Maybeck's earlier problem with the police and his own discovery that the county police had dug up Anna Ferragot's grave, Tegg attended his wife's dinner, clinging to a plan set in motion earlier in the day with a call to Vancouver. The harvest would take place tomorrow morning as planned. Tegg would deliver the organ himself. He had a noon flight booked out of Vancouver for Rio via Mexico City. His life as a veterinarian was finished; when he hit Rio he would be carrying Wong Kei's money and would have access to several accounts here in the city. If he worked quickly enough, that money could be electronically transferred before the little people had figured out how to even spell his name. That money was his ticket to buying his way in as a transplant surgeon. A new life.
A part of him recognized this as delusion. Fantasy. It all seemed too simple. It all worked out too easily, too perfectly. And yet he convinced himself that people did this kind of thing all the time. He read about them in the paper: Executives vanishing with the entire corporate pension; secretaries disappearing with their bosses; housewives cleaning out the joint accounts, never to be heard of again. All it took was a little courage, a little planning, and a lot of quick decisions.
He was focused on the upcoming harvest and his own escape. All he had to do was maintain a certain pretense of normality for the next few hours-fool everyone-and by tomorrow noon he would be gone, off to his new life. This was the way it was done, wasn't it? 'The way what is done?' the woman in front of him asked.
Had he said something to her? Was he thinking aloud, speaking his thoughts for everyone to hear? 'Sorry?' he asked, trying to remember her name, distracted by a piece of mushroom at the corner of her lips.
'What's that?' she asked, her napkin finding the mushroom.
Tegg's eyes found her breasts. Right out there for everyone to enjoy. There was more silicon in this room than hors d'oeuvres.
More tucks than in a Scottish kilt.
His wife signaled him so that this guest could see. What a lifesaver! He excused himself and dashed off to her side.
Peggy looked radiant, though somewhat awkward, in a Japanese tea dress cut so tightly around her hips and knees that she moved from guest to guest like a hobbled horse. Most of the other women in the room fell noticeably short of Peggy's high standards for presentation, though not for lack of trying.
His wife mouse-stepped past him and whispered, 'T.J.'s having trouble with the company, but he won a Pro- Am in Scottsdale last month.' She scooted over to the champagne and had a word with one of their white-gloved servers.
Tegg wasn't up to this pandering and politicking. For years he and Peggy had worked so hard to acquire this kind of social acceptance, but now that it was here, especially at a time of such nerve-racking decisions and potentially catastrophic problems, it all seemed so fake to him. They had bought this acceptance, by throwing his harvesting money at the arts-ballet, summer dance, the opera-by being seen. By blending in.
Ridiculous nonsense. What would Peggy say if she found out her substantial contributions to the arts came not from his work at the clinic but from the harvested kidneys of degenerate runaways? 'Wonderful to see you again, Elden. How's the practice?' Thomas-T.J.-Harper owned the second-largest retail department store in the Northwest. He had white hair, white teeth, and wore a tailored suit from London. 'Keeps me in stitches,' Tegg answered, waiting for the rag merchant to see the humor. The man responded with a slight grin, though it seemed forced. Everything was forced at occasions like these. Tegg wasn't sure what to say next. He drank some champagne. 'You did a fine job on Ginger's leg,' Harper said.
Ginger was the Harper's terrier mutt. Tegg felt his face flush.
These kinds of comments made him feel like cheap labor, a gardener, or a house cleaner. A little person. Tegg felt he was groveling, and he hated himself for it. He forced kind words from his mouth, for Peggy's sake. 'I understand your golf game is in top form. Congratulations on Scottsdale.'
The man glowed. 'We ought to go out sometime.'
'I'd love to,' Tegg replied. He wasn't much for golf, although they belonged to the club-more for appearances and for Peggy's sake than his own. Tegg excused himself and headed straight for Tina Endicott, whose eyes betrayed a restlessness that Tegg interpreted as sexual urgency. Byron Endicott had incited a great deal of envy in the hearts of the males in his social set by marrying this twenty-eight-yearold stunner, forty-odd years his junior. It was anybody's guess as to how long it would hold together, how much loose play Byron was willing to tolerate. Endicott had asked for a telephone twenty minutes earlier and had yet to reemerge from the study. Tina had legs that didn't stop and lush auburn hair.
