I had to get out, get some fresh air. I grabbed a parka, headed downstairs, turned north toward Washington Square Park. Walking, I deliberately didn’t dwell on what had happened. At the park, I found an empty space on a bench and sat down.
What had just happened? The answer came in bits and pieces—a stream-of-consciousness mélange. You cross the street, a bicycle comes from nowhere—there’s a collision. You survive, injured but okay. Dorothy goes downstairs to meet her son and gets killed by a crazed husband. The loss, the tragic irony. How to deal with what I had just seen and heard? So many “ifs.” If Monaghan hadn’t called me. If Dorothy had only known how far gone Warren was. If someone had interrupted them. Sometimes people survive; other times they don’t. There’s no rhyme or reason, no logic, no fairness, no justice. How fragile, on the knife edge, it all is. I’m here; the people in this park are here. Dorothy’s gone.
I shook my head, knowing there would be no answers tonight. In a day or two, when they track down Warren, maybe for some people it will be what today they call “closure.” But for far too many that’s a mirage. An innocent coed killed by a dope-addled stalker, a soldier shot down in battle, a tornado, a tsunami—there is no quick fix, maybe no fix at all, ever.
Then my mind shut down. The whole thing was too much. I slowly made my way home, ambling, not minding anyone around me. At a corner stand, I bought a hot dog, lots of mustard. I continued walking. Back at the apartment, I poured a glass of wine, took a few sips, put the glass down. Went to the bathroom, took a Diazepam, didn’t brush my teeth, took off everything but shorts and a T-shirt. Got into bed.
• • •
The main purpose of the rehearsal Monday afternoon was to put in the new scene for the oldest son, Mark, played by Austin Estabrook, and if it worked well, it would go in that night. Originally, Elliot had thought he could tweak lines in the first act, but on second thought he came up with a monologue for the character in the second act and emailed it to Austin over the weekend. Austin and Rowan worked on the scene on Monday morning.
As rehearsal of the scene that afternoon got underway, it was clear that the character came alive once he launched into his monologue. He chastised the other family members for their whining and complaining: “Uncle Roy was terrific to everyone here, loaning money to you, Mom and Dad, to buy this house—at no interest—giving both of you (indicating his younger siblings) funds for private schools and summer trips. Now he sets up this system to arrive at some kind of equitable distribution of our inheritance—but, more important, for us to examine what is really best for this family—and all you’ve done is whine, bicker, and argue. I’ve had enough.” He turned to my character: “Mr. Stanhope, I don’t know how you can possibly give any of us money. I certainly want no part of it—but the rest of this family (he made a broad sweep of the others) are so self-centered, so egotistical they can’t think of anything else. Once and for all, count me out.” And with that he exited.
The cast tried it. For the character of Mark, it changed everything, and for the other characters, nothing was quite the same either. Of course, as far as the script was concerned, there was work to do after Mark exited. For example, exactly how should each of the others react? How does the play get back on course? Elliot said he wanted to work on that, too. He suggested that we take a break and come back in about forty-five minutes, when he would have new lines. Everyone agreed it was worth spending as much time as possible that afternoon to put the new material in that night. Since I was not in the scene that followed, I was able to leave.
• • •
I was on the way to the subway when my cell phone rang. It was Monaghan. “Where have you been?”
“Rehearsing a play, remember?”
“How could I forget?”
“What’s so urgent?”
“He’s gone.”
“Who?”
“Tremayne. Disappeared.”
“How? When?”
“You tell me.”
“No trace of him?”
“The carriage house is empty. Apparently he hasn’t been seen since early yesterday.”
“What about Stuart Ross, his junior partner?”
“Gone too.”
“Is Warren’s car gone?”
“Still there.”
“Ross’s car?”
“Gone.”
“God. I don’t know what to say.”
“At least this confirms he’s our man.”
“I don’t think he can be impossible to catch. He’s become unhinged, and Ross doesn’t seem too bright.”
“I’ve put checks on everything: airports, trains, border crossings.”
“At this point the man is not going to be too alert. At the same time, he’s a desperate individual. All I can say is, good luck.”
“If you have any ideas, let me know.”
“One other thing,” I said.
“Yes?”
“I want to talk to Annie, the daughter, and to Danny. Annie has been calling me every day to ask where things stand. I didn’t want to tell her about last night, but I think I need to let her know that Mikey is in custody and Warren has disappeared.”
“I wish you would wait till we have Warren.”
“I really think I owe her this—and Danny.”
“Say as little as you can, and ask them not to breathe a word.”
“Absolutely.”
• • •
I called Annie, and got her machine. I asked her to call back, which she did half an hour later. “Any news?”
“Yes, though it’s not too good.”
“I was afraid of that.”
“Mikey is in custody.”
“Did he do it?”
“He says not.”
“Do they believe him?”
“I hate to say this.”
“Go ahead.”
“He claims he was with your father the night it happened—in the theatre.”
“Go on.”
“He says they had no intention of hurting Dorothy; they were trying to get money, both of them, and things got out of hand.”
“And what about Dad in all this?”
“Mikey claims your father lost it—went off the rails—and went too far threatening her.”
“Oh, God. It’s worse than I thought.”
“Nothing is definite. Nothing proven.”
“Where is Dad?”
“He seems to have disappeared, along with that young man he started the new company with. They’re looking for both of them now. The fact that he can’t be found makes things worse.”
“Sounds just awful.”
