“I see. But you don’t intend to oblige?”
“Of course not. Ma’am’s explicit orders are not to oblige. You can see she’s right about people snooping and reporting back on her. Since she insists on confidentiality, I’m not going to be the one to violate it.”
“You realize,” Mike said, “that the family put Mrs. Mac up to this. And that they do have a legitimate concern.”
“Only up to a point. What’s it their concern if she wants to go woman’s lib or immerse herself in trendy art or whatever? Or meet outsiders she’s interested in? If they want to keep an eye on her every minute, let ’em hire a private detective to do it.”
“Never. Definitely not the Durie style. Terribly déclassé.”
“It’s not funny, Mike. It’s ugly. If the McEye presses me for the latest about Ma’am’s doings and saying, I have to be the vague, evasive liar. For that matter, so do you. You don’t believe the McEye asked me to become her pet snoop without knowing I’d go to you with it, do you?”
“No, I guess not.”
“So?”
“So,” said Mike, “you’re still the one in the direct line of fire. Look. Suppose you went to Ma’am with this and asked for sanctuary? It even proves to her how trustworthy you are. Then—”
“Oh, please. If I tell her about it, she’ll head for a confrontation with Craig and Walter that’ll knock the roof loose. After which the McEye will be out for our blood. Remember George Oliphant?”
“Yes.”
“Well, the only difference between him and the McEye is that she’s fantastically competent at her job. I’ll give her that much.”
“But no information about Miss Margaret’s secret life.”
“None,” Amy said flatly.
“It’s up to you,” Mike acknowledged. “But I still can’t see anyone so competent at her job taking you to her bosom—and what a bosom—just because you agreed—”
“Seemed to agree.”
“—seemed to agree you’d be her snoop. There must be more to it than that. You did all right as assistant administrator of the works, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
He squeezed her waist hard. “Let’s not be excessively modest. Or is that job just low-level routine?”
“All levels. What really made her cup overflow was when she left me alone midafternoon—she went inside for a quick nap, I suspect—so that I was stuck with some significant correspondence. Each of those other four places they own has a manager who writes a full report on staff and maintenance every month. What goes on, what’s needed, and so forth. The letters I was handed to trim down and collate for Walter’s reading—”
“Walter?”
“He’s in charge of those places. Anyhow, the letters were all a jumble, and two of them, the ones from Aiken and Maine, were in impossible handwriting using native dialect. When the McEye saw how I had filtered out all the worthwhile information and collated everything in just two pages, tears came to those pop-eyes. Well, not really tears, but they did shine with gratitude.”
“So they should. By any chance, was there a hint in the London letter that Gwen’s not-quite-separated husband is occupying that apartment there?”
“No. But when I was on the elevator this morning with Ma’am and Dorothy and Glendon—”
“Going where?”
“To the ground floor with Ma’am. She wanted to show me the dining room and West Gallery. Both loaded with paintings. There’s a full-length portrait of her in the dining room that’s really dazzling. She’s about eighteen—that must have been soon before the accident—and even in that freaky Jazz Age outfit she’s meltingly beautiful. All aglow. There are also—”
“Hold it,” Mike said. “We’re off the track. What happened in the elevator?”
“Oh, that. Well, they were talking about some kind of showdown Glendon had with his parents, and I think it had something to do with Gwen and her husband.” Amy looked at his face. “Not very satisfactory, is it?”
“Not very.” Mike stood up. “You know, if we got the tape recorder down from the farm—”
“No, Michael. I do not speak to tape recorders. Only to people.”
He recognized from her tone that this was not negotiable. “All right, you won’t mind if I take notes while you tell it to me, would you? Mrs. Lloyd’s day at length?”
“Not really. But first supper. Then I want to take a walk with you. I want to get outside awhile before claustrophobia sets in. Don’t you feel that way?”
“I’m not shut in most of the day,” Mike pointed out. “What I feel is an itch to get these rewarding little details down on paper. However, right now I’ll settle for that pizza joint near the garage.”
“We do get free viands downstairs.”
