CHAPTER ELEVEN
In the morning, his head throbbing, Charlie takes the CB&Q train to the suburbs. Hemmings was supposed to drive but called at seven A.M. to beg off: He’s got the flu. Charlie’s been telling himself he’s going to ask the Bureau to have a car modified for him so he can learn to drive again. A knob on the steering wheel as he once suggested to Linda. A lever to replace the shift so he can press it in either direction with his wrist. But every time he starts filling out the request, he stops. It sets him apart, shines a spotlight on his injury. Still, this morning he regrets he hasn’t followed through.
Charlie glances down at Weaver’s wife’s address: Clemence Weaver c/o Adeline Hodges. A friend who’s putting her up? he wonders. As soon as the train starts rocking, Charlie falls asleep and finds it hard to rouse himself to get off at his stop. Christ. He can’t go without a good night’s sleep much longer. He feels weak and disoriented.
Fortunately, the house he’s looking for is only a few blocks from the Hinsdale station. A brick Victorian, set back from the road, sporting one of those crazy turrets with a pointy hat. The lady who owns it must be a gardener. Petunias are tumbling out of every possible crevice. Yellow roses are clutching the chimney wall. He climbs the stone porch steps and knocks. A woman with neat white hair opens the door.
“Yes?” She has one of those sweet Betty Crocker faces that leaves him tongue-tied.
“Ma’am, are you Adeline Hodges?”
“Yes . . .”
“And do you have a Clemence Weaver living here?” he asks.
“Well, yes.”
“Is she in?”
“And who are you?”
Charlie displays his badge, introduces himself. He shakes her hand, having always felt that’s the right thing to do: to treat people the way he was taught to treat fellow parishioners as a child.
“Well, to be honest,” Mrs. Hodges says, “I’m relieved you’re here. We’ve been worried about Mrs. Weaver.”
“Have you?”
“She’s paid for room and board but she hasn’t been down to dinner in a few days. I didn’t want to be nosy or anything, but I checked her room this morning. Thinking, well, you know, she might be ill or need help. Come in, Mr. . . . what did you say your name is?”
“Szydlo.”
“Mr. Szydlo. Now, what kind of name is that?”
“I think it may originally be Hungarian, but my family’s Polish.”
“Oh. I knew it was foreign.” He doesn’t usually tell that tale—the uncertainty of his family name—wonders why he’s told her. To gain her trust? She ushers him into a hallway dizzy with browning wallpaper, a foxhunt pattern on it. The foxes look demented. Their eyes glow red. A dark wooden railing, complex and Gothic, leads upstairs.
“What did you find in her room?” he asks.
“See, that’s what struck us as odd. Mrs. Weaver’s things are all there. Even her purse. Her wallet too. I didn’t mean to pry, but . . . I wanted to know if I should be worried. And her clothes are all just hanging there, like she’s coming right back. But no one’s seen her.”
“May I take a look?”
“Surely.”
“How long has she been here?”
“A year, I guess.”
“You ever see her husband?”
Mrs. Hodges shakes her head. “No, sir. I guess he works somewhere else and they can’t be together. But she told us she’s married. She wears a wedding band. She showed me his photo once. A real handsome fellow.”
“Has she had any visitors?”
“Not one. And she doesn’t speak to the other guests much. Some people think she’s snooty.”
Mrs. Hodges leads him up the steps. The upstairs hall has the smell that old houses get when their roofs leak, but Clemence Weaver’s room smells sweet. It’s large and airier than he expects. The woodwork is painted white and the sun pours in on a rug figured with pink roses, on the iron bed, left unmade. Wiggling his hand into the oversize rubber glove he wears to examine a crime site, he throws back the sheets and coverlet. No blood. No unusual marks. Just the wrinkles made by a sleeping person. The closet is hung with little bags of something that smell just short of perfume, the source of the sweet smell. Lavender, that’s what it is—the stuff Peggy hangs to keep the moths away. Long, slender dresses dangle from the rack; on the floor, high heels have fallen on their sides. Inside them are the imprints of Mrs. Weaver’s feet. The top drawer of the heavy old chest sticks and he has to yank it. Silky lingerie explodes out, and he stuffs it back in. Elegant things that he’s sure would feel like cream to his fingers without the glove. Nothing else. He shoves the drawer closed. The rest of the chest is filled with sweaters, scarves.
