“Hold on a sec,” he said, interrupting Devore in midsentence, and dropped the burning paper into the car’s ashtray. “Time to go. I’ll get back to you.” He’d just observed that the coordinates on the GPS monitor screen had remained unchanged for a significant length of time, which meant, in all probability, that the blue van had reached its destination. He broke the connection on Devore’s tinny protest, stashed the phone in its box more abruptly than was probably good for a delicate piece of electronic equipment and reached across it to tap keys on the laptop.
When he had the van’s location pinpointed on his street map, he sat back with an audible “Huh!” of surprise. He didn’t need to look up the address in his directory; it was one he knew well. He’d stayed in that hotel himself, a time or two. Had a nice view of the river, the tidal basin and the Washington Monument. In a few weeks, when the cherry trees were in full bloom, it would be downright spectacular.
And what the hell, he wondered, were those two women doing back in the middle of town? It didn’t make sense. If he’d just gotten his hands on one of the most devastating and sought-after pieces of information since the A-bomb blueprints, he’d be hightailing it out of town with the goods as fast as he could.
The more he thought about it, the more he had to wonder about the Carlysle woman’s role in all this. In fact, he couldn’t get the woman out of his mind. As he backed out of the parking space and circled the lot to the exit, nosed into traffic and set a course toward the Potomac, her name played in his memory like a phrase from a song, a bit of melody sung in her own gentle voice: “Hi, I’m Jane Carlysle.” He saw her face floating above his head like a loopy white cartoon balloon.
The weirdest thing was, he could still recall the way she smelled. It wasn’t even anything he could put a name to-not a particular scent, or a certain brand of perfume, but rather an elusive combination of things, like soap and bath powder, deodorant and hand lotion and shampoo, a smell that was uniquely her own, and at the same time achingly familiar to him. It had come wafting out of his past, from the depths of forbidden memory, calling to mind not just a particular woman, but a particular kind of woman.
He spent some time thinking about it before he came up with the word ordinary, but he wasn’t happy with it. The way that word was used, it usually meant nothing special, and that wasn’t what he meant at all. What he meant by the word ordinary, as applied to a woman, was, well, nice. The nice, everyday kind of woman, the moms, the sisters and sweethearts. The kind of woman a man gets married to, the one he wants nursing his babies, humming in his kitchen. The kind that puts a smile on his face every day of his life when he sings out, “Hi, honey, I’m home.”
That’s what Jane Carlysle smelled like. A nice…ordinary woman. So how come that nice, ordinary woman had just walked off with a package people were killing one another for?
He was beginning to have a bad feeling about this. A very bad feeling.
“Are you sure you don’t mind my staying?” Jane asked, turning reluctantly from a breathtaking view of the Washington Monument.
Connie closed the lid of her small ovemighter with a snap and glanced at her in surprise. “Heavens, no-are you sure you don’t mind my going? I feel as though I’m abandoning you.”
“You’re not,” Jane protested. “Please don’t think that for a minute. I’ll just catch a shuttle to Raleigh-Durham, and one of the girls can pick me up there. I did say I might like to stay over, spend a day or two in Washington-I’ve only been once, and it was such a long time ago.”
Connie sighed. “I know, and it’s a lovely idea. I’d stay on with you, dear, but to tell you the truth, I’m about all tripped out. I’d barely unpacked after my last jaunt, you know, and it was hi-ho, off to the auction.” She chuckled, pausing on her way to the bathroom to give Jane’s arm a comforting pat. “Believe it or not, even an old globe-trotter like me develops a longing for her own bed and cozy slippers from time to time.”
“That’s right,” Jane said with just a touch of wistfulness, “I’d forgotten you’d just come back from a trip. You were in Europe again, weren’t you?”
Connie’s eyes rolled expressively. “Oh my, yes, and not a very successful trip, either, I’m afraid. The weather was positively dreadful.”
Jane had no reply to that, since she couldn’t imagine any weather terrible enough to take the thrill out of Europe. She murmured inanely, “Well, I guess spring is late everywhere this year,” and turning, gazed again at the shimmering city beyond the window. The Washington Monument’s floodlit column had been rendered somewhat fuzzy by all the mist in the air, so that it seemed to glow in the lavender dusk like a ghostly candle.
Disneyland for adults-that’s what David had called Washington. He’d promised to take her there, someday, but as with most things where Jane was concerned, it hadn’t been very high on his priority list, and he’d never quite gotten around to it. So, of course, one of the first things she’d done after the divorce-right after covering up the gray in her hair and having her crooked front teeth capped-was take the girls to see the Capitol. Three days, that was all the time she’d felt she could afford to take off work, those first uncertain, terrifying months on her own. The girls, too young to fully appreciate the experience, had complained about the heat and sore feet. Jane had gotten blisters on her feet, too, but she hadn’t minded.
She’d promised herself then she’d go back when she had more time and see everything she’d missed. Why hadn’t she? After all, there’d been nothing-and no one-to keep her from it. Time just seemed to go by so quickly.
“That’s it, I believe,” Connie announced, giving her hands a brisk dusting as she emerged from the bathroom. She hoisted the strap of her overnighter to her shoulder and turned to survey the room once more. “Don’t believe I’ve forgotten anything. Now, dear, did you bring up everything you wanted from the van? Anything to go down? Are you sure you don’t want me to carry your painting home with me? I should think it might be rather a nuisance, especially on one of those dreadful little shuttle planes.”
“The painting isn’t really all that big,” Jane said. “I think it’ll fit in a shopping bag. Anyway, if not, I’ll wrap it and ship it home. I’m going to take your suggestion, though, I think, and have it appraised while I’m here. That man, Campbell, being so interested in it-and I didn’t buy his story about his fiancée being wildly in love with it, not for a minute, did you?-it just makes me wonder.” She hitched a shoulder and added defensively, “Well, stranger things have happened. You read about them all the time-priceless manuscripts turning up in an attic. some old master bought at a yard sale for pennies.”
Connie had the grace not to smile, but merely said solemnly, “Quite so, dear. As I said before, if you’re at all uneasy about it, it can’t hurt to be sure, can it? Let’s see, now, did I jot down the address of that art dealer friend of mine in Georgetown for you?” Muttering to herself over Jane’s grateful demurrals, she planted her half glasses on the end of her nose, produced her little jeweled pen and scrawled a name on a piece of hotel stationery. “There you are, dear. I’m sure there are any number of good dealers in the area, but this reference might save you some time. And let’s see…where’s your little popgun?”