“Oh, that’s good,” Evelyn said. “I’m glad.”
“He’ll be here Tuesday. He was ready to drop everything and come right away, but I told him there was no emergency, it was just a check-up, and knowing how Howard is the first few days he’s here it wouldn’t do Joe any good to show up anyway, so he finally agreed on Tuesday. If I forget to tell Howard about it tomorrow, you remind me, will you?”
“Yes, I will.”
“I want him to have a few days to get used to the idea. And you do some thinking about Dinah.”
“I will,” she promised.
iii
The next day, Friday, Howard came, arriving at about four o’clock in the afternoon. The white Mercedes came driving up to the door in the thin autumn sunlight and Howard emerged with his battered old black suitcase, like an unsuccessful salesman of religious articles stepping out of absolutely the wrong car.
Evelyn met him at the door. “Bradford’s gone for a walk. He said to tell you the manuscript is in his office and he hasn’t done any work on it.”
“The manuscript?” Howard put his suitcase down and opened his topcoat, while Evelyn shut the door. “Oh, for Christ’s sake, naturally, the manuscript. I keep forgetting that’s why I’m supposed to be here.”
“If you don’t pester him about it, the way you usually do, he’ll suspect there’s something going on.”
“I’ll try to remember.” He peered at her and said, “This must be a hell of a strain for you, leading a double life all of a sudden.”
“I’m supposed to be thinking now,” she said, “about whether or not I want to bring Dinah along.”
“To China?”
“Yes. I can’t make up my mind what to tell him.”
But Howard was suddenly thinking about something else. “They rhyme,” he said.
She frowned at him. “What does?”
“Dinah and China. What do you suppose a psychiatrist would say about that? Bradford’s wife Dinah dies, and he wants to go to China.”
“She’s been dead almost three years,” Evelyn pointed out.
“Yes, I suppose.” He shook his head, making a crooked grin of self-mockery. “I have the wordsmith’s mentality,” he said. “Language explains everything. What are you going to tell him?”
Now she was at a loss. “Tell him about what?”
“About Dinah and China. Your Dinah, taking her along.”
“Oh. I don’t know. I’m going to see Robert this evening, I thought I’d ask him. And I’ll call Joe from Robert’s place. By the way, Bradford wanted me to tell you that Joe’s coming here Tuesday to give him a check-up. The idea is, you’re supposed to start getting used to it now, having Joe break into your work schedule.”
“Mm. I suppose I’d better act irritated about that, too.”
“It gets easier to play-act after you’ve done it a while.”
“I hope so. Robert’s moved, has he?”
“Yes, he’s in Chambersburg. I have his address and phone number written down. I’ll give them to you.”
“Good. I’ll want to talk with him. If you’re going in there this evening, maybe I’ll come along.”
“All right,” she said, but something must have shown in her face, because he looked at her and grinned suddenly, saying, “Two’s company?”
“No, no, that’s all right.”
“I can talk to him tomorrow,” Howard said. “You have your evening with him.”
“No, that isn’t right, this is important. We shouldn’t be—”
“But you should be,” he said. “Everybody should be, as often as possible. That’s my theory of world peace. If everybody did, every time they wanted to, there’d be no more war. Come on, show me my room.”
She returned his smile, despite herself, and said, “Oh, all right. Come along.”
He picked up his sagging suitcase and followed her up the stairs. “Besides,” he said, as they climbed, “you might forgive me, but Robert never would. I may be a bleary-eyed old married man, but I know top-grade woman when I see it.”
“Howard,” she said, not even trying to hide her pleasure at the compliment, “has anyone ever told you you were incorrigible?”
“Incorrigible? Or encourageable? If you mean I can be encouraged, you’re absolutely right. But not by you, you’re going with a friend of mine.”
“A man of honor,” she said, laughing, and led the way down the hall to the room she’d had made up for him.
“Completely honorable,” he agreed. “Also, Grace has this vast network of spies.”
“You’re good for my spirits,” Evelyn said. “I can’t tell you how glad I am you’re here.”
He plopped his suitcase on the bed. “Which brings me to a serious subject,” he said. “My main reason for being here. Not what Bradford thinks, but the true reason.” He shrugged out of his topcoat and tossed it on the bed beside the suitcase. “I’m supposed,” he said, “to try to figure out how Brad’s communicating with these people. We want to be able to intercept the messages if we can, so we’ll know exactly what’s going on.”
“Yes, Robert told me.”
He looked at her. “You don’t have any ideas?”
“No, I’m sorry, I don’t. I haven’t seen anybody suspicious around here, any strangers or anything like that, not since that first time the Chinese came here in the limousine.”
“Well, while I’m not making believe to be a tough editor concerned with his manuscript, I’m supposed to pussyfoot around here pinching maids to see if they have notes hidden in their girdles.”
“That should be interesting work,” she said. She went over to one of the windows to raise the shade, and said, “Here comes Bradford.”
“Back from his walk?”
Howard came over to the window with her, and they both watched him coming up through the near orchard, surrounded by the twisty nearly leafless trees. He had his walking stick with him, a gnarled old ash stick presented to him during his state visit to Ireland when he was President. He still had a good stride, long and springy, and with his tweed jacket and his hiking shoes he looked as hale and healthy as any man alive.
Howard said, “What’s that he’s carrying?”
Evelyn had seen it, too, a small brown package tucked under his free arm, slender and flat. “I don’t know,” she said.
“Did he have it with him when he left?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t think so.”
Howard frowned, and watched Bradford stride closer, and then disappear around a corner of the house. “Does he go for hikes a lot?”
“He always has, whenever the weather’s good. He’s been doing it less lately, he seems to spend almost all his time in the library, reading. He’s given up a lot of things he used to do.”
“But he still walks.”
“Sometimes. You think he goes out to meet a messenger from the Chinese?”
“It’s possible, isn’t it?”
“Someone on the property, right here on our land? It doesn’t seem possible, but I guess it is, isn’t it?”
Howard said, “Go on down and see if you can find out what’s in that package.”
“I’ll do my best,” she promised. “I’ll talk to you later.”
“Right.”
She left his room and went down the front stairs and through the house toward the kitchen, meeting Bradford in the hall on the way. The package was still under his arm, but he’d left his jacket in the closet by the rear door. She came toward him, wondering how to ask what that was he was carrying, but he made the question. “There you are,” he said. He looked pleased and secretive. “Come on upstairs, I have something to show you.” With his other hand, he patted the package.