Now and Then

of a fifty-one-year-old woman was exploiting the elderly. I had not entertained that conceit in some years, but if I had, Jordan Richmond would have ended it. She had brown hair with blond highlights. By the standards of her colleagues she appeared to 12 be vastly overdressed. Glimpsed covertly as she passed, she seemed to be wearing makeup. She had on black pants and a jacket with a faint chalk stripe. Under the jacket was a pink tee. By the sound they made on the hard floor, I could tell she was wearing heels.

I hung around the hallway, trying to look inconspicuous, until she finished her office hours at 4:30 and, carrying a black leather briefcase, she headed out of the building. I went with her. We stood so close in the elevator that I could smell her perfume. On the street we turned right and she went into the Marriott hotel. I took a baseball cap out of my book bag and put it on. Spenser, master of disguise. Then I put the book bag in a trash basket out front, waited for a moment, and went in after her. She was in the lobby bar. At a table with a man. I sat with my hat on, at the far end of the bar, where it turned. It put her back to me, and I could look at her companion. He appeared to be tall. His mustache and goatee were neatly trimmed. His nose was strong. His dark eyes were deep-set. His dark hair was curly and short with touches of gray. He wore an expensive dark suit with a white shirt and a blue silk tie. He was sipping a martini. As soon as she was seated he spoke to the waitress. She took his order and brought Jordan a martini. Jordan picked it up and gestured with it at the man. He raised his glass and they touched rims. I ordered a beer. The bartender put down a dish of nuts. I ate some so as not to hurt his feelings.

Jordan and her companion gave some evidence that Doherty’s fears were not groundless. They sat close together. She touched him often, putting a hand on his forearm, or on his shoulder.

Once, laughing, she leaned forward so that their foreheads touched. All his movements were languid, not as if he was tired, more as if he was happily relaxed about everything. And very pleased to be him.

They had two drinks. He paid the check. They got up and went out. I left too much money on the bar and went after them. They walked back to Concord College together. Got into a Honda Prelude in the parking lot and drove out. I was parked down Main Street a way. By the time I got to my car they were out of sight. So instead I went over the Longfellow Bridge and drove down to Milton.

It took about a half hour to get to Brant Island Road. I parked on the corner with a view of the house where Dennis and Jordan lived. It was a white garrison colonial, with green shutters. The lights were on. There was a Ford Crown Vic in the driveway. At ten after eleven Jordan pulled the Prelude into the driveway next to the Crown Vic. She got out, straightened her pants a little, fluffed her hair for a moment, then took her briefcase from the car, closed the car door, and walked carefully to the house.

4.

It does sound kind of affair-y,” Susan said.

“I saw them together,” I said. “It’s an affair. But it’s not proof of an affair.”

“I know,” Susan said. “Will you say anything to the husband?”

“I don’t think so,” I said. “It would just be my opinion.”

“You want to offer him certainty?”

“I think until I can prove it, he’ll refuse to believe it,” I said.

Susan nodded.

“Hard to know, sometimes, what’s best,” she said.

“How about the truth?” I said.

She smiled.

“That’s often effective,” she said.

We were sharing sweet-and-sour pork for supper at P. F. Chang’s in Park Square. Unless you think that sharing means equal portions for both. In which case, I was having sweet-andsour pork, and Susan was having a couple of bites.

“But I don’t know,” I said, “at this stage of things, if I would have wanted to know without certainty.”

“You already had reason for suspicion,” Susan said.

“I did, but I couldn’t believe it.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know if I couldn’t believe you’d do it, or I couldn’t believe it could happen to me.”

“Or wouldn’t,” Susan said.

“Same result,” I said.

Susan isolated a small piece of pork on her plate, sliced it in half, and ate one of the halves.

“So I think I’ll wait until I can prove it,” I said. Susan nodded.

“Are you planning to burst in on them with a video camera?” Susan said.

“Ugh!” I said.

“How about planting some sort of electronic device?”

“Ugh!”

She smiled.

“Are you sure you’re cut out for this sort of work?” she said.

“Doherty needs to know,” I said.

“Even though it will cause him pain,” she said.