"It could have been Jack," Karen said.
"It could have been anybody. I didn't get a good look at the car. All I know is it was light in color-white or tan or pale blue-and good-sized. Maybe it looked bigger than it was," Mark added with a faint smile.
"It could have been Rob," Karen said. She sounded like a parrot, even to herself.
"I thought of that," Mark said. He swung his feet off the couch and sat up, looking quite himself except for the scraped, raw patches on his forehead and cheek. "This was brutally direct, though, not the same style as the other incidents. It's almost as if…" He stopped and looked intently at Karen. "If I weren't afraid of being slapped down for butting into someone else's business, I'd suggest you go to bed. Since I am afraid of getting slapped down, I suggest I go to bed."
He levered himself carefully to his feet. Hands still folded in her lap, Karen said, "Are you going back out there to sit in your car?" Mark made a movement as if to deny the implicit accusation; before he could speak, Karen went on, "Because if that's what you are planning to do, you may as well sleep here. Cheryl, I'll leave him to you; try to talk some sense into him. I'm going to make up the bed in the guest room."
As she left the room she heard Mark say, "I'll stay on one condition. If you call Tony Cardoza and tell him to rush over because baby brother has been damaged, I'll tear you limb from limb."
Karen did not hear Cheryl's reply. She got to the top of the stairs before she broke down. It wasn't a serious collapse, only a fit of trembling and a few hard, hot tears. Then she heard them in the hall below, and hurried to find sheets in the linen closet.
Later, after the house was quiet and she lay staring into the darkness, it was easier to come to grips with the truth she had denied so long. She was still in love with him; had never really stopped loving him. If spite had been Jack's reason for asking her to marry him, her motive for accepting him had been no less contemptible. Mark had never told her he loved her, never asked for a deeper commitment. Perhaps he never would have asked. But that was no reason to fall into the arms of the first man who offered her the conventional safety of marriage, who more or less demanded her acquiescence as something to which he was entitled.
Mark had saved her life, risking his own. He would have done the same for a stray dog or cat. But that did not lessen the value of what he had done.
THE
hot new listing in Gaithersburg was in a shopping mall, a fact the realtor had not bothered to mention.
"I told her, no malls," Cheryl sputtered. "That's not the type of clientele we're looking for. Besides, the rents are too high, and the so-and-sos want a percentage of the gross, can you imagine such nerve?"
They were having coffee at a fast-food restaurant while they discussed their next move. Cheryl's eyes were heavy, and even her curls had lost their usual bounce.
They had not talked about the previous night. Karen had overslept; when she came downstairs, Mark had already left and Cheryl was eating breakfast. Karen had had to rush in order to avoid being late for their appointment.
"What time did you finally get to sleep?" she asked.
"Late. That damned brother of mine slept like a baby," Cheryl added bitterly. "Did you hear him snoring?"
"I closed my door."
"I left mine open so I could tend to the sufferer if he needed me. He was asleep the minute his head hit the pillow, and he never stirred." A ghost of her old dimple showed at the corner of her mouth, and she added, "I was tempted to go in there and give him a kick, along about three a.m., but my better nature prevailed, as they say."
"Then he was all right this morning?" Karen concentrated on adding sugar to her coffee.
"Oh, sure. He looked like he'd been in a fight, though. Black eye and everything. I asked him if he was going to tell people he ran into a door and he said, yes, he was, because that's what hit him. A car door."
"I'm glad you can both laugh about it," Karen said.
"What else can you do? Life is full of narrow escapes. Some drunk-"
"I don't believe that, and neither do you."
"What do you believe?"
Karen shrugged. "It wouldn't surprise me to learn it was Jack driving that car. He hadn't been gone but a few minutes. If he happened to see me crossing the street he might have yielded to a sudden impulse-not meaning to hurt me, just scare me."
"He hates you, all right," Cheryl said soberly. "You should have seen his face after you walked out on him."
"I'm not afraid of him. Not physically, at any rate. He's too cautious to take direct action. But he can do a lot of damage in other ways… Oh, damn it, Cheryl, I wish you hadn't been exposed to that-and so many other horrible things."
