“Did you read the papers?” he asked.
“You mean about Lisa?”
“About me. Almost none of what they said about me was right.”
Dommerich could hear a change in the rhythm of her breathing. He heard, or sensed, movement on the other end. Probably the other woman. The tall one.
“Listen . . . Wait. My name is Carla. Give me something to call you.”
He knew what she was doing. He saw on television once that serial killers mostly think of their victims as things. Not real people. It's the same with rapists. So if you're going to be raped or killed you should try to talk to the guy, tell him your name, try to tell him about any good things you do and try to get him talking about himself. They were wrong about that too. Once it started, he never even heard what they were saying. He'd hear a voice. A mean and hateful voice. But it wasn't theirs.
“How about Claude?” Dommerich suggested. It had just popped into his head. Claude Rains. The Invisible Man. He had to smile.
“Claude, could you give me some kind of proof?” she asked.
“About what?”
“That you're really who you say you are. That this isn't some sick practical joke. Or that you're not just trying to blame someone else for what you did.”
He thought about hanging up again. This one was not as nice as her sister. ”I never once tried to blame someone else,” he told her. ”I always did it so they knew it was me.”
“Did you always rob them?”
”I never robbed them,” he said. The question offended him. The other thing he hardly ever did was steal.
“Someone robbed Lisa. There were things missing from her apartment.”
”I didn't take them. All I ever took was hair.”
A silence. Dommerich understood it. Lisa's sister didn't know he did that. It was never in the papers.
“You know who I bet did?” he asked.
“Who?”
“The man who was following you.”
“Why do you think so?”
”I don't know. Because he's a pig.” Dommerich was tempted to tell her about him urinating on his car. And smacking him with fingers that had piss on them. But the operator came on wanting another quarter. Lisa's sister said don't go. Please. He found one. It gonged and the line sounded clear again.
“I'm still here. But I do have to go.”
“Claude . . . that man. Did you ever see him near her apartment before?”
“No.” Dommerich chewed his lip. He had to be careful here, even if it meant telling a lie. “But I don't live around there.”
“Does he?”
“No. But he was watching the place this morning. And then he was watching you. Maybe he was watching Lisa before that”
“Claude . . . ” Her voice changed. It got very quiet. “Where is he right this minute?”
He didn't answer.
“You know where he lives, don't you, Claude. You're near there right now.”
“No, I'm ... hold on a minute.” He held the telephone against his chest. He covered the mouthpiece. She was smart, he realized. She knew he'd been following that man. And she'd heard him say that the man didn't live near Lisa. He could only know that if...”Ihave to go.” he said.
“Claude . . . ” The same quiet voice. “He might be the one. He might have killed Lisa.”
Dommerich took a breath. It made a whistling sound.
“Claude? Do you hear me? You liked Lisa and that man might have killed her. Tell me who he is and I promise you I'll make him talk. I'll carve the fucker up in ways you never dreamed up.”
”I . . . have to go.”
“Claude? Don't hang up. You owe it to . . . ”
He missed the cradle twice, finally using his hand to break the connection. He saw Lisa in his mind. She was jogging toward him, up Alameda, carrying her breakfast muffin. He waved at her. Said hi. She waved back. Big smile. He watched her go. She had almost reached the wooden stairs to her apartment when something made her stop and look up. That man, Hickey, was coming down. He was carrying her television set and her cable box. Stealing them.
She looked around for help. She yelled. He dropped the television and grabbed her. He began choking her. Dommerich wanted to help but he couldn't. There was a glass wall, the wall of the phone booth, between them. She was on the sidewalk now, not moving. Hickey looked up. He saw Dommerich. He raised a hand as if to smack him again but there was a glass wall. Seeing Dommerich seemed to give him an idea. He pulled out a knife and bent over Lisa. He stuck one thumb in the corner of her mouth, pulling her cheek up. Then he stuck the knife under his thumb and he ...
Dommerich screamed.
He screamed and he banged until the man from the gas pumps came, wide-eyed, and forced open the door. Dommerich ran to his car. He drove away. He drove almost a mile before the voice could be heard through the screams in his head. It was a mean voice. Hateful. But, as always, it began to calm him.
Dommerich slowed and stopped. His heart slowed as well. He saw his hat in the well of the passenger seat. He put it on.
He was all right now.
He was invisible again.
Dommerich drove back the way he came.
Nellie had returned in time for tea.
Barbara Weinberg, more than her husband, had become accustomed to Nellie's journeys into the past. She delighted in the stories Nellie would tell.
But it was different this time. Nellie had not gone to a party or a picnic, she had not gone camping with Tom, she had not gone dancing on the Venice pier. She had tried, this time, to go back to that part of her life that remained in shadows.
She told Barbara about her children. Two of them. Perhaps four. She told her what the psychiatrist had said. That she'd had only one, born dead. Still, she said, it was all very odd. There were other young members, over the years, who felt as she did. That they'd had children. The doctor's answer was always the same. These were dreams. Delusions. Not at all uncommon.
