I was elated to find out that at least one of my bogeymen had vanished from the cast of villains. If my brother was the one who had made the phone calls to our mother, at least I didn’t have to worry that she might be the target of someone’s displeasure with my sleuthing activities. That left the “Die, racist bitch” caller and the Bacchanalian Burglar. I strongly suspected Ramon’s brother, Juan, as the instigator of the threatening phone call, whatever he’d said about not trading in empty gestures. I was probably safe enough from him and the rest of Ramon’s cohorts as long as I was ostensibly trying to get Ray out of prison. If I raised their expectations and didn’t come through, I’d need to start watching my back.
Then there was whoever was spreading rumors about me in the art community and causing me to lose clients. That was sophisticated villainy, not inconsistent with felonious libation. For the moment, I would assume there was only one Bad Guy I had to worry about, if you didn’t count Natasha’s killer. Whether he—or she—was the same person who was hassling me, I hadn’t a clue.
At all events, now that my mother was safe, it was time to proceed to the next step.
I called Ivanova Associates and asked to speak to Melanie Klein. She had left a message on my machine the day after my first dinner with Scott, saying she hoped my “interview” had been a success and that she’d be available to discuss any problems or questions. I hadn’t called her back, so the invitation provided the perfect entrée.
Now that we were buddies and coconspirators, Christine, the receptionist, put me right through. Even such a small degree of clout was a new experience for me; I could be put on hold if I called McDonald’s.
“Melanie Klein,” she answered brusquely.
“I apologize,” I said in the face of her irritated tone. “If this is a bad time, we can speak later.”
“Oh, no, Ms. St. James,” she said more warmly. “Just a minor office crisis. Our clients always come first.”
“Ellen, please.” It was too hard to keep track of the pseudonyms, though at least I was down to only two.
“Ellen, then.” I could hear her calling me up on the computer. “How did your meeting with Mr. Collins work out?”
For a moment I couldn’t think who she meant by “Mr. Collins.” How do spies do it? “Well, actually, that’s why I’m calling,” I told her. I tried to sound embarrassed and a little hesitant, which, under the circumstances, wasn’t all that difficult.
“Oh, dear,” she said, picking up on my tone. “I hope nothing went wrong.”
Ha. “No, it isn’t…Mr. Collins was…perfectly gentlemanly. It isn’t anything like that.” I paused.
“Do go on, Ellen. We’re here to help you in any way we can. I hope you remember that.”
“I appreciate that,” I said. I pressed on bravely. “Well, I must confess that these arranged meetings are just the slightest bit…humiliating, if you see what I mean.” I tried to sound as if I might be twisting a very large strand of real pearls into knots because of my anxiety. Elegant angst, that was it.
“I’m so sorry you feel that way,” she said. “I hope Mr. Collins didn’t do anything to make you feel uncomfortable?”
“No. Actually, I sensed that he was a bit uncomfortable, too. One isn’t used to admitting that one has need of such introductions, if you see what I mean.”
“Yes, I do see, but I assure you that you have no need to feel—”
“Well, that’s just it, Melanie, I’m afraid that I do.”
“How can we help you?” she asked, after a moment. If she was faking concern, she was fairly accomplished at it. But then she might have been worried because she could see her fee slipping away.
“Well, I was wondering…”
“Yes?”
“Whether it might be possible…Oh, dear. I’m not sure how to put this.”
“Take your time,” she said, obviously used to equivocators. “I promise you, we’ll try to accommodate you if we possibly can.”
I’d probably dithered long enough. It was time to tug on the hook. “What I’d like to know is whether it would be possible to meet someone without his being aware that the introduction is being arranged by a matchmaking service,” I told her. “It would be so much more comfortable to meet at a charitable affair or a party, the way one does in the normal course of events.” I hoped I wasn’t overdoing the “one” business. I sounded like a member of the Royal Family giving an interview to the BBC. “Do you understand what I mean?” I asked her.
“Yes, I understand,” she said, after a moment. “But—”
“Well, perhaps it’s an improper request,” I said. “If such a thing isn’t possible, I’ll certainly understand.” I sighed delicately into the phone. “It may be that I’m just not suitable for a matchmaking service,” I said regretfully. “I did have such hopes, but—”
If she didn’t bite now, she never would.
She bit. “Please, Ms. St. James—Ellen—there’s no need to be discouraged. It’s possible that we could arrange something along the lines you suggest.”
“Thank you. I’m very relieved,” I told her. Which was actually true.
“You understand that there would be an additional fee for such an arrangement?” she asked.
“Naturally,” I agreed. “Of course, I would expect certain guarantees.”
She swallowed a cough. “Guarantees?”
“Not as to outcome, Melanie. But the candidates must meet certain requirements.”
“Ah.” Pause. “All of our clients are carefully screened.”
Right. “Well, I’d expect a little more than your usual care,” I told her. “For example, I’m afraid that a substantial income is mandatory.”
“I see.”
I bet she did. “I would, of course, expect to pay more for such assurances,” I told her. “I understand that this arrangement requires delicate handling.”