"I enjoyed that part of it," Cheryl said with a grin. "Watching you slap him down-that was wonderful. It wasn't worry that kept me awake, actually, it was that damned book. I started reading it and I couldn't stop. Then I was afraid to turn off the light."
"Georgetown ghosts?" Karen smiled, accepting the change of subject.
"And murders. I don't know which was worse. There was one awful story about some house that's haunted by a girl who was killed by her own father during some long-ago war, because she wanted to elope with a dashing captain from the wrong side. When a girl the same age moves into that house she is possessed by the ghost and tries to murder
her
father!"
Cheryl's eyes were round as pennies. "Bah, humbug," Karen said. "Sounds like a novel I read once. But I wouldn't blame the owner of the house for wanting to sue the author. Such a story wouldn't improve his chances of selling, especially to a family with a young daughter. Some people," she added cuttingly, "are hopelessly superstitious."
"It's the way the book is written," Cheryl said sheepishly. "Half serious and half kidding, like a gossip column. Then there was another one, about-"
"For heaven's sake, Cheryl!"
"… about a father and mother getting stabbed to death on the day of their daughter's graduation. Stabbed a dozen times-just cut to pieces. Now that really happened. It was in the newspapers. And they never found the homicidal maniac that did it-"
"If you don't shut up, I'm going to throw this coffee at you," Karen threatened. "I'm surprised you didn't wake me up screaming about witches at the window."
"Mrs. Grossmuller drives a big car," Cheryl said. "A Mercedes."
"A dark-blue Mercedes. That's enough of that. Where are we going next?" She pushed her coffee cup aside and unfolded the map.
Their search had been simplified by their decision to concentrate on areas that already had a number of antique and craft shops. One place in Bethesda, just off a main commuter route, boasted a small antiques mall that offered possibilities. A number of dealers shared the space, each with his own cubicle. There was space available, and the rent was within their means. They debated the pros and cons as they ate lunch at one of the many restaurants in the area-another positive point, as Cheryl reminded Karen.
"Going into a previously established place is a kind of short cut," she added. "People are already in the habit of shopping there."
"The space is awfully small, though. And it definitely lacks pizzazz-those awful cardboard dividers."
"The space limitation is a negative, I admit. We're going to have to sell other things, you know, not just clothes. What they call 'alternative selling areas.'"
"Like accessories-fans, shoes, shawls?"
"Jewelry, too. But I think we'll need more than that."
"Textiles and linens," Karen mused. "Laces and ribbons, buttons…"
"Boxes. Hat boxes, jewel boxes, button boxes…"
"Books on costume. Prints from
Godey's Lady's Book,
frames…"
"We definitely need more space," Cheryl said. "Let's go to Kensington."
Kensington also had a concentration of antique shops, with several malls like the one they had seen in Bethesda. Unlike the latter, which was in a purely commercial area, the Kensington center was surrounded by shady side streets and beautiful turn-of-the-century houses. The realtor they consulted was pleasant and helpful; they left with another handful of possibilities, but without a definite decision.
"We're going to have to settle on something soon," Karen said. "We could go on looking for the perfect place for months. Suppose we set ourselves a deadline. Two weeks?"
"Fine by me." It was Karen's turn to drive; Cheryl slid down and rested her head against the back of the seat. "I'm enjoying this, though. It seems impossible that we've done so much in only a few days."
"Especially considering the distractions. Maybe they are finished. Maybe that was a drunk driver last night."
Cheryl sat up and knocked on the dashboard.
"That's plastic," Karen said.
"It's the thought that counts," said Cheryl.
Cheryl insisted on approaching the house from an oblique angle, but there was no one squatting on the doorstep and Mr. DeVoto did not emerge to tell them about peculiar visitors.
"What time is Tony picking you up?" Cheryl asked casually.
"He said about six. Are you sure you don't mind-"
"Staying alone?" Cheryl deliberately misunderstood. "My dear, I won't be alone. Alexander will keep me company. Just be sure you're home by midnight, dearie, and don't let him take any liberties."
"I'm not so sure about that," Karen said. "He strikes me as the type who would take very nice liberties."
"Then let him take all he wants."
Tony never got the chance. He called shortly after six to tell Karen he couldn't make it; he was working late. Rob's body had been found in a wooded area in Virginia. He had been dead for almost two days.
