Teddi felt as if she were walking a tightrope.
What would Dora do if she knew she was under suspicion? How determined was she to succeed in bilking Mamie of everything she had?
How would Mamie feel about the plan Teddi and Jason were putting into effect? Would she be outraged at the idea that they wanted to discredit the daughter-in-law and grandson she had only just found? At the very least, whether they were right or wrong about Dora, Mamie would be terribly hurt.
Teddi watched Mamie as she went about her routine tasks, in the house and out in the garden, seeing a contentment that had not been there since the news had come about Ricky’s death.
Every time Mamie looked at Danny, or held him, there was a smile that only too clearly bespoke how important this child was to her.
Dora, engrossed in her new TV, luckily, didn’t seem to notice the way Teddi watched her. At dinner, though, sitting across the table, her expression seemed to sharpen at something she saw in Teddi’s face.
Teddi tried—unsuccessfully, she feared—to smile offhandedly. Inwardly, she was in a turmoil, praying that no one could really read her countenance. Fortunately, that was the moment Jason chose to tap on the back door. Teddi quickly pushed back her chair and excused herself, joining Jason on the back porch rather than inviting him in.
“It may not prove anything,” he said in a low voice, “because we don’t know for sure that Dora and Ricky were supposed to have been married in San Diego, but they weren’t.”
Teddi stared at him. “What do you mean?”
“I mean I called my uncle Jim, who lives in Escondido—you know, not far from San Diego—who’s a lawyer, and my cousin Jenny, who works as his secretary. She investigated it and just called me back. Nobody named Richard Thrane married anybody named Dora anything in San Diego County over the past two years. I didn’t figure she needed to look back any further than that, because Ricky hadn’t been down there that long.”
“So either they got married somewhere else,” Teddi said slowly, “or they weren’t married at all.”
“Right. Of course the fact that she says they lived in San Diego wouldn’t have to mean they were married there, but if they were really short of money, wouldn’t it be most likely they’d get married close to home, where it would be cheaper? And”—Jason paused for effect, though she was paying close attention, anyway—“there is no telephone listing anywhere in the county for Richard Thrane. Was his home address on that form he filled out for the insurance?”
“I don’t remember. I wonder what Mamie did with the form after she wrote to the insurance company?”
“See if you can find it. He must have had to put an address on it. If we had that, we might be able to find out more about him. About whether he was married or not.”
Finding the notification Mamie had received about the insurance Ricky bought proved to be quite easy. Teddi had been afraid Mamie had put it into her safe-deposit box at the bank, but she had not.
It lay in the corner of the top drawer in the desk, along with a few unpaid bills.
Teddi glanced around guiltily, but Mamie was out in the laundry room, and Dora was with her blaring television.
The form held both an address and a telephone number.
Teddi copied them and ran next door with the information.
Mrs. Temple let her in with a smile. “Jason’s up in his room, fooling around with the computer, I think.”
He turned to face her when she tapped on his door frame, and took the paper she handed him.
“Yes!” Jason said triumphantly. “Let’s call this number and see what we can find out.”
That plan, however, proved disappointing. Though the phone rang and rang on the other end, nobody answered.
“Well,” Jason said, hanging up, “whoever’s phone it is, it hasn’t been disconnected. I’ll try it again later. Has Dora been sneaking out of the house every night?”
“I don’t know. I’ve only caught her a couple of times. And they were just by accident. Am I going to have to sit up all night and watch for her to leave?” It was a dismaying prospect, going without sleep, but there must be a way to trap Dora if she was the imposter they believed she was.
“Can you cover until, say, two A.M.? Then I’ll take over until dawn,” Jason offered.
“What’ll I do if I see her leaving?” Teddi asked nervously. “Will I have to follow her?” It was a scary prospect. “What if she meets an accomplice?”
“I’ll get my Boy Scout whistle for you, and we’ll both leave our bedroom windows open. Give me a toot on the whistle, and I’ll come running. I’ll keep my clothes on, even my shoes, so it’ll only take a few minutes to get on her trail.”
It was the best plan they could come up with. Teddi figured Dora wouldn’t leave, if she were going to, until Mamie had gone to bed and was asleep. That had been the pattern so far. So it ought to be safe to take a nap earlier in the evening, to be sure to be awake during the critical period.
A little later, back at Mamie’s, she took a book and made a remark about reading in bed for a while. When she headed up the stairs, it was a little after nine o’clock. But once in her room, either napping or reading proved impossible. She was too tense.
She had Jason’s Boy Scout whistle on a cord around her neck, which should have been reassuring. But what if he didn’t hear it? What if he’d gone to the bathroom, or downstairs for something to eat? What would she do then?
To be ready for anything, she put on a pair of dark jeans and a black shirt—it was missing a couple of buttons, but she didn’t expect anyone to see it, anyway—and dark tennis shoes.
