He left the office just before four o'clock and took a cab to the network. He flashed a security badge and a police pass downstairs, both of which had been hard-earned and almost impossible to come by, and the network security were satisfied and instantly let him into the inner sanctum.
He took the elevator upstairs, and waited inconspicuously in the reception area. He picked up a phone there and dialed her extension, and her secretary told him she was in a meeting.
“In her office, or upstairs?” He sounded like someone who knew and the secretary was quick to give him the information.
“She's here. She's with Mr. Baker.”
“Any idea what time she'll be through?”
“She said she's leaving at five-thirty.”
“Thanks.” Chapman hung up the house phone and the secretary had no idea who had phoned, but she assumed that it was someone who knew Hilary, obviously someone higher up at the network.
She came out at exactly five-fifteen, and John recognized her at once, even without the receptionist's good night as she sped past. “Good night, Miss Walker.” Hilary turned to glance at her sharply and then nodded, she didn't seem to notice anyone else in the waiting area, or John as he followed her to the bank of elevators and stepped into one beside her. He almost felt weak at the sight of her, he could see every strand of the shining black hair twisted into a knot, the graceful hands, the long neck, he could even smell the crisp scent of her perfume. She walked with a sure step, a long stride, and when he bumped into her once, she looked up at him with green eyes that pierced straight to his soul, eyes that said don't touch me, don't even come near me. She got on a bus on Madison Avenue, instead of fighting for a cab, and she got out at Seventy-ninth Street. She walked two blocks farther north, and then he realized she was going to a doctor's appointment. He waited patiently outside, and then followed her again when she took a cab and went to Elaine's where she met another woman. He sat in a booth close to theirs, and was intrigued by what might be said. The other woman was a well-known anchor from the network, and she looked upset. She started to cry once, and Hilary looked unmoved. She watched her, unhappy, but not sympathetic. And then finally John remembered as the two women shook hands outside the restaurant, that the woman who was the anchor had been fired when he was in Paris. It had created an enormous stir, and she was either pleading with Hilary for her job, or telling her side of the story. Her firing had supposedly come from higher up, but maybe she thought if she could gain Hilary's ear, she might get back in. But it was obvious from the unhappy look on Hilary's face as she walked slowly downtown alone, that she couldn't help her. She stopped to glance in shop windows once or twice, and walked with a purposeful stride, yet a feminine sway to her hips, which kept him riveted as he watched her. She turned on Seventy-second Street finally and walked all the way to the river, to an old brownstone set near a tiny park. It was a pretty place, yet everything he sensed about her told him she was lonely. She had a solitary air, and a kind of hardness and determination about her that suggested walls she had built long before and never taken down since. As he had when he read her file, he felt intensely sorry for her, and he felt sad as he walked the few blocks back to his own apartment. She lived so nearby, yet she seemed to exist in a universe of her own, a universe filled with work and little else, and yet it was not fair for him to make that judgment. Maybe she was happy after all, maybe she had a boyfriend she was deeply in love with, but everything about her present and her past suggested a solitary person with no one to love and no one who loved her. And when he walked into his apartment and turned on the light, he had an overwhelming urge to call her, to hold out a hand, to become her friend, to tell her that Alexandra still cared … all was not lost … yet … or maybe she wouldn't care. As he had explained to Eloise at lunch, he felt as though he were being haunted.
He tried to get some sleep, but he tossed and turned, and finally, for lack of something better to do, he turned on the light and called Sasha in Denver. She was in her room, she had just gotten in from the concert hall and her feet were killing her.
“I'm glad nothing's changed.” He laughed as he lay on his back, thinking of her. He wondered if he'd been too hard on her when he talked about her at lunch. She still excited him in some ways, and that night he missed her. “Want to meet me in San Francisco?”
“When?” she sounded noncommittal.
“I'm going tomorrow. I should be through in a couple of days. When do you finish in Denver?”
“Tomorrow. We go to Los Angeles. San Francisco canceled.”
“I'll meet you in L.A.”
“I don't think you should.” There was a long silence, and he frowned.
“What's up?”
“It might upset some of the other dancers,” she said vaguely and he sat up slowly in bed. He was no fool, and he had played this game before. But it was not a game he liked playing.
“Would it upset anyone in particular, Sasha?”
“Oh I don't know. It's too late to talk about it tonight.” And as she said it, he heard a male voice in the background.
“Is that Dominique, or Pierre, or Petrov?”
“It's Ivan,” she said petulantly. “He pulled a hamstring tonight, and he was very upset.”
“Tell him I'm sorry. But tell him after you explain to me what the hell's going on. Sash, I'm too old for this kind of bullshit.”
“You don't understand the pressures of being a dancer,” she whined into the phone, and he sank back against his pillows.
“Well, I've tried for chrissake. What is it that I don't understand exactly?”
“Dancers need other dancers.”
“Ah … now we get to the root of the problem. You mean like Ivan?”
“No, no … well … yes … but it's not what you think.”
“How the hell do you know what I think, Sasha? You're so busy worrying about yourself and your feet and your ass and your tendons you wouldn't notice what anyone thought if they wrote it out in neon.”
“That's not fair!” She was suddenly crying, and for the first time in months he found he didn't care. Suddenly, in the space of one phone call, it was over. He had had it.
“It may not be fair, baby,” he spoke in his deep, gentle voice, “but it happens to be true. I think maybe you and I had better take our bows, and step back gracefully while the curtain comes down. If I read the program correctly, the fourth act just ended.”
“Why don't we talk when I get back?”
“About what? Your feet … or about how dancers need other dancers? I'm not a dancer, Sash. I'm a man. I have a very demanding job, I have a full life I want to share with a woman I love and who loves me. I even want to have children. Can you see yourself doing that?”
“No.” At least she was honest. The thought of it horrified her. She had no intention of giving up dancing for a year at any point in her life, and then fighting to get back all her muscles. “Why is that so important?”
“Because it just is, and I'm forty-two years old. I can't waste my time with games like this anymore. I gave to the artistic community once. I made my contribution. Now I want something different.”
“That's what I mean … you don't understand the pressures of being a dancer. John, babies aren't important.”
“They are to me, little one. And so are a lot of other things you don't have room for. You don't need me. You don't need anyone. Be honest with yourself.” There was a long empty silence as she listened, and suddenly he wanted to get off the phone. There was nothing left to say. They had said it all, and run out of words a long time since. They just hadn't noticed. “Good-bye, Sash … take it easy. I'll see you when you get back. Maybe well have lunch or a drink.” He knew she'd want the things she'd left in his apartment, but the truth was that he wasn't even anxious to see her.