“I agree. For what it’s worth, these last few days I’ve been talking to old friends of Warren’s, and they all say he’s changed. He’s sort of lost it.”
“I’ve had a suspicion, a fear, really, that something like this might happen. But, of course, I hoped against hope it wouldn’t. Have you told Danny?”
“I called you first. I plan to call him now.”
“I invited him to come up here and visit us for a few days.”
“That’s a terrific idea. I’ll urge him to do it.”
“I just can’t believe how this is turning out. It couldn’t be worse.”
“I agree. One thing: it’s not any real comfort, but you should know the show is going beautifully. We’re all doing it for Dorothy, and I’ve never been in a production where the cast was so dedicated.”
“You’re right; nothing is any comfort right now, but I’m glad for everyone else—and for her memory, of course.”
We rang off, and I faced the unpleasant task of having to go through the same exchange with Danny. As might be imagined, he was far more hysterical than Annie, having not only lost his mother but been betrayed by Mikey and his father. We got through it, however, and I told him I understood that Annie had invited him to come to Boston. I told him I thought the best thing he could do right now was get away from all this and stay with Annie for a few days. He told me he would think about it, that he had a great deal to absorb. There was no doubt about that.
• • •
The preview that Monday night went better than we had any right to expect. There were a couple of hiccups, but essentially the new scene worked beautifully and improved the entire last part of the play. I went home greatly relieved, especially when I compared this night to the one before. The chief worry now, of course, was the disappearance of Warren. I tried to come up with some idea about what had happened, but nothing had come to mind by the time I went to sleep.
When I was making coffee the next morning, it hit me. Maybe it was Monaghan’s mention of border crossings, or it may have been my coffee mug. I knew it was a wild idea, perhaps an insane idea, but I thought it was worth a try. The picture that had popped into my head was a shelf in a kitchen. On the shelf were twenty or more colorful, picturesque coffee mugs. The kitchen was in Dorothy and Warren’s house in Connecticut, where I had first met them some years earlier. When Dorothy asked what I would like to drink, I said a beer. She told me I could find one in the fridge, and a glass in the cabinet beside it. I got the beer, opened the cabinet door, saw a tall glass and took it, but I also saw, on the shelf above, two dozen or more mugs with names on them, which I soon figured out belonged to various inns or bed-and-breakfast establishments: The Old Drover’s, Highfield House, Stone Creek, Willow Bend, Copper Kettle, Wild Strawberry, Mount Pleasant, Maple Grove, Blue Heron, White Swan.
Back in the living room, I asked about the collection, and Warren explained. When he and Dorothy were first married, they began visiting small inns and B and Bs in northwest Connecticut, western Massachusetts, and Vermont: Washington, Cornwall, Stockbridge, Middlebury. In some cases encouraged by the owners, in other cases surreptitiously, they brought home mugs. After Annie and Danny were born, the trips became less frequent, but they never forgot the getaways taken during those early days, and the mugs reminded them of that.
As soon as I had shaved and dressed, I searched through my maps and called Monaghan. “This may be crazy, but I have an idea,” I said. “Warren and Dorothy used to visit a lot of inns in Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Vermont. Also, Warren has a cousin in Montreal who idolizes him. The cousin made a lot of money with Warren and thinks he can do no wrong. Warren is not thinking too clearly right now, and his young partner is not the brightest bulb on the tree. Warren might have thought of the first thing that came to mind: head for one of those inns and then go on to Montreal. They’ll stay away from interstates and toll roads and probably try to cross into Canada somewhere between East Franklin and North Troy. My suggestion is that you contact the police in all those small towns along Route 7 going north and, further on, between Interstates 89 and 91. See if the two of them have stayed in an inn or B and B. Also, the kid’s car will have a Missouri license plate.”
“If you ask me, that’s reaching for it.”
“I agree. Don’t bother with it yourself, but, if some kid in the office is free, put him on it.”
“I’ll see what I can do. By the way, do you think the young man is part of this?”
“Probably not. Warren may well have told him that he is innocent and being pursued by old enemies in the financial world, people trying to frame him. Stuart Ross is just naïve enough to believe him.”
“I hope you realize, Matt, that I’ll be pursuing this scavenger hunt just for you.”
• • •
Just after noon on Tuesday, I had an email from someone named Phyllida Fairchild. She said she wrote for Vanity Fair and was hoping to do a piece about Dorothy for the next issue. Would I please phone her? I called, and after four rings she answered.
“Thanks for calling back, Mr. Johanssen.”
“Please, call me Matt. You’re thinking about writing about Dorothy?”
“I’m hoping to. We haven’t quite decided what to do, whether to combine something on her with the murder at the Met Museum or to do a short piece just on her.”
“I can’t help you with that.”
“I know. But I would still like to learn more about her; I understand you not only knew her, but you knew the husband as well.”
“Yes,” I answered tentatively.
“Could we possibly get together—at your convenience, of course. I know you’re in a show that’s about to open, so maybe this is not a great time.”
“True.”
“Still, if you could squeeze something in.”
I looked at the calendar on my phone. “We have two previews tomorrow, a matinee and an evening show. In between I’m going to have a bite to eat with Elliot, the playwright, at a small French place nearby. We’ll be having a quick supper. He has to leave early to meet the director. Maybe you could come for a cup of coffee or a glass of wine at 6:30.”
“That’ll be fine.”
“It’s called Mon Plaisir, on 49th near Ninth.”
“Mon Plaisir it is.”