Play Dead

' . . . There are things that you know nothing about. Things that happened many years ago . . . sometimes the past can overlap with the present. That was what happened with David ...'

  'Serita?'

  'Yeah?'

  There was only one way to find the answer to what happened so many years ago, to what happened to David. 'Would you do me a favor?'

  'Sure.'

  'Don't tell my folks or the doctor.'

  'I won't.'

  'Can you get me a plane ticket to Chicago?'

  Chapter 26

  Mark burst through the door. His breathing was uneven, his chest hitching from the mere effort.

  'What the hell happened to you?' T.C. asked. 'You're a goddamn mess.'

  'Get me something to drink. A vodka, anything.'

  'You don't drink.'

  He collapsed into a chair. 'I do now.'

  T.C. grabbed two cans of Budweiser and tossed one to Mark. 'It's the best I can do. Jesus, Mark, your clothes are burned.'

  Mark ripped open the can of beer and chugged half of it.

  'You want to tell me what happened?'

  Mark stood, the can of beer nearly crushed by his grip. His words came fast, his pitch unsteady. 'I got to Judy Simmons's house at seven o'clock just like she said. I parked my car someplace off campus and walked about a mile before I spotted Judy's house. Then ...'

  'Then?'

  He swallowed. 'A taxi pulled up in front of the house. Laura got out of it.'

  'Oh shit.'

  'I ducked behind a tree. It didn't take a genius to figure out what Judy was up to. She must have figured -- '

  ' -- that if she put you and Laura together,' T.C. finished, 'the sparks would really fly.'

  Mark chuckled sadly.

  'What's so funny?' T.C. asked.

  'Nothing is funny,' Mark answered. 'Just ironic.'

  'Huh?'

  'You'll see. Anyway, I'm hiding behind this tree, watching Laura . . .' He stopped talking, his mind drifting back to the memory. Laura. His eyes had crawled over every inch of her with a yearning so great he was sure he would die. Just seeing her again, staring at her lovely face turned red from the cold, watching her walk up the path, made his stomach ache with a sense of loss.

  'Mark?'

  'Sorry,' he said softly. He took a deep breath and continued. 'Laura knocked on the door and waited. No one answered. She called Judy's name. Still nothing. So she tried the lock and opened the door. She went into the house.'

  'What did you do?'

  Mark looked away. 'I just stood there frozen in place. I don't know why. I should have just turned and left. But I couldn't. I stared and stared -- daydreaming, I guess -- until I saw smoke.'

  'Smoke?'

  'A fire broke out.'

  'What?'

  Mark nodded as if to reconfirm his own words. 'The smoke started to billow out of the cracks in doors and windows. It couldn't have happened more than five minutes after Laura entered.'

  'What did you do?'

  'I ran into the house. What a goddamn mess. It was unbelievable. Flames were crawling up the walls.'

  'Jesus.'

  'All I could think about was Laura. Laura is trapped somewhere in here, my mind kept repeating like a parakeet, trapped in the middle of this deadly blaze. Nothing else mattered. It was weird. The fire became nothing more than a diversion to me. I scrambled around desperately, hoping against hope that Laura was still alive.'

  'Don't tell me -- '

  Mark shook his head. 'I found her and pulled her out. The fire hadn't reached her yet. She was unconscious so I called 911 and stayed with her until I heard the sirens. I spoke to the hospital a little while later. She'll be okay.'

  'Thank God.'

  Mark swallowed hard. When he had lifted Laura, when he had taken her in his arms, he wanted so much to never let go, to protect her, to tell her everything was going to be okay. Tears found their way into his eyes before he forced them back down. 'The same,' Mark continued slowly, 'cannot be said about Judy. She's dead, T.C.'

  T.C. shook his head. 'I'm sorry, Mark. I know she meant a lot to you.'

  'Fires don't burn that fast, do they, T.C.? Somebody set that fire deliberately. Somebody murdered Judy Simmons.'

  'You can't be sure of that.'

  'I want to find that somebody, T.C. I want to nail that son of a bitch to the wall.'

  'Or daughter of a bitch.'

  'Huh?'

  'Think about it a second. Who would want to silence Judy?'

  'You're not suggesting . . .'

