Any hopes I had of intercepting Freddy were thwarted by the security staff. By the time I slipped back to the sunlamps to retrieve my parka and my own hard hat and got out the front door, the guards had put Freddy into a Dodge pickup and sent him on his way. I was just in time to see his taillights disappear as I jogged outside. I’d had to waste a minute talking to the woman standing guard at the entrance.
“You the detective? Can I see your ID? We lost track of you there for a few minutes-I’m going to have to search you.”
“To see if I’m carrying out any soap dishes?” I said, but I let her pat me down and look inside my shoulder bag. Fortunately, I’d decided to abandon the By-Smart hard hat, although I’d been tempted to keep it-who knew when I might want to come back here.
I only got a glimpse of the Dodge’s license plate-the starting letters “VBC”-but I thought it was the same truck that had been outside the Dorrado apartment the first time I visited Josie’s family. Had it only been two weeks ago? It seemed more like two years, sometime in the remote past, anyway. The speakers in the flatbed whose bass had been rocking the neighborhood-Josie had hollered something at the guys in the truck, something important, it seemed to me now, but I couldn’t think of it.
I trudged slowly down the drive to 103rd Street, dodging the trucks and cars that jolted through the deep ruts. Back in my own car, I took off my parka and turned the heater on. With David Schrader playing the Goldberg Variations on my CD player, I leaned back in my seat and tried to think through everything I’d been hearing this afternoon. The document April swore her father had, proving Grobian had promised to come through with money for her medical care. The Bysens wanted to find Billy because he had absconded with a document. Was it the same one? What was it? Had the fight over it between Bron Czernin and Patrick Grobian led to his death?
Then there was the explanation Pastor Andrés had given about his meetings with Frank Zamar at Fly the Flag. It had sounded convincing enough, that he had urged Zamar to go back to Jacqui Bysen and tell her he couldn’t make sheets for that price. Zamar must have made some sheets for the neighborhood, because April and Josie both had bought them through their churches. Had this made the Bysens so angry that they blew up his factory? After all, “We never, never renegotiate; it’s Daddy Bysen’s first law.”
Maybe Bron and Marcena, necking in a side street, had seen Jacqui and William, or Grobian, plant the device that torched Fly the Flag, and they had been assaulted to keep them from talking about it. But that didn’t make sense: Marcena had met Conrad the day after the plant burned down. If she had seen someone committing arson, she would have told him. I think she would have told him-what could she gain by keeping such information to herself?
Jacqui’s smirk when she said I’d find myself at a dead end if I was investigating those sheets, said that, at a minimum, she knew Zamar had been making them. But they still thought they’d had a deal with Zamar-she’d said they were five days behind schedule because he’d died.
And what about Freddy, Julia’s-well, not her boyfriend, the person who had gotten her pregnant. I wanted to talk to that chavo, but I wasn’t sure where I could run him to earth. He might be visiting Julia, or the pastor, or-I realized I didn’t even know his last name, let alone where he lived. Anyway, it seemed critical, maybe urgent, to find Billy first, find him before Carnifice did.
I shut my eyes and listened to the music. The Goldberg Variations were so precise, so completely balanced, and yet so rich they made me shiver. Had Bach ever sat alone in the dark wondering if he were up to the job, or did his music flow from him so effortlessly that he never knew a moment’s doubt?
Finally, I sat up and put the car into gear. Even though I was two blocks from the Dan Ryan, I didn’t think I could face all that truck traffic this evening. I retraced my path across the Calumet and picked up Route 41. It’s a winding road down here, lined with the ubiquitous vacant lots and fast-food joints of the South Side, but it hugs the Lake Michigan shoreline and is more restful than the expressway.
As I drove north, I tried to imagine a strategy for confronting the Bysens, but nothing came to me. I could picture wiping the smirk off Jacqui Bysen’s face or somehow managing to lay Patrick Grobian flat, but I couldn’t think of a way to get them all to confess the truth.
I passed the corner where I usually turned to see Mary Ann. It had been almost a week since I last stopped by and I felt guilty for driving past. “Tomorrow,” I said aloud, tomorrow, after practice, after the pizza I’d promised the team.
I had a nagging feeling that there was something else I could have done while I was south, but I gave up trying to think about it, gave up on the whole South Side, indulging myself with a CD of old divas, singing along with Rosa Ponselle on “Tu che invoco,” a favorite concert aria of my mother’s.
