I’m seeing him tonight, Susan thought. I could have brought them. What was the big rush? she wondered. Then, realizing it was nothing she had time to be concerned about now, she went into the studio. Picking up her notes for the show, she put on her headphones.
When the engineer announced the thirty seconds warning, she said quickly, “Jed, remember that call from Tiffany yesterday? I don’t expect to hear from her, but if she does call in, be sure to record her phone number when it comes up on the ID.”
“Okay.”
“Ten seconds,” the engineer warned.
In her earphones Susan heard, “And now stay tuned for Ask Dr. Susan,” followed by a brief musical bridge. She took a deep breath and began, “Hello and welcome. I’m Dr. Susan Chandler. Today we’re going right to the phones to answer any questions you have in mind, so let’s hear from you. Maybe between us we can put whatever is bothering you in perspective.”
As usual, the time went quickly. Some of the calls were mundane: “Dr. Susan, there’s someone in my office who’s driving me crazy. If I wear a new outfit, she asks me where I bought it, then shows up wearing the exact same thing a few days later. This has happened at least four times.”
“Clearly this woman has some self-realization problems, but they don’t have to be yours. There’s a simple, immediate solution to your problem, however,” Susan said. “Don’t tell her where you buy your clothes.”
Other calls were complex: “I had to put my ninety-year-old mother in a nursing home,” a woman said, her voice weary. “It killed me to do it, but physically she’s helpless. And now she won’t talk to me. I feel so guilty I can’t function.”
“Give her a little time to adjust,” Susan suggested. “Visit her regularly. Remember that she wants to see you even if she ignores you. Tell her how much you love her. We all need to know that we’re loved, especially when we’re frightened, as she is now. Finally, and most important, stop beating up on yourself.”
The problem is that some of us live too long, Susan thought sadly, while others, like Regina Clausen and maybe Carolyn Wells, have had their lives cut short.
The show’s time was almost up when she heard Jed announce, “Our next call is from Tiffany in Yonkers, Dr. Susan.”
Susan looked up at the control box. Jed was nodding—he would copy Tiffany’s phone number from the Caller ID.
“Tiffany, I’m glad you called back today—” Susan began, but she was interrupted before she could continue.
“Dr. Susan,” Tiffany said hurriedly, “I almost didn’t have the courage to phone, because I may disappoint you. You see . . .”
Susan listened with dismay to the obviously rehearsed speech about why Tiffany couldn’t send her the turquoise ring. It sounded almost as though she were reading it.
“So like I said, Dr. Susan, I hope I’m not disappointing you, but it was such a cute souvenir, and Matt, my former boyfriend, gave it to me, and it kind of reminds me of all the fun times we had when we went out together.”
“Tiffany, I wish you’d call me at my office,” Susan said hurriedly, then had a sense of déjà vu. Hadn’t she spoken those same words to Carolyn Wells forty-eight hours earlier?
“Dr. Susan, I won’t change my mind about giving you the souvenir ring,” Tiffany said. “And if you don’t mind, I want to tell you that I work at—”
“Please do not give your employer’s name,” Susan said firmly.
“I work at The Grotto, the best Italian restaurant in Yonkers,” Tiffany said defiantly, almost shouting.
“Cut to commercials, Susan,” Jed barked into her headphone.
At least now I know where to find her, Susan thought wryly as she automatically began to say, “And now a message from our sponsors.”
When the program was over, she went into the control room. Jed had written Tiffany’s phone number on the back of an envelope. “She sounds dumb, but she was smart enough to get in a free plug for her boss,” he observed acidly. Self-promotion on the show was strictly forbidden.
Susan folded the envelope and put it in her jacket pocket. “What worries me is that Tiffany is obviously lonely and trying to get back with her old boyfriend, and she sounds very vulnerable. Suppose some nut was listening to the program and heard her and got ideas about her?”
“Are you going to contact her about that ring?”