MARK
pounded the table with his beer can. "I hereby call the meeting to order-"
"Don't," Cheryl said, wincing. "This isn't a meeting of your awful old Murder Club, Mark."
"Well, I'm damned if I am going to go into deep mourning over Rob Simpson's demise," Mark said. "If a murder victim ever asked for it, he did. And if he was the one who's been harassing Karen, he got what was coming to him."
"I must be hearing things," Tony said. "Don't tell me you agree with me for once."
"I didn't say he was the one. I said he might be. It's possible-"
"Forget it," Tony said curtly. "I'm in no mood for your far-out theories tonight."
He looked older and more formidable as he sat hunched over the table, his hands clasped around his can of beer. Patches of wet darkened the fabric of his shirt and his black hair had curled into damp knots. There were a few wisps of dried grass clinging to it, and Cheryl gently plucked out the longest of them.
"You look exhausted, Tony. Why don't you go home and get some rest?"
Tony sat up straighten "I'm not tired. Just hot. Those Virginia woods were like a steam bath. I thought you'd want to know what happened. But if I'm in the way-"
A chorus of protests assured him he was not, and the lines in his face smoothed out. "It wasn't all that bad. Relatively neat, as these things go. The body wasn't far from the road-"
"Buried deep?" Mark asked.
"Not buried at all, just covered with loose brush and branches. The killer probably believed he wouldn't be found for months. What he didn't know was that there's a new subdivision just over the hill, on a parallel road. Kids and dogs…"
Cheryl made a faint sound of protest. Karen knew she was thinking of little Joe and imagining the shock a child would feel, stumbling over such a horror.
"Julie," she exclaimed. "Has she been told?"
"She was the first to be notified," Tony answered. "In fact, she identified him. Not that there was any doubt; his wallet and ID hadn't been taken. But there are formalities to be observed, and he didn't have any relatives in town, so…"
Karen rose. "I'm going to call her."
Cheryl started to speak, but then subsided with a shrug. "I have to," Karen said, answering the implicit objection. "I'll use the phone in the other room; you just… just go on talking."
But her cowardly hope that she might not hear the gruesome details was in vain; when she returned, the others were sitting in silence, waiting for her. At the sight of her face, Mark's brows drew together. "What did she say to you?" he demanded.
"She wants me to come tomorrow," Karen said wearily. "Well, what could I say? She was… very upset."
"Can't blame her," Tony said. "Her boyfriend was not a pretty sight."
Mark's was the only face that did not mirror Tony's distaste. "So the motive wasn't robbery," he said coolly. "How was he killed?"
"Multiple stab wounds, back and front. Some shallow and glancing, some deeper; it was one in his throat that did the job, tore the carotid artery. But a couple of the others-"
He stopped with an apologetic glance at the women.
"They won't thank you for treating them like shrinking violets," Mark said.
"That's right," Cheryl agreed. "I've heard worse from the two of you when you were dwelling on the gruesome details of your favorite murders. It's different for Karen, though. She knew him."
"Yes, I knew him. I didn't like him very much, but he enjoyed living so enormously, and it's horrible to think of someone you've met and talked to… But I'd rather know the facts than imagine things."
"The facts aren't very pleasant," Tony said. "He had been stabbed repeatedly, with a razor-sharp knife- not a switchblade, something longer and heavier. There were cuts on his forearms. The doc thinks he was on the ground by then, trying to shield his face and throat." He raised the can to his lips and drank deeply before continuing. "And more cuts on his back. Presumably he rolled over onto his face in the final moments, and the killer just-kept on slashing him."
Karen thought that after all she could not have imagined anything much worse. The shadowy charade was so vivid she could almost see it-the dim forms moving and whispering in the darkness under the tangled trees; the sudden lunge, the strangled cry, the fall and the struggle-and a featureless blackness stooping over the prostrate man, stabbing and stabbing and stabbing again, in a blind frenzy of hate.
"There must have been a lot of blood," said Mark.
"There was," Tony said, "a lot of blood."
"Then the killer would be splashed with it."
"Yeah, well, that would be a useful clue if we had any suspects," Tony said dryly. "We can't examine every closet in the Washington area. The killer has had time to change and destroy his clothes by now."