  T.C. shrugged. 'Do you remember what Judy said to you on the phone?'

  Mark thought for a moment. 'She wasn't making much sense. She said something about not knowing what I was doing, about not knowing the whole story.'

  T.C. shrugged. 'Maybe,' he concluded, 'we don't.'

  'Mrs Klenke will be with you in a moment.'

  'Thank you,' Laura said. She readjusted herself in the seat. The pain from the burns was greater than she had anticipated. Every move felt like sandpaper rubbing against a fresh wound. In the hospital they had given her painkillers. She had no idea how potent they were. Laura had managed to secure some codeine from a drugstore, but it was far from an adequate substitute.

  Laura looked at her watch. It took her a good portion of the night convincing Serita and Gloria to help her get to Chicago. They agreed reluctantly in the end, probably because they were afraid she would try to get there no matter what they did.

  They were probably right.

  T.C., the crafty son of a bitch, would be proud of her in an odd sort of way. She had spent most of the morning in her hospital bed playing detective. She called Brinlen College, got in touch with various professors and staff members, and asked about Sinclair Baskin. No one knew very much about him. Very few professors were left from 1960.

  But one call paid off.

  'Have you spoken to Mrs Klenke?' an older professor had asked her.

  'No. Who is she?'

  'Well, back then she was Miss Engle. She was Sinclair Baskin's personal secretary and if rumor had it correctly, the word to be emphasized is personal. Get my meaning?'

  The college office still had her name and phone number on file. Laura called up and persuaded Mrs Diana Klenke to see her. Now, just a few hours later, Laura was sitting in the woman's den.

  'Mrs Baskin?'

  Laura turned toward Mrs Klenke's voice. She had learned that Diana Klenke had been twenty-seven years old in 1960. That made her fifty-seven now, but she was still something to behold. Her hair had gone gray but her bone structure and smile made her more than just dazzling. She was very tall and lithe, elegantly dressed in a black Svengali suit. Her every move was graceful and subdued.

  'Call me Laura.'

  'Only if you'll call me Diana.'

  'Okay, Diana.'

  Diana Klenke's smile turned gentle as she looked at the younger woman in front of her. 'My goodness, you're stunning. Pictures do not do you justice, Laura.'

  'Thank you,' she replied. Laura wanted very much to return the compliment but whenever she had in the past, people thought she sounded phony and somewhat patronizing.

  'Would you like something to drink?'

  'No, thank you.'

  'Anything at all?'

  'Thank you, no.'

  Diana Klenke sat on the plush chair next to Laura. The room was beautiful and immaculately kept by what had to be a large staff of servants. The Victorian mansion must have held twenty-five rooms, each done in a style that would have made the Palace of Versailles envious. 'How was your trip?'

  'Fine,' Laura replied. 'You have a beautiful home, Diana.'

  Diana Klenke smiled as she nodded. 'My husband loved this house. It was his pride and joy. He died ten years ago. Killed in a car crash on his way home from the airport. As you might have guessed, he was a very wealthy man and now,' she paused, laughing lightly, 'I am a very wealthy widow.'

  'I'm sorry.'

  'Don't be. We were never all that close. Bes
ides, I have the older-man market cornered. They all want my money.'

  'I'm sure that's not true.'

  She shrugged. 'No matter. What can I do for you, Laura? You mentioned on the phone something about Sinclair?'

  'Yes.'

  'I read about your husband's tragic death. So damn sad. He was so young. Sometimes I think there must be a curse on the Baskin men.'

  'It seems so,' Laura agreed.

  'So what can I help you with?'

  Laura's leg shook. It would do no good to try and stop it. The leg would only start up again. She leaned forward. Pain shot through the burns on her back as she reached into her purse. 'Will you take a look at this photograph?'

  Diana Klenke took out a pair of reading glasses. Somehow, they added to her looks, making her appear even more stately and beautiful. Sinclair Baskin's former secretary took the photograph in her hand and studied it for nearly a minute without saying a word. 'That's Sinclair all right. The woman's name is Judy . . .'

  'Judy Simmons?' Laura offered.

  'Yes, that's the name. I remember that one very well.'

  'That one?'

  Diana nodded. 'Sinclair Baskin was a full-fledged womanizer, Laura.'