One of those members, she recalled, then asked the psychiatrist how it was that she had stretch marks on her breasts and on her belly. Then the doctor would admit, reluctantly, that another member, long deceased, had taken advantage of her. How very convenient, thought Nellie. Whenever pressed, the doctor always seemed able to produce a randy male patient who subsequently died but whom no one else seemed to remember.
She asked Barbara's help in learning the truth. Barbara promised it, but asked for patience. She could not very well ask Carleton Dunville. Doing so would reveal that Nellie was lucid. Perhaps, thought Barbara, she might get another chance at that office safe. She had seen that it contained records concerning the members but these had not interested her at the time.
Tea was served in a common room just down the hall from Nellie's suite. It was a formal affair, elegantly poured from a silver service into Wedgwood china cups. Cakes and scones were provided on Limoges platters with real Devonshire cream on the side. Alan saw little likelihood that the tea or the cakes had been drugged but, still, he and Barbara had chosen to partake of all meals on an alternate basis so that one might have a chance of remaining alert.
All of the members had gathered. A staff nurse, dressed as a maid for the occasion, served those unable to serve themselves. There were five men, the rest women, none under seventy. All wore glazed expressions. None seemed to notice the MP-5 submachine gun that Alan Weinberg held across his chest as his wife and Nellie sipped their tea. But the eyes, Barbara knew, would come alive when the nurse left the room. They would exchange smiles. They would whisper. The old man, Harland, would tip his yachting cap to Nellie and to Barbara in turn. But the nurse, this time, did not leave. She approached Alan, forcing a nervous smile. Nellie blinked away.
“There's nothing in the tea,” she told him. ''Mr. Dunville said you have his word on it.”
Weinberg waited, saying nothing. He was aware of the uses of his bandaged face, only one eye showing. But the nurse did not look away or lower her eyes.
�
�It's true,” she said. “I'd know it. And if anyone wanted to put you to sleep, we could have done it through your air-conditioner.”
Weinberg understood that. He'd sealed it and the windows two days before. But he nodded, slowly.
“You're a real nurse?” he asked.
“An RN. Yes.”
“What else are you?”
She hesitated. She did not answer. “Mr. Dunville . . .senior . . . would like to talk to you in private. He wants to end this.”
“Where is he now?”
“Across the hall. In the office.”
He glanced at Barbara's cup. She drained it, nodding. “Five minutes,” he said. “Miss Dameon's suite.”
They returned, with Nellie, to her rooms. She moved slowly, her eyes blank. Barbara asked her if she was there, pretending, or had she gone away again. She did not answer. Barbara steered her to her high-backed chair, then stepped into the corridor where she covered her husband's back as he trained his weapon on the double doors through which Carleton Dunville would come.
Dunville the elder opened them, wide, as if to show that no guards were lurking behind him. He stood there, holding his jacket open as well to show that he was unarmed. In one hand he held a cassette tape and what appeared to be a Polaroid snapshot. Weinberg waved him forward. Dunville closed the doors. He walked the thirty yards to Nellie's suite and entered it. He paused before Nellie's chair and looked into her eyes. She gave no sign that she knew he was there.
Dunville offered the snapshot to Weinberg. He examined it, then handed it to his wife who backed into the room and closed the door behind her. There seemed little point in covering the hall while Carleton Dunville was with them. Barbara looked at the snapshot. It was of a human head, eyes bandaged, blood soaked, badly misshapen. The rear right quadrant of the skull had been shot away. Still, she recognized Henry Dunville.
“Who did it?” she asked.
”I did.”
“Why?”
“Because he deserved it,” the elder Dunville answered. “And because I need you to know that he is no longer an issue between us.”
“What is? Aside from the files.”
Dunville shook his head, ruefully. “You needn't have taken them, you know. Young Carleton told the truth. You would not have been punished for what you did to Henry.”
“You'll understand,” Weinberg said, “why I chose not to bet our lives on that.”
“Of course. Will you assure me that no eyes but yours have seen them?”
“No.”
“Ah, yes. Your mystery assassin holds them in safekeeping.”
Weinberg saw the doubt. It did not matter. “Mr. Dunville, let us save time. You have people out looking for the machine. If they found it, they are now as dead as poor Henry.”
Dunville tried to study him, uselessly. “Will you return them?”
“No.”
“Then how can I let you leave here?”
Weinberg glanced down at his MP-5, wondering if it had suddenly turned into a banana. He chose not to make an issue of it. “As I told your son,” he said, “if there's no harm to me, there is none to you. If you kill us, those papers will be used because I will not be there to prevent it. Your son and Ruiz will die in the bargain.”
“And if I let you go?”
“I will be Alan Weinberg. I will abide by our contract. The files will be safe while I live.”
Dunville nodded slowly. He looked away lest Weinberg read his thoughts. Kill them both, he was thinking, and he would know, certainly within a week or two, whether that fax machine business was an elaborate bluff. Let them live and he might never know. And someday, weeks or years hence, the Weinbergs might die of other means. What then of the files? He did not relish living another thirty years with that over his head. Two weeks of doubt against a lifetime of it. His peace of mind seemed worth the risk.
Dunville, aware of that one eye trying to probe his brain, noticed the copy of the Los Angeles Times. He wondered how it came here. He picked it up. It was folded open to the page showing photographs of six young women.