“Yes, I think so. I just need to compare it with the one Regina Clausen had. I know it’s a long shot that they came from the same place, but I won’t be sure unless I can check it out.”
“Susan, those kinds of souvenir rings are a dime a dozen, as are the shops that sell them. Those guys who run the shops all claim their stuff is handmade, but who are they kidding? For ten bucks? No way. You’re too smart to believe that.”
“You’re probably right,” Susan said in agreement. “Besides . . .” she began, then stopped herself. She’d been about to tell Jed her suspicion that Justin Wells’s critically injured wife was the mysterious Karen. No, she thought, it’s better to wait until I see where that information leads me before I spread the word.
45
When Nat Small noted that Abdul Parki’s souvenir shop still hadn’t opened at noon on Wednesday, he became concerned. Small’s shop, Dark Delights, a porn emporium, was directly across the street from the Khyem Specialty Shop, and the two men had been friends for years.
Nat, a wiry fifty-year-old with a narrow face, hooded eyes, and a troubled past, could smell trouble just as distinctly as anyone who got near him could smell the combination of stale cigars and liquor that was his personal scent.
It was common knowledge on MacDougal Street that his sign announcing that he did not sell to minors had nothing to do with reality. That he never had been caught at it was due to the fact that he knew by instinct when an undercover cop opened the door of his well-equipped store. If there happened to be a young customer already there, attempting to make a purchase, Nat would immediately start demanding proof of age—as loudly as he could.
Nat had one abiding credo, and it had served him well: stay away from the cops. That was why he tried every other avenue available to him when he first became concerned about his friend’s failure to open for business that Wednesday morning. First he tried peering in at the door of Abdul’s shop; seeing nothing, he then phoned Abdul at home; not reaching him there, he tried phoning Abdul’s landlord. Of course, he got the usual answering machine runaround: “Leave a message,” it said. “We’ll get back to you.” Yeah, right, Nat thought. Everyone knew the landlord didn’t give a damn about the place and would jump at any opportunity to get out of the long-term lease Abdul had gotten during one of the city’s periodic real estate downturns.
Finally, Nat did the one thing that showed the depth of his friendship: He called the local precinct and reported his concern that something might have happened to Abdul. “I mean, you could set your clock by that little guy,” he said. “Maybe he didn’t feel well yesterday, ’cause I noticed he didn’t reopen after lunch. Maybe he went home and had a heart attack or something.”
The police checked Abdul’s small, exquisitely neat apartment on Jane Street. A bouquet of now-drooping flowers lay next to the smiling photo of his late wife. Otherwise there was no sign of recent habitation, and no indication that he had been there. At that point, they decided to go into the shop and investigate.
It was there they found the blood-soaked body of Abdul Parki.
Nat Small was not a suspect. The police knew Nat, and they all knew he was too smart to get involved in a murder; besides, he didn’t have a motive. In fact, the very absence of motive was the most troubling aspect of the case. There was nearly one hundred dollars in the cash register, and it didn’t look as though the killer even had made an effort to open it.
Still, it probably was robbery, the police decided. And the killer, probably a druggie, got scared off by something, maybe even by a customer coming in the shop. As the police scenario played out, the killer hid in the back until the custom
er left, then bolted. He’d been smart enough to put up the “closed” sign and snap the lock. And he gave himself plenty of time to get away.
What the police wanted from Nat and from other shopkeepers on the block was information. They did learn that Abdul had opened the shop as usual on Tuesday morning at nine o’clock and had been seen sweeping his sidewalk around eleven, after some kid scattered a bag of popcorn there.
“Nat,” the detective said. “Use that brain for something besides the gutter. You’re right across the street from Parki. You’re always putting the latest filth in your front window. Did you notice anyone going in or out of Abdul’s shop sometime after eleven?”