“The pizza joint,” Mike said. “Then a walk. Then we come back and you tell all.”
“But not tonight. We’re off all day tomorrow, so—”
“So tomorrow,” Mike said, “we’ll be driving up to the farm to reclaim the TV set and stereo and tapes and some books. After all, if this place is home, it should be a little more homey. Right?”
“I suppose.”
“Then right now, baby, we eat, drink, and be merry. We walk. Then we come home and you tell all. And it’s early to bed because tomorrow the bugle sounds at dawn. We have a lot of mileage to cover in one day.”
“Oh, God,” Amy said. “On my day off.”
The Massachusetts expedition went well, eased by traffic along the way that was at least tolerable and colored by bursts of crimson New England autumn foliage. With Amy at the wheel for the final Boston-to-New York run they didn’t make the speed they might have—as she pointed out, she had a feeling she wasn’t supposed to be behind this wheel at all—but still they were back home by midnight.
Security man Krebs let them in, and at Amy’s request—Mike wondered what the response would have been had he made it—Krebs kindly unlocked the workshop door so that a handcart could be obtained to fetch the TV set, stereo components, and cartons of books from the car. When Mike had brought back the wagon to the garage and returned on foot he found that his wife had whipped up a platter of sandwiches, located a couple of wedges of extravagantly rich cake, and had set places at the table in the staff hall for them. She was already hard at work on a sandwich.
Mike poured himself a cup of coffee from the machine and joined her. He looked into a sandwich. “What is this stuff?”
“Lobster salad,” Amy said thickly. “And that looks like Black Forest cake, doesn’t it?”
“It does. And this is your idea of what to go to sleep on?”
“Don’t worry, I’ll sleep.” Amy shoved over the two slips of paper before her. “Tomorrow’s schedules. Kind of interesting.”
Hers, he saw, was not the interesting one: 8 A.M. Miss Margaret. On the other hand, his, besides the expected office trips, had two items of interest. At eleven-thirty, there was Miss Margaret, no destination entered. At three P.M. Miss Camilla to Locust Valley, Long Island.
“Tell me something,” Amy said. “Why, if Miss Camilla has her own cute little car, does she need to be chauffeured out to Long Island?”
“Don’t know. Maybe her car is in the shop getting yet another body job. According to Sid Levine, she’s that kind of driver.”
“Is she?” Amy said, eyebrows raised. “Well, talking about body jobs—”
“Yes, dear. I grant that Camilla is state-of-the-art. I also suspect that her daddy Walter has been the only real love of her life since her mother died. As you are the love of mine.”
“True,” Amy acknowledged. “But that girl is something to behold. And there is an aura of decadence about her. I just want to post a warning. You look very good in that uniform.”
“Role-playing,” Mike said. “Trust me. Now how about the more interesting item here? Miss Margaret at eleven-thirty, no destination. No destination for the record? I imagine that’s what stirs up the family. Has them put Mrs. Mac and her snoops on it.”
“We could be facing some questions,” Amy warned.
“We could. In that case, what do I answer?”
Amy thought it over. “Nothing really untruthful,” she decided. “You could say that the one to ask is Miss Margaret, isn’t it? All innocence.”
Mike curled his lip at her. “First that gaudy line you handed your mother about my wild success as private tutor. Now this. And you told me you didn’t have a talent for dissembling.”
“You know I don’t. Or do I?” Amy gave this some thought too. “I suppose if I am developing a talent in that direction, it’s because that’s how you survive here. And you know what Abe said about survival.”
“Yep,” Mike said. “It’s the name of the game.”
When, with the sandwiches and cake wiped out, they made their way up to the third floor Mike trundled the handcart into the sitting room. He looked around. “Home,” he said. “Pretty cozy at that.”
Amy nodded. “It is, isn’t it? I just wish the McEye wasn’t right next door.”
“You can’t have a picnic without a gadfly,” Mike said. “Hey, has it struck you that she’s located right over Ma’am’s apartment? What’s chances she’s got a hole drilled in her floor and keeps an eye on Ma’am odd hours?”
