While My Pretty One Sleeps (3 page)

“You work here?” the cabby asked as she paid him. “Looks expensive.”

Neeve nodded noncommittally as she thought, I own this place, my friend. It was a realization that still thrilled her. Six years ago the previous shop at this location had gone bankrupt. It was her father's old friend the famous designer Anthony della Salva who had bullied her into taking it over. “So you're young,” he'd said, dropping the heavy Italian accent that was now part of his persona. “That's a plus. You've been working in fashion since you got your first after-school job. Better yet, you've got the know-how, the flair. I'll lend you the money to get started. If it doesn't work, I can use the write-off, but it'll work. You've got what it takes to make a go of it. Besides, I need another place to sell my clothes.” That was the last thing Sal needed, and they both knew it, but she was grateful.

Myles had been dead set against her borrowing from Sal. But she had jumped at the chance. Something she had inherited from Renata besides her hair and eyes was a highly developed fashion sense. Last year she had paid back Sal's loan, insisting on adding interest at money-market rates.

•   •   •

She was not surprised to find Betty already at work in the sewing
room. Betty's head was bent down, her frown of concentration now a permanent set of lines on her forehead and between her brows. Her hands, slender and wrinkled, handled a needle and thread with the skill of a surgeon. She was hemming an intricately beaded blouse. Her blatantly dyed copper-colored hair accentuated the parchment-thin skin on her face. Neeve hated to realize that Betty was past seventy. She didn't want to visualize the day when she decided to retire.

“Figured I'd better get a jump on things,” Betty announced. “We've got an awful lot of pickups today.”

Neeve pulled off her gloves and unwound her scarf. “Don't I know it. And Ethel Lambston insists she has to have everything by this afternoon.”

“I know. I've got her stuff ready to do when I finish this. It wouldn't be worth listening to her jabbering if every rag she bought isn't ready to go.”

“Everybody should be such a good customer,” Neeve observed mildly.

Betty nodded. “I suppose so. And, by the way, I'm glad you talked Mrs. Yates into this outfit. That other one she tried on made her look like a grazing cow.”

“It also was fifteen hundred dollars more, but I couldn't let her have it. Sooner or later she'd have taken a good look at herself in the mirror. The sequin top is enough. She needs a soft, full skirt.”

A surprising number of shoppers braved the snow and slippery sidewalks to come into the store. Two of the saleswomen hadn't made it, so Neeve spent the day on the sales floor. It was
the part she enjoyed most about the business, but in the past year she'd been forced to limit herself to handling only a few personal clients.

At noon she went into her office at the back of the shop for a deli sandwich and coffee and dialed home.

Myles sounded more like himself. “I would have won fourteen thousand dollars and a Champion pickup truck on
Wheel of Fortune
,” he announced. “I won so much I might even have had to take that six-hundred-dollar plaster-of-paris Dalmatian they have the gall to call a prize.”

“Well, you certainly sound better,” Neeve observed.

“I've been talking to the boys downtown. They've got good people keeping tabs on Sepetti. They say he's pretty sick and hasn't much fight left.” There was satisfaction in Myles's voice.

“And they also probably reminded you that they don't think he had anything to do with Mother's death.” She did not wait for an answer. “It's a good night for pasta. There's plenty of sauce in the freezer. Yank it out, okay?”

Neeve hung up feeling somewhat reassured. She swallowed the last bite of the turkey sandwich, gulped down the rest of the coffee and went back to the sales floor. Three of the six dressing rooms were occupied. With a practiced eye, she took in every detail of the shop.

The Madison Avenue entrance opened into the accessory area. She knew that one of the key reasons for her success was the availability of jewelry, purses, shoes, hats and scarves so that a woman purchasing a dress or a suit didn't have to hunt elsewhere for accessories. The interior of the shop was in shadings
of ivory, with accents of blush pink on the upholstered sofas and chairs. Sportswear and separates were contained in roomy alcoves two steps up from the showcases. Except for the exquisitely gowned display mannequins there was no clothing in sight. A potential customer was escorted to a chair, and the sales clerk brought out dresses and gowns and suits for her selection.

