A Woman of Intelligence

by Karin Tanabe

  “Because I saw someone else go in,” I whispered. “Jacob. Jacob Gornev went in her apartment building.”

  “What?” said Turner, much louder than I’d ever heard him. “Are you sure? When?”

  “Last night,” I croaked out and then started crying again. “In the middle of the night. I thought he was there to … I thought it was something else.”

  “Can you leave your apartment? Can you meet me?” he said, sounding nothing like his steady self.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Try. Get in a taxi and meet me near the fountain in the park. One hundred sixth and Fifth Avenue. You know it.”

  It wasn’t a question. Turner was well aware that when it came to Central Park, I knew every corner.

  I threw on a dress, pulled my hair back, and wrote Tom a two-word note. I’m sorry.

  CHAPTER 33

  I exited the taxi at Madison and 106th and ran west to the park. Standing by Untermyer Fountain was Turner. I kept running until my body hit his and I buried my face in his chest. He let me. He put his firm arms around me and listened as I said, “She didn’t hang herself, Turner. She didn’t.”

  “Let’s walk,” he said quietly. “Through the park, on the street, wherever you’d like.”

  I stood up straight, let my hand touch the water spraying from the bronze statues, from the three sculpted women in motion, and splashed it over my face.

  “Let’s go to the street,” I said. “It’s too pretty in here for such an ugly conversation.” We walked to the sidewalk together, to the hiss of cars and busy sidewalks.

  “Tell me again about last night,” he said as we began walking uptown. He was calmer than he’d been on the phone, but he was not the unflappable Turner Wells I had grown accustomed to.

  He moved closer to me as a couple passed us on the sidewalk, his body brushing against mine. He didn’t pull away for another block.

  As we walked, I told him every detail—about leaving Faye and realizing I was standing in front of Ava’s building; about seeing a man that I knew in a flash was Jacob.

  “You know the way he walks,” I said as an ambulance drove past us. “He has that ever-so-slight hunch. On some people, it would look inelegant, would age them, but on Jacob it just adds to his personality. His flaws have always given him more appeal.”

  “He has many flaws and much appeal,” said Turner, signaling for us to sit on a bench just inside the park at the corner of 110th.

  “Who told you?” I asked. “Coldwell?”

  “Yes. This morning. A friend in the police force tipped him off, so he was in front of her apartment building when they carried out her body.”

  “He saw her? He confirmed it was her?”

  Turner nodded.

  “But Turner, why would she want to die?” I said, grabbing his arm. “Did Ava Newman really seem like a woman who wanted to die? Ava was a woman with at least nine lives packed into one. Enough beauty for a dozen, enough brains for a dozen more. A trip to Moscow on the horizon that she was excited about. Another man begging her to go to Cuba. Revolutions to start, hearts to break; does all that point to a woman who is going to string herself up like Christmas lights? Who would make love to Jacob, then pour a few highballs and say, ‘You know what? It seems like just the right time to kill myself’?”

  “Did I say I didn’t believe you?” said Turner.

  “No.” I fell silent.

  “I don’t think Ava wanted to die,” he said. “In fact, I can almost say with certainty that she didn’t.”

  I opened my mouth to respond.

  “Almost,” he repeated.

  We sat in silence together as I tried to imagine the world without a good woman in a tangerine-colored dress who was led terribly, terribly astray.

  “Can I ask you something, Turner?”

  “Always,” he said, looking at me, his expression unreadable.

  “Why did Lee Coldwell choose me? To approach Jacob, to be an informant?”

  “I’m glad you were chosen,” said Turner quietly. “You’re good at this.”

  “I don’t think I was supposed to like Ava Newman as much as I did. I don’t think I’m very good at this at all.”

  “Hard not to like Ava Newman.”

  I thought about the way Ava talked about Turner in the movie theater. It was also hard not to like Turner Wells.

  “Did you choose me to do this?” I asked, looking at the edges of the park.

