With a shake of her head, she brushed that thought aside, then tossed the remnants of her lunch in the wastebasket, shrugged on her coat, and left for her walk. She took a walk every day on her lunch hour; and she always walked alone.
Quickly she made her way through the suite of offices to the reception area, then out into the long gray corridor. The elevator dropped her eight stories to the lobby, a mausoleum in brick and marble, enlivened by a few trees in large planters. She passed by the security guard at the front desk, pulled open the glass door, and stepped outside, blinking at the brightness of the day.
Within a short walk of the high rise was the Century City Shopping Center, an outdoor mall crowded with art galleries, clothing stores, a multiplex movie theater, and three department stores. Bullock’s, Crane’s, and the Broadway. She entered the mall and strolled down the main concourse, passing carts stocked with popcorn, hot pretzels, and cappuccino. A man selling flowers was serenading potential customers with a rendition of “On the Street Where You Live” in a loud, pleasant voice. Pausing to listen to the song, Wendy considered buying herself a flower; she decided against it. Too expensive.
As she reached the section of the mall devoted to restaurants, she encountered crowds of office workers from the nearby high rises. She disliked crowds. On impulse she entered Crane’s, hoping the store would be emptier.
It was. She wandered among the racks of women’s fashions, picking idly at dresses she knew she would never wear. Nearby was a glass display case crowded with wristwatches, cufflinks, rings, bracelets, and necklaces. Necklaces…
She stopped, staring at a necklace of gold squares strung together on invisible thread. It was exactly the sort of thing she’d been wanting for so long. The sort of thing she would have bought for herself in Santa Barbara, if she’d had the courage to go there.
“Oh, God, it’s gorgeous,” she whispered to herself, then glanced anxiously over her shoulder, afraid someone might have heard.
She took a step toward the display case, imagining how it would feel to have that necklace-so beautiful, so luxurious-touching the bare skin of her neck. Her hand rose, trembling, to her throat.
A thought ran through her mind, a crazy thought: How much does it cost?
She shook her head. It didn’t matter. Whatever the price, it was more than she could afford, even if she did pull down thirty grand a year and even if she did have a great deal of it squirreled away in a savings account-such a nice, safe, federally insured place to put your money, a place with no risks, no challenges, no excitement… like the lifestyle of a certain someone she could name.
I’ll think about it, she told herself.
She almost walked out of the store, then stopped, knowing that if she left, she would never come back.
Her gaze returned to the necklace. She touched her purse, silently reminding herself that inside it she would find a Crane’s charge card.
“No,” she whispered. This time she did not look around to see if anyone could hear. “You can’t. It’s crazy. It’s too… too impulsive.”
But that was the whole problem with her life, wasn’t it? She was never impulsive. Here at last was a chance to go a little wild, to buy a costly present for herself on the spur of the moment, for the sheer hell of it-a chance to blow a small chunk of her savings on something utterly impractical, something she didn’t really need, something she just wanted, yes, wanted, in the simple, uncomplicated way an animal or an infant wants food.
She had to have that necklace, dammit, simply had to. She ached to clasp it on her neck and feel its sinful weight against her breastbone.
“No,” she said again, but she barely heard herself; she was already walking up to the counter near the display case, where the male sales clerk was installing new batteries in an elderly man’s wristwatch.
She waited restlessly till the watch was ticking and the customer was satisfied. Then the clerk turned inquiringly to her. She asked in a voice that trembled only slightly, “How much is that necklace?”
He smiled. “Two hundred forty-nine dollars. It’s on sale.”
Oh, that was far too much. She couldn’t possibly. Just couldn’t. There was no way.
“I’ll take it,” she said.
The clerk raised an eyebrow. “Would you like to try it on first?”
“No. It’s fine. I’m sure it’s fine.”
He shrugged. “Okay.” He reached inside the display case and removed the necklace. It glittered magically. “Will that be cash, check, or charge?”
“Charge.”
The card was already in her hand. She gave it to the clerk, who ran a scanner over the bar code. Information on her charge account came up on the display screen of his computer terminal. The amber light glinted on his glasses as he briefly checked the file to see if her account was in good standing. It was, of course. She always paid on time.
The clerk smiled, apparently arriving at the same conclusion. “Here you are, Miss Alden,” he said, handing the card back.
A moment later the necklace was in a box, and the box was in a shopping bag, and the bag was in her hand.
“Thank you for shopping at Crane’s,” the clerk said as she walked away.
She nodded in reply, afraid to say anything, afraid to slow down, afraid she might change her mind, ask for her money back, do some crazy thing. And then she was out the door, free of the department store, having made her purchase, and she felt fine.
I did it, she thought proudly. I didn’t chicken out this time. I really for-God’s-sake did it.
When she went back to work, the words came easily. She tapped her foot as she wrote, keeping time to some melody playing in her head, a high, sweet, wonderfully secret melody only she could hear.
5
After a moment’s hesitation, Delgado selected the copy of the first audiocassette he’d received. He loaded it in the tape recorder. His finger pressed the button marked Play. Tape hiss rose in his ears like the phantom ocean caught in a conch shell. An anonymous official identified the tape as a duplicate before reciting the case number and other details.
Then a louder hiss sizzled through the headphones, signaling the start of the dubbed portion of the tape.
Julia Stern’s voice faded in. She’d stepped out of the bathroom, fresh from her morning shower, and the killer had grabbed her from behind. He must have told her not to scream for help, that the first sound she made above a whisper would mean death. Delgado could picture the young pregnant woman standing just outside the bathroom doorway in her blue terry-cloth towel, drawing shallow scared breaths as the Gryphon hissed in her ear and held the knife-if it was a knife-close to her throat.
Perhaps Julia had tried to reason with him, tried to find out what he wanted. The killer had told her. He wanted her to beg. To plead for her life.
Delgado doubted that the Gryphon had mentioned the tape recorder. But he’d been carrying one, all right- probably a small portable unit, either tucked in his coat pocket or snugged to his belt. It was unlikely that he’d used a handheld microphone; he would have needed one hand to grab Julia and the other hand for his weapon. But a built-in omnidirectional mike, standard in portables, would have worked just fine.
For about five minutes, the killer had recorded Julia’s voice as she asked him to please let her go. Five minutes was not a long time, but it must have stretched to hours for Julia Stern and her pounding heart.
Excerpts from that recording now crackled and hissed in Delgado’s ears.
“… didn’t see your face. So I can’t identify you. We’ve got a lot of nice things here. You can have any of it. There’s silverware in the kitchen. A color TV, a stereo. In the closet I’ve got some birthday presents for my husband: a camera, a watch, a new coat. Oh, God… Please, take anything you want and just go”-her voice cracked on that word-“and you’ll never get caught. I swear. I won’t even tell the police. I won’t tell anybody. Only, don’t hurt
