Coincidence (12 page)

“So how’s it going?”

I realized that I hadn’t answered Lou’s question about the book. I shifted in my chair and leaned back from the table, partly
to give myself a moment to think, partly to escape the foul stench of the cigar he had just lit up.

“Well, Lou, I’d like to be able to tell you it’s going better than it is. In fact I’d like to be able to tell you it’s going
at all.”

“What’s the problem?”

I shrugged. “I’m not sure I’ll be able to persuade anybody to believe a damn word I’m saying. I’m not even sure I can persuade
myself.”

He raised an eyebrow almost imperceptibly, but didn’t seem troubled by the announcement. “I’m sorry to hear that. I’m sure
if there’s a solution to the problem, you’ll find it.”

“I’m working on it,” I said. “If I solve it, you’ll be the first to know.”

“Take your time,” he said. “You’re not tied to a deadline; there’s no contract. Listen, if this doesn’t work out, maybe you’ll
think of something else.”

And that was the end of it: clear confirmation that George’s career as a writer was of no interest to anyone, least of all
his agent or his publisher. We had another Remy and parted company amiably on the sidewalk.

It was a crisp fall day with a clear blue sky. To be honest, I don’t usually notice things like the weather, unless of course
I have a particular reason to, for example if I’m supposed to play golf or go hunting or something. That day I had no particular
reason to give a damn about the weather, but I noticed it all the same, and I felt like walking for a while. As I did so,
I reflected on where I was, how I’d come to this point, and where I went from here. I felt strangely disconnected from reality—a
“pod person,” that old standby about aliens who take over the lives of human beings. It was interesting, if odd, to share
the perspective of the alien.

I needed something more real. On an impulse I suddenly felt I’d been putting off for too long, I made a call to Nadia Shelley.

N
adia said she could do lunch in a couple of days. Until we sat down and raised a glass together, I let her labor under the
impression that the purpose of this meeting was to talk further business of some kind. When, shortly afterward, I confessed
there was a more personal aspect to the invitation, I got the impression she had expected it but hadn’t been sure. She made
all the right noises of protest and reservation, everything that convention required of a respectable young woman. When I
proposed dinner at the weekend (when Sara would be away again), Nadia said she would let me know. I told her to call my mobile
number, which she did the following day to say she could make Saturday evening.

It was another week before we went to bed together. “Look,” I said on the afternoon we did, at her apartment, “if there are
regrets, let’s just agree to have them. But they’re not obligatory.”

She had thrown her head back and laughed, that wonderful mouth framing pearl-white teeth. Then she asked me if I loved my
wife. I told her how we’d drifted apart, with neither of us making much effort to reverse the process.

“You know what I think?” she said. “I think your wife is seeing somebody. Why else would she leave you alone as often as she
does? She’s almost inviting you to get involved with somebody. Doesn’t she ever ask you what you do with your time?”

I shook my head slowly, staring at the ceiling.

“Never.”

“Then it’s obvious.”

The thought that Sara was involved with somebody had of course crossed my mind, along with the recollection of that clause
in the prenuptial agreement about divorce “on whatever grounds.” She had nothing to lose: I everything.

“Why don’t you just leave her,” she asked, “if the marriage is as dead as you say it is?”

I sighed and wondered about telling her the truth. There was something about Nadia that made me feel I could be open with
her. We had made love with all the excitement of newness and novelty; at the same time there was something more between us
that felt right, as though we belonged together.

But I held back. I was in bed with her, yet in truth I hardly knew her—any more, for that matter, than she knew me. It was
too soon for trust. All I knew about Nadia was that she had something of the quality of a cat: The only thing she understood
was pleasure. Sheer sensuous, and sensual, pleasure. And, like all cats, she knew that the only way to get it was to go right
where it was and take it.

I turned over on my side, bringing our faces close together. “The thing is,” I said, tracing a finger softly down the curve
of her cheek, “I haven’t met anyone till now that made my marriage matter all that much.”

Our mouths touched, and our bodies began to re-entangle yet again. The passion that we both thought we had exhausted, at least
for the moment, swept over us again with undiminished force. I was harder even than I’d been before, and she whimpered her
desire as the thrill of sexual excitement engulfed us both once more.

“We’ll talk at the weekend. At Eastways.”

“Why not now?”

“Because I have to be somewhere.”

“You mean some damn art charity committee is more important than—”

“George, I’m not talking to you about
anything
while you’re like this.”

“Like what? What am I like? What is your problem?”

“This memory loss thing. I think you’re doing it on purpose.”

“I got hit on the head, for God’s sake!”

“Your doctor said those injuries could have been self-inflicted. They even found scratches on your hands as though you’d been
kneeling down to bang your head on the pavement.”

“That is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard!”

“You need help, George—please. You’re not well. You’re not yourself.”

I had been trying to get out of her some clearer statement of our situation. She refused to believe that I wasn’t just making
trouble, going back on “my” word of the previous week. My amnesia bluff had been called, but I still clung to it like a drowning
man hanging on to the last thing afloat. The biggest mistake I could make now would be to admit she was right and that I’d
been pretending. There was no easy way out of this. The only solution was to face up to things and adopt a reasonable manner.

“All right,” I said, as though weary of argument and sorry to have put her through it, “maybe you’re right and I’m nuts and
I cracked my skull open so I could
pretend
to lose my memory. Whatever! All I know is I
did
lose it, period. So yes, I do need help—and I would like it to come from you.”

“The weekend, George. I have to go.”

I closed my eyes as though in pain and listened to her footsteps recede, followed by the sound of the apartment door closing
behind her. Then I flopped onto the long white sofa behind me and stared at the ceiling.