A dark red square purse sits atop the bedside table. Elegant. Expensive-looking. But no wallet inside. Instead, some folded cash in a silken pocket.
“Does she have other purses?” he asks.
“I’m not certain. A brown one too, I think.” Charlie empties the purse entirely. Tucked into a different side pocket, he finds a French passport in a worn green leather case. When he opens it, the name on it isn’t Clemence Weaver. It’s Victoire Spenard. He takes in the photo, the long face, the darkened lips set in a haughty O, the eyes lined in makeup like an ancient Egyptian. This is the person Weaver married? He glances at her birth year: 1895. She’s well over fifty years old. Does he even have the right woman? He turns to Mrs. Hodges, still standing in the doorway.
“Is this Mrs. Weaver?” he asks, displaying the photograph.
She nods. He’ll have to show the photo to Rosalind. He thinks she said she saw Clemence Weaver once. Why would this woman have used an alias? Could she be a Soviet agent? Perhaps Weaver’s wife is or was his handler? When he gets back to the office he’ll look the name up. Victoire Spenard. With his one good hand and some effort, he slides the passport into one of the glassine evidence pouches he always carries and slips it into his jacket.
“Don’t touch anything in this room,” he warns Mrs. Hodges. “And especially don’t clean. Lock it and keep the other guests out. If we don’t find Mrs. Weaver, this room will be a crime scene.”
“Yes. I was right, wasn’t I? It’s odd, isn’t it?”
“Seems odd,” he agrees.
“Do you think she was murdered?” she asks him with giddy horror.
“That’s rarely the case,” he tells her. “She may have left with a small case and a different purse.”
He doesn’t believe a word he’s saying, because why wouldn’t she have taken all the cash? And why wouldn’t she have grabbed her passport—unless she has others with other names? Still, he needs to tell the landlady something to keep her from speculating with all her guests.
“I’ll be back,” he says.
“And you’ll let me know if they find her, won’t you? I won’t sleep a wink.”
“I’ll let you know.”
The next evening after work, Rosalind takes a piece of paper and a pen and sits at the small desk by the window where she pays her bills.
Dear Sirs,
I would like to inquire about a position at Argonne National Laboratory. As a student of Dr. Enrico Fermi and a scientist on the Manhattan Project, I have long believed in the peacetime potential of nuclear energy. I’m particularly intrigued by your work on light-water reactors.
She stops, stares at the page, notes that her hand is shaking. Should she write to Fermi first and ask him to intervene with Argonne? Would her old mentor welcome her reaching out to him? Or did he lose all faith in her when Weaver penned that report? Fermi never wrote or called after she was dismissed. True, he was at Los Alamos at the time. He had more important things on his mind. And as much as she adored him, he was often more interested in his own thoughts and theories than in people. “People are too volatile,” he once said. What must he have thought about the report that most of all stressed her volatility?
She sets down her pen. Later. She’ll tackle it later. Pacing, she realizes that she hasn’t spoken to Louisa since last Saturday, the day Louisa had her knockdown fight with Henry. The day Roz and Ava and Weaver spent their beautiful afternoon together. Usually, she and Lou speak two, three times a week. Roz knows there’s a benefit to this schism: Without the constant trickle of Louisa’s carping, Rosalind feels more lighthearted. Still, she picks up the telephone. Her enthusiastic “Hi, Louisa!” meets a wall. “I’ve been wondering how things are with Henry. You know, after that tiff last weekend . . .”
“So you actually found time to think of us with his nibs lurking around.”
“What?”
“Ava told me about Weaver.”
“Oh.”
“How could you see that man after what he did to you?”
“I didn’t plan it. It just—”
“And with all hell breaking loose at our house.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean Henry’s threatening to move out and get himself a room at the Allerton.”
