I'll Be Seeing You (23 page)

That's some realistic yell, Mac thought, when he first heard Kyle's scream. Then, as the terrified shriek continued, he began to run toward the woods. Something had happened to Kyle. With a burst of speed he raced across the lawn and behind the house.

From inside the dining room, Meg heard the screaming and ran to the back door. She yanked it open and grabbed Kyle as he stumbled through the door and fell into her arms, sobbing in terror.

That was the way Mac found them, their arms around each other, Meg rocking his son back and forth, soothing him. “Kyle, it's okay. It's okay,” she kept repeating.

It took minutes before he could tell them what had happened. “Kyle, it's all those stories about the dead walking that makes you think you're seeing things,” Mac said. “There was nothing there.”

Calmer now, drinking the hot cocoa Meg had made for him, Kyle was adamant. “There was so a man there, and he had a camera. I know. I fell when he pushed me, but I picked up something. Then I dropped it when I saw Meg. Go see what it is, Dad.”

“I'll get a flashlight, Mac,” Meg said.

Mac went outside and began moving the beam back and forth over the ground. He did not have to go far. Only a few feet from the back porch he found a gray plastic box, the kind used to carry videotapes.

He picked it up and walked back to the woods, still shining the light before him. He knew it was useless. No intruder stands around waiting to be discovered. The ground was too hard to see footprints, but he found Kyle's lantern directly in line with the dining room windows. From where he was standing he could see Meg and Kyle clearly.

Someone with a camera had been here watching Meg, maybe taping her. Why?

Mac thought of the dead girl in the morgue, then hurried back across the lawn to the house.

That stupid kid! Bernie thought as he ran through the woods to his car. He'd parked it near the end of the Drumdoe Inn parking lot but not so far away that it stood out. There were about forty cars scattered through the lot now, so his Chevy certainly wouldn't have been particularly noticed. He hurriedly tossed his camera in the trunk and drove through town toward Route 7. He was careful to go not more than five miles above the speed limit. But he knew that driving too slow was a red flag to the cops too.

Had that kid gotten a good look at him? He didn't think so. It was dark, and the kid was scared. A few seconds more and he could have moved backwards and the kid wouldn't have known he was there.

Bernie was furious. He'd been enjoying watching Meghan through the camera, and he'd had such a clear view of her. He was sure he had great tapes.

On the other hand he'd never seen anyone so frightened as that kid had been. He felt tingly and alive and almost energized just thinking about it. To have such power. To be able to record someone's expressions and movements and secret little gestures, like the way Meghan kept tucking her hair behind her ear when she was concentrating. To scare someone so much that he screamed and cried and ran like that little kid just now.

To watch Meghan, her hands, her hair . . .

S
tephanie Petrovic had a fitful night, finally falling into a heavy sleep. When she awakened at ten-thirty on Sunday morning, she opened her eyes lazily and smiled. At last things were working out.

She had been warned never to breathe his name, to forget she'd ever met him, but that was before Helene was murdered and before Helene lost the chance to change her will.

On the telephone he was so kind to her. He promised he would take care of her. He would make arrangements to have the baby adopted by people who would pay one hundred thousand dollars for it.

“So much?” she had asked, delighted.

He reassured her that there would be no problem.

He would also arrange to get her a green card. “It will be fake, but no one will ever be able to tell the difference,” he had said. “However, I suggest that you move someplace where no one knows you. I wouldn't want anyone to recognize you. Even in a big place like New York City people bump into each other, and in your case they'd start asking questions. You might try California.”

Stephanie knew she would love California. Maybe she could get a job in a spa there, she thought. With one hundred thousand dollars she'd be able to get the training she'd need. Or maybe she could just get a job right away. She was like Helene. Being a beautician came to her naturally. She loved that kind of work.

He was sending a car for her at seven o'clock tonight.
“I don't want the neighbors to see you moving out,” he'd told her.

Stephanie wanted to luxuriate in bed, but she was hungry. Only ten days more and the baby will be born and then I can go on a diet, she promised herself.

She showered, then dressed in the maternity clothes she had come to hate. Then she began to pack. Helene had tapestry luggage in the closet. Why shouldn't I have it? Stephanie thought. Who deserves it more?

Because of the pregnancy, she had so few clothes, but once she was back to her normal size she'd fit in Helene's things again. Helene had been a conservative dresser, but all her clothes were expensive and in good taste. Stephanie went through the closet and dresser drawers, rejecting only what she absolutely did not like.

Helene had a small safe on the floor of her closet. Stephanie knew where she kept the combination, so she opened it. It didn't contain much jewelry, but there were a few very good pieces, which she slipped into a cosmetic bag.

It was a shame she couldn't move the furniture out there. On the other hand, she knew from pictures she'd seen that in California they didn't use old-fashioned up-holstered furniture and dark woods like mahogany.

She did go through the house and chose some Dresden figurines to take with her. Then she remembered the table silver. The big chest was too heavy to carry, so she put the silver in plastic bags and fastened rubber bands around them to keep it from rattling in the suitcase.

The lawyer, Mr. Potters, called at five o'clock to see how she was feeling. “Perhaps you'd like to join my wife and me for dinner, Stephanie.”

“Oh, thank you,” she said, “but someone from the Rumanian Society is going to drop in.”

“Fine. We just didn't want you to be lonesome. Remember, be sure to call me if you need anything.”

“You're so kind, Mr. Potters.”

“Well, I only wish I could do more for you. Unfortunately, where the will is concerned, my hands are tied.”