“If Craig or Walter asked her to,” Amy said. “But they wouldn’t. Besides she married into that apartment. It used to be McEye’s when he was butler. Oh, yes, and who do you think occupied ours? I’ll give you a clue. A painter.”
“Easy. John Singer Sargent himself.”
“Oh, no. He’d be on the second floor swimming in luxury. Think,” Amy admonished. She looked aggrieved. “Now what was the use of my sitting here telling you everything I picked up during the day—and you were taking notes, too—and then you don’t remember any of it?”
“Darling, that’s why I take notes. They’re my memory bank. Wait a second. A painter. Obviously in residence. Could it be the one who gave young Miss Margaret her lessons?”
“None other. And painted that great portrait of her. The one in the dining room. This room was his studio.”
“Artist-in-residence,” Mike said.
“So he was. Anyhow, this whole apartment was his, and it was kept empty all those years after he left until we moved in.”
“Aha,” said Mike. “And that explains the strange experience I had last night when I woke in the small hours.”
“You slept like the dead all night.”
“I woke and sensed a presence. I tiptoed to the door and looked in here. And there was this transparent ghostly figure—male—wearing beret and string tie, standing at a transparent easel, but he wasn’t painting. Would you like to know what he was doing?”
Amy compressed her lips but, Mike knew, it was just a case of waiting her out. At last she said, “All right, what was he doing?”
“Laughing his head off. Peals of silent laughter filled the air.”
“Silent laughter?”
“Naturally, coming from a ghost. And do you know why? Because, if memory serves, he was the one who advised James Hamilton Durie to collect French impressionists. And Mary Cassatt. Which collection James quickly sold, thus dishing his descendants out of a few million dollars worth of great art. True?”
“That part of it. But how could he tell at the time?”
“He couldn’t. Because, my dear, despite the awe he inspired, he was just your typical small-minded, uncomprehending Philistine.”
“Not typical,” Amy said. “He evidently was awesome. Moses on the mountain.”
“I think that you may—”
“Awesome,” said Amy. “I saw that portrait of him and his wife. Even John Singer Sargent felt it and couldn’t get out from under it.”
A sort of death watch, Amy thought. Ma’am’s face was expressionless as she listened to the roll call of obituaries, but she was obviously wound up tight, the hands bearing down hard on the knob of the cane propped before her. From that degree of tension it couldn’t be just random bad news that was anticipated. There had to be a particular concern here about someone Margaret Durie would not name. Perhaps speaking that name aloud might be too painful. Which suggested, however illogically, that this daily reading of the obit index was simply a roundabout way of hearing that name, if and when it was listed.
Devious if true. And touching.
“That’s all there is,” Amy said, and saw her auditor visibly relax. “The art news now?” It would be a relief to do the art news. At least one knew what to look for in it. Jason Cook.
“Yes,” Ma’am said. Then abruptly, “No. Wait a moment.” The slender fingers fluttering over the packet of yet unopened mail were against the bottom envelope, the largest there, the kind Mike used for mailing short stories. “Who is this from, Lloyd?”
Amy looked closer. “From the return address, ma’am, the Upshur Institute.”
“I thought so.” The voice hardened. “You should have let me know it at once. I told you about Mrs. Upshur. Foolish of you not to understand I’d regard any message from her as urgent.”
Amy felt resentment start to percolate. “I didn’t think it was my place to read the return addresses on your mail, Miss Durie.”
“Indeed? Then from now on—”
A phone on the desk rang. Blessed instrument, Amy thought. A heaven-sent call to allow tempers to cool.
“Answer that,” Ma’am said, her tone indicating that this intrusion was no cooling agent. “Whoever it is, I’m not available.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Amy said. White phone in-house, she reminded herself; black phone outside line. She picked up the black phone and the white one continued to ring. She made the change to white, discovering in the process that there was a strip of white felt along its handpiece. Of course. A means of identifying which was which for the blind. But an in-house call to this apartment? On the McEye’s day off? “Mrs. Lloyd here,” she said with trepidation.