“He’s joking, surely?”
“He doesn’t think it’s a joke. Do you?” Louisa’s voice crumples chillingly.
“My God. Let me speak to him. You didn’t think to call me?”
“I figured you were too busy with Tom Weaver to care.”
“Of course I care.”
“How can you see that man again? After all he did? Have you forgotten how we all had to pick up the pieces when he threw you away last time?”
Roz feels attacked and yet recognizes, almost immediately, that it’s Louisa changing the subject so she doesn’t have to talk about what hurts in her own life.
“I’ll never forget that,” Roz says. It’s just like her sister to deflect, to push Roz away when she needs her most.
“And now he’s charmed Ava too. I don’t want my daughter being exposed to that louse.”
“He seems to have changed, Louisa. But I understand why you’re cynical. I’m cynical.” She can hardly tell Louisa about the FBI. Since the night she made love with Weaver, she’s ashamed how much she longs for him. Charlie Szydlo’s become Rosalind’s excuse for letting Weaver back into her life, and God knows, she needs one. “Tell me about Henry. What’s happened?”
“He hates me.”
“He doesn’t hate you. Maybe he’s just angry.”
“He says he’s had it with me. I know I’m not the easiest . . . I don’t know what I’ll do if he leaves. I haven’t worked since the war. And there are no torpedo plants hiring at present.”
“You could do all sorts of things. You’re good with numbers. You could be a bookkeeper. Or work in management somewhere. You’ve got the experience.”
“Women don’t manage things anymore. Not since ’45.”
“But you could. And it’s important to know Henry would give you and Ava money, no matter what. Couldn’t you put him on the phone? Let me talk to him?”
“We’re not speaking.”
“Not even enough to wander in and tell him I want to speak to him?”
“No.”
“C’mon, Lou.”
“No.”
“Okay, I’m coming over there,” Roz says.
“What? Now?”
“Yes. Right now. I’ll grab the bus, be there in a half hour.”
Louisa harrumphs before she hangs up.
All these years, Roz has wondered how Henry put up with Louisa. How he managed to ignore her sister at her most miserable. She recalls how he would sometimes turn to Roz when she was just a teenager and oh so subtly shake his head, his eyes glancing upward as if to say, Your sister. We’ll ignore what she just said, shall we? Rosalind owes Louisa so much but finds it so hard to breach the trench that’s been dug between them. She brushes her teeth, reapplies her lipstick, and grabs her purse. Still, she loves her family, and as small and odd as it is, they’re all she has.
After getting a full report about school from Ava and a whispered diatribe about how really awful Henry can be from Louisa, Rosalind hugs her sister.
“Please, Lou,” she says. “Hand out the olive branch. Let him know you wish to work things out at least. That’s all Henry ever asks for.”
“He’s the one that should be handing out an olive branch, the son of a bitch.” Louisa turns back to her dishes. But then Roz sees she’s crying. “He’s never loved me. Not really. I see that now. When I’ve loved him all along. When I gave up everything to take care of him.” She wonders what her sister means.
“Hey.” She reaches out to touch her, but Louisa flinches, shoves back an elbow. Rosalind stands for a long time, watching her, her throat sore with worry. “I’m sorry,” she says at last. “I’m sorry you’re hurt. He does love you. I’m certain he does.” But Louisa doesn’t answer. How many people in the world are so poisoned by sadness, they push love away when it’s the one thing they long for most? Even more since the war.
“Please. Please, leave me alone.” Roz sees Louisa in a way she’s never seen her before: wounded. Sturdy Louisa. Implacable Louisa. Wounded.
“We can talk. Take a walk maybe.”
Louisa shakes her head fiercely.
“Later, then, maybe.” Shrugging, Roz leaves her and heads down the hall, knocks softly, then opens the door to Henry’s study. Her brother-in-law is leaning over his desk with a chessboard in front of him. She closes the door quietly behind her and asks, “Playing by yourself?”
“Kid. I’ve missed you.” He rises, puts his arms around her. Throughout her childhood, it was most often Henry who was there to clean a cut knee or give her a hug when the world seemed askew.