It had been Sal who advised Neeve to go that way. “Otherwise you'll have klutzes yanking clothes off the racks. Start exclusive, honey, and stay exclusive,” he had said, and as usual he was right.

The ivory and blush had been Neeve's decision. “When a woman looks in the mirror, I don't want the background fighting what I'm trying to sell,” she'd told the interior designer who wanted her to go into great splashes of color.

As the afternoon wore on, fewer clients came in. At three o'clock Betty emerged from the sewing room. “Lambston's stuff is ready,” she told Neeve.

Neeve assembled Ethel Lambston's order herself. All spring clothes. Ethel was a sixtyish free-lance writer with one bestseller to her credit. “I write on every subject under the sun,” she had breathlessly confided to Neeve on the opening day of the shop. “I take the fresh approach, the inquiring look. I'm every woman seeing something for the first time or from a new angle. I write about sex and relationships and animals and nursing homes and organizations and real estate and how to be a volunteer and political parties and . . .” She had run out of breath, her navy-blue eyes snapping, her white-blond hair flying around her face. “The trouble is that I work so hard at what I do, I don't
have a minute for myself. If I buy a black dress, I end up wearing brown shoes with it. Say, you have everything here. What a good idea. Put me together.”

In the last six years, Ethel Lambston had become a valuable customer. She insisted Neeve pick out every stitch she bought as well as choose accessories and compile lists to tell her what went with what. She lived on the ground floor of a brownstone on West Eighty-second Street, and Neeve stopped there occasionally to help Ethel decide what clothes to keep from year to year and what to give away.

The last time Neeve had gone over Ethel's wardrobe was three weeks ago. The next day Ethel came in and ordered the new outfits. “I've almost finished that fashion article I interviewed you about,” she'd told Neeve. “A lot of people are going to be mad at me when it comes out, but you'll love it. I gave you lots of free publicity.”

When she made her selections she and Neeve had differed on only one suit. Neeve had started to take it away. “I don't want to sell you that. It's a Gordon Steuber. I refuse to handle anything of his. This one should have gone back. I cannot stand that man.”

Ethel had burst out laughing. “Wait till you read what I wrote about him. I crucified him. But I want the suit. His clothes look good on me.”

•   •   •

Now, as Neeve carefully placed the garments in heavy protective bags, she felt her lips narrow at the sight of the Steuber outfit. Six weeks ago, the daily maid at the shop had asked her to speak to a friend who was in trouble. The friend, a Mexican,
told Neeve about working in an illegal sweatshop in the South Bronx that was owned by Gordon Steuber. “We don't have green cards. He threatens to turn us in. Last week I was sick. He fired me and my daughter and won't pay what he owes us.”

The young woman didn't look to be more than in her late twenties. “Your daughter!” Neeve had exclaimed. “How old is she?”

“Fourteen.”

Neeve had canceled the order she'd placed with Gordon Steuber and sent him a copy of the Elizabeth Barrett Browning poem which had helped change the child-labor laws in England. She underlined the stanza “But the young, young children, oh my brothers, they are weeping bitterly.”

Someone in Steuber's office had tipped off
Women's Wear Daily
. The editors printed the poem on the front page next to Neeve's scathing letter to Steuber and called on other retailers to boycott manufacturers who were breaking the law.

Anthony della Salva had been upset. “Neeve, the word is that Steuber has a lot more than sweatshops to hide. Thanks to what you stirred up, the Feds are nosing around his income-tax returns.”

“Wonderful,” Neeve had retorted. “If he's cheating at that too, I hope they catch him.”

•   •   •

Well, she decided as she straightened the Steuber suit on the hanger, this will be the last thing of his that goes out of my shop. She found herself anxious to read Ethel's fashion article. She knew it was due to come out soon in
Contemporary Woman
,
the magazine where Ethel was a contributing editor.

