"No one makes me happy," April grumbled.
"Bullshit. Didn't I do that great story on you? And you got promoted?" Lily reminded her.
April didn't want to tell her that she'd done the interview under orders from a superior, but another correction was in order. The interview had nothing to do with the promotion. "I took a test for the promotion," she said.
"Still, the story didn't hurt."
April smiled. "All right, I'll let you break the story when we're ready to make an arrest, okay?" That was a big concession. "But you'll have to keep your mouth shut about your source."
"Serious? How soon will that be?" Lily bounced in her chair.
"I have no idea. We're following leads. What was your take on Anderson?"
"Oh, it's the oldest domestic employment agency in the country still run by a family member. I did the piece as a human-interest service story just after 9/11 when thousands of people lost their jobs in the city and were looking for any kind of work, kind of like the Depression," she reminisced.
"I mean the owner," April prompted.
"Well, actually she did the interview with me because she wanted my help to write a book about her service to the rich and famous."
"No kidding." April woke up.
"I didn't have time to use what she gave me because the slant was the high-end field of domestic workers. But what she had was dynamite. She claims to have the inside dope on three generations of high-profile, wealthy clients. You should see her home. It's filled with memorabilia and photos of herself with megastars. She showed me gifts from movie stars and politicos, princes and presidents. Frank Sinatra, mob bosses. You wouldn't believe the people she knew. It's like a museum."
"What about her? What's she like?"
"This is the part that I thought would interest you. She kept files on everybody—the people she worked for, the staff members she placed, their friends. She made a point of knowing everything about everybody. Get this—she called it good business. She bragged to me about having their complete trust. She went into their places to water their plants when they were out of town. 1 thought it was kind of creepy. It seemed to me that if you had her or one of her people in your house, you were kind of harboring a spy."
April had already been alerted to that possibility. "That's very interesting," she said. "What happened to the book?"
"Oh, 1 referred her to some agents I know. She needed a writer, of course. And that got her all paranoid. She was afraid someone would steal her material."
"So nothing came of the book?"
"No. What do you want to eat?"
April glanced at the menu, then checked her watch. Five minutes to Woody time. "I'm really sorry. I have a long day, and 1 have to get cracking. "
Lily looked disappointed. "This was my day off," she grumbled.
"We'll do a long lunch soon, okay?"
"Right."
"One more thing. Where is Miss Anderson's home?"
"Beekman Place. She has a town house on Fiftieth."
"Fiftieth Street?" April's head jerked up.
Lily nodded. "I wouldn't forget something like that. It's a real freaky place, been in her family for a long time. Didn't you know?"
"Oh, the home address was on my list for today,"
April said slowly. Jo Ellen had been on her list for the day.
"It's close, right?"
"Yeah." April touched her hair. It was drying off now, absolutely flat on her head. It reminded her of another question she needed to ask. "By the way, what color hair does she have?"
"Jo Ellen? Gray."
"No kidding. She doesn't color it?"
"She didn't when I talked with her."
April started gathering up her things. "You've turned out to be a doll," she said. "I'm really grateful for your time."
"Was I useful?"
"Very useful. Where are you- going? Do you want a ride? I'll take you anywhere between here and Midtown North."
Lily laughed. It was almost a straight line west. "No, thanks," she said. "And good luck."
April nodded. She needed it.
Forty-five
Woody was right on time, waiting double-parked outside when April emerged from the restaurant at five past eight. The wind had picked up in the last half hour, and sleeting rain pounded the pavement.
"Morning, Boss. Was that Lily Eng?" Woody said as she scrambled into the car.
"Yes."
He knew better than to ask what they were meeting about. "The shop?"
"Yes. How are you doing, Woody?" She knew he hated to be left out.
"Me? I'm fine. It's quiet," he told her, as if crime was all that really mattered to him. He pulled the car out, angling across First Avenue through the traffic to make the turn west onto Fifty-seventh Street. For once, he did it without hitting the siren, and for that, she was grateful. At the red light on First Avenue they watched pedestrians fight the gusting rain as they crossed the street. The sky had darkened almost to night. As Mike would say. "Esta feo, feo." It was ugly weather. Woody whistled through his teeth.
"Turn up the box," she said anxiously. If something happened this morning, she didn't want to be the last to know.
For a few minutes only static blew in. Then the dispatcher's voice came on with business as usual. Woody stopped whistling before April told him to, and she was thankful for that, as well. The slightest positive thing helped on a bad day. She was feeling bloated and queasy from another of Skinny Dragon Mother's sticky breakfasts and the diner's rusty-nail tea. She hadn't drunk very much of it, only enough to know it wasn't going to be a health aid. "Anything new?" she asked after a pause.
"Looked like Charlie worked all night, and he's wearing the same clothes from yesterday. Maybe he didn't go home. I didn't see the sergeant," Woody reported.
"Anything else?"
"Barry was hinting around. He wants in."
Barry Queue was their former intelligence officer, the one who was so secretive and didn't try to make friends.
"What did you tell him?" It could be that Queue was someone's spy and she had to watch out for him. Or else he was coming around. She hoped it was the latter. She preferred team players.
"Didn't say nothing, just that I'd let you know."
"Thanks for the heads-up." She had more questions about a few other people but not the energy to pursue them right then. It occurred to her that as Iriarte had done before her and every other boss did, she was always gathering information on the whereabouts, activities, and personal habits of the people who worked for her. Part of it was simply chain of command. To run an efficient unit and
avoid surprises, one had to know what was going on. The question was, where did the job stop and controlling begin? And that was her question about the Anderson woman, too.
She'd been deeply troubled by what Lily had told her. It appeared that Jo Ellen Anderson was more than just intrusive with the girls she placed; she also meddled in the lives of her customers. She went into their houses and watered their plants. That was unusual, and particularly troubling because it gave her access to their private spaces. What else did she do there? And who else could have used those keys? April's thoughts raced ahead. Even more interesting was the fact that Jo Ellen lived in a town house on Fiftieth Street, two blocks from Maddy and even closer to Alison. She had gray hair. April's mind wandered back to the photos Woody had taken at the two houses. A gray-haired woman who fit Jo Ellen's description hadn't been in any of them, but she wondered if the woman had been questioned by anybody else during the canvass of neighbors, and the name just hadn't popped up yet.
"Are you okay, boss?" Woody asked.
"Yeah, fine," she said. But she didn't feel fine at' all. She'd lost her cookies only once before on account of something her mother had fed her. A few years ago when Lieutenant Bernardino had been in the car, she'd had to get out and barf on the street. The horrible feeling of that lost face still haunted her. She'd vowed never to do