I’d have done better to ask for the moon.
Before I could even fit my key in the lock, Abby’s door banged open and she swooped like a vampire into the hall, the wide sleeves of her white painter’s smock flapping like the wings of an albino bat. “Where the holy hell have you been?” she shrieked, grabbing hold of my shoulder and pulling me around to face her. “You’re so late the Mai Tais are all gone! Now I’ll have to fix you a plain old rum and Coke!” Her bright red lips were pouting, her dark brown eyes were blazing, and her long black hair was loose and swirling around her head like a storm cloud.
I was unnerved by her troubled demeanor. “What’s the matter, Abby? There’s no reason for you to be so upset. It’s too cold for Mai Tais anyway. This is hot toddy weather.”
“That’s not the point!” she screeched, stamping one fuzzy pink slipper-clad foot on the bare wood floor of the landing. “The point is why are you so late? Where the hell have you been? We’ve both been going meshugge. We were worried about you!”
“We?” I said. “Who is we? Did Dan get here already, or is Tony the baker still here from last night, charming your pants off with his trick snake?”
“Hardeeharhar,” Abby said, relaxing her shoulders a bit, but refusing to smile. “You’re wrong on both counts. And I wouldn’t be making jokes if I were you. There’s nothing funny about murder.”
Now I was as upset as she was. “What murder are you talking about? And who are you talking about? Do you have somebody in your apartment? And, if so, who the hell is it?” I was too exhausted (okay, exasperated) to keep playing her little guessing game.
“Come see for yourself,” she said, turning aside and bowing low, gesturing with one sweeping, outflung arm for me to enter her mysterious domain.
I gave Abby a snotty look, then took a deep breath and stepped inside. I didn’t know what to expect, but I can truthfully say (and you should trust me on this), that if I’d walked in to find Vice President Richard Nixon himself lolling on Abby’s little red loveseat in a complete state of undress, it wouldn’t have surprised me in the least.
It wasn’t Richard Nixon, though. It was Terry Catcher, and I was shocked right down to my snowboots.
He wasn’t undressed, I’m happy to report, but he was lolling (well, sleeping, I guess I should say), on his back, on the love seat, with his lower legs hanging over the armrest like two large salamis strung from a delicatessen ceiling. One arm was folded over his chest, and the other was dangling over the edge of the tiny couch, fingertips grazing the floor.
I tiptoed up to the couch and leaned over him. “Terry?” I whispered. “Are you okay? What are you doing here?”
His only response was a snort and a whistle. He was sleeping so soundly even the A-bomb wouldn’t have budged him.
“He doesn’t look so worried to me,” I said to Abby, resuming a normal speaking tone and walking back over to where she was standing, not bothering to tiptoe. “If you ask me, he looks drunk.”
“Well, he is now!” she said, still pouting. “But that’s just because you were so late getting home. He was worried out of his gourd about you, and he said if anything happened to you it would be his fault.” Abby flounced into the kitchen area, plopped down at her tiny dining table and lit up a Philip Morris.
I sat down and lit up, too, trying to collect myself. “So what’s going on?” I stammered. “How long has he been here? Did he tell you about his sister?”
“Sure did. Told me the whole sickening saga. But what I want to know is why you didn’t tell me about it,” she whined, looking more petulant by the moment. “When did you start keeping secrets from me?”
So that’s what she was so upset about. “I wasn’t keeping anything from you, silly,” I insisted. “I was dying to tell you everything! I wanted to talk to you about the murder last night, but you had company, if you recall, and it was obvious that the three of you wanted to be alone.”
“The three of us?” She gawked at me as if my ears were blowing bubbles.
“You, Tony, and the snake,” I said (and if you think it was easy for me to sit there so calmly and crack another stupid snake joke when I was literally jumping out of my skin with curiosity and concern about Terry, then you’ve got-as Vicki Lee Bumstead would say-another think coming).
Finally, Abby laughed and hopped down off her high horse. “Okay, you’re forgiven,” she said. “But you’d better clue me in on every single thing that happens from now on, or I’ll cut off your cocktail allowance.” Abby liked to play detective, too.
“I will,” I promised, “but right now I’m the one who needs to be clued-in. So put your answer hat on. What on earth is Terry Catcher doing here?!!!” I was trying to keep my voice down to a reasonable pitch, but I’m not so sure I succeeded. “How did he get here? When did he get here? And why is he flopped out in a coma on your love seat? He should have been back home in Pittsburgh by now! His bus left at three-thirty yesterday afternoon!”
“Are you sure about that?” Abby teased, dark eyes twinkling. She loved to play games when she was holding all the cards-which, when she was playing with little old simple-minded me, was pretty much all the time.
“Arrrgh!” I growled. It was all I could do not to scream and start pulling my hair out by the handful. “Please, Abby!” I begged. “Can’t you just give it to me straight? I’m having a nervous breakdown here!”
“Oh, all right!” she said, sighing loudly. “Don’t get your tushy in a twist. You’re such a prissy killjoy!” She took a deep drag on her cigarette, then blew the smoke out in a forceful gush. “Okay, here’s the scoop: I went uptown to deliver my new painting to Lusty Male Adventures today, and when I got back, around three this afternoon, your friend Terry-who, by the way, I much prefer to call Whitey-was standing right next to the door to our building, leaning his back against the wall and looking as lost and tired and scruffy as a stray dog.
“At first I was wary of him,” Abby continued, “but then, when I got close enough to see how well-built and handsome he was, I figured he must have come to see me-that the agency had probably sent him over. So I walked right up to him and introduced myself, and asked him if he was looking for modeling work. You can imagine my surprise when he said no, he was looking for you.”
Abby stuck out her chin, gave me an accusatory look, took another puff on her cigarette, then went on with her story. “When I told him you wouldn’t be home till six or six-thirty, he said that was okay, he’d wait. Well, I couldn’t see leaving such a gorgeous, intriguing, and obviously lonely man like Whitey standing all by himself out on the street, in the freezing cold and snow, for three whole hours! So I did what any thoughtful, compassionate, red-blooded American girl would do under the circumstances-I invited him up for a drink.
“Which reminds me,” Abby quickly interjected, “do you want a rum and Coke?”
“Yes, please,” I said, too weak (okay, wicked) to resist. “But keep talking while you’re pouring. Dan’s due here i n…” I looked at my watch… “twenty minutes, and if he sees Terry, and finds out about his sister, and discovers that I’m working on another sensational murder story, he’ll have me locked up for life in the Women’s House of Detention.”
“Well, at least you’ll be close by,” Abby said, moving over to the kitchen counter to mix our drinks. “The girlie slammer’s just a few blocks away on Greenwich Avenue. It won’t be too much trouble to visit you.”