“Certainly it would.”
“Good. I’m relieved that you’ve been so…sympathetic in this matter.”
“We are happy to be of service to our clients,” she said. “I suggest that we meet—very privately, of course—to conclude the specific details. Then we could begin our search for…suitable candidates.”
“That would be fine,” I told her. I didn’t want to go near the place again if I didn’t have to. “Perhaps in a couple of weeks? I’m leaving on vacation shortly.”
“Excellent,” said Melanie Klein. “I know you won’t be sorry about this, Ellen.”
I hate it when people say things like that. I’ve probably seen too many Greek tragedies not to feel that tempting fate seems a less-than-safe proposition. Still, I was so excited to confirm that Ivanova Associates facilitated “undercover” introductions to wealthy partners that nothing could dampen my enthusiasm.
Since I still had to mail the Botero illustration to Ramon, I decided to stop by the art supply store and pick up a beginner’s list of watercolor supplies, specifying the kinds of tubes and brushes and drawing pad so that Ramon could place an order through the prison catalogue if he wanted to. I also got a cashier’s check for fifty dollars and had it made out to him. I hoped he wouldn’t spend it for cigarettes (or something worse) instead, but a promise was a promise. I sent the list, the check, and a color copy of the Christie’s catalogue page by overnight mail, with a note to the effect that he should call me at the first possible instant about the sculpture.
Forward, march.
Since my visit with Ramon, I’d been thinking about Natasha Ivanova’s firing Lupe Garcia and Christine the receptionist’s predecessor at about the same time. The business didn’t appear to need downsizing, and I wondered if there was something more than coincidental about letting two employees go at once. I wasn’t eager to approach Mrs. Garcia again, so I decided to try to track down the receptionist to get her version of the firing. You didn’t have to be a journalism whiz like Cynthia to know that aggrieved people aren’t always excessively choosy about their audiences.
I thought Christine might recognize my voice over the phone, so I dragooned Cynthia into using her professional wiles to find out the former receptionist’s name and phone number from Ivanova Associates. She called me back with the information in less than five minutes.
“That was fast,” I told her.
“It was easy. I said I represented an employment agency checking references. All you have to do is sound official, demanding, and slightly bored.”
I laughed. “I’ll keep that in mind,” I said. “Thanks.”
“So how’s it going?”
“Fairly well, as a matter of fact.” I filled her in on the salient features of what we’d found out. “This might end up turning into a pretty terrific story.”
“Great,” she said, with less enthusiasm than I thought the topic deserved. “Um, actually, I was referring to Scott.”
“What about him?” I asked cautiously. Scott was not a topic I wanted to discuss with Cynthia under any circumstances.
“Well, are you seeing him?”
“Sure. We’re working together on this investigation,” I said, though I knew what she was really driving at. If I gave Cynthia one more inkling that I might be interested in Scott as more than a source of legal aphorisms, she would never let up until she had extracted every last line of dialogue between us and subjected it to minute inspection for hidden meaning. I wasn’t ready for that.
“I mean, are you dating him?” she asked in exasperation.
“No.” It was the truth. “Why do you ask?”
She let out a relieved sigh. “I’m so glad,” she said.
Uh-oh.
“Because, you remember what I warned you about last time? About not getting too involved with him, so you don’t get hurt?”
I nodded and then realized she couldn’t see me. “I remember,” I said neutrally.
“Well, I was talking to him yesterday—”
Yesterday? On Sunday?
“—and he said he was interested in someone. Of course, there’s always the chance that it might be you…”
We both had a little chuckle, initiated by Cynthia, over the likelihood of that.
“But I thought I should give you the tiniest little warning that he might be getting involved with someone. I mean, just in case. But since you say you’re not seeing him…”
I didn’t respond. I was trying to imagine how this topic had come up. There were a number of possibilities, none of which I enjoyed contemplating.
“You’re probably wondering how he happened to mention that,” Cynthia said after a moment.
“It crossed my mind,” I admitted.
“Well, there’s this journalism awards dinner coming up, and Jeff Riley can’t go, and I thought Scott might want to use his ticket.”
She didn’t fool me. She’d asked him out. “Are you getting an award, Cynthia?” I asked as pleasantly as I could manage.
“No.”
I would not give her the satisfaction of asking if he’d accepted her invitation.
“Anyway,” she continued, “he wanted to, but he couldn’t make it. But you know that wonderful, incredibly flirtatious way Scott has of talking?”
I didn’t, actually, but I could see I was going to hear about it.
“He intimated that he was becoming interested in someone.” She gave a self-deprecating laugh. “He was so mysterious about it, I almost didn’t see what he was getting at, at first.” She paused. “Well, I hope you won’t mind if I end up seeing him socially. I wouldn’t have said anything if you hadn’t assured me that he didn’t mean anything to you.”
I hadn’t assured her of any such thing, but I wasn’t going to react. I wasn’t sure she wasn’t just engaging in a bout of wishful thinking, either. She was just too nobly concerned for my feelings. God, it was high school revisited. I expected to hear the tardy bell any minute.
