“No,” he said, and immediately wondered why he was lying. Not five minutes ago, Leona had told him she was unhappy. So why not put it all on the table, get it out in the open, tell her the truth, tell her what Frank suspected and what Frank was doing about it.
No, he thought.
If she wants it on the table, she’ll put it there herself.
“Do you think he would?” she asked. “Tell you? If he thought I was having an affair?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did you tell him? When you were having an affair with Agatha Hemmings? All those years ago?”
“No.”
“Do men tell each other such things?”
“Some men. Not me.”
“Some women do,” she said, and looked toward the bar, where her drink was being mixed. “Not me. Anyway, I don’t have any women friends,” she said, almost to herself, and then turned back to Matthew. “I consider you a friend,” she said gravely.
“Thank you,” Matthew said, and nodded.
“Do you consider me a friend?”
“I do.”
“Truly?”
“Truly.”
“A good friend?”
“A very good friend.”
Put it on the goddamn table, he thought. Get it out in the open, Leona! If you want to tell me about it, tell me!
“As a very good friend,” she said, “would you want someone taking pictures of me? Through a motel window, Matthew?”
“Well…”
“Pictures of me naked,” she said.
“Well…”
“My legs spread.”
“Leona, I…”
“Some guy’s head buried in my crotch,” she said.
“Tanqueray martini on the rocks, a twist,” the waiter said.
He looked very pale and very apologetic.
Leona looked up at him and smiled angelically. “Thank you,” she said.
“Sir? Another one for you?”
“No, thanks.” Matthew said.
The waiter hurried away from the table.
“I think I embarrassed him,” Leona said.
“I think you embarrassed me, too,” Matthew said.
“Oh, don’t be a jackass,” she said, and raised her glass. “Here’s to rainbows,” she said. “And to wishes.”
He watched her as she drank.
“Why are you unhappy?” he asked.
Leona sighed deeply.
“Tell me,” he said.
She sighed again.
“Maybe because I’m getting old,” she said.
“Nonsense,” he said. “What are you. Leona? Thirty-seven? Thirty-eight?”
“I’ll be forty next month.”
“You could pass for twenty-three.”
“Ah, sweet-talker,” she said, and reached across the table for his hands. “Dear, good friend,” she said, “dear, dear friend.” and smiled wanly. “Matthew?” she said.
“Yes, Leona.”
“I’m not having an affair.” she said.
She squeezed his hands.
She looked deeply into his eyes.
“If Frank should ask you…”
“Yes?”
“You just tell him I’m not, okay?”
“Uh-huh.”
Trying to sound noncommittal.
“I am not having an affair, okay?”
“Uh-huh.”
Still going for noncommittal.
“Good,” she said, and smiled, and picked up her glass again.
Warren Chambers was unlocking the door to his condominium apartment when he heard the phone ringing. He threw open the door, left the key in the latch, ran into the living room and yanked the receiver from the cradle.
“Hello!” he said.
“Warren, it’s Matthew.”
“Yes, hello, Matthew.”
Now I have to tell him, he thought.
Matthew, I’ve been made.
Also…
Matthew, I know you met with the suspect this afternoon.
Here’s a possible scenario, Matthew.
Let’s run it by as an exercise, okay?
Your partner suspects his wife is playing around. He asks you to put a private eye on her. You oblige. But it is you yourself, Matthew, who is diddling the lady. So you tell her you’ll have to behave yourselves while the private eye is on the job. So you both lay low, you should pardon the expression, until the p.i. gives the lady a clean bill of health. Then, when Summerville is convinced his wife is true blue, you and the lady go back to fucking your brains out.
How does that sound, Matthew?
Not bad for a spur of the moment improv, huh?
And if you happen to be asked — as well you might be in the next two minutes — how come you were meeting your partner’s luscious wife at Marina Lou’s this afternoon, you can always say…
“Warren, you’ve been made.”
Warren blinked.
“Warren, did you hear me? You’ve…”
“Yes, I know,” Warren said. “But how do you know?”
“Leona told me.”
Warren said nothing.
“I had a drink with her this afternoon.”
Warren still said nothing.
“I want you to put someone else on her,” Matthew said. “Right away.”
“I’m very glad to hear you say that,” Warren said.
“What?”
“It makes me very happy to know that you want to continue the surveillance.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Warren. Why wouldn’t I want to continue?”
“I don’t know, Matthew. But I’m sure there are many reasons in this world why people start investigations and then want them stopped.”
“Warren, have you been drinking?”
“No, Matthew. Very definitely not. I’ll start looking for someone right away. I don’t have to tell you that the pickings are pretty slim in Calusa.”
“I know that. Do your best.”
“I will. Matthew…?”
“Yes?”
“Does the name Wade Livingston mean anything to you?”
“Yes. He’s a doctor. Why?”
“A gynecologist. Leona went to see him this afternoon.”
“So?”
“So nothing,” Warren said. “Maybe she’s pregnant.”
“Or maybe she went for her yearly checkup.”
“Maybe. I tracked her home after the visit, waited around outside her house till around four-thirty, when she left for Marina Lou’s.”
“Then that was your car I spotted.”
“Some private eye, huh?”
“Warren, I’m going to need whatever you can get me on the Brechtmann family.”
“The beer people?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. How soon?”
“I plan to go there tomorrow, if they’ll see me.”
“By ‘they’?”
“Sophie or Elise, either one.”
“I’ll get to work right away. Anything else?”
“Yes. I went to see Arthur Hurley.”
“I wish you hadn’t done that, Matthew.”
“Why?”
“He’s got a record as long as my arm.”
“How do you know?”
“One of my cop people ran him through the computer. How’d you find him?”
“By calling around. He’s staying at the Calais Beach Castle with a young blonde named Helen Abbott, and a guy named Billy Walker. You might ask your cop people to run a few more computer…”
“I will.”
“And let me know who’ll be tailing Leona, okay?”
“If I find someone.”
“Find someone, Warren.”
“Someone good this time, huh?”
“You said it, not me.”
“Matthew…?”
“Yes?”
“You have no idea how glad I am that you’re not…”
“Yes?”
“Never mind,” Warren said. “Talk to you,” he said, and hung up.
Soaping herself in the shower, her hands gliding over her belly and her breasts, Helen Abbott wondered if they weren’t all just kidding themselves. Never mind truth, never mind justice, truth and justice had nothing whatever to do with a million dollars.