“I’m going to make it up to you,” Taylor assured her as they drove past Lake Success, brimming blue beyond the car window. “As long as you don’t become a menace to me, I’ll take care of everything.”
“But what are we going to do?” Hope said. “My God, we have to call the police sometime.”
“First we’ll get back and make sure the children are safe and then you can all go to your mother’s house,” Taylor said. “But we have to tell a good story that will keep me in the clear.”
“I’m a lousy liar,” Hope said. “If you invent some story, it better not be far from the truth or I won’t be able to remember it.” Taylor said she had to say that she and Bill had been alone all day and evening Saturday: “I’ll say that Bill and I were sitting alone by the fire Saturday night, enjoying the fire—because we had been sitting by the fire, that way I can remember it,” Hope said—and that after she went to bed Saturday evening, an intruder had burst in, sometime during the night. She would then tell what had happened exactly as it had happened, except she would say that when the man left, he had not returned, and she had no idea who he was. Then on Sunday, she would relate, this man Taylor, whom she’d never met, but whom Bill had been expecting, had arrived, found the door open, heard Hope screaming, found Bill dead and Hope tied up in the bedroom. He had freed her and then, because of her fear for the children, had taken her back to Los Angeles before notifying the police.
Taylor kept talking about how he would fix the situation. He talked again about moving Bill’s body to Bill’s apartment, or maybe taking Bill’s body to Tom’s apartment, killing Tom and bringing Tom’s body, or maybe both bodies, back up to the ranch. He said he wished he had been able to leave Bill’s body in a ditch somewhere by the side of a back road where it wouldn’t be found for a long time and then could be considered an accident. He kept saying he would fix it, but he came up with so many plots and plans Hope couldn’t keep track. “I’ll call you Mr. Fix-it,” Hope told him, and he laughed heartily.
“Do you know whether Bill has a birth certificate?” he asked.
“I don’t think so,” Hope said. “For some reason Bill and I discussed that, I really don’t remember why, and I remember Bill saying he didn’t have one.”
“Well, you never know,” Taylor said briskly. “Bill told me that all his papers were in an old suitcase in his apartment, so we’ll take a look.”
“Oh, God,” Hope said, “I don’t want to go to Bill’s apartment. I had such nice times with Bill there, I can’t go there ever again.”
“We have to go to Bill’s apartment,” Taylor said pleasantly, firmly. “We can’t go back to your house until five-thirty, because if we get there before Tom comes back with the baby, he’ll see us there and he’ll know you’ve been left alive and he’ll go crazy. He might even kill you right there.” Hope still could not comprehend that Tom was paying to have her killed; the idea was unfathomable. Still, Taylor had known so much, so many details. And Tom never took the baby on Sunday.
Taylor seemed to enjoy the ride. He pointed out various features of the Lincoln, including a device that he set to keep the speed at fifty-five miles an hour. Hope wanted to get home faster. “Make it sixty-five,” she asked him. “Oh, no,” Taylor said. “The number one thing to watch out for is a traffic ticket. It’s the little things that can get you, in this business, and we don’t want to be stopped for a traffic violation.”
He talked easily about his business, how to hide things, where to stash cars one no longer needed, how to change identities and pass unnoticed. “If you want to know more about me,” he said, “read The Day of the Jackal. I’m the Jackal.” His tone had become menacing. “Are you aware that a car is following us?” When Hope automatically turned around to look, he grabbed her arm. “Don’t ever turn around,” he told her. “If you’re being followed, you never want them to know that you know.”
He had brought a large tin of tobacco with him from the ranch house. “Living by the water, where I live, I have to keep my tobacco in a tin, or it would get damp and spoil,” he explained.
“Where do you live?” Hope asked.
“I live in a beautiful home on a lake in a small city outside Paris,” he said.
