Jonathan Kellerman - The Web

We went downstairs again. The house was a scramble of streaks and shadows, hidden angles and blind corners, ripe with charged air.

We passed through the front room and the dining room. The library door was closed but unlocked.

Once inside, I turned on a crystal lamp. Dim light; the salmon moiré walls looked brown, the dark furniture muddy. Very few books. Maybe a hundred volumes housed in the pair of cases.

Unlike the big library, this one was alphabetized: fiction to the left, nonfiction to the right, the former mostly Reader's Digest condensed editions of best-sellers, the latter art books and biographies.

I found the Disraeli quickly: an old British edition of a novel called Tancred. Inside was a rose-pink, lace-edged bookplate that said EX LIBRIS: Barbara Steehoven Moreland. The name inscribed in a calligraphic hand, much more elegant than Moreland's.

I turned hurriedly to page 184.

No distinguishing marks or messages.

Nothing noteworthy about line eighteen or word eighteen or letter eighteen.

Nothing noteworthy about anything in the book.

I read the page again, then a third time, handed it to Robin.

She scanned it and gave it back. "So maybe 'DISR' stands for something else. Could it be something medical?"

Shrugging, I flipped through the book again. No inscriptions anywhere. The pages were yellowed but crisp at the edges, as if never handled.

I put it back, pulled out another volume at random. Gone with the Wind. Then Forever Amber. A couple of Irving Wallaces. All with Barbara Moreland's bookplate.

"Her room," said Robin. "So he probably thinks of the big one as his. Leaving something there makes more sense- it's right behind your office. Maybe he pulled something out and left it for you."

"This isn't exactly strolling weather."

She wagged a finger at me. "And someone forgot to bring his rain slicker!"

"Unlike the always-prepared Dr. Picker. Wonder if she packed her little gun under that giant condom. I should have insisted on going with her and Pam. Maybe I should go over to the bug zoo and see what the two of them are up to."

"No," she said. "If Jo is armed, I don't want you out there in the dark. What if she mistakes you for an intruder?"

"Or pretends to."

"You really suspect her?"

"At the very least she's working for Stasher-Layman."

She frowned. "And Pam's out there with her- let's go see if Bill left anything for you."

"Two targets in the dark? Forget it." I buttoned my shirt at the neck and raised the collar. "You go back and lock yourself in the room, and I'll dash over. I'll circle around from the back and avoid the bug house."

She grabbed my arm. "No way are you leaving me alone. Waiting for you to return will drive me batty."

"I'll be quick. If I don't find anything in ten minutes, I'll forget about it."

"No."

"You'll get drenched."

"We'll get drenched together."

"Let's just forget the whole thing, Rob. If Moreland wanted to send a message, he should have used Western Union."

"Alex, please. You know if I wasn't here, you'd be running to that bungalow."

"I don't know that at all."

"Come on."

"The point is you are here. Let me go in and out or forget about it, Nancy."

"Please, Alex. What if he's in danger and our not helping leads to tragedy?"

"There's already been plenty of tragedy, and what can Disraeli have to do with helping him?"

"I don't know. But like you said, he's got reasons for everything. He may play games, but they're serious ones. Come on, let's make a quick run for it."

"You'll catch a cold, young lady."

"On the contrary. It's a warm rain- think of it as showering together. You always like that."

We were soaked immediately. I held her arm, and rain-blinded and slick-footed, concentrated on staying on the paths.

No worries about the gravel-crunch; the downpour blocked it out.

Vertical swimming; new Olympic event.

The downpour felt oily as it rolled off our skin.

Slow going till I spotted the yellow light over my office door. I stopped, looked around. No one in sight, but an army could have been hiding, and I knew if Moreland was out there it would be nearly impossible to find him before morning.

I glanced toward the insectarium. Lights still off. Pam and Jo hadn't gotten in.

The rain chopped our necks and our backs. Deep-tissue massage. I tapped Robin's shoulder and the two of us made a dash for the bungalow. The door was unlocked, as I'd left it. I got Robin inside, then myself, and flipped on the weakest light in the room- a glass-shaded desk lamp.

Water flooded the hardwood floor. Our clothes clung like leotards and we sounded like squeegees when we moved.

Books and journals on my desk.

Piles of them that hadn't been there this afternoon.

Medical texts. But nothing by or about Disraeli.

No references beginning "DISR."

Then I found it, hefty and blue, on the bottom of the stack.

The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations.

I flipped to page 184. Samples of the wisdom of Benjamin Disraeli.

Line 18:

Justice is truth in action.

All that for this? The crazy old bastard.

Robin read the quote out loud.

I tried to recall the Auden quote … naked justice, justice is truth.

Wanting me to do something to ensure justice?

But what?

Suddenly I felt tired and useless. Dropping a sodden sleeve onto the desk, I started to close the book, then noticed a tiny handwritten arrow on the bottom of page 185.

Pointing to the right.

Instruction to turn the page?

I did.

A notation in Moreland's handwriting parallel to the spine. I rotated the book:

214: 2

That turned out to be the wisdom of Gustave Flaubert.

Two quotations.

One about growing beards, the other demeaning the value of books.

More games… Moreland had been reading Flaubert the day he'd shown me the office. L'Éducation sentimentale. In the original French. Sorry, Dr. Bill, I took Latin in high school… tapping the book, I felt something hard under the righthand leaf.

Ten pages down. Wedged into the spine and taped to the paper.

A key. Brass, shiny new.

I removed it. Underneath was another handwritten inscription, the letters so tiny I could barely make them out:

Thank you for persisting.

Gustave's girl will be assisting.

"Gustave's girl?" said Robin.

"Gustave Flaubert," I said. "The girl who comes to my mind is Madame Bovary. I told Bill I'd read the book years ago."

"Meaning what?"

I thought, "Madame Bovary was married to a doctor, got bored, had affairs, ruined her life, ate poison, and died."

"A doctor's wife? Barbara? Is he trying to tell us she committed suicide?"

"He told me she drowned, but maybe. But why bring that up now?"

"Could that be what he feels guilty about?"

"Sure, but it still doesn't make sense, making such a big deal about that now."

I tried to reel the book's plot through my mind.

Then the truth came at me nastily and unexpectedly, like a drunk driver.

"No, not his wife," I said. Dropping the key in a wet pocket, I shut the book.

Stomach turning.

"What is it, Alex?"

"Another Emma," I said, "is going to help us. A girl with eight legs."

"Something hidden near her cage?" said Robin. "Or in it?"

"He may have hidden it in the bug zoo to keep it from Jo. She claimed to be queasy about bugs, and this afternoon I told him my suspicions of her."

"She's there right now."

"Holding the ladder for Pam. Be interesting to see if she actually goes in."