"I've already made those arrangements for myself. I called the Jewish Museum and asked what catering service they use for their monthly board meetings."
"Great. I'll check in again at noon. Be good."
"Feel free to help yourself to anything in the refrigerator. And the various remote controls for the television and the DVD are in the drawer of the coffee table."
"It's surveillance, not babysitting, Mark." But she wondered just how much food Mark would have in the house, after living on his own for a month, and whether she would find any of it appealing. "If I were to order food-say, a pizza, just for example, or Chinese-is it okay if it's not kosher? Or will I somehow violate your house by bringing in treyf?"
"There are paper plates and plastic utensils in the cupboard just to the right of the refrigerator. Use those, take your containers with you, and it should be okay. Although, really, there are some lovely frozen latkes. They thaw in seconds in the microwave."
Hanging out in Mark's house was not unlike the babysitting gigs of Tess's teenage years. Only instead of listening for muffled cries from a child's bedroom, she strained her ears toward any out-of-place sounds on the quiet suburban street. And, just like when she'd been babysitting, she was bored out of her mind in less than thirty minutes.
It had been a long, fruitless day-Lana was still MIA at work and home-and Mark had steadfastly declined to call the police about the possible threat to his life, no matter how Tess coaxed in their phone conversations. "We'll talk about that tomorrow," he insisted over and over.
Uninterested in food, she decided to indulge in another old babysitting habit-unbridled snooping. The house was neat and fairly clean, but there was that indefinable absence, the feel of a missing woman. Everything was just a bit awry, not to mention dusty. After inspecting the bookshelves and the contents of the various medicine cabinets, Tess tried the doors of Natalie's walk-in closet. The clothes, suitable to an Orthodox woman in their style and hues, were clearly expensive. Natalie had dozens of shoes and a shelf of fashionable hats, which she probably needed for synagogue. A built-in safe indicated a cache of fine jewelry. Why hadn't Natalie taken those with her to pawn as necessary? Because she wanted them back, Tess thought. Because whatever's going on is temporary, a contingency. She always meant to get them back. No fur coats, however-could she have sold them to raise money for her escape? Then Tess remembered it was still storage season. Except for excitable types such as the legendary Mrs. Gordon, who had needed her lynx before she headed off to see the fjords.
Only if the famously difficult Mrs. Gordon were on a cruise-how could she have another emergency? A distracted, lost-in-thought Mark had said last night's call was from Paul. Did that mean Mrs. Gordon had located a ship-to-shore telephone at what must be 3:00 a.m. her time and called Paul at home, demanding to have another coat airlifted to the Norwegian Princess! Dubious. Extremely dubious.
Adrenaline on alert, Tess called Mark's cell phone and got voice mail for the first time that day. She consulted a Rolodex next to the phone in Mark's study and found a home number for his salesman, Paul Zuravsky.
"Last night? No, Mark and I spoke this morning, and that was it. He told me he was going to be with you all day again."
Tess was too upset to care about the disapproving note in Paul's voice, as if he blamed the freckled shiksa for Mark's taking time away from the business.
"Paul, do you know where Mark was calling from?"
"He must have been on his cell, I think, because the reception was bad. But he didn't mention where he was."
"Did he say anything else about what he planned to do today? Was there anything out of the ordinary about the conversation?"
"No. But something odd happened early this afternoon. The vice president from Mark's bank called, pretty agitated. He wanted to talk to Mark about his decision to close an account. I didn't think anything of it, because Mark's capable of getting in a snit with people, forever moving and closing accounts to get better rates and deals. He's a big believer in the well-timed fit."
Tess remembered how he had terrorized the wholesaler from Montreal. Still, she couldn't see how a bank had managed to enrage him just now. Mark had claimed to be in his hotel room all day. But he had told her to call on the cell.
"Did he take the money out in cash? How much?"
"No idea. Enough to get a vice president to follow up with a phone call."
"That fucker," Tess said, and Paul coughed as if shocked, although Tess bet that the Mrs. Gordons of the world used a few choice words when their whims weren't indulged. "He set me up. He made sure I would be occupied all day so he could go behind my back and cut some deal with them. The idiot. They'll take the money and kill him."
"What are you talking about? He's been with you all day-" but she hung up on Paul, too agitated to explain, and dialed the Wyndham's main number.
Mark was registered, but the phone in his room rang unanswered, bouncing her to a voice-mail system in five rings. Fortunately, the valet confirmed that the Cadillac had gone out sometime in the last hour. It helped, Tess realized, being able to describe the driver as a tall, well-dressed man in a yarmulke. That detail tended to stick out in people's minds.
She looked at Mark's phone, realizing too late that she couldn't use the redial trick that Mark had tried at Lana's apartment. But he had caller ID, just as she had advised him. The call that had come in at 9:14 last night was a local one, a 410 number that looked familiar to Tess, although it was listed as "Caller Unknown." She flipped open her cell, looking at the log of calls she had made in the past two weeks, and then the numbers she had stored there since taking Mark's case.
Last night's call had been made from Vera Peters's home phone.
The days were getting shorter, each night falling faster than the one before. Dusk was long past when Tess pulled up at Vera's house, but there was only one light on, somewhere on the first floor.
She banged on the door, making more and more noise, until neighbors began to shout. "They'll be calling the police soon, if you don't answer," Tess screamed into the metal frame of the storm door. The inner door opened slowly, but it was Lana on the other side, not Vera.
"No one here wants to talk to you."
"It's really not about what you or Vera wants at this point," Tess said, shoving past Lana and showing off her gun, although she had no idea what she would do with it here. "If you don't cooperate with me, I'm going to call the police and tell them you're a coconspirator in a long laundry list of crimes."
Lana looked confused and frightened, but her voice remained firm. "No one's here."
"But someone's been here." The telltale trail of a child's detritus snaked through the living room-a strange little rock family with googly eyes, a miniature View-Master stamped "Memories of Skyline Drive," a paperback copy of From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler that looked as if it had been read to death. "They were here. Where are they now, Lana?"
Vera Peters came down the stairs with her heavy tread, tying a bathrobe around her as if she had already been in bed, although the hour was early. "Tell her, Lana. I don't want any trouble. This is not my affair, and it shouldn't be yours."
"But-"
"No more buts. Why are you protecting her still? I only let them stay here because they promised to do the right thing by the children. You're not going to get the money they owe you. You're never going to see them again. Didn't you notice? They left the children's things, but they took their own. They're going to leave us here to explain whatever happens. We're better off talking to this nosy one than the police."