“Oh, I have a friend who comes from Paris,” Hope said, and she began to talk about Lionel’s background, his life and career. Taylor seemed interested, and as they talked, Hope was struck by coincidences. Taylor said he was based in France, as Lionel was; Taylor said he had two daughters, as Lionel did. Lionel had been a Marine captain in Korea; Taylor said he had been in Korea, too. Lionel had worked on the film Exodus, and spoke fluent Hebrew; Taylor said he had been involved in the Arab-Israeli war, on the Israeli side. “Well, you have a lot in common, going around from country to country as you both do,” Hope said.
Taylor laughed. “I’d like to go back to Europe,” he said, and he asked again whether Bill had a birth certificate and a passport. Hope was terrified he would ask her about her own passport; she had a valid one in a drawer at home, dating back a few months earlier, when she had considered going to Europe with Lionel.
“I’ve got a great idea!” he exclaimed. “We’ll drive to Mexico and get married. That way you can’t testify against me if I get caught.”
“Oh, I can’t marry you, Taylor,” Hope explained, “because I’m still legally married to Tom.” Thank God, she thought, thank God I’m still married. Then it struck her that if he killed Tom, or had Tom killed, she would then be legally available, and the thought that Taylor might think that way, too, made her feel dizzy. She had another fear lurking in the back of her mind, too. Bill had had a vasectomy, so Hope was not using birth control pills. She was afraid she might be pregnant now, and she said so.
Taylor was overjoyed. He reached for her hand and pressed it to his lips. “Oh, that’s the greatest news in the world,” he exclaimed. “Nothing could make me happier. Oh, I hope you’re pregnant.”
Hope was convinced, then, of what she had suspected since some time during the night, especially since Taylor had become affectionate and loving, holding her hand as he’d seen Bill hold it, rubbing her cheek. Taylor wanted to—expected to—step into her life, taking Bill’s place. She realized that he was acting as he thought Bill would have acted toward her, and he wanted her to act as though she were with Bill. He hated hearing her say she was afraid, or that she was in pain; he wanted her to be happy and loving, as though she were with Bill. She felt sure—during the drive itself, and later—that Taylor wanted her to act like his wife. So she did.
Taylor stopped once on the ride back, for gas. When he reached across the front seat of the car and opened the glove compartment, she saw several wallets, but she didn’t see which one he took out, which credit card.
On the road again, she talked constantly, to keep him interested. She flattered him, amused him. “All my life I’ve been waiting for the right man,” she said. “And here you are—Mr. Wright!” She talked about her mother and about her stepfather, about how she herself had married pretty soon after her mother’s marriage because she had never gotten on well with her stepfather, that everything was filtered through her mother and she felt her stepfather had a bad impression of her, that she was always being compared unfavorably to his children who had great wealth and stability in their lives. She told Taylor she felt like the black sheep in the family, and he nodded understandingly. “I’ll bet if your mother met my mother,” he declared, “they’d get along fine.”
Hope had been to Bill’s apartment only a few times, at night, with Bill driving, so she had only a vague idea of where it was on Lafayette Park Place. They got lost for a while in downtown Los Angeles, and drove up and down several streets before she recognized a Chevrolet dealer’s showroom on a corner.
In the underground garage at Bill’s apartment house, she directed Taylor to the right parking space and stood by as he riffled through Bill’s keys. The apartment was still and dark. She went to the bathroom, then sat on the sofa as Tayl
or rummaged through a suitcase full of papers. “Here they are,” he told her, “just like Bill said. Now where are his insurance policies?” He had asked her earlier about Bill’s insurance; he seemed concerned about Bill’s daughters.
“Oh, please let’s go,” Hope said. “I’m sure they’re all at the office.”
“No, here’s one,” Taylor said happily. He said he was glad he had found it because he was concerned about the welfare of Bill’s daughters.
“Put your head down so nobody can see you,” Taylor said, as they drove up the steep, sloping driveway. Hope crouched very low and, as soon as he’d parked, she jumped out and ran around to the door that led into the living room. It was already dark, the wooded hillside behind her house looking sinister and threatening. Licha was running the vacuum cleaner in Hope’s bedroom.