“It’s Nugent in the office, ma’am. A troublesome matter for you, so it looks to be.”
Amy realized her hands were trembling. A troublesome matter, and there was Ma’am glaring in her direction. “Yes, Nugent?”
“A call from Mrs. Jocelyn of a sudden,” Nugent sounded panicky. “She wants a car at ten prompt. And Lloyd—your mister that is—I mean Lloyd, ma’am—well, he’s not to be found. Not in his room nor staff hall nor the garage. And he has to arrange for the extra driver.”
Curse Mrs. Jocelyn, Amy thought wrathfully. From the first look at Madam Chairperson she could be marked as nemesis. But Mike not to be found? The light suddenly dawned. He hadn’t come to bed with her, but had headed for the typewriter instead. And as sometimes happened when he had this fever, he might have been at it till dawn and, tuned in only to the alarm clock, was now sleeping it off.
Let Ma’am glare her impatience, she thought, there wouldn’t be any dereliction of duty on Mike’s part while she was filling the McEye’s shoes. “Nugent?”
“Yes, Mrs. Lloyd?”
“Is there a spare key to that apartment?”
“Well, yes, ma’am,” said Nugent, thus settling that little question, “but I don’t really—”
“He’s right there, Nugent. Take a minute off, use that key, and attend to the matter personally. Do you know what I mean?”
“I think I do, ma’am.”
“Personally. At once. Thank you, Nugent.”
Amy firmly put down the phone and braced herself for some hostile questioning, but Margaret Durie apparently had not the slightest interest in the mysterious workings of staff. “If you’re quite finished,” she said coldly, “bring me the letter opener.”
Amy placed it in the outstretched hand. The envelope had been doubly sealed with a strip of tape over its glued-down flap. Ma’am found the edge of the tape and deftly slid the blade under and along it. She motioned at the breakfast service before her. “Clear this away. And no need to remain standing.”
Amy sat down and hastily moved the service to her side of the tab
le. There was a change in the atmosphere, she sensed. The tension was still there, but there was no more bile in it. Now there appeared to be a taut eagerness. The poker player’s eagerness in drawing cards with a big pot on the table.
And, in fact, Ma’am did remove two cards from the envelope. Neutral-colored, large—about half the size of a sheet of typing paper—and they were speckled all over by almost invisible little dots. Braille. Of course. And there was a greenish slip of paper accompanying them, easily identifiable as a check.
Watching those fingers search out the message of the dots, Amy decided that the poker-playing analogy was pretty accurate really, especially if one had in mind the kind of player who, after drawing the cards, could mask all reactions to them.
The mask fell away as Ma’am finally put aside the cards and rested her fingertips on the check. Although the blank eyes were disconcertingly focused below Amy’s, the face, thank God, was friendly. At its most charming, Amy thought with some irritation. The old woman may not have seen herself in the mirror for fifty years, but she must sense that when she turned on that charm it was enough to make the birds sing. Possibly excluding Gwen Durie’s gift canary in the bedroom, which never did seem to sing.
Ma’am smiled. “Our dear Mrs. Upshur,” she remarked. “Full of sage advice, and”—she shook her head pityingly—“confusion when it comes to her accounts. Are you confused in the handling of your accounts, Lloyd?”
“I don’t believe so, ma’am.”
“Indeed? Perhaps we ought to make you treasurer of Mrs. Upshur’s Institute. It would do her good to deal with someone not as beholden to her as I am. However, since I am treasurer by title, I suffer the obligation. On my desk, Lloyd, a ruler and a pen. Bring them here.”
Amy brought them. The ruler was rather an unusual one, she observed, silver from the look and heft of it, a flat six-inch square with an open slot along its center. The pen was a heavy, old-fashioned silver fountain pen which could have been a family heirloom.
Ma’am rested the cane against the arm of the chair. “Now stand here at my shoulder, Lloyd. That’s right. And do exactly as I instruct. Make sure this check is face up and place the ruler over the appropriate spaces so it will contain my margins. Then you’ll guide my hand as I write. I have a tendency, so I’ve learned, to crowd my letters.”
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