“I have plans tonight, so if there’s nothing else…”
“Plans? Like a date?”
“Dale.”
“Okay. None of my business. Just make sure he’s not after your money.” It was a pathetic attempt at a joke, and it fell flat, as it deserved to. “Chloe…when you’re getting ready to move, I’d like first crack at anything you get rid of. Especially Kat’s things, of course.”
“Even the painting?” She raised an eyebrow, capable now of making jokes at her own expense.
“Actually, I would love to have that painting. More than anything.”
“It was always yours, Dale. Remember? I gave it to you for Christmas, the year Kat was eleven.”
“Ten.” But they smiled at the old disagreement. Their fractiousness was a memory now, a reminder of a time when they could afford such petty irritations.
Heading down the drive a few minutes later, Dale saw three small figures cutting across his land. Chloe’s land, he corrected himself, and soon to pass out of the Hartigan name altogether. Enjoy it now, he wanted to yell out. If Snyder’s property was already in escrow, bulldozers would probably be here by Labor Day, grading the land for the forty or so houses the site would accommodate. Would Muhly sell as well? No, he was too stubborn, too proud of being able to say he worked a farm that had been in his family for five generations. The old Meeker farmstead had stayed in Dale’s family for three—which, as it turned out, was the end of the Hartigan line.
From this distance the children were dim shadows in the twilight, and it was difficult to tell if they were boys or girls, especially as they moved single file through the grass, which was waist-high to their small frames. They had to raise their knees to right angles to find their footing. How had it gotten so overgrown? Chloe must have forgotten that she was responsible for maintaining this part of the property, or thought it no longer mattered with a sale imminent. Didn’t she know that high grass like that attracted rats and other vermin? It almost made him happy, this evidence of Chloe’s characteristic carelessness, his reflexive self-righteousness. Seemed like old times.
As the three children reached the tree line, they re-formed so they were walking abreast and reached for one another’s hands. Swinging their arms between them, they ran toward the elms and maples and ailanthus. Girls, Dale thought, only girls hold hands. Boys, no matter how young and unself-conscious, would never be caught doing such a thing.
Then, just like that, the girls were gone, disappearing so suddenly in the gray-green dusk that Dale was forced to wonder if they had ever really been there at all.
Author’s Note
Because of the odd nature of Maryland in general and Baltimore County in particular, it is possible that there is a Glendale somewhere within the county’s strange and ragged boundaries. But the area described in this book is wholly fictional, as are the circumstances of its creation. Those who know the state will find a clue or two to Glendale’s whereabouts, but they’ll never find Glendale.
A fictional setting, as it turns out, requires just as much research and outside expertise as a real one. For myriad details on police work, farm work, high school, musical theater, fathers, daughters, mothers, sons, etc., I am grateful to: George Pelecanos, Anthony Neil Smith, Bill Toohey, Gary Childs, David Simon, Beth Tindall, Toby Hessenauer, Linda Perlstein, Denise Stybr, the Coles family (Charles, Mary Jeanne, Beth, Charlie, and Katie), the Russell family (Adam, Stacey, Rebecca, and Harrison), Ann Watson and daughter Whit (and everyone else at Viva House), Joan Jacobson, and, finally, Haranders everywhere, to use Uncle Byron’s phrasing. I wish I hadn’t lost the name of my correspondent from Television Without Pity, the bright and articulate young woman from Norfolk, but I’ll keep looking for you on the boards devoted to BMP shows. A special thanks to Maureen Sugden, who copy-edited this book with extraordinary care. If any errors survived her scrutiny, it’s clearly my fault.
Although I’ve always been quick to credit my editor, Carrie Feron, and agent, Vicky Bijur, I’ve never publicly tried to thank everyone at my publishing house because it’s inevitable that someone will be overlooked and I’ll feel rotten. But this time out I would like to essay at least a partial list: Selina McLemore, Michael Morrison, Lisa Gallagher, George Bick, Debbie Stier, Sharyn Rosenblum, Samantha Hagerbaumer, all the sales reps (but especially Ian Doherty), and, last but never least, Jane Friedman.
About the Author
LAURA LIPPMAN was a reporter at the Baltimore Sun for twelve years. Her Tess Monaghan books—By a Spider’s Thread, The Last Place, The Sugar House, BaltimoreBlues, Charm City, Butchers Hill, and In Big Trouble—have won the Edgar, Agatha, Shamus, Anthony, and Nero Wolfe awards, and her novel In a Strange City was named a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. She is also the author of the critically acclaimed stand-alone novel Every Secret Thing. She lives in Baltimore, Maryland.
To receive notice of author events and new books by Laura Lippman, sign up at www.authortracker.com or visit www.lauralippman.com.
also by laura lippman
EVERY SECRET THING
Tess Monaghan Mysteries
BALTIMORE BLUES
CHARM CITY
BUTCHERS HILL
IN BIG TROUBLE
THE SUGAR HOUSE
IN A STRANGE CITY
THE LAST PLACE
BY A SPIDER’S THREAD
Credits
Jacket design by Marc J. Cohen
Jacket photograph by Douglas Whyte Photography
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
TO THE POWER OF THREE. Copyright © 2005 by Laura Lippman. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition © JUNE 2005 ISBN: 9780061836787
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Lippman, Laura, 1959–
To the power of three / Laura Lippman—1st ed.
p. cm.
ISBN 0-06-050672-5
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
About the Publisher
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Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Epigraph
Contents
Thursday
Chapter 1
Part One
Friday
Chapter 2
Ch
apter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Third Grade
Chapter 7
Part Two
Saturday
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Sixth Grade
Chapter 13
Part Three
Sunday
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Ninth Grade
Chapter 17
Part Four
Monday
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Tuesday
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Eleventh Grade
Chapter 25
Part Five
Wednesday
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Twelfth Grade
Chapter 33
Part Six
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
August
Chapter 38
Author's Note
About the Author
Other Books by Laura Lippman
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
To the Power of Three Page 37