Warren may have been wrong about the significance of sudden weight losses or new hair styles or public telephone calls, but he did not think he was wrong about a flimsy T-shirt and no bra on a lady as well put together as Leona Summerville. If this lady was his wife, he would not have let her out of the house dressed this way. Not even if he was with her. Not even if she was handcuffed to his left wrist.
If this lady was not having an affair, Warren would swim the Gulf of Mexico to Corpus Christi, Texas.
Warren was willing to swear a deposition this very moment that this woman was having an affair.
She was looking at a red garter belt now.
Across the store, Warren busied himself fingering the lace on the bottom of a half-slip.
And now she was looking at red net stockings.
Yessir, Warren thought. This lady—
And now she was looking at him.
His heart leaped into his throat.
Eyes meeting his.
Faintly quizzical expression on her face.
He turned away at once.
But she had made him.
Never in his goddamn life, never! Tailing hoods in St. Louis, guys who had radar could smell cops if they were anywhere within a mile’s distance, never! And here, in a backwater little Florida town, he gets made by a housewife who’s fucking around!
Jesus!
“Hello?”
“Yes, is this the Albemarle Motel?”
“It is.”
Lizzie Borden had stayed at the Albemarle Hotel on her visit to London in the year 1890. Andrew Holmes knew such things.
“Is a Mr. Hurley staying with you?”
“Hurley?”
“Arthur Nelson Hurley.”
“Second,” the man on the other end said.
Andrew waited.
Corner of Piccadilly and Albemarle. He was tempted to ask the person at the other end of the line if he knew there’d once been an Albemarle Hotel in London.
“Nobody by that name registered here,” the man said.
“Can you tell me if he might have been registered in the past few days?”
“No,” the man said, and hung up.
There.
Sitting in the gray Ford.
Tall black man built like a basketball player, wearing dark glasses, chino slacks, and a tan cotton sweater with the sleeves shoved up to the elbows. The same man who’d been in the lingerie department. Left the moment she’d looked at him, but here he was again, waiting outside the store.
The rain had let up a little.
Without bothering to open her umbrella, Leona walked swiftly to the Jag, dodging puddles, unlocked the door on the driver’s side, got in, let down the window, threw the umbrella onto the backseat and then started the car.
And listened.
Behind her, two lanes back and three cars over, she heard the Ford starting.
She backed the Jag out of her space, her eyes on the rearview mirror, and then turned into the lane leading to the parking-lot exit on Main Street. She looked into the mirror again. The gray Ford was just turning in behind her.
She made a right turn onto Main Street.
The Ford made a right turn behind her.
Okay, she thought, let’s really check it out.
For the next ten minutes, she led the Ford through a series of lefts and rights through downtown Calusa, and then south on the Tamiami Trail all the way to Manakawa, and then back north to Calusa again. The Ford stayed behind her all the way.
She had read about rapists, even murderers, who followed their victims for days.
She wondered if she should stop the nearest police car. tell the officer she was being followed.
Oddly, she wasn’t frightened.
She was only annoyed.
The dashboard clock read ten minutes to twelve.
She did not need this inconvenience.
She checked her own wristwatch.
She wondered if she should call, cancel.
Instead, she headed west on Bayou Boulevard, the Ford a discreet five cars behind her, and then pulled into the parking lot of the Bayou Professional Building. She looked into the rearview mirror. The Ford was still cruising, searching for a parking space.
It was raining hard again.
The dashboard clock read five minutes to twelve.
She checked her lipstick in the mirror. Freshened it. Blotted it. Tossed the Kleenex into the little plastic trash container.
Three minutes to twelve.
The Ford had found a space. The engine died.
She lighted a cigarette, sat smoking it, watching the clock.
Ground-level office door opening. Black umbrella and white skirts, little white cap, white pantyhose, flat white rubber-soled shoes. Running off into the rain. Little red Toyota. Flurry of skirts, car door slamming behind her. Engine starting. Car moving off. Gone.
Leona put out her cigarette.
The clock read five minutes past noon.
She leaned over the backseat for her umbrella, opened the door and the umbrella almost simultaneously, and stepped out into the rain, skirt riding high on her thighs, long legs flashing.
As she walked rapidly toward the building, she could feel the black man’s eyes on her back.
“Mr. Hope?”
“Yes, Cindy?”
“It’s your wife… your former wife… on six.”
“Thank you. Any luck on those calls?”
“Not yet.”
“Keep trying.”
“I’m down to Magnolia.”
“What?”
“The Magnolia Hotel.”
“Oh. Good. Thank you.”
He stabbed at the 6-button in the base of his phone.
“Hello, Susan,” he said.
“Matthew, how are you?”
“Fine, thanks. And you?”
“Just fine. Will you be going to the Poseidon Ball this Saturday night?”
Good old Susan. Straight for the jugular.
“Why?” he said. “You want to tie my tie for me?”
“Thanks, I did that for too many years,” Susan said.
“Or fasten my cufflinks?”
“That, too,” she said.
“Why did you want to know, honey?”
“Did you just call me ‘honey’?”
“No, you just called me, honey.”
“Matthew…”
Warningly. No time for nonsense. Important matters on her mind.
“Yes, honey, I called you ‘honey,’ ” he said. “Force of habit. Forgive me.”
“Well, please don’t call me ‘honey’ at the ball, okay?”
“Wait, don’t tell me,” he said. “You’ll be there with a very old cockroach and you don’t want me to indicate by word or gesture that you and I ever shared the joys of…”
“Close but no cigar,” Susan said. “He’s twenty-three years old and he…”
“Susan, shame on you.”
“Matthew, please don’t let’s…”
“Twenty-three?”
“Matthew…”
“Sorry. But twenty-three?”
“Yes, and a linebacker for the Tampa Bucs.”
“Gee.”
“Yes. He’s six feet four inches tall, Matthew…”
“Golly.”
“And he weighs two hundred and forty pounds…”
“Well, sure, a linebacker.”
“And he’s very very jealous.”
“Ah.”
“Which is why I called. I don’t want any trouble Saturday night, Matthew…”
“Oh, neither do I!”
“So please don’t ask me to dance…”
“I won’t, I promise.”
“Or chat with me…”
“Or sit with you, or even look at you. Got it, Susan.”
“Matthew, this is not a joke. I’m truly concerned for your well-being.”
“Then maybe I’ll just stay home.”