Mr. Markham took in some air.
“Of course, Barbara and I would like it to stop. It is painful for us. But you can’t believe we would harm our own daughter.”
“She made the whole thing up,” Mrs. Markham said.
“You could settle it with a simple DNA comparison,” I said.
“We will not dignify her lies like that,” Mrs. Markham said.
I looked at Mr. Markham; he shook his head. I stood.
“Well,” I said. “I have a dog waiting for me.”
Neither of them stood.
“For what it is worth,” I said, “your daughter is not quitting, and neither am I. Sooner or later we will know the truth, whatever the truth turns out to be.”
“The truth is,” Mrs. Markham said, “that she’s a self-indulgent, spoiled, drug-addicted liar.”
I smiled at her.
“No more Mrs. Nice Guy?” I said.
Mrs. Markham didn’t answer. Mr. Markham said nothing. I had nothing else to say.
So I left.
23
“I could never understand why he loved her,” I said. “She was so dumb and bossy and... what... self-centered, I guess.”
Dr. Silverman was wearing a gray suit this morning, with a black turtleneck sweater.
“Tell me a little more about her,” Dr. Silverman said.
A regular damn chatterbox today.
“My father pretends she’s smart. He always acts like she’s a wonder if she, you know, cooks a lamb chop, or finds her keys, or buys some cheap piece of fabric for the couch. He always acts as if no one else could have done it.”
“It must be annoying.”
“It is,” I said. “And she always sort of acts like she’s won some sort of contest when he does it.”
“Maybe she has,” Dr. Silverman said.
“With me?” I said.
“You think?” Dr. Silverman said.
“Yes. With me and my sister. For Daddy.”
Dr. Silverman nodded. She appeared to understand everything. Of course, that could be training rather than truth. Still, there was a great deal of warmth in her. I could feel it. And distance, too. I couldn’t quite understand how she was both at the same time. She waited.
“Elizabeth is older,” I said. “She didn’t like me. I’m sure she resented me for being born.”
“How do you get along now?”
“We don’t. We are connected because we’re, you know, sisters. But we still don’t really like each other.”
“Why?” Dr. Silverman said.
“Why?”
She nodded.
“She’s so much like my mother, I suppose. And more than anything else, she thinks you are a failure if you are not with a man.”
“Is she with one now?”
“Too many,” I said. “She’s divorced. She’s desperate. She’ll sleep with the first guy who offers.”
“How about you?” Dr. Silverman said.
“After my divorce? No. I handled that pretty well. I slept with men if I liked them, and not if I didn’t.”
“Until recently,” Dr. Silverman said.
“Yes.”
We were quiet.
“Now I don’t sleep with anybody.”
Dr. Silverman was quiet. I was quiet. It wasn’t so hard being quiet as it had been.
“How did you compare,” Dr. Silverman said.
“To my mother and sister?”
She nodded. I smiled.
“Favorably,” I said.
“Talk about that,” she said.
“I was always good at things. I was an athlete. I rowed in college, single sculls. My father taught me how to shoot. I liked to go to ball games with him. I liked to talk about his work. My father was a cop. A captain when he retired. He used to take me in to work sometimes. I was kind of funny. I had dates. I was popular in school. My grades were okay. Not like Elizabeth’s. She got all A’s every year. It impressed the hell out of my mother, but I sort of knew, and I think my father did, that grades are mostly bullshit. I got B’s and C’s without trying very hard.”
“It sounds like you were close to your father.”
“Yes.”
Then Dr. Silverman said, “Did your father prefer you?”
“You mean over my sister?”
“Or your mother,” she said.
I was quiet again, thinking about the answer. It wasn’t that I didn’t know the answer. It was trying to say it without sounding like a jerk. Finally, I settled for sounding like a jerk.
“He liked me best,” I said.
Dr. Silverman nodded. We were quiet again. I felt very heavy inside.
“Are we getting oedipal here?” I said.
“What do you understand by the term ‘oedipal’?”
“Kill my mother and marry my father... symbolically of course.”
“Do you think we’re getting oedipal?” Dr. Silverman said.
“Hey,” I said. “You’re the oedipal expert.”
Dr. Silverman smiled.
“He liked you best,” she said.
“Yes.”
“That could be quite burdensome for a young girl. Particularly if her mother was problematic.”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” I said. “I wanted to kill my mother and marry my father? That’s so trite.”
“I normally try to avoid using terms like ‘oedipal,’ ” Dr. Silverman said. “It is merely a label, and as such is not very useful.”
“Then why the hell are we talking about it.”
Dr. Silverman smiled and didn’t answer.
“Because I introduced the damn term,” I said.
“I think you did,” Dr. Silverman said.
24
I had just cleaned up after breakfast with Sarah when the phone rang.
“Sunny Randall?” a voice said.
“Yes.”
It was a whispery voice, as if someone wanted to disguise it.
“I got information about that Sarah Markham case you’re working on.”
“Would you like to give it to me?” I said.
“You know the Middlesex Fells?”
“I do.”
“Road runs along the south edge of the woods?” the voice said. “West of Route Ninety-three?”
“Border Road,” I said.
“Drive there and park anywhere on Border Road. We’ll find you.”
“When?”
“When can you get there?” the whispery voice said.
“Noon,” I said.
“Noon,” the voice whispered, and they hung up.
It was 8:30. They were generous with their lead time. Which is dumb. Or amateurish. Or both. I called Spike.
“I need you to be in the woods off Border Road in the Middlesex Fells by eleven a.m. at the latest.”
“Sure,” Spike said. “Gun or no gun.”
“Gun,” I said.
“Okay,” Spike said, “tell me about it.”
I told him.
“Ah,” Spike said. “Movement of some sort. Could it be a feint, and they are after the girl?”
“The thought occurred,” I said. “I’m making an arrangement.”
“Okay,” Spike said. “I’ll be there.”
“Don’t forget your cell phone.”
“Or my gun,” Spike said. “Or my head.”
I hung up and dialed again and got Tony Marcus.
“Sunny Randall,” he said. “Always a pleasure.”
“I need a favor.”
“That’s what I’m here for,” Tony said. “Doing favors for Sunny Randall.”
“I need someone to babysit my dog, Rosie...”
“That funny-looking little one with the nose?”
“The beautiful little one with the classic features,” I said, “and a young, scared white woman who is hiding in my apartment.”
“And why was it I would do that?” Tony said.
“Because you like me,” I said. “You’ve told me that often.”
“I do like you, Sunny Randall, except sometimes when you’re annoying me.”