As he was revving himself up for his conversation with Tina, his wife again caught his eye and offered a glance at the diminishing caviar that told him his guests had gone through twenty-five hundred dollars worth of fish eggs in half the allotted time. Message received: The soup course would be advanced and served any minute. He and Peggy could work a party the same way he and Pamela could handle a harvest.
It just wasn't as much fun. Tegg nodded toward the study indicating he would fetch Byron Endicott. Peggy acknowledged and tottered off toward the kitchen.
As Tegg crossed the foyer, a waitress answered the front door.
Facing him, her features twisted in anxiety and her swollen limbs trembling with trepidation, stood the piggish Pamela Chase. What was she doing here? More problems? Tegg felt a tic coming on and reacted quickly as his shoulder and head attempted to meet, by hurrying to greet Pamela. The young waitress flinched with his tic and glanced quickly away, as if she hadn't seen it. He saw a fear in Pamela's squinty little eyes that he didn't care for one bit, 'Pamela? Problems?' he questioned. 'It's important,' she said, maintaining her cool surprisingly well, glancing sideways at the uniformed caterer. 'An emergency at the office.' The electricity in her eyes told him this required immediate action.
He motioned her toward the study, well aware he would have to evict Byron Endicott. If he didn't handle this carefully, rumors of a scandal would be started before the fish course.
As he ushered Pamela into his study, his mind sorting through possible explanations for her arrival-had Maybeck opened his little package? — he tried to see this young woman through the eyes of Byron Endicott. He knew damn well the kinds of things that would be said about them if he failed to handle this correctly. But he didn't care. Let them talk. By tomorrow, a new life.
Control, he reminded himself, feeling another tic coming on but refusing it, as if slamming a door in its face. Unknowingly, he slammed the door to his study. It made a tremendous crash. Pamela jumped. old man Endicott mumbled into the receiver and hung up. He rose to his feet and came around the desk with a suspicious, irreverent expression. 'And who is this lovely creature?' he asked Pamela.
Tegg experienced a flash of embarrassment. He said, 'This is my surgical assistant, Pamela Chase. Byron Endicott,' he said, indicating the old man. 'I'm afraid something has come up at the clinic, Byron. We'll need the study for a moment if you don't mind.'
'Enchanted,' Endicott said, taking her hand. 'Not Douglas Chase's little girl?' 'Yes ' Pamela said, looking to Tegg nervously. 'An such a lovely young woman!' he lied. 'Last time I saw you … But just look at you!' he said, leering artificially.
She blushed. Endicott grinned at Tegg. 'I'll leave you two,' he said, his implication obvious. 'But you must introduce her around, Elden, or I'll raise a stink. I promise.' To Pamela he said, 'We are all very close friends of your parents. You really must say hello before you leave.'
Endicott smirked, gave Tegg a teasing, nasty look, and let himself out of the room. 'I'm sorry for coming,' she said. 'Not to worry,' Tegg replied. 'You look awful. What is it?' He closed the door tightly, a dozen thoughts crowding his brain. 'The police came to my apartment asking about my trips to Vancouver.'
At first he couldn't be sure he had heard her right, but from her grave expression, from the constriction in his own chest, he knew that indeed he had. He felt the betraying savagery of two. tics overcome him-like two sharp bolts of electricity. He fell into a chair. His blood banged so loudly in his ears he couldn't hear what she said next. First Maybeck, now Pamela. Too close. Much too close. There was no time to waste. He began plotting immediately. 'They know about everything,' she said. 'They offered me a deal if I gave them you.'
Had Maybeck talked? His attorney, Howard Chamberland, had assured him everything was fine-Maybeck had been released on a misdemeanor charge. His palms went clammy. Control! he reminded himself again, answering her perplexed and ghostly gaze with a squaring of his shoulders and a lifting of his chin. The police moved about as fast as languishing sea lions, certainly no match for his latest plans. No reason to panic. Evaluate the situation. Analyze. Indecision was anyone's biggest enemy. He had contingencies.
He looked into her dark, squinting eyes and thought about telling her of his plan to escape. But that would
