‘How do you know all this, David?’
‘I’ve been watching these people for a long, long time.’
‘So, let’s say Julie identifies the creep. Then what?’
David’s gaze was steady. ‘Why don’t we cross that bridge when we come to it?’
NINETEEN
‘A few great magicians … have always realized that these ephemeral, temporary miracles could be restorative for their audiences. They listened for the brief pause between the end of the trick and the start of the applause – the split second when the entire audience shares a gasp of genuine amazement. At that moment there’s always been an honorable quality in illusion.’
Jim Steinmeyer, Hiding the Elephant,
Da Capo, 2004, p. 331
After I left David, I took the stairway down to deck six, waited in line for a cappuccino at Café Cino then carried it, casually sipping, as I wandered through the boutiques. I was heading for the art gallery.
Although a surprisingly large number of paintings had sold at the auction the previous day, the empty easels had been refilled, as if by magic, with equally unappealing offerings. I wondered if Nicole had artists chained in the bilges, churning them out.
She wasn’t there, but a young man who identified himself as Nicole’s assistant assured me that if I came back at two o’clock I could talk to Nicole directly.
‘I really, really like that Dutko over there,’ I gushed, pointing to a hideous oil of a dark-haired woman posing cheek-to-cheek with a horse to whom she bore an uncanny resemblance. ‘But Buddy would just murder me if I paid six hundred dollars for it.’
‘I’ll speak to Nicole about it. I’m sure she can do better than that.’ The man actually winked.
‘Thank you so much. It’s absolutely perfect for our family room.’
Back in our stateroom, I found Ruth sitting on her bed reading a book. When she saw me, she tossed the book to the floor. ‘There you are! It’s almost one o’clock! We were about to give up on you. I’m starving. Where do you want to go for lunch?’
I’d hustled and bustled so much that morning that the thought of fighting my way through the buffet lines at the Firebird, or trying to talk over the din, gave me instant indigestion. ‘Let’s be civilized and go up to the dining room,’ I said. ‘I’ll go collect the others.’
I stuck my head around the door. ‘Georgina?’
Breep-breep. Breep-breep. I nearly jumped out of my sandals. ‘What the heck is that?’
Georgina was rummaging through her cosmetic bag. ‘Get that for me, will you, Hannah?’
Ah, the phone. That white, ultra-mod moebius that sat on the desk in our cabins. I’d never heard it ring before.
I crossed to the desk and picked up. ‘Hello?’
‘I just wanted you to know I’m really glad you found your daughter,’ someone said.
‘I’m…’ I started to say, then thought better of it.
‘Look,’ the voice hurried on, low and urgent. ‘There’s something you need to… oh, shit!’
‘Who is this?’ I demanded, but the caller had already hung up.
‘Who was that?’ Georgina wanted to know.
I stared at the silent receiver, thinking that the voice sounded familiar. Male, for certain. Young, but not too young. Nervous. Connor Crawford? What was that all about?
Not wanting to send Georgina off on a killing spree, I shrugged and said, ‘Wrong number. Are you ready for lunch?’
‘Give us ten minutes,’ Georgina replied as she attacked her unruly mane with a hairbrush.
‘I’ll go ahead and get us a table, then,’ I told her. ‘Tell Ruth I’ll meet her there.’
Once I reached the dining room, I used the extra time to cruise among the tables, looking for David. I found him sitting alone at a table for two near a window, studying a menu. ‘May I?’ I pulled out the chair opposite him and sat down.
‘I’m expecting Oprah Winfrey to join me,’ he quipped, looking up at me over the top of the menu.
‘I won’t stay long, then,’ I said with a smile.
David Warren, cracking a joke. Would wonders ever cease? ‘A burden shared is a burden halved,’ someone a lot wiser than I had once said. Perhaps I had lightened his. I hoped so.
I leaned across the table and told David about the mysterious phone call I’d just received.
‘Who do you think it was?’ he asked after I’d finished.
‘Not sure. It could have been that young Crawford boy, the one who got Julie drunk.’
David tented his fingers and tapped his chin thoughtfully. ‘If the lad is interested in your niece, perhaps he’s been keeping tabs on her. It sounds like he may have seen something.’
‘My thoughts exactly.’
‘Only one way to find out,’ David said.
‘I know. Track him down and ask him.’
‘There you are!’ It was Ruth.
‘Gotta go, David,’ I said, rising. ‘If you see him first…’ I didn’t need to finish the sentence.
‘I know what to do.’
Two minutes later, at my request, our waiter escorted Ruth and me to a table for four tucked away in a private corner near the sweeping staircase that led up to the balcony.
When Georgina and Julie finally joined us, I was happy to see that Julie’s appetite had returned. ‘I want one of everything,’ she told the waiter brightly, ‘but I guess I’ll settle for the moussaka. And the lamb!’
Between the avgolemono soup and the loukoumades, I updated my family on the information David and I had learned that morning. Up to a point, that is.
‘Julie,’ I said. ‘I think we have identified the man who attacked you. We’re not one hundred percent sure, but I was hoping that if you saw him again, you might be able to recognize him.’
Julie lowered her fork. ‘I don’t know, Aunt Hannah. It still seems all fuzzy, like a really bad dream.’
Georgina reached out and seized her daughter’s hand. ‘I don’t know, either, Hannah. I’m not so sure I want to put Julie through another ordeal. Hasn’t she suffered enough?’
Ruth stared at Georgina as if she’d just sprouted horns. ‘If Julie can positively identify the man, we can put the bastard away. You want him wandering the streets, Georgina? Preying on other unsuspecting young victims?’
‘Well, no. But…’
‘It’s OK, Mom.’ Julie turned to me. ‘Just tell me what to do.’
After lunch, we returned to our staterooms. At my instruction, Julie changed out of her shorts and tank top into a conservative pair of jeans and a ‘C is for Cure’ pink ribbon T-shirt borrowed from her mother. With her hair tucked into a ball cap, and a pair of dark glasses, I didn’t think Westfall would recognize her unless he got a close look, and I didn’t intend for that to happen.
When we arrived at the art gallery around a quarter after two, the close-out sale was in full swing. Nicole’s assistant sat in a chair behind the desk, writing up sales slips and wearing out his smile. Nicole herself was loudly explaining the investment value of a Thomas Kinkade signed and numbered limited-edition print and hand-embellished canvas called ‘Gingerbread Cottage’ to a woman leaning on a walker. I’d seen similar prints in a gallery in Annapolis for around two hundred and fifty dollars, so I hoped this woman wouldn’t shell out the five hundred dollars Nicole was asking for it.
Of Nicole’s husband, there was no sign.
‘Spooky,’ Ruth declared, indicating the Kinkade. ‘If you were Hansel and Gretel, would you go into that cottage? There’s a hellish glow behind every window. Something diabolical is going on in there, you just know it.’