"It reminds me of something," Mark muttered. "Some case we discussed a year or two ago. Damn. My brain's gone sour."
Tony was not as hardened as he appeared. His reaction to Mark's remark was exaggeratedly violent. "Goddamn it, Mark, don't give me your crap about poltergeists and homicidal maniacs! I'm in no mood for academic discussions."
"You were the one who mentioned poltergeists the last time," Mark said mildly. "I'm talking about a murder case, one of the classic unsolved crimes. Something you said reminded me of it, but I can't pin it down."
"Huh," said Tony, only half-appeased. "You can find parallels to everything, Mark. There's nothing new under the sun. Especially these days, when half the killers we haul in are high on something or other."
"Your favorite junkie again?" Mark asked.
"Well, hell, what other explanation is there? From what I've heard about this guy, he had some peculiar friends. They wouldn't have to be all that peculiar; a lot of the smart young Washington types play around with coke and the latest fads in designer drugs. Either he picked the wrong friend to assist him in his burglary, or he ran into someone later that night who wasn't dealing from a whole pack."
"What does this do to your theory that Rob was the one hassling Karen?"
"It doesn't affect it in the slightest. I know-some crazy driver came close to nailing you last night, and it sure as hell wasn't Rob. It's my belief that that had nothing to do with the other incidents."
He eyed Mark warily, as if anticipating an objection, but Mark only shrugged. "It wasn't the same sort of attack."
"Again we agree. Or is this the first time? You can't eliminate the possibility of a drunk driver, there are plenty of them around. Also"-he looked at Karen-"your soon-to-be ex is driving a rental car, a tan Olds 88. There's no use testing it for bloodstains or dents, since the car didn't actually hit you. Also…"
He hesitated. "Oho and aha," said Mark. "Don't tell me you've located pretty boy Horton?"
"He's not in Cleveland," Tony admitted reluctantly. "That lead didn't pan out. He could be anywhere, including Washington. However, I can't think of any reason, sensible or otherwise, why he would want to harm Karen. It's been a week since she saw him; he must know she'd have reported it by now."
"Hmph," said Mark helpfully.
"Believe me, there is absolutely no reason for the girls-excuse me, the ladies-er-"
"Try 'women,'" said Cheryl.
Tony scowled at her. "The female persons to be alarmed. Whether Rob was the joker or not, his murder has absolutely nothing to do with the other business. That was harassment pure and simple. The frequency of the incidents proves it-night after night, a constant battering at the nerves of the victim. I think you've seen the end of that. A certain person got the bejesus scared out of her tonight-"
"Julie?" Karen exclaimed.
"It could have been her and Rob working together. She's the right type-malicious, neurotic."
"But why would Julie-"
"Motive is the last thing we worry about, Karen. People do the damnedest things for the damnedest reasons… Let's talk about something else, okay? I'm off duty-for a few hours-and I'd like to forget about crime. Tell me about your house-hunting."
"It's not very interesting," Karen began.
"It is to Tony," Mark said with a smile. "That's how the big tough cop spends his spare time-looking at houses."
"I don't know what's so damned funny about that," Tony said stiffly. "It's stupid to pay rent when you can be building up equity in a house. And our tax laws make investment property very attractive."
"Don't count on that continuing," Mark warned. "It's one of the loopholes I'm hoping to close."
"You fuzzy-minded liberals don't worry me, pal. There are too many special-interest groups fighting you. What's this one?"
Cheryl surrendered the sheet of paper, with a self-conscious glance at Karen. "It got mixed in with the others by mistake. We aren't really considering it."
"Why not?" Tony studied the fuzzy black-and-white photograph. After a moment he said quietly, "It looks like a house in one of those old-time books-
Tom Sawyer,
or
Huckleberry Finn.
Front porch, big shade trees, picket fence…"
"The photograph doesn't do it justice," Karen said. "It's a charming house. Needs work-"
"But nothing major," Cheryl said quickly. "Just painting and plastering and a little carpentry. They put in a new furnace five years ago-"
"How's the plumbing?" Tony asked.
"That was brought up-to-date at the same time. It needs new wiring-"
"That's not a major problem. The price isn't bad. You could probably talk them down a few thousand."