Finally, Neeve made up the lists for Ethel. Blue silk evening suit; wear white silk blouse; jewelry in box A. Pink-and-gray ensemble; gray pumps, matching purse; jewelry in box B. Black cocktail dress . . .” There were eight outfits in all. With the accessories they came to nearly seven thousand dollars. Ethel spent that amount three or four times a year. She'd confided to Neeve that when she was divorced twenty-two years before, she'd gotten a big settlement and invested it wisely. “And I collect a thousand bucks a month alimony from him for life,” she'd laughed. “At the time we broke up, he was riding high. He told his lawyers it was worth every cent to get rid of me. In court, he said that if I ever marry again the guy should be stone deaf. Maybe I'd have given him a break if it weren't for that crack. He's remarried and has three kids, and ever since Columbus Avenue got classy his bar's been in trouble. Every once in a while he phones and begs me to let him off the hook, but I tell him I still haven't found anyone who's stone deaf.”

At that moment Neeve had been prepared to dislike Ethel. Then Ethel had added wistfully, “I always wanted a family. We separated when I was thirty-seven. The five years we were married, he wouldn't give me a child.”

Neeve had made it her business to read Ethel's articles and had quickly realized that even though Ethel might be a talkative, seemingly scatterbrained woman, she was also an excellent writer. No matter what subject she tackled, it was obvious her research was massive.

With the help of the receptionist, Neeve stapled the bottoms
of the garment bags. The jewelry and the shoes were packed in individual boxes and then gathered in ivory-and-pink cartons with “Neeve's Place” scrolled along the sides. With a sigh of relief, she dialed Ethel's apartment.

There was no answer. Nor had Ethel left her answering machine on. Neeve decided that Ethel would probably arrive any minute, breathless and with a taxi waiting outside.

At four o'clock there were no customers in the shop and Neeve sent everyone home. Darn Ethel, she thought. She would have liked to go home as well. The snow was still falling steadily. At this rate, she'd never get a cab herself later. She tried Ethel at four-thirty, at five, at five-thirty. Now what? she wondered. Then she had an idea. She'd wait until six-thirty, the usual closing time, then deliver Ethel's things on her way home. Surely she could leave them with the superintendent. That way if Ethel had imminent travel plans, she'd have her new wardrobe.

The taxicab-company starter was reluctant to accept her call. “We're telling all our cars to come in, lady. Driving's a mess. But gimme your name and phone number.” When he heard her name, the starter's tone changed. “Neeve Kearny! Why didn't you tell me you're the Commissioner's daughter? You bet we'll get you home.”

The cab arrived at twenty of seven. They inched through the now almost impassable streets. The driver was not pleased to make an additional stop. “Lady, I can't wait to pack it in.”

There was no answer at Ethel's apartment. Neeve rang in vain for the superintendent. There were four other apartments in the brownstone, but she had no idea who lived in them and couldn't
risk leaving the clothes with strangers. Finally she tore a check out of her book and on the back of it wrote a note to slip under Ethel's door: “I have your purchases. Call me when you get in.” She put her home phone number under her signature. Then, struggling under the weight of the boxes and bags, she got back into the cab.

•   •   •

Inside Ethel Lambston's apartment, a hand reached for the note Neeve had pushed under the door, read it, tossed it aside and resumed his periodic search for the hundred-dollar bills that Ethel regularly squirreled away under the carpets or between the cushions of the couch, the money she gleefully referred to as “Seamus the wimp's alimony.”

Myles Kearny could not shake off the nagging worry that had been growing in him for weeks. His grandmother used to have a kind of sixth sense. “I have a feeling,” she would say. “There's trouble coming.” Myles could vividly remember when he was ten and his grandmother had received a picture of his cousin in Ireland. She had cried, “He has death in his eyes.” Two hours later the phone had rung. His cousin had been killed in an accident.

Seventeen years ago, Myles had shrugged off Nicky Sepetti's threat. The Mafia had its own code. They never went after the wives or children of its enemies. And then Renata had died. At three o'clock in the afternoon, walking through Central Park to
pick up Neeve at Sacred Heart Academy, she'd been murdered. It had been a cold, windy November day. The park was deserted. There were no witnesses to tell who had lured or forced Renata off the path and into the area behind the museum.

He'd been in his office when the principal of Sacred Heart phoned at four-thirty. Mrs. Kearny had not come to pick up Neeve. They'd phoned, but she was not at home. Was anything wrong? When he hung up the phone, Myles had known with sickening certainty that something terrible had happened to Renata. Ten minutes later the police were searching Central Park. His car was on the way uptown when the call came in that her body had been found.