Love Walked In
THIRTY-FOUR
They stood staring at each other for some moments. They stood staring at each other for some moments. Vernon was afraid to move in case the image shattered. But no lightning spiked, no thunder boomed, and he moved so quickly toward her he could not remember crossing the room. The cold rain saturating her clothes became his cold rain.
“Nellie.” Arms around her, Vernon said it again.
As if in getting him wet, she realized she herself was soaking wet, she asked Vernon if there was anything around that she could wear. Her wet clothes had been discarded and she had wrapped herself up in Vernon’s bath-robe; Samantha, having returned with the food Vernon didn’t eat, had then been dispatched to buy Nell new clothes-jeans, shirt and wool jacket. And boots. Hers would never dry in time. “In time for what?” Nell asked.
“Dinner.”
In between the wet clothes and the dry ones, Nell told Vernon the story.
He listened for half an hour, interrupting the flow of her talk only once to get her a blanket because she had shivered. He kept clothes and blankets in his office because he sometimes slept there.
With the blanket tucked about her, she went on. “I should have run away after Valerie finally let me out of my room.”
“This is the Hobbs woman?”
Nell nodded. “I should have left them; I should have run.”
“Nell”-he put a hand on her arm-“forget ‘should.’ You did what you thought was right. That’s enough. Go on.”
She told him about the imprisoned mares. “It’s-I can’t think of any words to describe it. But I suppose just stating the facts describes it, doesn’t it?”
Vernon asked, “This guy who grabbed you in the barn that night-why did he? Do you know?”
Nell looked toward the window, thinking. She did not want to turn his attention to the man and the pitch-black room. She knew it would overwhelm the rest. “I don’t know, I honestly don’t. The first thing he did was to spray something in my eyes. I couldn’t see.”
“You couldn’t identify him, then?”
She shook her head. “I know he was short and wiry from having to sit in front of him. He could’ve been a jockey, for that matter. He was certainly a good rider. As far as I know, I didn’t see him again. I don’t think he was one of the men who worked for Valerie Hobbs.”
Vernon looked at her. “It was you,” said Vernon. “The anonymous tip to the police.”
“Yes. Who was that woman? I never saw her before.”
“Neither had anyone else. She was Dan Ryder’s wife. Widow, I mean. Police traced her back to Paris.”
“That’s-” She shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
“Neither do we. Arthur’d never seen her. Have you called him? Does he know you’re back? Does your father?”
“No. Not yet. Please don’t tell anyone.”
Her look was so beseeching he wouldn’t have told whatever she didn’t want told to whomever she didn’t want it told.
“Do you have any idea how much they… sorry.” He realized he’d be laying a guilt trip on her. “Of course you have.”
“It’ll only be another few days. We can get the mares out, can’t we?”
“One way or another. Yes, I can certainly try. Valerie Hobbs. That’s the owner, as far as you could tell?”
“I’m not sure; I think she was. There were a number of others, men. I didn’t get to talk much to them. I mean, they weren’t supposed to talk to me. One of them did; he was pretty nice. Bosworth.”
Vernon was up and pacing from sofa to window. The rain had stopped: the dome of St. Paul’s seemed to shine, rain washed or light washed.
Nell went on. “I don’t think this Valerie Hobbs was the-what do you call it?-instigator.”
He turned and smiled. “The perp? Perpetrator?”
“Yes. I think she was in someone else’s pay.”
“The bastard who grabbed you?”
She shook her head. The one who’d abducted her was not the one who’d paid repeated visits to her room in the night. “I never saw him again.”
Vernon sat down beside her. “Nell, can you think of any reason someone would think you’re a danger to them?”
“Not beyond his assuming I saw him-”
Samantha walked in with several Fortnum’s boxes. She set them beside Nell, saying, “It’s the only dependable place to shop.”
Nell thanked Samantha, thanked both of them, for going to all this trouble.
“Trouble?” said Vernon. “Is there a woman alive who’d rather type than shop? She enjoyed doing it.”
Samantha stuck out her tongue. She enjoyed doing that, too.
The boxes open, Nell pulled out a white silk shirt, Calvin Klein jeans, a blue and brown Harris tweed jacket and a black velvet skirt. Nell pronounced them all beautiful. “I’ll get dressed.”
“Good. We’ll go to dinner.”
Samantha asked, “Where, Aubergine? Did you make a reservation?”
“No, but I’ve got the maître d’ in a hedge fund that’s making him enough money he can retire. He’s thirty-one, so he’s pleased.” To Nell he said, “Had you planned on overnight digs? You can stay with me. I’ve got three bedrooms and I’m your stepbrother.” He smiled.
“Oh, my,” said Samantha. “I can see a clever defense attorney mounting that as an argument against the possibility of sexual misconduct.” She said to Nell, “Listen, don’t worry on that score. He’s about as romantic as a rise in interest rates.”
“You’d know, would you?”
Samantha laughed, said good night and headed for the door. Vernon watched her go, smiling. She really was worth her weight in gold securities.
THIRTY-FIVE
Vernon poured himself a finger of whiskey and went over to the mirror, waiting for Nell. In the time she’d been here, a gloomy afternoon had changed to an iridescent evening. The lights of streets and buildings and houses glittered; St. Paul’s dome was bathed in moonlight, and he wondered, How could a day that started as woefully as this one end up the way it had?
“Everything fits,” said Nell behind him, adjusting items that needed none, buttoning a button on the Harris tweed jacket and then unbuttoning it, the same with the white silk blouse. “Even the shoes.” She held up a foot. She smiled. Actually, she beamed.
To Vernon she looked not only happy but also gorgeous. “Perfect” was all he said.
“I’ll bet this is a good restaurant.”
“Would I take you anywhere else?”
“No. But there’s probably a dress code.” She looked unsophisticated and uncertain.
“They always hand me a tie at the door. Listen, if the cut of that coat can’t get you in, we don’t want to go. Come on.”
The maître d’ at Aubergine raised no question of coat or tie. He wouldn’t consider questioning Vernon Rice; Vernon was too good a customer and too big a tipper. They were sitting in a quiet corner while Nell read the menu.
“Oh, God, I just realized I haven’t had a decent meal in weeks!” She put her hands to her face as if ashamed to admit it.
“Then you’re in luck. The food here is unbelievably decent. I expect you’re a vegetarian?”
“Well, yes, I guess I am.”
“They do something with mushrooms here that’s just short of psychedelic.”
“Order for me, will you?”
He ordered for both of them, looked at the wine list, asked for a wine which made the sommelier extremely happy. Then Vernon shoved his silverware around and leaned on the table. “Okay, now, continue talking.”
Nell did, through a first course of a vegetable pate, a second course of green salad and a third course of the heavenly mushroom dish. She talked little about herself, a lot about the mares. “She had this literature-pamphlets, folders, estrogen studies. I read about all of this. An American firm has had the patent on a drug called Premarin forever. It takes hundreds of thousands of horses to meet its quota.” Her fork, like a tiny silver plane, appeared to be writing in air. “The way these mares are roped means they can’t move more than a couple of inches any way. They can’t lie down. Nine and ten months pregnant and they can’t lie down. Imagine that kind of imprisonment for a horse, tied so they can’t move. Horses are meant to run free. They only got the little bit of exercise I talked Valerie Hobbs into letting me give them.”