“What do you want to know about Mrs. Harker?”
“The same thing: if she was working at the Clinic on that particular day. Also when, and why, she stopped coming here.”
“The why part I can’t tell you, because I don’t know. It mystified me at the time and still does. She made some excuse about her mother being ill and needing attention, but I happen to know Mrs. Fielding from my connection with the Women’s Club. The old girl’s as healthy as a horse. Quite an attractive woman, if she could remember to keep her velvet gloves on... No, it wasn’t Mrs. Fielding’s illness, I’m sure of that. As for the work itself, I believe Mrs. Harker enjoyed it.”
“Was she good at it?” Pinata asked.
“Excellent. Sweet-natured, understanding, dependable. Oh, she had a tendency to get overexcited at times and lose her head a bit in an emergency, but nothing serious. And the kids all loved her. She had a way, as childless women sometimes have, of making the kids feel very important and special, not just something that happened from an accidental meeting of a sperm and ovum. A fine young woman, Mrs. Harker. We were sorry to lose her. Have you known her long?”
“No.”
“Next time you see her, give her my kind regards, will you? And tell her we’d like to have her back whenever she can come.”
“I’ll do that.”
“In fact, if I could find out the circumstances that made her quit, I might be able to change them.”
“The circumstances are entirely Daisy’s, not the Clinic’s.”
“Well, I just thought I’d check,” Alston said. “We have occasional disagreements and disgruntlements among the members of our staff just like any other business. It’s surprising we don’t have more when you consider that psychology is not an exact science and there are consequently differences of opinion on diagnosis and procedure. Procedure especially,” he added with a frown. “Just what does one do with a girl like Juanita, for instance? Sterilize her? Keep her locked up? Enforce psychiatric treatment? We did our best, but the reason it didn’t work was that Juanita herself wouldn’t admit there was anything the matter with her. Like most incorrigibles, she’d managed to convince herself (and tried, of course, to convince us) that women were all the same and that what made her different was the fact that she was honest and aboveboard about her activities. Honest and above-board, the favorite words of the self-deceiver. Take my advice, Steve. Whenever anyone insists too vigorously on his honesty, you run and check the till. And don’t be too surprised if you find somebody’s fingers in it.”
“I don’t believe in generalizations,” Pinata said. “Especially that one.”
“Why not?”
“Because it includes me. I make frequent claims to honesty. In fact, I’m making one now.”
“Well, well. This puts me in the embarrassing position of either taking back the generalization or going to check the till. This is a serious decision. Let me meditate a moment.” Alston leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. “Very well. I take back the generalization. I’m afraid it’s easy to become a bit cynical in this job. So many promises made and broken, so many hopes dashed — it leaves you with a tendency to believe in the psychology of opposites, that is, when a person comes in and tells me he is affable, honest, and simple, I tend to tag him as a complex and irritable cheat. This is an occupational hazard I must avoid. Thanks for pointing it out, Steve.”
“I didn’t point out anything,” Pinata said, embarrassed. “I was merely defending myself.”
“I insist upon thanking you.”
“All right, all right, you’re welcome. At time and a half I don’t want to argue with you.”
“Oh yes, time and a half. I must get on with the job. I address the Newcomers Club at two, a good, malleable group usually. I have considerable hopes for our treasury.” He took a ring of keys from his desk drawer. “Please wait here. I can’t ask you into the file room. Not that our records are top secret, but many people like to believe they are. Want something to read while I’m gone?”
“No thanks. I’ll just think.”
“Got a lot to think about?”
“Enough.”
“Daisy Harker,” Alston said casually, “is a very pretty and, I believe, an unhappy young woman. That’s a bad combination.”
“What’s it got to do with me?”
“Not a thing, I hope.”
“Save your hopes for the treasury,” Pinata said. “My relationship with Mrs. Harker is strictly professional. She hired me to get some information about a certain day in her life.”
“And Juanita was part of this day?”
“Possibly.” Possibly Camilla was, too, though so far there was no indication of it. When Daisy called his office the previous morning, as scheduled, and learned the details of Camilla’s death, she was surprised, pained, curious — a perfectly normal reaction, which dispelled his last trace of doubt about her sincerity. She had, she said, asked both Jim and her mother if they’d ever known a man named Camilla, and she was waiting to hear from her father, to whom she’s sent a special delivery letter.
Alston was staring at him with a mixture of amusement and suspicion. “You’re not very communicative today, Steve.”
“I like to think of myself as the strong, silent type.”
“You do, eh? Well, just watch out for that Lancelot syndrome you’re carrying around. Rescuing ladies in distress can be dangerous, especially if the ladies happen to be married. Harker has the reputation of being a very good guy. And a smart one. Think it over, Steve. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Pinata thought it over. Lancelot syndrome, hell. I’m not interested in saving Daisies in distress. Daisy, what a silly name for a grown woman. I’ll bet that was Fielding’s idea. Mrs. Fielding would have picked something a little more high-toned or exotic, Céleste, Stephanie, Gwendolyn.
He got up and began pacing the room. Thinking about names depressed him because his own were only borrowed, from a parish priest and a child’s Christmas game. During the past three years especially, since Monica had taken Johnny away, Pinata had wondered a great deal about his parents, trying, not too successfully, to follow the advice the Mother Superior had given him many times: “There’s no room in this world for self-pity, Stevens. You’re a strong man because you had no one to lean on, and that’s a good thing sometimes, to live without leaning. Think of all the fixations you might have developed, and dear me, there are a lot of them around these days. The essential thing for a boy is to have a good man to pattern himself after. And you had that in Father Stevens... Your mother? What else could she have been but a young woman who found herself bearing too heavy a cross? You must not blame her for being unable to carry it. Perhaps she was just a schoolgirl... ”
Or a Juanita, Pinata thought grimly. But why should it matter now after more than thirty years? I could never trace her anyway; there wasn’t a single clue. And even if I found her, what about him? It’s possible she wouldn’t even know which of the men in her life was my father. Or care.
Alston returned, carrying several cards picked out of a file. “Well, you have something, Steve. I’m not sure what. December 2, ’55, was the last day Mrs. Harker worked here. She was on duty from 1:00 to 5:30, in charge of the children’s playroom. That’s where the younger children are kept while their parents or relatives are being counseled. No actual therapy is done there, but it was part of Mrs. Harker’s job to observe any behavior problems, such as excessive destructiveness or shyness, and report them in writing to the professional members of the staff. The way a three-year-old plays with a doll often gives us more of a clue to the cause of family trouble than several hours of talking on the part of the parents. So you can see Mrs. Harker’s work was important. She took it seriously, too. I just checked one of her reports. It was full of details that some of our other volunteers would have failed to notice or at least to record.”