By the time he was being questioned at three o’clock, Nat had had plenty of time to think, and to remember. Yesterday had been slow, but then Tuesdays always were. Around one he had been putting some display boxes for newly arrived X-rated films in the front window. Although he hadn’t actually stared at him, he had noticed a well-dressed guy standing on the sidewalk outside his shop. He seemed to be looking over the stuff already on display. But then, instead of coming inside, he had crossed the street and gone directly into Abdul’s shop, without even pausing to look in the window.
Nat had a pretty good impression of what the guy had looked like, even though he had seen him only in profile, and the man had been wearing sunglasses. But even if that well-dressed guy had gone into Ab’s place around one, he certainly wasn’t the one who killed the poor little guy, Nat told himself. No, there was no use even mentioning him to the cops. If he did, he would end up wasting the whole afternoon in the precinct station with a cop-artist. No way.
Besides, Nat thought, that guy looks just like all my customers. The Wall Street guys and the lawyers and doctors who buy my stuff would go ballistic if they thought that I was talking to the cops about one of their kind.
“I seen nobody,” Nat informed the cops. “But let me warn you guys,” he added virtuously. “You gotta do something about the druggies ’round here. They’d kill their grandmothers for a fix. And you can tell the mayor I said so!”
46
Pamela Hastings feared that the students in her Comparative Lit course had wasted their time by coming to class today. The combination of two sleepless nights and the continuing acute worry about her friend Carolyn Wells had left her physically and emotionally spent. And now her suspicion that Carolyn’s injuries might not have been accidental, and that in fact Justin might have been angry or jealous enough to have deliberately tried to kill her, had proven to be almost totally distracting. She was painfully aware that today’s lecture on The Divine Comedy was both disjointed and uneven, and she was relieved when it was over.
Making matters even worse was the message she received to call Dr. Susan Chandler. What could she say to Dr. Chandler? Certainly she had no right to discuss Justin with a perfect stranger. Still she knew she could not avoid at least returning the call.
The Columbia campus was bright with sunshine, colorful with the turning leaves. It’s a good day to be alive, Pamela thought ironically as she walked through it. She hailed a cab and gave the now all-too-familiar destination: “Lenox Hill Hospital.”
After less than two days the nurses in the station outside the intensive care unit almost seemed like old friends. The one on desk duty answered Pamela’s unasked question: “She’s holding her own, but still very critical. There is a chance that she’s coming out of the coma. We felt she was trying to say something earlier this morning, but then she lapsed back. It’s a good sign, though.”
“Is Justin here?”
“He’s on his way.”
“Is it okay if I go in to see her?”
“Yes, but only stay for a minute. And talk to her. No matter what most of the doctors say, I swear some supposedly comatose people know exactly what’s going on. They just can’t reach us.”
Pam tiptoed past three units that housed other desperately ill patients before she reached the one in which Carolyn was lying. She looked down at her friend, heartsick at what she saw. Emergency surgery had been performed to reduce brain swelling, and Carolyn’s head was covered in bandages. Tubes and drains invaded her body from all angles. Her nose was covered with an oxygen mask, and purple bruises on her neck and arms were testimony to the violent impact of the van.
Pamela still found it almost impossible to believe that something so terrible as this could have followed the happy evening she had shared with Carolyn only a few nights ago.
Happy until I started doing readings, she thought—and Carolyn brought out that turquoise ring . . .
Careful not to exert any pressure, she placed her hand over Carolyn’s. “Hi, babe,” she whispered.
Did she sense a faint stirring, or was she just wishing for response?
“Carolyn, you’re doing great. They tell me you’re on the verge of waking up. That’s wonderful.” Pamela stopped. She had been about to say that Justin was frantic with worry, but realized that now she was afraid to bring up his name. Suppose he had pushed Carolyn? Suppose Carolyn had realized that it was him behind her on that corner?
“Win.”
Carolyn’s lips had barely moved, and what came from them was more a sigh than a word. Still, Pamela knew she had heard it accurately.