  'He had affairs?'

  She laughed. 'Dozens. Blondes, brunettes, redheads -- it made no difference as long as they were beautiful. He changed them in a blur. One day, this one. The next day, another. You see, Sinclair Baskin was a handsome, smooth-talking man. He fooled around with co-eds, with school colleagues, with married women. I remember when he slept with the department chairman's wife.' She stopped, smiled. 'He even fooled around with his own secretary.'

  Laura was not exactly sure how to continue. 'You say there were dozens of other women?'

  'At least.'

  'Do you remember most of them?'

  She shook her head. 'Hardly any.'

  'But you said you remembered Judy Simmons.'

  'Yes.'

  'Why?'

  'Because she was something special. For one thing, she was not his type.'

  'Why not?'

  'Just look at her photograph. Don't get me wrong. Judy was pretty. But Sinclair did not go after girls who were merely attractive. He wanted gorgeous. After all, he was looking for some extra-marital thrills. He already had a wife. Looks were all he cared about.'

  'I see.'

  'I mean, it would be normal for him to try to bed her once maybe, but not more than that.'

  'And that's why you remember her?'

  Diana Klenke shook her head. 'That's only part of it. The main reason I remember her so well is that she lasted. They were together for more than two months. It was the first time I had ever seen Sinclair care about a woman -- myself included. He was as close to helplessly in love as a man like Sinclair Baskin becomes. He even considered divorcing his wife so that he could marry Judy. Thoughts of other women disappeared from his mind. It was all highly irregular for him.'

  'So what happened?'

  'Happened?'

  'What went wrong?'

  Diana stood. She walked over to the window and drew back the curtain. The backyard was as magnificent as the house. There were statues, gardens and fountains. Laura could see a swimming pool, a tennis court and a gazebo. Diana stared out, inhaling deeply as if the sight alone would make the air fresher and better to breathe. 'Sinclair broke it off.'

  'Just like that?' Laura asked. 'He was madly in love with her and he just let her go.'

  Diana nodded, her eyes still looking out the window. Outside, a branch cast a thin shadow over her face. 'One day it was love. The next . . . it was over.'

  'Was that normal? I mean, did Sinclair Baskin do that sort of thing a lot?'

  'Like I said before, Judy Simmons was an unusual case. I was surprised . . . at first.'

  'But why did he break it off? His family? His kids?'

  She still did not face Laura. 'Not because of his family and not because of his kids.'

  'Then what?'

  A tight smile slowly came to Diana Klenke's lips. 'My husband loved this yard, Laura. When the weather was nice, he would come home from work early and just putter in the garden. Enjoying the fruits of his labors, he would say. He found gardening to be very therapeutic. Me, I hate gardening. But I do love the results, don't you?'

  Laura nodded. 'It's beautiful.'

  'I'm sorry. You were asking me about Sinclair and Judy.'

  'Yes,' Laura said. 'What ended their romance?'

  Diana closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them again, she slowly turned away from the window, her gray eyes locking on to Laura. 'His weakness. His weakness destroyed his relationship with Judy.'

  'His weakness?'

  'Beauty, Laura. Beauty came back and blinded him again.'

  'You mean he found somebody else?'

  Her smile chilled Laura. 'Not just somebody else. Like I said before, Judy Simmons was attractive enough, but his last girl ...'

  'Yes?'

  'She was incredible to look at, a woman sculpted by the gods. Her kind of beauty could twist a man's mind, Laura. A man's soul. And this woman did just that. Her beauty tore at Sinclair until the pain became unbearable. My God, she was gorgeous, nearly as gorgeous as -- '

  Diana's words stopped so suddenly that Laura jumped. The color ebbed away from her face.

  'What is it?' Laura cried. 'What's the matter? Diana?' The older woman's whole body trembled, her eyes wide and out of focus. 'Mother of God.'

  'What? What is it?'

  '. . . as gorgeous,' Diana said slowly, 'as gorgeous as you.'

  Laura's eyes narrowed into thin slits. 'I don't understand.'

  'The woman who stole him away . . . she looked just like you, Laura. You're the spitting image of her.'

  Laura's face froze in confusion. A stray thought, an awful, unforgivable thought, stabbed at her chest with a pointed edge. It couldn't be. It just couldn't be. 'She looked like me?'