Even with stopping at my own place to walk the dogs and collect some wine, I managed to make it to Morrell’s by six o’clock. It felt luxurious to have a free evening ahead of me. Morrell had promised to make dinner. We’d lounge in front of a fire, not letting the break-in or Marcena’s injuries worry us. Maybe we’d even toast marshmallows.
My romantic fantasies crashed to the ground when I got to Morrell’s: his editor had flown in from New York to see Marcena. When Don Strzepek and Morrell had met in the Peace Corps, Marcena had been there also, a university student traveling around the world, seeking out danger spots with the idea of doing a book. Morrell apparently had called Don yesterday to tell him about Marcena’s injuries, and Don wanted to see her in person; he’d arrived ten minutes ago.
“I’m sorry I didn’t let you know, darling.” Morrell didn’t sound very penitent.
Don kissed my cheek. “You know what they say-forgiveness is easier to get than permission.”
I forced myself to laugh: Don and I had clashed a couple of years ago, and we still tread warily around each other.
He and Morrell were going to drive down to Cook County as soon as we’d eaten, although Morrell had been to the hospital this afternoon. Marcena still lay in a coma, but the doctors were encouraged by her vital signs and thought they might start waking her up over the weekend.
“Where are her parents?” Don asked.
“I’ve called,” Morrell said. “They’re in India, on vacation. Her father’s secretary promised to track them down-I’m sure they’ll be here as soon as they get the word.”
I was glad to know Marcena’s vital signs looked good. “No one bothered you while you were out?” I asked Morrell.
“Bothered you?” Don asked.
Morrell explained about the break-in and the theft of Marcena’s computer. “So it’s good you’re staying here, Strzepek, because we need someone able-bodied around the house.”
“Vic can fight twice her weight in charging rhinos,” Don said.
“When she’s fit-she’s taken a few knocks of her own lately.”
They joked about it some more-Don is a weedy guy, a heavy smoker, who doesn’t look as though he could fight his weight in pillows-then Morrell said seriously, “I do think someone was following me this afternoon. I had to take a cab to the hospital, of course, and the driver actually mentioned that the same green LeSabre had been behind us since we left Evanston.”
He gave a tight, unhappy smile. “Maybe I should have been paying attention myself, but when you’re not driving you forget about things like looking in the rearview mirror. Going home, I did keep watching, and I think someone was there, different car-couldn’t make out the model, maybe a Toyota, but once I went in my front door they took off.”
“But that doesn’t make sense,” I objected. “Unless-they could have a remote listening device, I suppose, so they know when you’re leaving, and what you’re saying when you’re here.”
He looked startled, then angry. “How dare they? And who the hell are ‘they,’ anyway?”
“I don’t know. Police? Carnifice Security, seeing whether we know where Billy is?” I lowered my voice to a murmur just in case. “Did you find out anything from the neighbors?”
“Ms. Jamison saw a strange man letting himself into the building when she was out with Tosca. That was around six this morning.” Tosca was Ms. Jamison’s Sealyham. “Well-dressed white man around thirty-five or forty, she just assumed he was a friend of mine because he had a key that worked in the lock.”
Morrell practically runs a B and B for his globe-trotting reporter friends-Marcena wasn’t the first person I’d shared his time and space with. Another reason to wonder about living together. Aside from the sin, of course, I thought, remembering Pastor Andrés’s stern warnings about Josie and Billy.
Morrell was still speculating on who could have gotten a front door key to his condo, but I interrupted to say it was too big a universe. “Your building manager, the Realtor, one of your old friends. Maybe even Don, here, if he has a pressed suit someplace in his wardrobe. Really, though, the guy probably had some kind of master device that Ms. Jamison didn’t see him use, a sophisticated electronic tumbler pick. That kind of device is out of my price range, but an outfit like Carnifice probably gives them away as door prizes at the company picnic. The FBI has them, or-well, any big operation. The real question is why they’re not doing anything except watching. Maybe they are waiting for us to find out what Marcena knew-maybe if we start acting, we’ll prove to them we learned what she knew and then they’ll move in for the kill.”
“ Victoria, I can’t possibly follow that logic,” Morrell said. “Why don’t we forget about it while we eat.”
He’d made a chicken stew he’d learned to cook in Afghanistan, with raisins, coriander, and yogurt, and we did a reasonably good job of putting all our conflicts and worries to one side during the meal. I tried not to mind that Don drank most of the Torgiano-it’s a red wine from the Italian hill country where my mother grew up, and it’s not easy to find in Chicago. If I’d known Don was going to be there guzzling, I would have brought something French that was easier to replace.