She bent over the bed, putting her lips to Carolyn’s ear. “Babe, listen to me. I think you said ‘Win.’ Is that a name? If that’s what you mean, squeeze my hand.”
She was sure she felt a hint of pressure.
“Pam, is she waking up?”
Justin was there, looking somewhat disheveled, his face flushed and strained, as though he had been running. Pamela did not want to tell him what she thought Carolyn had said. “Get the nurse, Justin. I think she’s trying to talk.”
“Win!”
This time the word was clear, unequivocal, and the tone was imploring.
Justin Wells bent over his wife’s bed. “Carolyn, I’m not going to let anyone else have you. I’ll make it up to you. Please, I’ll get help. I promised last time that I would, and I didn’t, but this time I will. I promise. I promise. Just please, please come back to me.”
47
Although Emily Chandler had maintained her membership in the Westchester Country Club after the divorce, she did not go there very often for fear of running into her successor, Binky. But since she loved golf, and Binky wasn’t a golfer, the only real area of concern was a chance encounter in the clubhouse. And because she did enjoy meeting her friends for lunch there occasionally, Emily had figured a way to avoid any unpleasant meetings.
She would call the maître d’, ask if the Trophy Wife was expected, and if he said she wasn’t, then Emily would make a reservation.
That was how it worked out on Wednesday, and as a result, she and Nan Lake, a longtime pal—whose husband, Dan, regularly played golf with Charles—were meeting for lunch.
Emily had dressed with special care for the meeting. Always in the back of her mind there lurked the possibility that Charley might just happen to be there as well. Today she had chosen a Féraud pant suit in a tiny blue-and-white check that she knew suited her ash blond hair. Earlier, while looking in the mirror for a final check, she had thought of the many times people expressed surprise that she was Dee’s mother.
“You look like sisters!” they would exclaim, which made her very proud, though she knew they were exaggerating.
Emily also knew it was time to put the divorce behind her, time to get on with her life. In many ways she had succeeded in overcoming the initial outrage and bitterness she had felt over what she still considered to be Charley’s betrayal. But even after four years, some nights she still woke up and lay sleepless for hours, not angry but infinitely sad, remembering that for a very long time she and Charley had been happy together—genuinely happy.
We had fun, she thought, as she prepared to leave for the club. She turned on the alarm system of the town house she had bought after the breakup. Every step of the way, we had fun. Charley and I were i
n love. We did things together. It wasn’t as though I let myself fall apart; I’ve kept my body in good shape. Emily got into her car. For God’s sake, she asked herself, what made him change overnight; what made him just throw away our life together?
The sense of desertion was so great that she knew, even though she found it almost impossible to admit to herself, that it would have been easier if Charley-Charles had died instead of just leaving her. But hard to admit or not, it was a fact, and she knew Susan suspected and probably understood.
She didn’t know what she would have done without Susan. She had been there for her from the first day, when Emily had really doubted that she could go on. It had been a long process, but now she felt she was almost able to make it on her own.
She had followed Susan’s advice to make a list of the activities in which she always had intended to become involved—and then to do something about it. As a result she was now an active volunteer with the hospital auxiliary, and this year was chairing its annual fund-raiser. Last year she had been an active campaigner for the governor’s reelection.
One other activity she had undertaken she had kept to herself, not even telling Susan, perhaps because it was the most important thing she ever had done. She had started volunteering at a hospital for chronically ill children.
She found it a truly rewarding experience, and it helped her to put things into perspective. It reminded her of the old saying, which was so very true: You feel sorry for the man who has no shoes until you meet one who has no feet. After those mornings at the hospital, she returned home and reminded herself to count her blessings each and every day.
She arrived at the club before Nan and went directly to the table. She had been feeling guilty ever since Sunday, the fortieth anniversary of her marriage to Charley. She had been so down and depressed—and also so self-indulgent. She knew she had upset Susan with her tearful outburst on Saturday, and then Dee had made it worse by lacing into Susan, saying she didn’t understand what it was to lose someone.