  “A lot of people chose you,” he said finally. “Just some of them didn’t understand why they were choosing you. Months back, Jacob told me that Ava was probably going to Russia. He let me in on a few hazy details of what she was doing in Washington—though we already knew—and that he wanted someone very American to replace her. I told Coldwell and we started ripping apart Jacob’s past, going deeper than we had before, and we found you. With your UN connection, Coldwell decided that you would be the easiest person to give a history to. We decided to tie you to me. And then we decided to present you to Jacob, to plant the idea of you in his head.”

  “Had you seen me before? Before the day we met in the car? Had you watched me before?”

  “Once,” he said. “You were leaving your house with your husband, you were on your way to the Plaza Hotel.”

  I nodded. “The ghastly medical gala.”

  “You had the devil in your eyes,” he said, smiling. “You looked ready to go to war. You didn’t have a lightness about you as most women do when they’re going to a party. I thought that was a good thing.”

  “Do you still?”

  “I think … I think my opinion has changed. Now I think you deserve some lightness. Some joy.”

  “I think that’s easier to have when you’re next to me,” I said quietly.

  “You don’t need me.”

  “But I do,” I insisted, without looking at him. “I do.”

  He stood, and held out his hand. I took it and we walked to the northern edge of the park.

  Across 110th were brick buildings, far more run-down than those on Fifth, but stuck between them was a beautiful, colorful house. I looked closer and saw that it was a hotel. It was olive green with a multilayered portico in front painted muted tangerine and mustard. It seemed to be confused, Tuscan in character but displaced in Harlem. However, I had perfected my Italian in Morningside Heights, so maybe that was just the way of New York.

  I was no longer crying, my hands were no longer shaking, and I was no longer in denial that Ava was dead. Instead, I was only thinking about Turner. Nothing was being said between us. But something had to be.

  “How do you do this?” I whispered.

  He didn’t answer, looking at the same hotel I was.

  “How do you live a lie? Every day, lie, lie. Even when terrible things happen. Even when people die. How do you keep lying? Pretending to be a person you’re not.”

  “I think I can do it because I’ve surrendered myself,” he said thoughtfully. “I am a very small dot in this world. My actions are of little significance. But put together with the actions of many, they could have great significance. I want to move the country in the right direction. Then when I’m terribly old and terribly unimportant, I can say that I walked the right path.”

  “You,” I said, looking over at him, “are already a man of great significance. You don’t need to work for the FBI to make that true. It will always be true. Turner…” I said, keeping my eyes on his. “The time I have spent with you has been extremely significant in my life.”

  He moved closer to me, his body only inches from mine.

  The air grew thicker and fuller.

  “Turner…” I closed my eyes, willing myself to find the courage I’d been lacking for the last two years. “I find you…”

  He didn’t have to say anything. It was obvious that I was speaking to a man who thought about me. Who saw me. That, I realized, was one of the reasons I couldn’t stop thinking about him. With Turner Wells, I felt very seen.

  “I fi
nd you very attractive,” I finally whispered.

  “Katharina.” Just my name, nothing else, the silence sitting between us, extending the minutes, the quiet.

  “What do you think was the last thing she saw before she died?” I asked.

  “I think,” said Turner, glancing again at the hotel. “When there is that much fear—either because you want to die or because someone else wants you to die—you stop seeing anything. All you see is that want.”

  He looked at me.

  “Rina,” he murmured, and then his mouth was on mine, his arms were around me, and nothing else was said.

  I’d wanted to kiss many people in my life. I’d never wanted to kiss someone more than Turner Wells.

  Then it was said. “We can’t,” he murmured. “We can’t.”

  “We can’t,” I echoed.

  But our hands and our lips wouldn’t listen. They whispered, We can.

  CHAPTER 34

  This time, when I returned to the apartment, Tom was holding the equivalent of a gun. He was gripping the boys, both boys. When I walked inside he pulled them even closer, as if they belonged only to him. As if he were going to take them away from me.

