man, and every time I wonder why three of us needed twenty-two rooms, I remember how happy he was showing them off.”
He touched on his divorce. “I married the week after I graduated from college. Terrible mistake for both of us. It wasn’t a financial problem, but medical school, especially when it involves the continuing study of psychoanalysis, is a long, hard road. We didn’t have time for each other. By the end of four years, she’d had enough. Sheryl lives in Chicago now and has three children.”
It was Darcy’s turn. Carefully, she steered around giving the names of her famous parents, jumping quickly to leaving the advertising agency and setting up her budget decorating business. “Somebody once told me I’m a new version of Sanford and Son, and I guess it’s true, but I love it.” She thought of the room she was decorating for the recuperating sixteen-year-old.
If he noticed gaps in the background, he did not comment. The salads arrived just as a producer friend of her parents stopped at the table. “Darcy!” A warm kiss, a hug. He introduced himself to Michael Nash. “Harry Curtis.” He turned back to Darcy. “You get prettier every day. I hear your parents are touring in Australia. How’s it going?”
“They just got there.”
“Well, give them my love.” Another hug and Curtis left for his own table.
Nash’s eyes did not signal curiosity. That’s the way it works with shrinks, Darcy thought. They wait for you to tell them. She did not offer an explanation of what Curtis had said.
It was a pleasant dinner. Nash confessed to two passions, riding and tennis. “They’re what keep me in Bridgewater.” Over espresso, he returned to the subject of Erin’s death. “Darcy, I don’t usually offer advice to people, even free advice, but I wish you’d drop the idea of answering these ads. That FBI fellow seemed perfectly competent to me and if I’m any judge, he’s not going to rest until whoever murdered Erin is paying the price.”
“He told me that in so many words. I guess we all do what we have to do.” She managed a smile. “The last time I spoke to Erin, she said she’d met one nice guy and wouldn’t you know it, he hadn’t called back. I’d bet my bottom dollar it was you.”
He took her home in a cab, told the driver to wait, and walked her to the door. The wind was sharp and he turned so that he was protecting her from its full blast as she turned the key. “May I call you again?”
“I’d like that.” For a moment she thought he was going to kiss her cheek, but he simply pressed her hand and went back to the waiting cab.
The wind pulled at the door, causing it to close slowly. As the lock clicked, the sound of footsteps made her turn. Through the glass she could see the figure of a man rushing up the steps. An instant sooner and he would have been in the vestibule with her. As she stared at him, her mouth too dry to scream, Len Parker pounded at the door, kicked it, then turned and ran down the block.
X
FRIDAY
March 1
Greta Sheridan debated between getting up or trying to sleep for another hour. A gusty March wind was rattling the windowpanes and she remembered that Chris had been after her to have these windows replaced.
The early-morning light filtered through the drawn draperies. She loved a cold room for sleeping. The quilt and blankets were warm and the blue and white moire canopy gave the bed a comforting enclosed feeling.
She had been dreaming of Nan. The anniversary of her death, March thirteenth, was two weeks away. Nan had turned nineteen the day before. This year she would have been celebrating her thirty-fourth birthday.
Would have been.
Impatiently, Greta tossed back the covers, reached for her velour robe, and got up. Pulling on her slippers, she went into the hallway and down the winding staircase to the main floor. She understood why Chris was concerned. It was a large house and it was generally known that she lived alone. “You don’t know how easy it is for a professional to disarm a security system,” he had warned several times.
“I love this house.” Every room held so many happy memories. Somehow, Greta felt that to leave this place would be to leave them as well. And, she thought with an unconscious smile, if Chris would finally settle down one of these days and give me some grandchildren, it will be a wonderful place for them to visit.
The Times was at the side door. As the coffee perked, Greta began to read. There was a brief item on an inside page about that girl who’d been found dead in New York last week. Copycat murder. What a horrible thought. How could there be two such evil people, the one who had snuffed out Nan’s life and the one who had killed Erin Kelley? Would Erin Kelley still be alive if that program had not been aired?
And what was it that she had been trying to remember when she insisted on watching it? Nan. Nan, she thought. You told me something that I should have realized was important.
Nan, chatting about school, her classes, her friends, her dates. Nan looking forward to the summer program in France. Nan who loved to dance. “I Could Have Danced All Night.” The song could have been written for her.
Erin Kelley had also been found wearing one high-heeled shoe. High heel? What was it about those two words? Impatiently, Greta opened the Times to the crossword puzzle.
The phone rang. It was Gregory Layton. She’d met him at the club dinner the other night. In his early sixties, he was a federal judge and lived in Kent about forty miles away. “An attractive widower,” Priscilla Clayburn had whispered to her. He was attractive, and he was asking her to have dinner with him tonight. Greta accepted and replaced the receiver, realizing that she was looking forward to the evening.
Dorothy came in at the stroke of nine. “Hope you don’t have to go out this morning, Mrs. Sheridan. That wind is mean.” She was carrying the mail, including a bulky package under her arm. She laid everything on the table and frowned. “That’s a funny-looking thing. I mean, no return address. I hope it’s not a bomb or something.”
“Probably more of that awful crank mail. Damn that program.” Greta started to pull at the string on the package and had a sudden sense of panic. “It does look funny. Let me call Glenn Moore.”
Police Chief Moore had just arrived in his office at headquarters. “Don’t touch that package, Mrs. Sheridan,” he told her crisply. “We’ll be right over.” He called the state police. They promised to rush a portable security surveillance unit to the Sheridan household.
At ten o’clock, handling the package with infinite caution, an officer in the bomb squad positioned it to be X-rayed.
From the living room to
which she and Dorothy had been banished, Greta heard the man’s relieved laughter. Dorothy at her heels, she hurried back to the kitchen.
“These won’t blow up, ma’am,” she was assured. “Nothing in there except a pair of mismatched shoes.”
Greta saw Moore’s startled expression, felt the blood drain from her face as the package was ripped open, revealing a shoe box with the sketch of an evening slipper on the cover. The lid came off. Inside, nestled together in tissue, were a high-heeled sequined slipper and a scuffed running shoe.
“Oh, Nan! Nan!” Greta did not feel Moore grab her as she fainted.
At three o’clock on Friday morning, Darcy was yanked from restless sleep by the insistent ringing of the phone. Reaching for it, she saw the time on the clock radio. Her “hello” was quick and breathless.
“Darcy.” Her name was whispered. The voice sounded familiar, but she couldn’t place it.
“Who is this?”
The whisper became a shout. “Don’t you ever close the door in my face again! Hear me? Hear me?”
Len Parker. She slammed down the phone, pulled the covers around her. A moment later the phone began to ring again. She did not pick it up. The ringing continued. Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen rings. She knew she should take the receiver off the hook but could not bear to touch it, knowing that Parker was on the other end.
Finally it stopped. She yanked the jack from the wall, rushed into the living room, and put the answering machine on automatic pickup, then hurried back to bed, slamming the bedroom door behind her.
Had he done this to Erin? Followed her when she walked out on him? Maybe followed her to the bar where she was supposed to meet someone named Charles North? Maybe forced her into a car?
She’d call Vince D’Ambrosio in the morning.
For the next two hours she lay awake, finally falling into a sleep that once again was troubled with vague, restless dreams.
* * *
At seven-thirty, she awakened with an instant sense of fear, then remembered the reason for it. A long, hot shower relieved some of the tension. She pulled on jeans, a turtleneck sweater, her favorite boots.