  Diana nodded.

  Without thought Laura reached into her purse. Her mind and body were numb. She took out her wallet and thumbed through it. With trembling fingers she plucked out a photograph. 'I know it's been thirty years,' she began in a voice that had no tone, 'but could this be the woman?'

  She passed the picture to Diana Klenke, who once again slipped her reading glasses onto her face. She stared at the picture for a very long time. 'Yes, that's the woman.'

  'How can you be sure? It's been -- '

  'I'm sure,' Diana interrupted. 'You don't forget a woman like that.'

  Laura snatched the picture back, almost defensive now. She held the picture against her chest as if it were more than just an image on paper. After a few moments, her hand pulled the picture back, her gaze studying the woman in the photograph as if for the first time.

  Her mother.

  'Mary,' Diana said suddenly. 'Her name was Mary.' Laura felt drained, helpless, like a shaken prize fighter who was not sure where the next punch was coming from.

  'And one other thing,' Diana added.

  'Yes?' Laura managed.

  'That woman was the last person to leave Sinclair's office before his suicide.'

  Graham knew he would have to make the call. There was no real reason to put it off. Besides, he had no idea what had happened in room 607 when David went up there. Baskin may have just been on the receiving end of a chewing-out from his motherin-law. Wouldn't be the first time a motherin-law butted in to where she didn't belong. Graham's, for example, was a full-time nag. She probably wouldn't fly across the Pacific just to nag him, but Graham wouldn't put it past her either.

  He picked up the phone and dialed Laura's number. Graham was a pure procrastinator, been that way since he was a kid. He liked to put things off, especially delivering bad news. He wasn't lazy, mind you, and yes he knew he would have to do it eventually, but if he put it off, maybe it would just disappear altogether or the world would blow up or reality would change. That was why Graham felt relieved when he heard the answering machine pick up.
>
  He left a message asking Laura to call him and then took another swig of whiskey.

  Richard Corsel loved to watch ice hockey. Players would gently glide across a floor of glacial grandeur, lost in the bliss of free-skating, only to be on the receiving end of a bone-crunching wallop from some gargoyle with more facial scars than Michael Jackson in bright sunlight.

  What a game.

  Naomi was not so crazy about the sport, nor was she particularly happy about the way the twins had taken to their father's passion. 'You might as well have gotten them into professional wrestling,' she had scolded him.

  'Come on, honey, it's not that bad.'

  'I don't want my boys playing hockey, do you hear me?'

  But Richard was not worried. After all, he had never played ice hockey. In fact he didn't even know how to ice-skate. But the game was the perfect spectator sport. Richard became so involved in the banging and hitting and, yes, the artistry of the battle that thoughts of the bank and the bills and his own mortgage disappeared.

  TV 38 was his station. They carried the Boston Bruins games, though that expensive cable station was starting to eat up a lot of the hockey schedule. He would probably have to break down and order SportsChannel soon, but he hated the idea of paying to watch hockey on television. There was something blasphemous about it.

  So Richard turned on the television and settled back in his old recliner. Roger and Peter were on the carpet in front of him, alternating between watching the game and imitating the action. The Bruins were leading the Oilers by a score of 7-5. It should have been a moment of pure diversion for Richard, a moment when his mind was completely at ease. Instead he was plagued by a small blurb he had read in the newspaper. He tried to clear his mind, tried to think of his wife and children.

  His thoughts came drifting back to Laura -- Laura and that fire at Colgate College.

  Of course there was no evidence in the newspaper that the fire had anything to do with the missing money. There was nothing in the article to suggest that the psychopath who placed a knife against Richard's throat had decided to torch Laura and her aunt. None whatsoever. The article merely stated that the fire was being 'investigated'. That was hardly reason to start jumping to conclusions and pointing fingers.

  'Goal!' the announcer yelled.

  'Goal!' Peter and Roger mimicked in unison.

  The Bruins had increased their lead to 8-5. Pete and Rog stood up and celebrated. 'Wasn't that an incredible shot, Dad?'

  'Great shot, Pete.'

  'Are you going to take us to a game again this year? How about when they play the Rangers?'

  'I'll try my best.'