“I hear that the dam’s burst in this household. What’s going on?” she asks.
“A guy can only take so much,” he says. His mouth presses in at the corners, making him look almost fierce, though Henry is buttered melba toast. He was handsome when he married her sister. A mop of dark hair. Sturdy squared shoulders from his years in the service. He volunteered for World War I and victory was declared soon after, so he never saw battle. He did desk work in Washington during the Second World War and celebrated in the streets on VJ Day. But Louisa is a war that cannot be won. Worn down by the enemy, Henry’s skinnier every year. His shoulders roll forward; his scalp shows through the comb marks in his hair. His brush of a mustache now sports white wires among the brown. He’s still handsome, but in the threadbare way of a much-loved chair.
“Here, sit.” He gestures to the corner where he often reads and turns his office chair to face her. On the walls are all his certificates. Diplomas and CPA licenses. Such a steady guy. Working hard. Never letting anyone down.
“Tell me about what’s going on,” she says. “Why now? You’ve put up with her all these years.”
“It wears on a fellow. I’m not made of steel. How many years do I have left?” he asks.
“Thirty. Forty.”
“If I’m wildly lucky. Do I want to spend them feeling angry?”
“You know she loves you even if she doesn’t always show it.”
“I’ve been thinking about this,” he says. “How people fall in love and put up with someone who gives them none of what they want. They’ve chosen badly and then feel stuck. A lifetime of suffering, for what? A glimmer of hope that things will change. Well, it took me years to come to this, but people don’t change.”
Rosalind can’t argue. Weaver withheld so much from her, and yet she clung to the hope that someday he’d marry her, openly love her. The less he gave, the more she craved.
“But you love Louisa. You still wish she’d give you what you want, don’t you? Love or patience. What if you give her an ultimatum?” Roz asks. “Tell her you’ll stay under certain conditions. Write them out.”
He shrugs. “Give Louisa an ultimatum? Do you really imagine she’d respond to that?”
“She’s scared.”
“If I leave, she’ll be more scared . . .”
“But you’d leave Ava? Lou could keep you from seeing her.”
Henry nods. “It’s why I haven’t left yet.”
“Did something precipitate this?” Rosalind asks.
“A tussle a week ago.”
“About what?”
“Her wanting to move to the suburbs. Her prejudice. It’s just wrong. She won’t give our new neighbors a chance.”
“Maybe she just wants a different life? A fresh start? I know you still love her.”
He nods almost imperceptibly. “And sometimes hate what she says. I hate her bigotry. Her anger at the world.”
“Is saving the marriage in the cards?”
He shrugs.
Rosalind looks at this kind man who came to her rescue when he was very young, and she wavers. Why should he spend his life suffering at someone else’s hand? Maybe he could woo some sweet widow, someone who might appreciate him. Maybe he could find real happiness, even if Louisa never will.
She sighs. “If you want to talk to me anytime, you know where I am,” she says. Walking over to him, she kisses his receding hairline. “Don’t do anything precipitous without warning me, okay?”
“Sure. Hey . . . things going all right with you? I heard Ava talking about Weaver. So he’s back?”
“He is.”
“You handling that okay?”
“I’m fine,” she says.
“And you mentioned wanting to get back to science. Have you done anything about that?”
“I’m working on it. Anyway, it’s time to worry about yourself for a change.”
“Okay. I don’t want to nag.”
“I love you,” she tells him. “You’ll always be family to me, no matter what you decide. You know that, right? And if you do move out, you’re invited to come over and share in my lousy cooking anytime. And you can bet I’ll visit you at the Allerton.”
“Kid,” he says. He grabs her wrist and kisses the back of her hand. She feels like he wants to say more but can’t put the words together. Men are so bad at declarations of any kind, but she’s always felt safe in his love.
The phone rings at seven thirty the following Monday morning. Wrapping a towel around her dripping hair, Rosalind runs to answer.
“If you can’t speak freely, just say, ‘There’s no Jane Hart here.’”
