Эд Макбейн - Snow White and Rose Red

Someone had killed her, that was for sure. Whether that someone had been Sarah Whittaker was quite another matter. And yet she had hit Christine Seifert hard enough to put her in the intensive-care unit.

“You do her a great disservice by supporting the delusion that she is sane,” Pearson had told me. “You are helping her to destroy herself.”

I sat looking bleakly at the file.

Bloom was watching me.

“Matthew,” he said, “why don’t you go home? There’s nothing you can do here till we find her.”

I nodded.

“Matthew?”

“Yes, Morrie.”

“Go home, okay? I’ll let you know.”

I kept wondering where Sarah was.

What she was doing.

Was she out there in the darkness of the bird sanctuary someplace, a nighttime wilderness as tangled as her mind was supposed to be?

I shouldn’t have been drinking, but I was.

I kept going over it again and again.

Sipped at my second martini and tried to remember every word she’d ever said to me, every gesture, tried to decipher every nuance of meaning.

I still could not believe she was crazy.

But she had hit Christine Seifert with the stiletto-tipped heel of her sandal.

Could have killed her.

If she was not crazy, why would she have done that? We were on the way to Southern Medical. A team of unprejudiced doctors there would have examined her and...

Perhaps supported the findings of all the other doctors.

I sighed heavily.

I remembered her urgent request for a male attendant to accompany us. Had she been planning on flight all along? She’d known the location of the Mobil Station on Xavier and Taylor. Not far from the bird sanctuary, in fact. Had she been there before? Had she calculated that a man couldn’t possibly go into the ladies’ room with her? “Jake doesn’t watch me while I sit on the toilet.” But wouldn’t even a man have walked her as far as the restroom door? Waited outside for her? Or was there a window in the ladies’ room? Had she planned on making her escape through a window? If such a window existed? Go into the restroom, the male attendant waiting outside, climb out through the window, and run off into the thicket. Forced to change her plan, though, when Knott’s insisted that Christine come along. Picked a shoe with a stiletto heel, not entirely suitable for a meeting with the men who would rule on her sanity, but a deadly weapon in the hand of a desperate woman. Clobbered Christine, left her lying on the floor — God, had she killed Tracy Kilbourne and thrown her into the Sawgrass River?

The telephone rang.

Bloom.

They had found her.

I went into the kitchen and snatched the receiver from the wall phone.

“Hello?” I said.

“Dad?”

“Hello, honey, how are you?”

“Okay,” Joanna said. “I guess.”

“What are you doing?”

“Watching television. Mom went to dinner with Oscar the Bald.”

“Anything good on?”

“Is there ever?” She hesitated. “Dad,” she said, “what’d you find out?”

“About what, honey?”

“About... you know... the school.”

“Oh yeah, right,” I said.

“I won’t have to go away, will I, Dad?”

Dr. Pearson had mentioned that I was doing Sarah a great disservice by supporting her delusion. Should I now support Joanna’s hope that she would not be sent away to school in the fall? Should I become the White Knight she desperately wished I could be?

“Dad?” she said. “Did you work it out?”

She was fourteen years old.

I took a deep breath.

“Honey,” I said, “I’ll talk to your mother, of course, but—”

“I thought you might have talked to her already.”

“I did. And both Frank and I went over the separation agreement...”

“Well, what do you mean, ‘talk’ to her, then?”

“Talk to her again . But, honey, if she’s intent on sending you away—”

“Don’t say it, Dad.”

“Joanna... there’s nothing on earth I can do to stop her.”

“Aw shit , Dad!” she said, and hung up.

I looked at the telephone receiver. I sighed heavily. I debated calling her back, but instead I put the receiver back on the cradle and went out into the living room again. I turned on the pool lights. Outside, a mild breeze rattled the palms. I felt lonelier than I ever had in my life.

I thought about Sarah again, out there someplace.

“How old is Joanna?”

“Fourteen.”

“Oh my. Almost a woman.”

“Almost.”

“What color hair does she have?”

“Would you mind telling me what this fascination with hair is?”

“Well, your wife Susan had brown hair...”

“Still does.”

“And your girlfriend Aggie had black hair...”

“Yes?”

“So what color hair does your daughter have?”

“Blonde.”

“Ah. Like me.”

“Yes.”

“Is she pretty?”

“I think she’s beautiful.”

“Do you think I’m beautiful?”

“I think you’re very beautiful.”

“Am I more beautiful than Joanna?”

“You’re both very beautiful.”

“Who else do I have to worry about?”

“You don’t have to worry about anyone.”

“Not even Joanna?”

“Of course not. I want you to meet her one day. Once this is all over with...”

“Oh, I’d love to meet her!”

I remembered her kiss.

Fierce... urgent... angry... passionate.

“You’d better be true to me, Matthew.”

The telephone rang again.

I carried my martini glass into the kitchen and picked up the receiver.

Joanna was sobbing.

“How can you do this to me?” she said.

“Honey, if there were any way in the world—”

“Why’d you sign something that gave Mom the right to—”

“Now you sound like Frank,” I said.

“This isn’t funny , Dad!” Joanna warned.

“I know it isn’t. But, sweetie—”

“Yeah, sweetie, sure,” Joanna said, sobbing.

“I’ll talk to her again, I really will. I’m sure she doesn’t want you going that far away, either.”

“You’re both trying to get rid of me, is what it is,” Joanna said.

“Honey, we both love you to death.”

“I’ll bet,” she said.

“We’ll talk it over,” I said. “We’ll try to work something out.”

“Uh-huh.”

“We will, darling.”

“You promise you’ll work something out?”

“No, I can’t promise that, Joanna. But I promise I’ll do my best.”

“Okay,” she said, and sighed.

But she had stopped sobbing.

“You all right now?” I asked.

“I suppose.” She was silent for a moment. Then she said, “I hate Oscar the Bald. Do you think that’s why Mom wants me to go away to Massachusetts? So she can be alone with him?”

“Honey,” I said, “would you want to be alone with Oscar the Bald?”

Joanna burst out laughing.

“I’ll talk to her, okay?” I said.

“Okay,” she said. “Thanks, Dad, I love you a lot.”

“I love you, too,” I said.

“G’night,” she said, and hung up.

I went back into the living room. I sat in one of the easy chairs facing the pool, and drained my martini glass. I debated mixing another one. I decided against it. I wished with all my heart that Joanna could be here with me tonight — but of course I had signed that goddamned settlement agreement.