“Where’s K.C.?” Hope shouted above the noise. Licha looked up, startled, and switched off the machine. “Mr. Masters took him,” she said. Hope’s heart dropped. My God, it’s true, she thought. It’s true about Tom. She forced herself not to scream.
“Licha, what time did he say he’d bring K.C. back?”
“About five-thirty,” the maid said. Hope’s bedroom clock said 5:45.
“Licha, I’ve had a problem,” Hope said, trying to keep her voice steady. “Someone is here to assist me. Would you please leave the room now, and when Tom comes back with the baby, please don’t tell him I’m back. I’m quite upset over the divorce coming up. Just get K.C. and bring him back here to me as fast as you can, please.”
Licha wrapped the vacuum cord around the machine and left the bedroom. Hope ran after her. “Licha, where’s Keith?” Licha said she hadn’t seen him. “Where was he last night?” Hope asked. Licha said he’d slept over at his friend Danny’s. Hope vaguely remembered, then, that Keith was supposed to go with Danny and his father to a basketball game on Sunday. Hope went back into the bedroom and called Danny’s house, but no one answered.
Taylor had come in. He stood in the bedroom doorway, smiling. “Don’t worry,” he said. “There’s no problem. Tom has to bring K.C. back because Tom is expecting a phone call at a certain number at six-thirty. That’s the phone call to let him know what happened. He’ll bring K.C. back before then, because he isn’t going to want to blow his cover by doing anything now. He’s going to spend some time talking to the maid so she is sure to remember him. He’ll come soon, don’t worry.”
Taylor was right. In a few minutes Hope heard K.C. in the kitchen with Licha. She wanted to run to him, but she stood, frozen, in the bedroom until K.C. came down the hall to her room. She scooped him up and hugged him as though she never wanted to let go.
Hope knew that Hope Elizabeth was next door, at a birthday party at the Pinskys’. She phoned quickly to say she was back and she told her daughter, quickly, that there had been a problem with the car and that Bill had stayed up at the ranch to take care of it. Hope said a friend of Bill’s had come back to help them while Bill wasn’t there. The child sounded concerned that her mother had been hurt in a car accident, so Hope told her that she should go out into the Pinskys’ yard and that Hope would wave to her from the window. “When you’re ready to come home from the party, call me first so I know you’re coming,” Hope said. She was terrified of having the children alone for a moment.
She waved to Hope Elizabeth from the bedroom window, then went down the hall to the living room, where Taylor was sitting on the small sofa.
“Can I call my mother now?” Hope ventured.
“No, I don’t want you to contact your mother at this point,” Taylor said.
“But I always call her when I come back from out of town,” Hope protested. “If I don’t call her she’s going to worry.”
“She isn’t going to worry yet,” Taylor said. “Keith isn’t home yet, and even after he gets back to Danny’s house, he’s still going to have to wander the neighborhood to get home. Your telephone is tapped, and if you make a call now it would be very dangerous. There are people watching you.”
Hope stayed away from the phone, but Taylor made some calls; at least, Hope heard him talking on the bedroom phone. Once he seemed to be telling someone what to say to Tom. “This is ridiculous,” Taylor said on the phone. “We’ve got a real psycho on our hands. It’s a bad contract and I’m going to have to discuss it with you. But he is expecting your call, so call him and say that there were too many people at the ranch but it will be taken care of on Wednesday. In the meantime, I’m going to get together with you and talk about this.” Hope was convinced that she and the children were in deadly danger, not only from Tom, but from some middleman who had bought the contract. She suspected it might be a man Tom knew, whom she knew by name, a man who had lent Tom five thousand dollars that Tom had not repaid. Taylor told Hope he could not tell her who the middleman was, but when Hope mentioned that man, Taylor said yes, she was right.
At seven o’clock Taylor said he would drive Licha to the bus stop down on Santa Monica Boulevard. “You must not pick up the phone and you must not try anything while I am gone,” he said. “If you leave, you will be killed by the people outside, and if you call anyone, I will have to kill you myself.” Hope asked whether she could take a shower. “Yes, go in the shower and stay there till I come back,” he said.
