Body in the Big Apple

“Now, what about the books and typing paper?” Emma had a hectic flush on her cheeks and asked this eagerly. It was just like the old days, when they’d tried to get locked in the Metropolitan Museum after reading From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E.

Frankweiler.

“At the service, his agent talked about a book, one that was to be published only after Fox’s death. Lorraine mentioned that he was working on an important book, too. What do you know about it?”

“A couple of times when I visited him, he was typing. I could hear it through the door. It wasn’t a very safe building—the buzzer didn’t work and anybody could get in from the street door. I really wanted him to move, but he always said no one would bother an old man like him. He gave me a key, ‘just in case,’ he said, but I’m not sure what he meant, what the case would be. I always knocked, since there wasn’t an intercom and I didn’t want to disturb his work.

That’s how I heard the typing. He was pretty good at it.”

“The book, Emma, what was the book about?”

“Some political thing, I imagine. He told me it was his magnum opus and the most fun he’d had in years.

He kept it in a fireproof metal file cabinet. He was afraid of fire—said the building would go up in a flash.

I gave him one of those small extinguishers, and he was very pleased. But he never said anything about when the book was going to be published.” 105

“Did he ever talk about being afraid of anything else, particularly anyone else?”

Emma shook her head. “It’s not the greatest neighborhood and, as I said, the building wasn’t secure. He was afraid of fire because of his books and papers, not because he was worried about himself. I always thought he liked living on the edge—in a funny way, liked being a wanted man, hiding out.” Which was what Arthur Quinn had implied. Well, thought Faith, whatever gets you off—although in this case, it was permanent.

“It just doesn’t make sense. Without much of an estate, Nathan Fox was certainly worth more alive than dead to anyone who knew who he really was. Why kill him? Why not simply turn him over to the feds for the reward money?”

“But only a handful of people knew who he was—

me, this Lorraine Fuchs, Todd, but that was years ago.” Emma was right. It was a short list—so far. Faith could already add several names: maybe Harvey Fuchs—she hadn’t mentioned him to Emma yet—

maybe Arthur Quinn, maybe Poppy Morris.

“You better watch out . . .” The Salvation Army Santa’s tape was starting from the beginning again.

This time, Faith put the money for the check on the table and they put their coats on.

When she passed him, Faith shoved a five-dollar bill in the pot.

They were rolling out pecan shortbread cookies for an office party at one of the publishing houses when the phone rang. Faith grabbed it, hoping it was her grandmother, with whom she’d been playing phone tag since receiving the plaintive message about the closing of 106

B. Altman’s—or “Baltmans,” as Hope had called it when she was little.

But it wasn’t Granny; it was Emma. Emma sounding more frantic and flat-out terrified than Faith had ever heard her.

“I don’t know what to do! You’ve got to help me!”

“What’s wrong! Where are you! Emma, if you’re in any danger, you have got to call the police!”

“No, no! Faith, I’m at my wit’s end!”

“What! What is it!”

“The caterer I hired for the Stanstead Associates holiday party tomorrow night has been shut down by the Board of Health!”

107

Five

This was serious.

“Michael thinks everything’s all set, and besides people from the firm, he always invites extras—people he wants to impress, important people. I’ve been calling every caterer in the city and everybody’s booked.

I’m desperate!”

Trying extremely hard not to feel slighted as a caterer, Faith worked to sound sympathetic. The important “extras” would no doubt be people essential to Michael’s political ambitions, and a wife who muffed a simple thing like an office party was not going to present herself as a strong candidate for pulling off state dinners.

“I know Have Faith won’t be able to do it. Of course you’re booked, but do you know anyone who could possibly step in? It could even be an outfit from Jersey.” Emma’s voice trembled.

Faith was enormously relieved. She should have had more faith. Emma assumed she was busy, as all the hot—and even not so hot—caterers in town were. And 108

Faith was busy. She was doing a lunch tomorrow and an after-theater dessert buffet in the evening. Saturday night, she had two dinners and a cocktail party.

“What time is it scheduled for, and is it dinner?”

“Six o’clock, supposedly after work, but no one’s going to be working much on a Friday this close to Christmas. What we’d arranged was hors d’oeuvres, then a buffet of more substantial food and desserts. But it can all be scaled down. The most important thing is to have a lot to drink. At least that’s what Michael always says.”

“I have a job, but not until later, and I think we can do both.”

“You! But that would be heaven! I never dreamed you might be able to do it. Come over and take a look at the place. I don’t think you’ve seen it. I’ll give you a key and then you can come and go when you want.

Oh, this is too good to be true! We’ll keep it simple—

things everybody likes: foie gras, caviar, festive things.”

Foie gras and caviar with toasted brioche and blinis being the Triscuits and Wispride spread of this crowd, Faith reflected. Obviously, money was no object, and it certainly did make things easier. She took down the number of expected guests and a few other details from Emma, then began calling her suppliers. By the time Josie returned from a lunch break of Christmas shopping, Faith had the Stanstead party pretty much under control. She was happy to be helping Emma out, but even happier to have the opportunity to get a good look at some of the guests.

Emma and Michael Stanstead’s rich young urban professional apartment, up in the Eighties between Fifth 109

and Park in a grand old prewar building, owed more to Mark Hampton than Pottery Barn. Faith looked around the spacious living room. The walls had been covered in heavy damask silk with a slight woven stripe that was the color of bittersweet in autumn. In addition to the grouped collections of botanical and architectural framed prints, there was a striking modern oil by Wolf Kahn over the fireplace. The seating was chintz, but comfortable. Couches to sink into and curl up on.

Large easy chairs next to skirted round tables piled with books. The lighting from the ceiling was soft and supplemented by table lamps. Another painting, a por-trait of Emma as a child by Aaron Shikler that Faith recognized from the Morrises’ living room, hung between the front windows. The entire apartment had been tastefully bedecked for the season. Swags of white pine and holly and pots of deep crimson cyclamen trailed across the mantel. More pine was fes-tooned over the doorways with shiny red ilex, gauzy silk ribbons floating from the boughs. There were flowers everywhere. She went to adjust one of the blooms—a white amaryllis, faintly edged with red—

that had fallen slightly to one side, away from a profu-sion of blossoms and greens in a large silver Georgian wine cooler. The flowers were replacing a Dale Chihuly glass bowl, normally on the pedestal. “Too horrible if someone knocked into it,” Emma had declared, cradling the fragile piece in her arms and putting it in one of the cabinets under the wall of bookshelves, which contained burnished leather-bound volumes, complete with an