But instead of phoning her back, I grabbed the money from behind the bar and I left the house.
The night was clear enough so the stars were out — what few of them could be seen within the city limits — but as soon as I crossed the patio, the automatic lights lit up and doused them. On a hunch, I stopped walking and held still a moment. The lights clicked off, and then, sure enough, the sky did its color-change trick. Loom! it went, and that transparent midnight blue swung into focus. Of course, it lasted no longer than a second. After that, the blue started seeming ordinary again, and I continued on toward the truck.
I drove to Sophia’s, parked in front of her house, and looked around for suspicious strangers before I got out. (The money made an obvious bulge in the right-hand side of my jacket.) Then I climbed her front steps and rang her doorbell.
An immediate, perfect silence fell. You know how sometimes your ear does something funny and there’s an instant when the sound goes off? That’s the kind of silence. Noises I hadn’t even been aware of — mechanical hums and creaks, a murmur behind the curtains — suddenly stopped. And nobody came to the door.
I rang again. Cars hissed down the street behind me, and a faraway train whistle blew, but the house went on giving off its numb, dead silence.
If there had been a mail slot, I’d have slipped the money through it. What she had, though, was one of those black metal postboxes, the kind that doesn’t lock, and I wasn’t such a fool as to entrust her money to that. So I stood there awhile longer, and then I turned and left.
Probably she was watching me as I walked back to the street. She was peering out from behind her curtains to make sure I left. I felt self-conscious and stiff. I made a point of adding a carefree bounce to my step. Even after I reached the truck — after I was home again, parking in the Hardestys’ driveway — I had a spied-upon feeling. When the automatic lights came on, I ducked my head. I scurried across the patio with my shoulders hunched, like a suspect on the evening news.
Okay, so she was mad at me. She was planning to make this difficult. But the nice thing about fussy people is, they have their little routines. You always know where you can find them, and when, if you want to track them down.
15
AT 9:58 the next morning, she was sitting on a bench at the far end of Penn Station, gazing straight ahead. I know she saw me coming. But I couldn’t read her expression until I got closer. (I was traveling through squares of sunlight; she was hardly more than a silhouette.) I arrived in front of her and stood there. She raised her chin. Her eyes were swimming in tears.
She said, “You hung up on me, Barnaby.”
“I apologize for that,” I told her.
A woman sharing the bench glanced over at us curiously. I sat down between her and Sophia, blocking the woman’s view. “I don’t know what got into me,” I said.
“Nobody’s ever hung up on me. Ever!”
I reached into my jacket and drew out the money, which I’d transferred to a plain white envelope for privacy’s sake. (I’d thought of every possible scenario — even put a note inside, in case she refused to speak to me.) “Sophia,” I said, and I cleared my throat, preparing to make my announcement.
But Sophia went right on. “I simply wasn’t raised that way,” she told me. “I’m sorry, but that’s how I am. I was raised to be respected and treated with consideration. I was taught that I was a special, valuable person; not the kind that someone could hang up on.”
I said, “See, it was only that I felt … interrogated, you know? On account of the tone of voice you used.”
“Why wouldn’t I interrogate you? You walked into my aunt’s private home without her permission! Naturally I would wonder what you were doing there.”
“Well, I should think it was obvious what I was doing there. I wanted to get your money back.”
“Did I ask you to get my money back? Did I request your assistance? I tell you this much, Barnaby: I’d have thrown that money in your face if you brought it back!”
Then she glanced at my envelope. She said, “Is that what this is?” in a piercing, carrying tone that made me slide my eyes toward the other passengers. “Is that what you came to try and give me?”
I said, “Sofe—”
“Because I’m not accepting it, Barnaby. You’d have to ram it down my throat before I’d accept it.”
This was a temptation, but I decided on a different tactic. I said, “No, no, no. Good grief, no! It’s … something for Opal.”
“Opal?”
“Her, um, Christmas present. I need for you to take it to her.”
“Opal’s Christmas present is in this envelope?”
“Take it, will you? Take it,” I said, and I held it out to her. Right then it mattered more than anything that I get rid of it; I didn’t care how. When she unclasped her hands, finally, and allowed me to lay the envelope on her palm, I felt a kind of lightness expanding inside my chest. I imagined I had been freed of an actual weight.
“You’re asking me to carry this to Opal’s apartment?” Sophia said, and she raised her eyes to look into mine.
“Well,” I said, “or else … no.” (I could see how that might get complicated.) “No, I want you to give it to Natalie at the train station.”
“Natalie?”
“She knows you’re coming. She’ll meet you there.”
Sophia blinked.
“She’ll be … yes! At the Information island,” I said. And then something about how this situation rhymed, so to speak, made me laugh. I said, “I can assure you it’s not contraband.”
A confused, slightly startled expression crossed her face, as if some string had been tugged in her memory, but she went on looking into my eyes.
“Goodbye,” I said, rising.
“Wait! Barnaby? You’re leaving?”
“Yes, I promised I’d help pack up Mrs. Alford’s house today. Oh. Incidentally,” I said. (My mind was racing now.) “If you and Natalie happen to miss connections, I did put her telephone number in the envelope. Just get it out and call her. But you shouldn’t have any trouble.”
She nodded, with her lips slightly parted. I turned and walked away.
Spink and Kunkle, Plumbing Specialists, the man’s card read. “Our Name Says It AH.”
“Your name says it all?” I asked.
“Sure does,” he said. A freckled man with reddish, fizzing hair.
“ ‘Spink and Kunkle’ says it all?”
“ ‘Plumbing Specialists’ says it all,” he told me irritably.
“Oh.”
“I’m supposed to fix a leak in the master bath.”
“Right.” I handed back his card, and then I turned from the door and called, “Hello?” (I had no idea how to address Mrs. Alford’s daughter, never having heard her last name.) “Plumber’s here!” I called.
“Oh, good.” She came galumphing down the stairs. Dressed for manual labor, Valerie was gawkier than ever. She wore huge white canvas gloves that made her look like Minnie Mouse. “Thanks for stopping by on such short notice,” she told the man. “We’re trying to get the house ready to sell, and you know how a minor thing like a drip will scare some people away.”
“Ma’am,” the man said heavily, “no drip on God’s green earth is minor. Believe me.” He was following her up the stairs, carrying what seemed to be a doctor’s bag. “If you was to put a measuring cup under that drip,” he said, “you would be scandalized. Scandalized! To see how much water you’re wasting.”
“Well, this house belonged to my mother, you see, and somehow she never …”
I went back to the kitchen, where I was packing the pots and pans. Martine was doing utensils. Supposedly, we’d be finished by the end of the day, but that was just not going to happen. Valerie had already asked if we could return tomorrow. I said, “Tomorrow? Tomorrow’s Sunday.”