Hope took K.C. into her bedroom and went into her bathroom. She turned on the water very full so that it made a lot of noise; she stood there and cried and cried.
When Taylor returned, she was sitting on the bathroom stool, her hair wrapped in a towel. “I know you didn’t do anything while I was gone,” he said approvingly. “That’s good.” She dried her hair and wrapped herself in a long, warm robe. Back in the living room, she sat on the sofa again, with K.C. playing on the floor. Taylor looked around the room, then at Hope, and smiled. He sat down near her on the sofa and took her hand. “I could really be happy living this way,” he said.
By nine o’clock Keith and Hope Elizabeth were home. “I have to go to bed,” Hope told Taylor. “I am just exhausted.”
“Yes, you go to bed,” he said. “Take the children into your room and lock the door. I am going to sit up here in the living room all night and protect you.”
It had been a long day for Hope Elizabeth, and she began having temper tantrums, throwing herself at Taylor and pounding at his legs, crying, “I hate you! You’re crazy! I hate you!” Hope had told her Taylor was Bill’s friend, but she thought her daughter must know, somehow, that Bill would not come back, and that Taylor was there in his place. She tried to calm the child, terrified that Taylor would become upset and violent.
But Taylor handled it beautifully, laughing, soothing her, calming her down, not getting upset at all. In fact, he was wonderful with the children, wrestling with Keith on the living room rug, talking about football. Now he led them all into Hope’s room, arranged the children in the wide bed, and kissed them good night. Hope went to the door to lock it behind him, from the inside. He took her in his arms. “Kiss good night,” he said.
When Hope woke up early Monday morning, she heard Taylor in the kitchen, whistling as he cooked breakfast.
She heard him telling Keith he would drive him to school, and her heart pounded. “Please don’t let him go to school,” she begged.
“Keith has to go to school,” Taylor insisted. “Things have to appear normal.”
While Taylor was gone with Keith, Hope went into the bedroom and picked up the phone. Quickly, before she could lose courage, she dialed her mother.
“I’m home,” Hope told her mother, “but I have a problem, and I want to make sure you’ll be around this evening.” Honey said she was going to a party. “I don’t care what plans you have,” Hope cried, “call me tonight.”
She had just hung up the phone when Taylor walked in and the phone rang. It was her mother.
“You sound terrible,” Honey said. “Is something very wrong? Shall I send the police?” Taylor was standing at Hope’s side. “Oh, no, no,” Hope said.
“It’s just a personal thing, and I’m a little upset. I just want to keep in touch.” She hung up the phone and faced Taylor, her heart pounding.
“I see you called your mother,” he said pleasantly. “That’s nice.”
The phone rang constantly all day Monday. Many of the calls were from Chips members, telling her they were coming to the luncheon on Wednesday. After a few calls, Taylor seemed satisfied that Hope would not cry for help when someone called, and he left the house, telling her he had things to do. He told her he was trying to have the contract canceled, but that until he did, she was in great danger, along with the children. He said the organization had people watching her, people who would shoot her and her children on sight, but he said he had people watching, too. He said that a man who was working in a yard across the street was not really a gardener, but one of “my people.” He talked about a yellow car that belonged to some of his people, and later that day, Hope saw a strange car in her driveway. It was a yellow car with brown trim.
“There’s no food in the house,” he said. “You’re a terrible housekeeper, you know. Your room is very messy.” He said it teasingly, lovingly, like an indulgent lover. He insisted that she come with him and Hope Elizabeth and K.C. to get some lunch, so they all drove down to the Hamburger Hamlet, where the children had big burgers and Taylor, too, ate heartily.
“As you can see, I have to be away from the house a good deal,” Taylor said to Hope, when they were back at the house. “I think you need protection when I am away. If I get you a small gun and show you how to use it, will you use it?”
“No, no, no,” Hope said. “I hate guns and I won’t touch it.”
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