She laughs. “There is no Jane Hart here. But I’m alone, Agent Szydlo.”
“Do you have time to speak to me, then?” He sounds almost shy. Again, he strikes her as a nice man, one she wishes she’d met at a party. Last night, lying in bed, longing for Weaver, she was surprised to find herself thinking about what it would be like to kiss Charlie Szydlo. She imagined he would taste of watermelon. Clean, sweet. She whispered his name out loud. “Charlie.” Why is she even thinking these thoughts about the very man who’s gotten her involved again with her old lover? It makes her uneasy.
“I promised I wouldn’t call and I haven’t,” he says. “Did you decide to see Mr. Weaver again?”
“Yes.”
“Excellent.” He sounds relieved. “Have you learned anything you’re willing to share?”
She likes that he respects her reluctance. Willing to share. “Well, one thing,” she’s surprised to hear herself saying.
“Yes?”
“It hardly makes sense.”
“I know it’s hard to talk on the phone. Would you mind coming to see me on your lunch break? My office isn’t far from Field’s. It’s in the Bankers Building, 105 West Adams at the corner of Clark. I’ll have sandwiches. There’s a photo I want to show you. And you can tell me what Weaver said that doesn’t make sense.”
“All right. Let me write down the address.”
The day is hot and swollen. As Rosalind walks to work, it feels as though her linen dress is growing tighter; her shoes bind. By the time she reaches the Michigan Avenue Bridge, she has to remove her white cotton gloves, picking them off finger by damp finger. She’s seeing spots before her eyes as she steps into Field’s, which isn’t much cooler. The fans spin listlessly over the sales floor. Field’s installed Comfort Air back in the thirties but ripped the whole system out for war-effort scrap metal in ’41. Now they promise they’re going to reinstall it before next summer. Not soon enough.
At the moment, workmen are attaching fluorescent tubes under the counters for cooler lighting. The borers squeal like dentists’ drills. The store has so few customers, Janice has time to leave her perfume counter to walk over and tell Rosalind about the medical student she went out with last night.
As they’re speaking, Janice whispers, “That man over there. I keep seeing him in the store. I think he’s got a pash on you.”
“What?”
“That man.”
Rosalind turns, pretending to straighten her counter. The man looks to be in his fifties, thickly built, with short straw-colored hair—surely it can’t be his own; there’s nothing about it that looks real. His eyes are so pale they appear empty. He has the face of a bum, but he’s surprisingly well dressed: an expensive suit, polished shoes. A pearl stickpin through his tie. There’s nothing flashy about the outfit. It’s elegant, except it doesn’t match his thick, unrefined appearance at all. As soon as he sees Roz sizing him up, he turns his back.
“You’ve seen him before?”
“He came near the end of the day yesterday and I saw him following you later when we went home. I thought I was making it up, but then to see him again today . . . he must be gaga over you. There, he’s gone out the door.”
Is the FBI tailing her with a new man now instead of Charlie? How dare they keep following her! And why come to her job, where they know she’ll be all day?
“Thanks, Jan. I’ll watch out for him.”
“Yeah. He’s kind of creepy, actually. You don’t know him, do you?”
“Lord no!”
At noon, she steps out onto the sidewalk, glancing around to see if the pale man is waiting. There are cars parked all along the curb. Cabs to hide in. He could be anywhere among the thousands of people on State Street. There are police officers in view too. This summer she’s seen them, officers walking two by two, threading through the summer crowds. But no need for the police. She’s pretty sure this fellow is just one of Charlie’s guys, keeping tabs on her. Then, half a block down, she spots him standing between two coffee carts, an unrefined man in refined clothes staring with those awful empty eyes. She’s alongside Wieboldt’s department store so she ducks into its revolving door, and, rushing past the displays of thin cotton dresses and cheap men’s slacks, she exits two doors south. Hurrying toward Dearborn, she keeps glancing back to make sure he’s gone. She doesn’t know why she’s so intent on losing him, except she’s disturbed by the way he looks, and it feels like a game. She relishes the idea of telling Charlie she shook his guy. The Bankers Building feels farther away than she expected. By the time she gets there, her dress is damp in every place it touches her skin. She announces herself to the man behind the desk, and while she waits for Szydlo to come down, she scans the lobby for her pursuer, expecting him to walk in any minute.
