Laura Lippman - Another Thing to Fall

“To throw some movie dialogue back at you – who would admit to being that?”

He continued to drum the table, but with less hostility. “Don’t tell me, don’t tell me, don’t tell me – The Untouchables . Sean Connery to Kevin Costner, when he says he’s an ATF guy. You didn’t get it word for word, though.”

Tess nodded. “We watched it recently. Part of Lloyd’s continuing education, although I’m not sure De Palma is the best influence on a kid we’re trying to keep on the straight and narrow.”

“I like Lloyd,” Ben said. He seemed vaguely surprised by the concept. “I’ll help him, anyway I can. He really should be working with Lottie – he’s clearly got more aptitude for the visuals than the words – but if I make that suggestion, she’ll shoot it down as if it were skeet. So I’m going to plant that idea in Flip’s head. Lloyd should be a P.A., work his way up on the production side of things, where his lack of a formal education won’t matter as much. Television and film are still democratic that way. If you can do the job, no one cares about your degree or pedigree. I knew a kid, started as a P.A. in high school, and he’s directing episodes of network television now. Ditto, if you can’t do the job – a big-deal degree is worthless.”

For a moment, Tess almost liked Ben Marcus. But then she registered that was exactly what he wanted. That he had, in fact, fastened on the topic of Lloyd’s future to divert her from something he didn’t want to discuss. Selene, Greer, Flip? It was like the childhood game of hot and cold, and Tess had been very hot there for a second, or at least warm. Now under the table Ben’s feet were still, his hands calm.

“Ben?”

“Yes?”

“Last night, after we spoke, Selene and I had a little chat. She told me her relationship with you began three weeks ago.”

“Give or take. I didn’t write it down in my diary, draw a big heart around the day, but, yeah, give or take, that’s when it started.”

“Greer was already working as Flip’s assistant by then.”

He was a bright guy. He didn’t need for Tess to connect the dots for him, to point out that this meant much of what he said was bogus. He was so bright that, when caught in a lie, he didn’t rush in with more words, or try to explain himself.

“That sounds right,” he said. “You know what, you’re good at continuity issues. You’d be a good script supervisor, if you put your mind to it. See, that’s what I do – I help people. I’m lovable that way, but I wouldn’t want it getting around.”

He grabbed his cup, rising to his feet so quickly that the small table rocked and Tess had to rescue her own cup of coffee before it toppled. “See you around, Sam Spade. Don’t take any wooden nickels.”

As she left Starbucks, Tess once again had the sensation that an overstuffed sofa was following her down the sidewalk. Yes, there was Mrs. Blossom, trying to be inconspicuous on the south side of Baltimore Street. Tess couldn’t fault her clothing – a large, flowery dress was not particularly out of place in downtown Baltimore – but there was something about Mrs. Blossom that drew the eye, a delicacy of movement, not unlike the tutu’ed hippos in Fantasia . Caught, she gave a cheerful wave, and dashed across the street to join Tess. For a large woman, she moved pretty fast.

“You only had to do the surveillance exercise once, Mrs. Blossom,” Tess said.

“But I keep getting caught,” she panted out, a little breathless from her sprint through traffic. “Except the other night, but I lost you for part of the evening, so I didn’t think I should count that.”

“The other night?”

“Yes, when you were with Selene Waites. And then you came out of the bar with Derek Nichole. I like him.” She frowned. “Well, I liked him better, before he started doing movies with so much cursing. I don’t like cursing.”

“You – you followed me to New York?” Tess had been trying to do a walk-and-talk, hurrying toward her car – and a meter that was due to expire any moment – but this conversation was worth slowing down for, even if it meant a twenty-seven-dollar parking fine. “All the way in?”

“Yes, although it seemed kind of cheating because you weren’t driving, so you wouldn’t have been as alert. I didn’t go into the restaurant-”

Tess made a conscious effort not to smile at the thought of Mrs. Blossom trying to make her way into that achingly hip eatery. That would have been something to see. Then again, they might have mistaken her for the latest drag queen to play Edna Turnblad in Broadway’s version of Hairspray and welcomed her as a star.

“And, you know, it’s so hard to park in New York, I just kept circling. I know that’s not a good technique – and if you had been in there a long time, I could have run out of gas – but I decided to commit, like you told me. I got lucky, too. I had just turned on the block when I saw you come out.”

“Did you pay attention to the time? Did you see him pick me up?”

Mrs. Blossom fished through her purse, a bright purple bag the size of a small suitcase, and pulled out a memo pad. “It was about eleven-thirty when you went in, ten to midnight when you came out.” She looked up from the pad, her eyes sorrowful. “Miss Monaghan, you looked like you’d been drinking . That doesn’t seem very professional.” Mrs. Blossom consulted her memo pad again, all Joe Friday just-the-facts seriousness. “At twelve-ten A.M. – should I use military time?”

“No, you can use A.M. and P.M.” Tess didn’t want to bother with the math.

“At twelve-ten A.M., the Town Car arrived at a hotel.”

“Name of the hotel?”

“The SoHo Grand.”

That was the hotel where Selene had been seen drinking later, where Derek Nichole was staying.

“I found a parking place around the corner and went into the bar, off the hotel lobby. It was tricky, because the lobby is on the second floor, and I couldn’t be sure I would see you coming and going, but I figured if I sat next to the window, I’d be able to see you leave. I went up there and had a nonalcoholic beer. It cost ten dollars! And they were so rude, made me wait forever, and it was loud . I don’t know why people go to places like that. But I could see the lobby from where I sat, and pretty soon, Derek Nichole and Selene Waites showed up, and they were given one of the sofas, although the table said it was ‘reserved.’ She’s so pretty in person. And little. Is she as sweet as she looks?”

“Hmmmmm,” Tess said, trying to be diplomatic. “What did they do?”

“They came in and ordered drinks – a beer for him, a cocktail for her, although she kept drinking cranberry juice – and they were talking very low to each other, kind of serious. I tried to hear what they were saying, but I wasn’t close enough. And then the bar closed, so I went outside and got in my car, and waited until I saw the Town Car come back. That was about four A.M., and this time, it was Mr. Nichole who brought you out.”

It was oddly embarrassing to think about Mrs. Blossom watching her drugged body being hauled around New York like a sack of potatoes. True, it wasn’t her fault that she had been dosed with roofies – or ketamine or GBH – but it was still humiliating. Where had she been during the interval, in Derek Nichole’s hotel room? If the two had wanted privacy, hadn’t that put a crimp in their plans? Was Selene that desperate to drink that she had to knock Tess out in order to party hearty? Nothing really added up. She thought about the multiple gossip items, her text messages to Ben – what was Selene doing?