“This was not as tidy as it might have been,” he said. “There is a more immediate issue. One of containment.”
One hand still held the videocassette he had brought. He leaned toward the actress, showing it. “Nellie? May I use your screen?” he asked. Her dead eyes stared ahead, unblinking.
Satisfied, he set the newspaper down and crossed to Nellie's player. He took out a movie and inserted the cassette. He turned once more to Weinberg.
“If you've healed properly,” he said, “you can be out of here in a few days. But we have four Taiwanese arriving next week by way of Canada. Two Iranians are scheduled the week after that. All are illegals. They will pay fees, Mr. Weinberg, that will make yours seem a bargain. I cannot afford to have the police poking about while they're here.”
“Why should they be?”
Dunville, cocking his head toward the newspaper, explained about Hickey. Hickey, he said, had done well on the whole but he had left a trail that might conceivably lead back to Sur La Mer. In addition, he had as much as threatened blackmail. He would have to go. Measures were already being taken.
Weinberg caught a glint of satisfaction in his wife's eye. She would gladly have seen to Hickey herself. Gratis. Still, he wondered why Dunville was telling him all this.
“He began leaving the trail this morning,” Dunville told him. “Two women showed up at the girl's apartment, followed, in quick succession, by the FBI and the police. Hickey was there as well. Apparently, he was seen.”
Dunville pressed the “play” button.
“There was a confrontation between the two women and the FBI agents. Why, I don't know. They had every right to be there. The smaller one is the girl's sister. Here you see the two women being led away . . . one of them struggling. Hickey will follow them to the residence of another student who . . . ”
“Barbara,” Weinberg interrupted. “Please watch the door.”
She looked at him, puzzled.
“Please,” he repeated.
She obeyed. She opened it and scanned the corridor. There was no one.
“Sorry. Go on.”
Weinberg, once again, was glad of his bandages. His face would surely have shown that he knew those two women.
Dunville continued his narrative. He described the stop at a convenience store, clearly in search of an address. “There. She's holding a page from a phone book. Obviously she found something in the apartment, which Hickey was supposed to have cleaned, leading her to a source of possible information.”
Weinberg dared not look at his wife. He could only hope that she would not consider her job done and return to view this tape. Her bandages did not hide her face. As it was, he could see a light beginning to flicker in the eyes of Nellie Dameon.
“The taller one stayed at this house for some time,” Dunville told him. “We must assume that they learned something. It also appears that these women are professionals of some sort.” Dunville told him of Hickey's call to one of the policemen who had been at that apartment and of Hickey’s lie, ultimately transparent, about representing the family of another victim. He told him of the father's comment that suggested that the sister was well known by, but not a friend of, the federal authorities. ”I wondered,” he said, “if she just might be an agent. And if so, might Axel Streicher have crossed her path over the years.”
Weinberg shrugged. He shook his head. But his one eye was burning. He knew now why the girls' photograph in the newspaper had looked so familiar. That face. The red hair. The name, Benedict. All of that should have been enough. No, he had never seen Lisa Benedict before. But he had certainly seen the woman she resembled so closely. He had seen Carla Benedict. And the tall one with the gentle face was Molly Farrell.
“What could the friend know?” Weinberg asked. “The one they visited.” He was grasping for a change of subject. He hoped that it did not show.
“She knows, or believes, that the
girl was here. She knows, or believes, that she came to see Nellie.” Dunville stared, searchingly, at the old woman. “She telephoned a short time ago, asking. My son took the call. He denied any knowledge of a visit. But the girl asked . . . other questions. She knows too much.”
“Do you intend to kill her?”
Dunville did not answer.
“If so, who will do it?”
“We have friends. Not here. Outside.”
Weinberg stepped to the machine. He turned it off. “How will it be done?” he asked.
“Efficiently.”
Weinberg, in no mood for this, felt an urge to slap the smugness from the face of the older man. He restrained himself, although he took a step closer.
“Do what you wish about Hickey,” he said through his teeth. “But if you harm the girl who called, where will it end? With the two women who came to see her? With her close friends? Her roommates?”
Dunville blinked. “There is a good deal at stake here. More than you know.”
Weinberg reached for Dunville’s lapel. Again, he stopped himself. “None of this was necessary,” he said. “No part of it. Is it possible that you're as stupid as Henry?”
An odd blandness appeared in Dunville’ s eyes. Weinberg thought that he had glimpsed it before. But now he was sure. He knew that look. He had seen it on the day when he knew that he must get out of Europe. Dunville was looking at him as if he were already dead.
But now there was something new. A look of surprise. The eyes had drifted. Weinberg followed them. They were looking at Nellie.
Weinberg turned his head. There was Nellie. She was looking up at him. Tears had begun to well. In her hands she held the newspaper that Dunville had left at her side. She had turned it to the grainy yearbook photo of Lisa Benedict. Next to it, on the page, was the photograph of a body, covered with plastic.
“Did they do this?'' shewhispered.
Dunville could only stare.
Weinberg lowered himself to one knee. He took the newspaper. He put it aside. “We didn't know either,” he said gently. “Not until it was too late.”
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