“Miss Porter?” Szydlo says softly. “You okay?”
“Why are you still having me followed?” she whispers.
“Pardon?”
“You know someone’s following me.”
Charlie’s lips part; he looks puzzled.
“Is he here now?”
“No. I shook him.”
“Let’s get out of the lobby.” He sternly grabs her arm. “I shouldn’t have had you come here. It didn’t occur to me they’d have you followed.”
The perspiration on her neck turns icy and goose bumps rise all down her arms. In the elevator she asks, “They? Who?” No one else is in the car, yet she only mouths the words “A Soviet operative?” He nods. She read that word in the paper: “operative.” It sounds so threatening somehow. Invasive.
“That man was a Soviet agent . . . ?” She says it to herself more than to him. To help herself understand. To believe it. The man with eyes so pale they seemed utterly empty . . .
They don’t say anything else as the elevator rises. It’s one of those modern elevators with no elevator man, and they’re alone. Charlie is watching the numbers on the indicator. She notes his face. Kind. Sad. Serious. She feels protected in his presence. But out on the street, back at work, will she feel the same?
The FBI offices are blessedly cool. They have air conditioning and she’s craved it. But now she’s shivering.
“Why would they follow me?” she asks.
“To understand who Weaver’s spending his time with. Just like I did. You coming here could have compromised him.”
“Put Weaver in danger?”
“Hopefully you shook the fellow like you said and he didn’t discover you were on your way to the FBI. As for Weaver, I imagine he’s been putting himself in danger for quite a while.”
Agitated, she follows Charlie past a bullpen of men talking on telephones, discussing things in small clusters, and then into a large wood-paneled room with three circular ceiling vents shooting out more cool air.
“I thought a conference room would be a nicer place to share lunch.” Charlie shuts the door. “Without a bunch of wolves howling.” He smiles and pulls out a chair for her.
“Should I be worried?” she asks.
“About the wolves?” She can see he’s trying to lighten the mood.
“Now I’m kind of scared. You following me scared me. And this guy is even creepier.”
“Even creepier than me, huh?” he asks. She can see color coming to his cheeks.
“Sorry . . . I didn’t mean . . .”
“We’ll try and find out who he is,” he says. He has a soothing voice. “Don’t worry too much. Even if you didn’t shake him, it’s a big building. There are all sorts of offices here. Not just the FBI. Doctors. Lawyers. And I bet you did get rid of him. You didn’t see him in the lobby, did you?”
Roz shakes her head. Settling into the large swivel chair he pulled out for her, she fishes a handkerchief from her purse to catch the perspiration coursing down her forehead. She doesn’t know if she’s hot or cold.
“I didn’t know what kind of lunch you’d like, so I gave you a choice.” Out of a brown paper bag, Szydlo pulls various sandwiches and, pointing to them, tells her what’s inside. She’s having trouble concentrating.
“I think I’ll wait a minute. Until I cool off . . .”
She shoves back the hair on her forehead, twists the rest of her mane into a knot, and blots her neck. She must look a mess.
“Want a Royal Crown?” He pushes a dripping bottle toward her. Before he lets her take the bottle, he pops the top with his thumb. The burning-cold froth hits her mouth with a sweet shock. Lifting a folder, he gallantly fans her, watches with concern.
“Describe the man,” he says. “If you can.”
She recounts the stolid body, his empty eyes, the pale thatch of hair that doesn’t look quite real. The expensive clothes. The shining shoes.
He writes down what she tells him.
“You should eat,” he says. “We don’t have much time until you need to go back.”
She reaches for the sandwich marked CHICKEN SALAD in blue ink. He’s laid out the lunch nicely, even managed to find plates. Along the rim, the china is stamped with a green circle. The top of the circle reads DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE; the bottom, FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION. She unwraps the sandwich. It’s surprisingly delicious, cold, creamy, and crunchy with fresh celery. She watches Szydlo unwrap his with a single hand. How hard would it be to have only one hand? A challenge to do the simplest things. As he eats, politely, neatly, she feels him watching her, waiting.