She was as prepared as she could get.
The minutes on her digital clock changed with maddening slowness. Her inability to relax made her chest ache, and she drew a deep breath, and then another, trying to calm down.
Her conviction that Ricky and Dora had not been married to each other was stronger than ever. Surely Ricky would never have married a girl like Dora. It hadn’t been a lapse of memory when he designated Mamie as his beneficiary, and Dora was no more than an opportunist who had seen a chance to insinuate herself into Mamie’s household for her own gain.
And if that was the case, then what? To lose Danny, so soon after Ricky had vanished from her life, would desolate Mamie. She was already making such plans for the baby. She was planning a trust fund for his education, and she was forever spotting something that would be appropriate for a little boy: a red wagon, a tricycle, a swing set for the backyard.
There was no way this story could have a happy ending, Teddi thought wistfully. Unless by some miracle Dora had been Ricky’s wife, and Danny really was Mamie’s grandson. In which case, Teddi herself would probably be eliminated from the household before long, of her own volition if they didn’t ask her to leave.
She didn’t think she could spent the next few years in the same house with Dora. Even if she had put the money back in the jar, if she had simply borrowed and returned it, Dora had not asked to take it. Teddi was sure of that. Which meant that Dora would never be someone you could trust. Nor would Dora be likely to tolerate the presence of someone else in the household for long.
A surreptitious sound brought her into a sitting position.
From below there was canned laughter on Dora’s new TV. But this had been a different kind of sound.
After a moment it came again, from outside. Through the open window at the front of the house.
Teddi reached out and turned off the reading light, throwing the room into near-darkness. Silently, she slid off the bed and crossed to the other window. Jason’s room was completely black; was he sleeping in preparation for his own watch? They hadn’t figured on anything happening this early, but might not Dora have used the TV for cover and slipped out of the house now through a window?
Teddi leaned as close to the screen as she could get and lifted the whistle to her mouth to give the signal: two short blasts.
There was no visible response from next door, but of course Teddi hadn’t expected there would be. She hurried back to the street-side window to listen carefully again.
That first sound, whatever it was, was not repeated. She had almost given up and retreated when she heard the rapping.
Not on the front door below; she was pretty sure of that. On a window, maybe?
Teddi wished there were no screen, or that it were easily removed, for she wanted to lean out, to listen. She wished Dora would turn off the TV, for though it wasn’t loud from up here, it was enough to cover small noises outside.
And then there was another sound that allowed the TV to get louder, but Teddi recognized it. The window in Dora’s room slid up, sticking enough so that Teddi heard her curse, then screeching as it moved upward.
She couldn’t see what was directly beneath her own window. The house was in the light from the street except right up against the building, and there was no way to twist her head to see into those shadows.
Someone was out there. Dora had opened the window to him. And Teddi heard the hissed reaction.
“You idiot! You’ll blow everything!” Dora was furious.
Teddi couldn’t make out the whispered response, only that it was a male voice. When Dora spoke again, she, too, had lowered her voice, so that the words were frustratingly unintelligible.
What should she do? Teddi wondered frantically. Blow the whistle again for Jason, in case he hadn’t heard her first alarm? That seemed like a good idea, but then what? Go downstairs?
She put both plans into action, glad her rubber soles made her progress silent.
Dora’s door was closed, so it was safe to go past it. Mamie was in the living room, listening to music and reading, her back to the doorway.
Through the house, then, to the back door, twisting the lock, sliding out into the darkness of the back porch.
A glance toward Jason’s house revealed no sign of movement outside. Was he already watching the unknown visitor, or was she out here by herself?
Her heart was hammering, so that all she could hear was the blood in her own ears. Teddi paused, trying to adjust to the dimness, willing her own breathing to calm down.
Around the back of the house, then the far corner, then . . . she stopped, one hand unconsciously pressed against her chest.
There was a bulky figure beside the house and, from this close, though she still couldn’t make out all the words, Teddi was sure they were quarreling in low, angry voices.
She strained to hear, catching an occasional emphatic word, mostly profanity on the part of the man. Then she thought he said, “Be there!” and Dora retorted with another burst of profanity.
The window slammed shut, and after a few seconds, the man turned and moved rapidly toward the street.
He was leaving, Teddi thought in a panic. What was she supposed to do? Where was Jason?
Wildly her gaze searched the shrubbery, the shadows under the trees, but there was no sign of Jason.
Where was he?
Already the man was striding toward the corner half a block away.
It wasn’t enough to learn what they could about Dora. This man, whoever he was, was mixed up in this whole thing. It was essential to find out who he was, and what he was up to.
Teddi drew a deep, painful breath, and decided: There was only one thing to do. She’d have to try to follow him.