  “Mama!” Gerrit screamed, but Tom wouldn’t let him go to me.

  “Rina, just go to the bedroom. I’ll put the boys in front of the TV.” I watched him wheel in the playpen and place both boys inside, moving it closer to the television set.

  When Tom came in the bedroom, I was standing by the door, leaning against my dresser. He gestured to the bed, for me to sit down. I shook my head no.

  “Do as you please,” he said, sitting down. “That seems to be your refrain lately anyway.”

  “I’m sorry about today. I wasn’t ready to start this again. I needed more time.”

  “Isn’t it nice to just make impulse decisions. To not evaluate right or wrong.”

  “I don’t often make impulse decisions,” I said thinking about what I’d done only a half hour before. I could still feel Turner on my lips, his body pressing against mine. But the sensation was quickly disappearing, reality pulling on my skirt again.

  “Do you not like this life you have?” Tom asked, gesturing to the door. “Two healthy children, a husband who provides for you, who is loyal to you, is that not enough?”

  Loyal. I thought of Turner, the shot of life that I felt as soon as his lips had touched mine. Tom was loyal, I had no doubt. I remembered taking a six-month-old Gerrit to the hospital to visit Tom at work. When we were leaving, a nurse pulled me aside and said that she’d never met a man as proper as Tom Edgeworth. Never a wandering eye, and certainly not a hand. She had told me how lucky I was, and I’d told her that I knew. But life had been different then.

  I nodded. “I like many things about our life. My life.”

  “That’s shocking to hear, frankly. Because the way you’ve been acting it seems like you’re experiencing some severe buyer’s remorse. About me, about the kids. That you wish you had never tied yourself to a soul or had any children. All you seem interested in right now is a drinking habit and the company of ridiculous women. Does that sound about right?”

  I shook my head no.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Of course I’m sure.”

  “Carrie Kirkland told me that you are having an affair,” he said, standing up and looking at me straight on.

  I looked at his handsome face and shook my head no, too exhausted to start crying.

  “Are you having an affair?”

  I shook my head again.

  “Why does Carrie think you’re having an affair?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve been different, I haven’t been myself. She’s probably reading into that.”

  “That’s not what makes people think you’re having an affair. That makes people think you’re drinking too much. Seeing a man locked in an embrace with you, that’s the telling sign.”

  I thought of Turner’s lips. His hands. A kiss that made the wind sigh with approval. Hands touching exposed summer skin. But it had ended there. We had not reached for more. But if we’d dared go into the hotel across the street, if we’d been somewhere with fewer eyes, less judgment, less room for guilt, I would have reached.

  “I am not,” I whispered.

  “Fine,” he said, looking away from me. “Please put the boys to bed and sleep in the guest room. We really should just start calling it your room. And starting tomorrow, I’m going to have a psychologist come see you every day when the boys are napping. I’ll stay out of your hair so you can properly bond with your children again, but that bonding will be done within these very pleasant walls. I don’t want you to leave this house unless it’s to take the boys to the park and once for ice cream on Friday. You need to remind them that you love them. They’re feeling abandoned. And if you don’t want to feel very abandoned, you better stop this rebellion. Affair or not, I’ve had enough with your bullshit, Katharina.”

  He walked to the living room and called his parents’ apartment.

  “She’s back, Mother. Yes, I know. I know. I think she’ll be able to handle it now. Plus, I’m here.”

  The man who had spent two waking hours a day with his children since they were born was their savior, and I was a madwoman.

  I heard the receiver rattle.

  “Katharina,” Tom called out.

  “Yes?”

  “Peter took his first steps today. It was a real sight.”

  CHAPTER 35

  Holding the phone to my cheek while the boys played at my feet, I listened to Coldwell’s calm voice.

  “It is surprising. Her suicide.”

  “Especially since it’s not a suicide. Especially since Jacob Gornev killed her.”