“You want to tell me about Weaver?” he asks at last. “Anything.”
“I thought you had something to show me.”
“You first,” he says.
She doesn’t want to talk about Weaver. “Weaver’s told me only one thing: that breaking up with me wasn’t his choice.”
Charlie squints at her. “Wasn’t his choice?”
“He says someone forced him to be with Clemence, the woman he married.”
“He didn’t say who?”
“No.” There’s more to tell Charlie. Weaver told her he was a Communist in college. But lots of people were Communists in the thirties. She’s not going to share it yet. Besides, Weaver says he’s trying to extricate himself. She’s surprised to find herself wanting to protect him.
“Did he say anything else about his wife?”
“He said, ‘Nothing you think you know about my marriage is true.’ Whatever that means.”
Charlie looks up from his notes. “Miss Porter, she’s missing.”
“Who?”
“His wife. That’s what I wanted to tell you. She was renting a room in the suburbs. I went out there. She’s disappeared. Her clothes, a purse, her passport, are all still there. But no one’s seen her.”
Every follicle on Rosalind’s head tightens. She sets down her sandwich and feels dizzy—like she did this morning in the heat. Clemence Weaver—who stood for all she isn’t and will never be—is missing.
“You don’t think . . . you’re not suggesting Weaver . . . he wouldn’t.”
“Probably not.” She distrusts the smooth tone of his voice and his choice of words: “probably.”
“You think he’s somehow implicated, though, don’t you?”
“We don’t know anything yet. That’s something you learn in the FBI. Never assume. Look at this photo. Is this Clemence Weaver?”
He hands it to her. It appears to be a blown-up passport photo. The face is unmistakable: the woman who ruined her life. For months after Weaver left her, Rosalind fixated on this woman. He’d chosen Clemence over her and she needed to know why. So she catalogued all she knew: Clemence was older, more sure of herself, more exotic, taller, more slender. She held those superlatives against herself. Seeing the face again brings pain.
“Yes, that’s his ex-wife.”
The parted hair pulled back to reveal those planes of her face, those sharp cheekbones. Those piercing dark eyes lined in kohl.
“Oh, and . . . as far as we can tell, despite what Weaver may have told you, she’s not his ex-wife.”
“They weren’t married after all?” Rosalind is surprised by how happy that makes her. Sunlight reaching her heart. Maybe that’s what Weaver meant when he said nothing she knew about the marriage was true.
“No, we see no evidence they’ve divorced. As far as we can see, they’re still married.”
“Oh . . .” Her disappointment is precipitous. But then Weaver never said anything about divorce, did he? She’s merely wished it were so. Every time Weaver steps into the picture, she fools herself.
“What name did he call her?” Charlie asks.
“Clemence. Clemence Weaver.”
He nods.
“I already told you that.”
“You did. He didn’t use any other name?”
“Like a nickname?”
“Any name.”
She shakes her head at him. “I only found out her name from other people. Once she came along, I was sent packing.”
Rosalind can say that now with a sarcastic ring. But why does her heart still ache at the words? This morning she lifted the little manila envelope Weaver gave her from beneath the Scandinavian sweater at the bottom of her sweater drawer and slid it into her purse. The leather under her fingertips pulses now like a beating heart. Should she take it out and share it with Charlie? She absolutely should if she really is doing this for the FBI. But she thinks of Weaver making love to her, his new tenderness. And that confounding new vulnerability. Until she knows more, she doesn’t feel ready to tell Charlie any of that. Weaver said his life depended on it. Life and death, he said. Why does he wield such power over her?
“You’ll be cautious with Weaver, won’t you?” Charlie says. “You’ll call me if you need help or—”
“He’s not dangerous. Weaver’s lots of things. A liar for one. But he’s not dangerous.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Charlie says. “Especially when it comes to Weaver, I don’t think we can assume anything.”