25
It was a clear, warm morning in Minneapolis. Jane waited until she judged that most of the people in Christine's apartment complex were up and off to work. She performed a drive around Christine's neighborhood, searching for signs of watchers. There were no men sitting in vehicles parked where they could watch Christine's apartment, no windows in nearby apartments with curtains hung too low so an eye or a lens could peer out above them. Jane drove through a second time and looked in all directions, not trying to detect anything specific, just looking at everything and being open to the possibility that she would see something unusual. There were more cars parked in the complex than there had been in June, because the students had returned from summer break.
She found a parking space on the street, half-opened the tailgate of her SUV, then changed her mind and closed it again. She would leave the suitcase in the back until she had spoken with Christine. She walked to the front door of Christine's building, carrying only her purse. She pushed the buzzer for number 4, Christine's apartment, and waited, then pushed it again. It was nearly nine, and she had assumed Christine would be awake. Maybe she had gone out already.
Jane walked to the driveway that led to the garage beneath the building. There was an iron gate across the entrance. Beyond it she could see there were sixteen spaces, two for each apartment. Seven had cars in them. She looked for the small gray Volkswagen Passat she had bought for Christine, but didn't see it.
Jane took out her new phone and pressed Christine's telephone number. The phone gave its ringing signal a few times and Christine's voice came on. "This is Linda Welles. Please leave a message at the tone." The cheerful, girlish voice didn't reassure Jane. She heard the tone and said, "It's me. I said I'd be back, and here I am. Here's my number." She recited it and closed the phone.
Jane went back to her car, drove up the street, and stopped at a hotel she had seen on the way into town. She checked in and went to her room. She showered, changed her clothes, went down to the hotel restaurant, and had breakfast. Then she called Linda Welles's number again, and heard the same message.
She went out to her car and drove back to the apartment complex. She walked to the front door again and buzzed Christine's apartment several times, but there was still no answer. She saw a small car coming up the main road of the complex. Its turn signal began to blink as the car approached Christine's building. Jane pivoted and went back down the steps as the car stopped in the driveway. The woman in the car looked young, only a couple of years older than Christine, with wavy red hair. She appeared not to notice Jane as she pressed her remote control and the iron gate across the entrance swung upward. The woman drove in and turned to the right, and Jane cut across the flower bed and sidestepped into the garage just before the iron gate came down again.
Jane stopped beside the nearest car and sat down on the pavement between its grille and the cinder-block wall. She listened as the woman who had driven in turned off her engine. That was reassuring to Jane. If the woman had seen her slip inside, she would have kept the car running, and probably driven out again. Jane waited and heard the door slam and echo in the enclosed space, then heard her high heels—pock, pock, pock—go to the door and into the building.
When Jane heard the door swing shut, she got up and moved to it. The door was steel, and it was locked. Jane reached into her purse and took out a bookmark made of thin, flexible plastic. She slid it into the crack between the door and the jamb, then moved it down to the metal guard beside the door handle that kept people from slipping credit cards into the space to open the door. She pushed the plastic a few times until it slid the lock's plunger out of the way. She tugged the door open, stepped into the stairway, and climbed up to the corridor. When she was at Christine's apartment, Jane used the plastic bookmark again, went inside, and closed the door.
Everything was wrong. The air smelled old, as though no window had been opened for a long time. Jane felt uneasy. She walked into the bedroom. The bed was made. Jane bent down and sniffed the pillowcase. There was a very faint perfumy scent from Christine's hair, but there was also a thin layer of dust.
Jane noticed a copy of Vogue by the lamp beside the bed. She stepped closer and glanced at the date: September. It was a month old, because Jane had noticed that the October magazines were already out. Under it was a copy of American Baby. There was no address sticker on the front of either magazine. Christine didn't subscribe, almost certainly because she was only here using the name Linda Welles for a few months. She had undoubtedly bought the magazines at a supermarket or drugstore, where the only issues for sale were the latest. Would she buy them and not get around to reading them for so long?
Jane went back through the living room and into the kitchen. She reached out to the refrigerator door. Before it was open an inch she knew. There was plenty of food—butter and eggs on the top shelf, squash, broccoli, asparagus, lettuce, tomatoes in the bottom drawer, a steak in its market package. Jane looked at the date on the open milk carton. The milk was about two weeks past its "sell-by" date. She looked at the steak. It was gray. The label's "sell-by" date was three weeks ago.
Jane closed the refrigerator, turned around in the kitchen, and studied the apartment in a new way. Now it was a place that Christine had abandoned or been taken from. Jane knelt on the floor and examined the tile from the side, then eyed the carpet in the living room. She didn't see any stains or streaks from a big cleanup. Nothing in the apartment seemed to have been broken, and she couldn't see large footprints on the carpet. Whatever had happened here had been quiet and neat.
She walked into the bathroom. The electric toothbrush was still plugged in, charging. The razors, lotions, makeup, bubble bath, shampoo, and conditioner were all still here. She looked closely at the bathtub. It was clean and dry.
As Jane went back into the bedroom, she checked the windows, looking for one that had an open or damaged latch, but she couldn't find one. She went to the closet. The clothes Christine had picked out at the mall were all hanging on their hangers. The apartment looked as though Christine had left it to go out on an errand. Jane entered the second bedroom. The baby things were all still there. She moved to the living room again, found the telephone book in a drawer beneath the phone, and looked up the number of the hospital where Christine had been planning to deliver. As she dialed the number, dozens of possibilities crowded one another in her mind. Christine could have been admitted early because of complications, and been lying in bed to avoid a miscarriage. She could already have had the baby prematurely, or be in labor right now. She could have been subject to paranoid fear, decided the apartment wasn't safe and checked into a hotel. Christine could have met new friends and been invited to stay with them. She could have fallen down and broken a leg.
"University Hospital."
"Hello," said Jane. "I'm calling to find out whether you've admitted my niece, Linda Welles, as a patient. That's W-e-l-l-e-s. She'd be in maternity, a patient of Dr. Molinari."
"One moment please. I'll check for you."
Jane waited, holding her breath. The woman's voice had sounded warm and motherly. Maybe that was a good omen.
"No. I don't see her here."
"Is it possible she's been admitted and already discharged? I've just arrived from out of town."