I was not going to let Cynthia undermine my peace of mind with innuendos. Anyway, I had to keep my eye on the ball, and the ball was getting to the bottom of Natasha Ivanova’s murder. “No problem,” I told her. “I wish you luck.”
“Thanks,” she said. She sounded disappointed.
Marian Walters, the erstwhile Ivanova Associates receptionist, answered the phone on the second ring. It was the middle of the afternoon on a workday, so I surmised that she had not yet found another job. She sounded extremely tired, as if she had the flu, but when I told her I was investigating age-related discrimination in the workplace (I was hazarding an educated guess here), she came to life.
“You can say that again,” she said vehemently. “I haven’t been able to get anything but temp jobs since I left my regular employment.”
“And that’s because…”
“Because all anyone wants in an office is a twenty-five-year-old with a waistline to match. I’m forty-five. Nobody wants an old woman around.”
“That’s not old,” I said sincerely.
“Ha. You must be close to my age, or you wouldn’t say that. Trust me, it’s old in the job market. I hope you never have to find that out for yourself.”
I hoped not, either.
“It probably doesn’t sound like such a big deal to you, but I liked being a receptionist. I liked meeting clients and talking to people. Now all I get are jobs filling in for people on vacation, and after they show me the coffee machine and the ladies’ room, nobody talks to me for the duration. Not unless I screw up, which I don’t do very often,” she added, with unmistakable pride.
“It must be very frustrating,” I agreed.
“You got my name from the temp agency, right? So you must know there are a lot of women in my situation. Some men, too, I guess.”
I didn’t contradict her. “A lot of people seem to have trouble finding something as good as the job they left,” I said.
“Yeah, I liked my old job. Parts of it, anyway. The clients were the best.”
“That was at Ivanova Associates,” I said, rustling some papers next to the phone to make it sound as if I were consulting my notes. “The matchmaking firm, right?”
“Right.”
“And you left there because…”
It hung in the air for a minute. “Because I was fired,” she said finally.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” I told her. I hesitated. “Might I inquire whether you feel that your being asked to leave was an age-related issue?”
“Ha,” she said again. “This is all confidential, right?”
“If I use any of this information, I’ll make sure I change your name,” I promised.
“Well, it might have been age-related, in a way. They replaced me with a young girl who’s still in school. But the real reason they fired me is that I saw something I shouldn’t have.”
Oh, boy. How was I going to get her to tell me? I went fishing. “Something dishonest?”
She snorted. “In a way, but not in the business sense. I caught her having a…a tryst with one of the clients, one of the ones the service had already married off. She didn’t like anyone knowing, that was clear. I got my notice right away.”
“You caught Natasha Ivanova with a client?” I asked, a little breathlessly.
She laughed. “Not her. If you ask me, she wasn’t interested in men, period. The other one, the butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-her-mouth assistant. Melanie Klein.” She said it venomously.
Wow. “How did it happen?” I asked her.
“Oh, you can imagine. I came back to the office really late one night because I’d left something there. I was going to a play at the Ahmanson, so I didn’t have time to come back after work. The play was out at eleven, and by the time I got back to the office, it was after midnight.” She snickered. “Obviously, they weren’t expecting anyone to drop by.”
“What did you do?” I asked her.
“I said ‘excuse me,’ grabbed what I’d come for, and ran out.”
“Were you able to recognize the man?” I asked, as delicately as I could.
“Sure. He’d been around before. He was very good-looking and charming, and I think he was something in finance, or something like that. I heard he’d married a rich woman with a few years on her, if you know what I mean.” She laughed apologetically. “Well, I should talk. See? We all do it.”
“I know what you mean,” I said. “Um, you don’t by chance remember the gentleman’s name, do you?”
“No, I don’t.” She sounded slightly alarmed. “Why are you interested in that? It doesn’t have anything to do with age discrimination.”
I’d clearly pushed too far, so I tried to backtrack. “I’m just trying to get the complete picture. Besides, it’s a great story, so I can’t help being interested. Why didn’t you ever pursue a legal course of action against Ivanova Associates?” I asked her.
She sounded a little ashamed. “I don’t know any lawyers, and I don’t have a lot of money. I hear it costs to bring suits like that.” She sighed. “When I got the letter from Ms. Ivanova, it said there had been client complaints about my work. Melanie Klein must have told her that. How could I fight it? They could probably find people to say whatever they wanted. They gave me a big fat severance check, too. Besides, I thought I’d find another job right away. You know how it is,” she said apologetically.
“Sure,” I said, feeling sorry for her. “One last question.”
“What is it?”
“Do you think there’s any connection between what you saw and Ms. Ivanova’s murder shortly after that?”
Silence. “What are you trying to say?” she asked after a minute, her voice rising in panic.
I felt guilty for upsetting her. “Nothing. I’m not suggesting anything. But she was killed just after you—”
“I don’t know anything about it. Some Mexican kid killed her, didn’t he? Why are you asking me?”
Before I could tell her, she slammed down the phone.