I don't need your help, Stephanie thought as she hung up the phone.

Now it was time to write the letter. She composed three versions before she was satisfied. She knew that some of her spelling was bad, and she had to look up some words, but at last it seemed to be all right. It was to Mr. Potters:

Dear Mr. Potters,

I am happy to say that Jan, the father of my baby, is the one who came to see me. We are going to get maried and he will take care of us. He must get back to his job right awaye so I am leaving with him. He now works in Dallas.

I love Jan very much and I know you will be pleassed for me.

Thank you.

Stephanie Petrovic

The car came for her promptly at seven. The driver carried her bags out. Stephanie left the note and house key on the dining room table, turned off the lights, closed the door behind her and hurried through the darkness, down the flagstone walk to the waiting vehicle.

On Monday morning, Meghan tried to phone Stephanie Petrovic. There was no answer. She settled down at the dining room table, where she had begun to go through her father's business files.

She immediately noticed something. He'd been registered and billed for five days at the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills, from 23 January to 28 January, the day he flew to Newark and disappeared. After the first two days there were no extra charges on that bill. Even if he ate most of his meals out, Meghan thought, people send for breakfast or make a phone call or open the room bar and have a drink—something.

On the other hand, if he'd been on the concierge floor,
it would be very like her father just to go to the courtesy buffet and help himself to juice, coffee and a roll. He was a light-breakfast eater.

The first two days, however, did have extra charges on the bill, like the valet, a bottle of wine, an evening snack, phone calls. She made a note of the dates of the three days when there were no extra expenses.

There might be a pattern, she thought.

At noon she tried Stephanie again, and again the phone was not answered. At two o'clock she began to be alarmed and phoned the lawyer, Charles Potters. He assured her that Stephanie was fine. He'd spoken to her the evening before and she'd said someone from the Rumanian Society was dropping by.

“I'm glad,” Meghan said. “She's a very frightened girl.”

“Yes, she is,” Potters agreed. “Something that isn't generally known is that when someone leaves an entire estate to a charity or a medical facility such as the Manning Clinic, if a close relative is needy and inclined to try to break the will, the charity or facility may quietly offer a settlement. However, after Stephanie went on television literally accusing the clinic of being responsible for her aunt's murder, any such settlement was out of the question. It would seem like hush money.”

“I understand,” Meghan said. “I'll keep trying Stephanie, but will you ask her to call me if you hear from her? I still think someone should go after the man who got her pregnant. If she gives away her baby, she may someday regret it.”

Meghan's mother had gone to the inn for the breakfast and lunch service, and she returned to the house just as Meg was finishing the conversation with Potters. “Let me get busy with you,” she said, taking a seat next to her at the dining room table.

“Actually you can take over,” Meghan told her. “I really have to drive to my apartment and get clothes and pick up my mail. It's the first of November, and all the little window envelopes will be in.”

The evening before, when her mother had returned from the inn, she had told her about the man with the camera who had frightened Kyle. “I asked someone at the station to check it out for me; I haven't heard yet, but I'm sure one of those sleazy programs is putting together a story on us and Dad and the Andersons,” she said. “Sending someone to spy on us is the way they work.” She had not allowed Mac to call the police.

She showed her mother what she was doing with the files. “Mom, watch the hotel receipts for times when there were no extra expenses for three or four days in a row. I'd like to see if it only happened when Dad was in California.” She did not say that Los Angeles was half an hour by plane from Scottsdale.

“And as for Palomino Leather Goods,” Catherine said, “I don't know why, but that name has been churning around in my mind. I feel as though I've heard it before, but a long time ago.”

Meghan still had not decided if she would stop at PCD on her way to the apartment. She was wearing comfortable old slacks and a favorite sweater. It'll do, she thought. That was one of the aspects she had loved about the job, the behind-the-scenes informality.

She brushed her hair quickly and realized that it was growing too long. She liked it to be collar length. Now it was touching her shoulders. The dead girl's hair had been on her shoulders. Her hands suddenly cold, Meghan reached back, twisted her hair into a French knot and pinned it up.

When she was leaving, her mother said, “Meg, why don't you go out to dinner with some of your friends? It will do you good to get away from all this.”

“I'm not much in the mood for social dinners,” Meg said, “but I'll call and let you know. You'll be at the inn?”

“Yes.”

“Well, when you're here after dark be sure to keep the draperies drawn.” She raised her hand, palm upright and
outward, fingers spread. “As Kyle would say, ‘Give me a high five.' ”

Her mother raised her hand and touched her daughter's palm in response. “You've got it.”

They looked at each other for a long minute, then Catherine said briskly, “Drive carefully.”

It was the standard warning ever since Meg had gotten her driving permit at age sixteen.

Her answer was always in the same vein. Today she said, “Actually I thought I'd tailgate a tractor trailer.” Then she wanted to bite her tongue. The accident on the Tappan Zee Bridge had been caused by a fuel truck tailgating a tractor trailer.

She knew her mother was thinking the same thing when she said, “Dear God, Meg, it's like walking through a mine field, isn't it? Even the kind of joking remark that has been part of the fabric of our lives has been tainted and twisted. Will it ever end?”

That same Monday morning, Dr. George Manning was again questioned in Assistant State Attorney John Dwyer's office. The questions had become sharper with an edge of sarcasm in them. The two investigators sat quietly as their boss handled the interrogation.

“Doctor,” Dwyer asked, “can you explain why you didn't tell us immediately that Helene Petrovic was afraid that she had mixed up the Anderson embryos?”