Nightlines

'It's a strained analogy,' Nudger told her. 'I've never seen any barge traffic on you.'

She smiled, nothing more than a twitch of her facial muscles, without humor. 'Sorry, I didn't mean to be maudlin.'

Nudger sipped his coffee and looked upriver to where the Huck Finn, an elaborate stern-wheeler excursion boat, was docked near the silver leap of the Arch. Beyond it, traffic was moving, distant and reflective, across Ead's Bridge into Illinois. A faraway tugboat whistle blasted a lilting note, like a sad warning. Nudger was afraid. He didn't understand the capricious dark wind that might at any time catch Claudia and carry her away from him.

'Are you okay?' he asked, resting his hand on her arm.

'Sure.' She smiled again, this time maybe meaning it.

Nudger sat back and watched her try to eat. She managed a few small bites, then pushed the food away and concentrated on her coffee.

'Do you ever think about going back to teaching?' he asked.

'No, I haven't for a long time. I don't see why I should think about it. Anyway, I've got a job.'

'You've got a profession, too.'

'You mean I used to have a profession.'

'I know a woman who's headmistress of a private girls' high school in the county. She owes me, or feels that she does. I could talk to her, see if there is or will be an opening to teach, ask her to interview you.'

'I'd have to tell her the truth. Would you hire a convicted child abuser? A murderess? Someone who let her own daughter…'

'You didn't leave that window open on purpose, Claudia.'

'My baby…' she said, simply and sadly, with a grief so vast her words seemed to echo in it. Her expression didn't change and her eyes remained dry; she was in a place beyond tears.

'You didn't deliberately cause Vicki's death,' Nudger said firmly. 'You should believe that. You have to believe it!'

'Sure. Dr. Oliver agrees with you. He used hypnosis, had me relive that night in my mind. But that was only in my mind.'

'So is your guilt.'

'Maybe all guilty people convince themselves of that.'

'And maybe some who are innocent,' Nudger said. 'I'd hire you.'

'Not if you wanted to keep your job. What would happen if the parents found out about my past?'

'Who knows? It might be rough, but maybe you could stick it out, with the proper backing. Enough of the faculty and parents might understand your situation and support you.'

'Probably not.'

'Then you'd lose your job. You'd get another job.'

She bit her lower lip and studied Nudger with her dark, dark eyes. She'd artfully applied a lot of makeup around them, but cruel daylight confirmed that she'd been crying during the night. 'Do you really think it's possible?' she asked.

'I can find out. I might be able to get you the interview, but from that point on you'd be carrying the ball on your own.' He understood how important it was for her to feel that she'd be the one landing the job. 'Do you want to teach again?'

She looked into her cup, then out again at the river that he knew was drawing her as it had drawn others. 'Sometimes not at all,' she said, 'sometimes more than anything else.' She raised her cup and sipped.

'Think about it,' Nudger said. 'Be sure before you let me know if you're interested. And remember, no guarantees. But a chance.'

She stood up, leaned forward and kissed his forehead. Her lips were still warm from the coffee. 'Thank you,' she said, and walked away from the table, away from the cold, beckoning slide of the river.

Carrying his Egg McMuffin, Nudger caught up with her at the shore end of the wooden gangplank.

When they got back to Claudia's apartment building, she asked Nudger if he was coming upstairs. She had several hours before she had to be at Kimball's to help prepare for the lunchtime crowd. Nudger reluctantly declined. He was a workaday guy with responsibilities, he told her. She didn't seem to believe him. He kissed her. The Volkswagen was idling roughly, vibrating hard enough to jingle the keys dangling from the ignition switch. No place for a romantic tryst.

'Where are you going now?' she asked.

'To my office. Then to see if I can find out more about Luther Kell.'

He didn't tell her what that entailed. If Kell was home, Nudger would wait for him to leave, then follow. If Kell had already left for work or wherever he went during the day, Nudger would make sure the house was unoccupied, then try to get inside and search for evidence pointing to Kell as a murderer. Illegal entry into the home of a possible killer was the sort of thing that frightened Nudger for a number of reasons; it was a game with a lot of ways to lose. But he had no choice. He hadn't much time to learn about Kell. Springer had seen to that.

Claudia kissed Nudger again, a slow, soft brush of her lips across his cheek, then got out of the car and closed the door without slamming it. Before walking away, she turned and leaned low to peer in at him through the open window.

'For both of us, will you be careful?' she asked.

'If you'll be careful for the same two people.'

She nodded and stood up straight. Nudger shifted to first and pulled away from the curb. At the corner, when he checked in the rearview mirror, Claudia was gone.

XXVI

Ten thousand dollars,' Agnes Boyington said to Nudger, sitting across from him in his office. She'd been waiting downstairs for him when he arrived, standing rigidly outside the doughnut shop, as if she'd rather endure the heat than enter.

Nudger swiveled thoughtfully in his chair and stared across the desk at her, trying to grasp what she was saying. Ten thousand dollars. One hundred C-notes. Mucho dinero. All those dead Presidents…

'My final offer,' she added, setting her mouth in a straight, firm line.

'Oh, everyone says that,' Nudger told her.

'To earn the money,' Agnes reminded him, 'you have only to do nothing and keep your mouth shut. I'm sure that for you the former will be easier than the latter.'

'You're trying awfully hard to corrupt me, Boyington. To lead me down the primrose path.'

'You've seen the primroses in all seasons.' She got one of her long brown cigarettes from her purse, manipulated the never-fail lighter, and touched flame to tobacco. Tilting back her head so that she could gaze down her nose at him, she blew a cloud of smoke that hung together in an oddly grotesque shape which drifted toward the ceiling like a medium's ectoplasm. 'What is your answer?'

'I don't mind if you smoke,' he told her.

She exhaled another cloud of smoke, this one not so dense. He was getting to her. 'Just what is it about my offer that bothers you, Nudger?'

'The fact that you made it, and that you keep increasing it. And that if I accept it, you'll have me at a permanent disadvantage. I wouldn't like that.'

'Those are logical reservations, though based on unfounded suspicion. Anything else? No more consideration for your professional honor?'

'That, too. And something more. It bothers me that I don't understand why you're making the offer.'

'I told you, Jeanette is under great stress. She isn't thinking clearly, or she wouldn't have hired you. I don't want her hurt more than she is already.'

Nudger shook his head slowly, not looking away from Agnes Boyington. 'I'm sorry, Agnes, I can't accept your explanation of motherly concern. It fits you about as well as a size ten hat.'

Something crossed her face, momentarily altered the ice-gleam in her eyes. A reflection of pain. It surprised Nudger. It was like glimpsing human emotion in a reptile.