  “Whatever it is,” said Coldwell. “The police are all over it. They’re trying to keep the press away, because when her picture goes out, pretty as she is, was, it’s going to be a circus even if they don’t manage to tie her to the Communist Party. But despite the failings of the New York Police Department, they should at least be able to do that.”

  “But no circus yet.”

  “Not yet. So far, she’s just a woman who’d had enough.”

  “Jacob certainly thought she’d had enough.”

  “Listen, Mrs. Edgeworth. I think it’s real swell that you and this woman bonded and all, but we can’t look too interested in the case because then the police will wonder why,” Coldwell continued, ignoring my tirade. “I’ve got someone on the squad. And he reiterated that it really looks like a suicide. A simple suicide. What you saw was probably Gornev going in for something … quick. And then leaving. But you didn’t stick around to see him leave.”

  “You know, what I remember about Jacob in the bedroom is very clear. And I assure you, after I had sex with him, all I wanted was a cigarette and a sidecar. I didn’t want to string myself up with rope to meet my maker. So, forgive me, but I don’t think—despite your man on the squad—that Ava slept with Jacob for one last thrill before offing herself. As the only other person in this mess who has gone to bed with Jacob Gornev, let me just go ahead and tell you that Ava’s something quick was not followed by a quick little suicide.”

  Coldwell was silent, not even a smoker’s exhale. “I think you’re complicating things.”

  “I’m the one complicating things? ‘A simple conversation. A simple suicide,’” I said, barely able to mask the disdain in my voice. “Sounds like everything is simple in your line of work. How about if Jacob pops over here wanting to simply kill me? Should I be fearing for my life, Mr. Coldwell?”

  “Be vigilant, but not afraid, Mrs. Edgeworth.”

  “Sound advice. I’ll have it embroidered on a pillow.”

  He didn’t reply.

  “I’m telling you, Mr. Coldwell, Jacob killed her. I dated that man, I was in love with that man. I know what he looks like even from the back. Are the police even considering him yet?”

  “I doubt it.”

  “But you will.”

 
; “We want the sharks,” said Coldwell. “If Jacob is the shark, we’ll get him. But I think he’s a frail man getting frailer by the day. And that even Ava Newman could have overpowered him.”

  “He may be a walking corpse, but he’s still a goddamn shark,” I said.

  The line went dead.

  An hour later, I finally had the boys down for a nap. I sat by the window and looked out at the sidewalk. Too many emotions were swelling in me and I only wanted to focus on one. Lust. Pure, complete, reckless, incredible, life-changing lust. I closed my eyes and leaned back, but no sooner had my spine uncurled than the phone rang. I lunged for it after half a ring. I knew exactly who it was.

  “A Doctor Creighton is here to see you,” said Sam’s skeptical voice. I had given both him and Eduardo a very big tip and asked them not to share my comings and goings or the presence of Sarah Beach. I had never mentioned the man who’d just arrived. He was fully Tom’s idea.

  “Thank you, Sam,” I said unenthusiastically. “Send him up.”

  The elevator dinged, and a man with a gray beard and a doctor’s bag emerged, the prerequisites of any psychologist that Tom would hire for me.

  “Mrs. Edgeworth,” he said kindly, his voice monotone. “I’m Doctor Creighton. You husband asked if we might talk today.”

  “And every day this week.”

  “He’s a little worried about you.”

  “That’s an understatement.” He was one step from shackling me to the couch.

  “Shall we sit here?” he asked me, gesturing to the couch in the living room.

  “No, let’s move to the library where we can close the door. My children are sleeping.”

  It was the only time of day when I was not actively mothering and now I had to spend it doing psychoanalysis.

  “May I sit here?” he asked, pointing to a leather sofa. I nodded and watched him take out a paper and pen.

  “Would you like to sit as well?” he asked, confused that I was observing him when it was supposed to be the opposite.

  “I’d rather stand by the window. If that’s all right.”