He and Cheryl went on talking. Karen listened in silence. Cheryl had really fallen in love with the house; it was a pity they couldn't get it, for the premises would have been ideal. If she had had the cash, or if she thought she could depend on a reasonable settlement from Jack, she might have been tempted to take a chance-a gamble, really, for it would be at least two years before they would know whether their business would turn a profit. Just as well I don't have it, she thought. I'm not going to risk Pat's money on something so chancy.
She glanced at Mark; she couldn't help it, he drew her gaze as irresistibly as a magnet attracts a nail. Whatever subject occupied his mind and furrowed his brow, it was not one that pleased him. His battered face was a silent reminder of how close they had come to death the night before. Random, coincidental, that attack? She had a feeling Mark was not convinced. She had a feeling she wasn't either.
Alexander shifted his weight across her feet, grumbling in his sleep. Across the table two heads, shining gold and dishevelled black, bent over the papers. Outside, darkness and mist pressed at the window, trying to come in-failed. Held back, not by a physical barrier of glass but by the opposing forces within-light, safety, companionship. They were more than four separate people, they were a group connected by complex, intertwining strands. It was nothing so simple as friendship, though that was an element; there were different levels of loyalty and frustration and old resentment and new caring.
Karen was reminded of the other occasions, so long ago, when four of them had sat around the same table. She and Mark, Pat and Ruth. Usually it was Mark and Pat who did most of the talking then, arguing about everything under the sun from the Shakespeare ciphers to pro wrestling; seldom agreeing, sometimes changing sides in mid-argument just for the fun of it. Occasionally Ruth would interject a comment in her quiet, ladylike voice, a commonsense, pointed remark that stopped the combatants in mid-shout and reduced them to foolish smiles. Karen had never said much. It was pleasure enough to listen and laugh, to feel herself part of such accepting warmth. Besides, it wasn't easy to get a word in edgewise when Pat was in full spate! At least that was what she thought at the time, if she thought about it at all. She had a feeling that when the group met again-if it ever met again-her voice would be heard more often, even if she had to yell to make it heard.
As if feeling her gaze, Mark looked up. Perhaps his thoughts had been running along a similar line, for he said, "Have you heard from Pat and Ruth?"
"Only a cable from Pat after Mrs. MacDougal arrived. He threatened me with nameless things for letting her get away."
"He couldn't have stopped her either. Mrs. Mac is a force of nature, like a hurricane."
"It was nice of you to visit her."
"Nice, hell. I didn't do it to be nice. I didn't keep in touch with Pat and Ruth to be nice. I don't do anything to be nice, for God's sake!"
Tony couldn't resist that. He interrupted his discussion with Cheryl long enough to remark, "You never said a truer word. Quit insulting the man, Karen."
Karen waited until the conversation across the table had resumed-Tony was asking about zoning regulations, a subject on which Cheryl was well informed-before she said quietly, "I didn't mean it to be insulting. 'Nice' is a rare quality. I wish there were more of it in the world."
"It's okay."
"Ruth was the one who told you where I was working, wasn't she?"
A reluctant smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. "As a matter of fact, it was Mrs. Mac."
"I suspected Julie."
"Not her. She wouldn't do you any…" He checked himself. After a moment he muttered, half to himself, "She fits the profile. I just can't see… What has she got against you?"
"Nothing! Oh, there were a few little irritants; she had hoped to get some of Ruth's and Mrs. Mac's antiques for her shop and she was furious when I decided to keep the clothes for myself. But Julie blows her stack about everything, and then she cools off and forgets it. Besides, she has other ways of getting at people."
"Such as?"
"Oh…" Karen gestured helplessly and laughed a little. "I was tempted to say that, being a mere male, you wouldn't understand; but after reading some of the congressional transcripts I know men are just as good at it as women. The insults disguised as compliments, the constant pricks and jabs that hit the victim's weakest point. For instance, she kept telling me…" Karen stopped. I am strong, I am invincible, she told herself, but I am double-damned if I am going to tell Mark Brinckley about Julie's comments on my weight and my dowdiness. She went on, "For instance, she gave me that awful book about ghosts and murders and hinted that there was some terrible story about this house."