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“I’d be glad to call you George Washington if you’d just put that damn coat over your shoulders.” Hawthorne picked the coat up off the floor.

Jessica walked back to the couch, swaying slightly. “Just Misty is good enough.”

“So, who gave you the tequila?”

Jessica turned and threw back her shoulders so her breasts jutted out at him. “There’s just no way that I’m going to tell you that, so you’d better stop asking.”

“Then put the coat on and I’ll stop, for the time being at least.”

Jessica took the coat and slid her arms into the sleeves, which hid her hands. The coat nearly reached her ankles. “Do I have to button it up?”

“Yes.”

Jessica began buttoning the coat but had trouble focusing on the buttons and so she stopped. “You’re very difficult. I’d thought you’d be nicer.”

“You caught me at a bad moment.”

Jessica sat down in a corner of the couch. She raised her left leg. “See this?” She shook her leg so the anklet jiggled.

“The chain? What about it?”

“My father gave it to me six years ago. You know where Mount Monadnock is?”

“More or less.”

“My father flew his plane into it. That was also six years ago. Ka-boom! All they found was scraps. Did you ever have a father?” Jessica lowered her leg.

“Of course.”

“Did you ever have a stepfather?”

“No.”

“You’re lucky. When my father died, I thought I’d die too.”

Hawthorne nodded. “I thought that when my wife and daughter died.”

“They died in a fire, didn’t they? That’s a shame.”

“Would you like a cup of tea or coffee?”

“Wouldn’t it be awful to have a stepwife and a stepdaughter? I mean, like having a stepfather? I have a brother but he’s my whole brother. His name’s Jason. He’s sweet.”

“You’re lucky you have someone you love, Jessica.”

“Yes,” she said seriously, “I think that’s true . . . You’re not calling me Misty.”

“Would you like some tea, Misty?”

“No, thanks. I’m afraid I’d puke. You ever seen girls puke?” As Jessica spoke, she wrapped a strand of blond hair around one finger, released it, then began to wind it around her finger again.

“A few times.”

“There’re girls over in the dorm that puke just about every time they eat. Why would someone do that?”

“Maybe they’re sick.”

“My stepfather’s sick. You wouldn’t believe some of the stuff he’s done. If I told you, you’d be so angry you’d want to hurt him. And you’d be right, too.” Jessica pulled her knees up on the couch and rested her chin on them. Her toes with their green polish stuck out from beneath the hem of the blue overcoat. “I have a friend who’d like to kill him, but that’d get me in trouble. It’s a temptation, though. Just shoot him dead, that’s what I’d like. I wish you could tell me why my dad flew his plane into a mountain. You think it was on purpose?”

“Of course not.”

“That’s what I thought too, but Tremblay said he did it on purpose. He said my dad flew his plane into the mountain because he knew he was fucking my mother. Tremblay, I mean. I asked Dolly—that’s my mother—but she just got angry. Tremblay doesn’t even like Dolly; he just likes her money. He’s turned her into a zombie.”

“It sounds like an awful story,” said Hawthorne.

“It
is
an awful story. That’s why I got to get Jason outta there.”

There was a knocking at the French window. Hawthorne stood up. Kate entered and saw Jessica sitting on the couch. “So this is your problem,” she said.

“I’m nobody’s problem ’cept my own,” said Jessica. “I don’t see what you’re doing here. I’ve already done my homework for tomorrow.” Jessica giggled.

“Dr. Hawthorne invited me.” Kate removed her ski cap and shook out her dark hair.

“I was dancing for him,” said Jessica, standing up and letting the coat slip from her shoulders. “I bet you couldn’t dance if you practiced a hundred years.”

“Leave the coat on,” said Hawthorne, taking a step toward her.

But the coat was already puddled at her feet. Jessica turned with her arms outstretched. “See how good I am? And I don’t even have music. Watch this.” She ran several steps, then did three cartwheels, landing on her feet by the door to the kitchen. “You couldn’t do that, no matter how much you practiced.” She suddenly looked thoughtful. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

The French window opened again and Alice Beech entered. She looked at Jessica, half naked and swaying a little with her hand to her mouth. “Good grief,” she said.

Jessica glanced around and nodded her head as if agreeing with something important. “I think I’ve got to throw up right now.”

Alice ran toward her. “Oh no, you don’t. You wait till you get to the toilet.” She took the girl’s arm and hurried her out of the room. After a moment there came the sound of retching.