Eastways was the house up in the Berkshires. I had suggested going up there on my own, telling Sara I needed a few days of
peace and quiet in order to think. More important, it gave me a chance to snoop around and generally find out what I could
about the man I was supposed to be. The moment I’d spoken about going up there, Sara said she would join me at the weekend.
She would come up on Friday night, then we’d have all the time we needed to do whatever talking we had to do. She seemed to
think it would be easier up there.

I took the train on Thursday morning, having arranged that the man who worked for “us” would meet me on arrival. I had of
course no idea what he looked like, but he knew me and hurried up to me as soon as I emerged from the station into the pale
afternoon light.

It was only a twenty-minute drive to the house. I’d found a couple of photographs of the place in George’s desk but wasn’t
quite prepared for the sweep of the grounds and the magnificent lake view. The house itself was standard neoTudor, but large
and pleasantly rambling.

A rotund and motherly woman bustled from the front door when she heard the car drive up. Her name, I knew, was Martha. She
and her husband, Joe, who had driven me from the station, lived in a house on the estate and looked after the place. I knew
they had been with the family—Sara’s family—for many years, so they had known George throughout his marriage to Sara.

Martha fussed around and settled me in and asked about my health. She said she understood that I’d been suffering headaches
and blackouts since I was attacked. I said it was really just occasional memory lapses now, and they were getting better,
but I hoped she and Joe would bear with me when I seemed lost or even stupid for a moment. The appeal touched the mother in
her, and I knew I was going to have no problems with either of them.

Despite missing Nadia, I resisted the urge to call her. We had agreed that absolute discretion was essential.

That night I ate alone and watched a movie on television. Martha had fixed me some kind of chicken with a French-sounding
name, and I found to my satisfaction that the house had a fine wine cellar. It was an altogether agreeable evening, after
which I enjoyed a long, dreamless sleep. I decided that I liked that house; something about it agreed with me. My only regret
was that, according to Sara’s will, there was no way I would ever inherit it.

No word had been spoken between Nadia and myself about getting rid of Sara. We had talked only of my leaving her. I had implied
it was a question of timing, legal niceties, financial settlements. If there happened to be an accident in the meantime, it
would be just that—an accident. Nadia wouldn’t know enough to betray me without making herself an accomplice. So she hadn’t—and
wouldn’t—ask questions. I was very sure about Nadia on that level. She knew what she wanted and was single-minded about getting
it.

I had killed before. I had killed George, admittedly not with my own hands, but I had delivered him without a qualm to those
who would do the deed. I knew beyond doubt that killing did not trouble me in any moral way. All that concerned me was whether
I could get away with it—the eternal eleventh commandment, the only one that mattered. I knew that Sara’s murder would be
harder than George’s, but I would find a way. My biggest problem was time. Her life had to end before the marriage did, and
although I didn’t know the details it was obvious to me that this was a badly ailing marriage.

Next morning I went through the house—drawers, files, and closets—in search of anything that might come in useful. Not as
a weapon so much as an angle, a way of going about things that might deflect suspicion away from myself and toward… who could
say? Perhaps the man Sara was involved with was married and I—that is, George—had been a convenient “beard” to keep things
from his wife. Or, was it a woman she was involved with? Why not? Such things happen, and often.

Another thought suddenly crossed my mind so unexpectedly that it made me jump. Was George gay? Had he been the “beard” for
his wife’s affair, or affairs, while at the same time discreetly going his own way? It was a scenario that I could not dismiss
and that I would have to handle very carefully if it turned out to be true. But I found nothing, no evidence of entanglements
of any kind on either side. In short, nothing that I didn’t already know, which was precious little. It was frustrating.

After lunch I went for a walk through the woods and down to the lake. About an hour later, on my return from a different direction
from that on which I had set out, I found myself stopping to look up at a clock tower on a side of the house I hadn’t so far
seen. Scaffolding had been erected around two sides of it.

As I stood there, Joe came up to say that he’d given instructions for the maintenance work to be suspended while I was there
in order to avoid disturbing me. I thanked him for his thoughtfulness.

The top of the tower was crenellated, and I wondered if there was a terrace. A few minutes later I found the interior stairs
that led up to it. I emerged into a space that would be nice for having drinks with friends on a summer evening. The parapet
on one side, I could now see, had been demolished in preparation for whatever work had to be done. The scaffolding beyond
it created a temporary balcony allowing work to be done from that side. I stepped out cautiously and peered over the low protective
barrier. The drop was precipitous. I imagined the sound of a human skull hitting the flagstones below, and pulled back with
a shiver.

But a plan had formed in my mind. It was going to be simple now. I knew exactly what I was going to do.

Half an hour later I was sitting in front of a log fire in the library, nursing a whisky and soda. Waiting for the evening,
when Sara would arrive.

“Sara”

I
had finally told George the truth the night before I left for Philadelphia. It was the most difficult thing I’ve ever had
to do. In fact, I really had no right to do it at all. Steve and I had agreed to keep our relationship secret so long as he
had one major hurdle to get over—the party vote that would confirm his selection as candidate for the state Senate. It was
due to take place in just over a week’s time. After that his position would be more secure, though by no means unassailable.
There was over a year till the election, and a lot could happen in that time—including divorce and remarriage. But a “scandal”
now, of the “Candidate abandons family for another other man’s wife” kind, would finish him before he’d even gotten started.

But suddenly I couldn’t go on like that any longer. I was sure that George suspected something, and I simply didn’t have it
in me to continue deceiving him. He didn’t deserve to be treated so shabbily. For too many nights we had been lying together—in
more ways than one—he trying not to disturb me as he watched me in the dark, while I pretended to be asleep. Finally, that
night, I knew I had to face him. There was no other way.

I opened my eyes and looked up at him, meeting his gaze.

“It’s Steve, isn’t it?” he said.

“Yes,” I answered simply, unable to attempt any kind of lie or evasion.