Kate and Hawthorne looked toward the bathroom door. “I don’t know where she got drunk,” said Hawthorne. “She’s been drinking tequila but she won’t say with whom.”

“And why did she come here?”

“She said she wanted to dance for me.” He heard how foolish it sounded.

“Do you think someone put her up to it?”

“I just can’t imagine her doing it on her own.”

Hawthorne walked to the French windows. He looked through the glass, then pushed open the door and stepped out onto the terrace. Kate followed him. The wind was blowing.

“Aren’t you cold?” she asked.

Hawthorne shook his head. He looked up at the windows but they were empty. He turned back to Kate. “I’m glad you were able to come over. Alice wasn’t home. I’d left a message on her machine.”

They looked at each other as they stood by the balustrade. The moonlight made their faces pale and dark at the same time. “You sounded upset,” said Kate.

Through the French windows, Hawthorne saw the nurse lead Jessica back across the living room to the couch. “Maybe I’m losing my sense of perspective,” said Hawthorne. “When she showed up, I wanted to get someone here right away. You know, a witness.”

“I don’t blame you.” Kate looked out across the moonlit playing fields. “I was glad we talked today and that you told me about Wyndham. It made me feel I knew you better.”

Hawthorne thought of what he hadn’t said and the deception it created. He felt guilty about increasing the degree of their intimacy. The wind rustled the dead ivy on the wall above him. The moon, hanging above the roofline, shone on the gargoyles.

“I was glad to spend that time with you,” he said at last.

“It’s awful to think of you carrying those memories inside.”

Hawthorne wasn’t sure how to respond. “Yes,” he said at last. Through the window, he saw that Alice had gotten blankets and a pillow for the girl.

“What happened to the boy . . . Carpasso?”

Hawthorne didn’t speak. Carpasso’s adolescent face seemed to float in the air.

“Jim?”

“He died. He hung himself.” He heard Kate’s intake of breath. “He sent word to me in the hospital that he had to see me. By that time it was clear he’d set the fire. He was being held in a juvenile detention center. I said that I didn’t want to see him, that I never wanted to see him again. I had no sympathy left. He phoned me. I said I didn’t care what happened to him. The next day I was told that he was dead. He had taken sheets and hung himself from the door. When I heard he was dead, I felt glad. I hoped he’d suffered. Then, I don’t know, later at any rate, I felt terrible. I felt responsible for all three deaths. It was as if I had murdered him.”

Kate had turned to face him. “But that’s not true. You were full of grief.”

“At times part of me still feels glad that he’s dead. I can’t forgive myself for that.”

“Kate, come here a minute.” Alice was calling to her. Jessica had gotten to her feet. Alice held her arm and Jessica was trying to pull free. They stood by the couch, staggering a little. Kate hurried through the French windows as Hawthorne watched.

The two women made Jessica lie back down on the couch. Hawthorne could barely make out their voices. Alice again covered her with a blanket as Kate stroked her hair.

Hawthorne looked up at the windows above him. They were empty but he still had the sense that something was there.

Then, gradually, a shape materialized in a third-floor window—the dark coat, white hair, and thin white beard outlining the jaw. Ambrose Stark again stared down at him. But this time it was different. A great malicious smirk distorted the lower half of his face. The lips were bright red. Hawthorne dug his fingernails into his palms. He stared back at the specter above him, forcing himself not to turn away. He told himself it was a portrait that someone was holding up at the window. But that grin—surely that wasn’t on any portrait. Stark’s eyes were bright with malevolent humor.

“What are you staring at?” Kate was coming back out to the terrace.

Hawthorne looked up toward the third floor. The image of Ambrose Stark was gone. He tried to calm his breathing. “Nothing,” he said.

“You look awful.” Kate joined him, then looked up at the empty windows.

“It’s nothing. How’s Jessica?”

“She’s better. Alice will take her over to the infirmary. What did you see up there?”

“Nothing. Just shadows.”

“How spooky those gargoyles look in the moonlight.”

“Yes,” said Hawthorne.

Alice joined them on the terrace with Jessica, who had a blanket wrapped around her shoulders.

“When you walked over here,” Hawthorne asked Alice, “did you see anyone?”

“I don’t think so. Well, I think I saw the night watchman.”

“Think?” said Hawthorne.

“I didn’t see his face and he wasn’t nearby.”

Then, strangely, came the liquid notes of a clarinet. They all stood unmoving, struck by the oddness of hearing the single instrument.

“Do you hear that?” asked Hawthorne, almost fearing that they didn’t.

“Of course,” said Kate. “How pretty it is.”

It was a jazz tune of almost unbearable sweetness. The music seemed to be coming from someplace above them.

Jessica raised her head. “I could dance to this,” she said. “Really, let me try.”

Alice gripped the girl’s arm to keep her from throwing off the blanket. “What is it?” she asked. “I know I’ve heard that song before.”

Hawthorne was afraid he wouldn’t be able to keep his voice steady. “Someone is playing ‘Satin Doll,’” he said.

Seven

D
ete
ctive Leo Flynn was sucking on a big Dominican cigar, inhaling so deeply that he could feel the smoke banging against his lungs’ air sacs and infundibula—as the medical examiner liked to say. The smoke felt good. Even the fact that it was bad for him felt good. Flynn was sitting on the bench of a picnic table behind a small house on the outskirts of Portsmouth. It was early Monday afternoon and raining but Flynn was sitting under an umbrella poked up through a round hole in the redwood table, and only a few drops blew against his face. The umbrella had green and white stripes. Through an L-shaped tear in one green panel a stream of water cascaded into a blue coffee cup with the words “Irving’s Caddy Shack” in white letters around the side. Seated across from Flynn, Irving Porter, a detective with the Portsmouth police department and the owner of the house, also sucked on a cigar. In fact, the cigars had come from Porter and the backyard was the only place where Porter’s wife would let him smoke. She didn’t even like him smoking in the garage because she said the smoke snuck into the cars. Flynn didn’t know anything about that. He was glad to have a good cigar, even though it was cold and the trees were bare. And he liked Porter, who was a man about his own age and who shared his own bad habits.

Beyond that, they were talking about floaters and bodies that washed up on shore, because Porter had a body that had been tagged a simple drowning till Flynn nagged and nagged, calling twice a day from Boston—a car mechanic named Mike Ritchie who’d been pulled out of the bay in June. So Porter had the body exhumed and it turned out the guy had been killed just like Buddy Roussel and Sal Procopio: an ice pick jammed into the brain. By now Flynn had no doubt he was looking for a Canuck named Frank, a guy in his late twenties with dark brown hair and a thin face like somebody had given it a squeeze. And Frank was a joker, or at least he told jokes. Flynn even had one repeated to him. What’s the sign say over the urinals in the Canuck bar? Please don’t eat the big mints.

“Sure you don’t want a Bud?” asked Porter, blowing a cloud of smoke up into the umbrella.

“Too early for me. I’d hafta take a nap later. I’ll come back after I talk to a couple of people.”

“You want lunch?” Porter was wearing a heavy overcoat and a red hunting cap with the flaps pulled down over his ears, which made him look like an old hound.

“The cigar’s enough.”

“You ever smoke any Cubans?” Porter’s voice had grown wistful.

“Sometimes. I mean, if they get confiscated.”

“Never see any Cubans up here. Had one in Mexico once. Least they said it was a Cuban.” Porter poked at the ash on his cigar with a fingernail. “You know, I never felt good about Ritchie turning up in the bay. The guy didn’t fish, didn’t swim. I must of asked myself a thousand times what he was doing there.”

“Now you know.”

“Fuckin’ ice pick—only an autopsy would pick it up after that time in the water. I figure the tide carried him a ways. Shit, he could of been dumped off a dock right here in town. My kid brother was in high school with him. Even went to his funeral.”

“What kind of guy was he?”

“Ritchie? Shortcuts, he was a great believer in shortcuts. It never works.”

“Quick money,” said Flynn. Then he thought, What the fuck do I know about it?

“Ritchie wasn’t greedy. He was just trying to get by. But he was sloppy, drank too much, made a lot of mistakes. He kept trying to figure the angle, like the right number, the right piece of information would solve his problems. I figure somebody got tired of dealing with him and decided to clear the decks. A guy like Ritchie, who drinks like he did, you can’t trust his mouth.”

“Why didn’t you do an autopsy back in June?”

Porter looked off across his wet backyard as if unhappy with the question. “No marks. No sign of foul play. He could have been drunk and taken a tumble. And maybe we had a full plate at the time, I don’t recall.”