'Every time I wake up, I keep hoping it's been a bad dream.'
Anguish hung in the room like an almost palpable miasma and Sigrid could feel herself stiffening. 'If you'd rather,
Commander, we can come back another time.'
'No. I'm all right.'
'Can you talk about Friday night?'
'Friday.' The frown reappeared. 'What's today?';
'Monday.'
'That's right. The nurse told me that at-breakfast? Lunch? I'm sorry. Everything keeps getting muddled.'
She spoke with some effort and her voice was low, but there was a musical undertone that was very appealing and it reminded Sigrid that Haines Froelick said that he and Zachary Wolferman had been equally enchanted by the commander's voice.
'Commander, do you remember the cribbage tournament?' Sigrid asked.
'Yes… Vassily and I… the Hotel Maintenon. We had drinks and there was a nice old gentleman and his cousin. We talked and then-'
Her voice broke off and she looked at them in mute appeal.
'Was anyone else badly hurt?' she whispered. 'They said two men were killed and the man I was playing against
– a policeman-was seriously hurt but they didn't mention any women.'
'Your cousin is fine,' Sigrid said bluntly, guessing what lay behind her question. 'She was at the far side of the room and wasn't hurt at all.'
'You know about Molly?'
Her head sank deeper into the pillows and tears seeped out around her closed lids. 'I've been so worried,' she whispered. 'And I couldn't ask. She said not to and I didn't know if she was in trouble… or what. You're sure she's all right?'
'We're sure,' Knight said.
She opened her eyes and looked at them gratefully. 'Then why hasn't she come?'
'I'm sure she has,' Sigrid lied impulsively. 'You were probably too groggy to remember.'
'Yes, that's it. That must be it.'
'Commander,' said Alan Knight, 'you mentioned Vassily Ivanovich. Could you describe your relationship with him?'
Commander Dixon turned her head on the pillow and smiled faintly at him. 'Isn't he a love? He and my dad were friends once. He rememberss o much about Dad that I had forgotten. Hellraisers., both of them.'
'There's been some suggestion that perhaps Ivanovich's visit here isn't quite as innocent as it appears,' said Knight.
Her eyes widened. '
'After all, ma'am, with your job and security clearance-'
'I forgot you were Intelligence,' she said and her bell-toned voice held the first hint of amusement. 'Always looking for spies under the bed. Forget it, Lieutenant. I don't talk about my job to anybody, not even to long-lost friends of my father. Anyhow, Vassily's never asked. I don't think he would. Even if they told him to. I know it's hard to understand, but he really does love Americans. My father pulled him out of the water himself. He'd never do anything to hurt my father's child.'
The words had tired her, but she seemed compelled to make him understand. 'Some things go beyond ideology, Lieutenant.'
'But, ma-am-'
'No buts, Lieutenant,' she said softly.
He let it drop for the moment andh elped Sigrid lead her through what she had observed Friday night. It added nothing to what they already knew. No, she had noticed no one hovering around Table 5 before they were asked to take their places; no, she hadn't paid any attention to the cribbage board at the next place. It was the first time that she'd realized that Zachary Wolferman was one of the dead men and her eyes misted.
'What about his cousin? Mr.-Froman?'
'Froelick,' Sigrid told her. 'He wasn't hurt.'
'That's good.'
Her attention drifted towards the packages they had placed on her bed table. 'Are those for me?'
The things they had chosen somehow seemed frivolous and incongruous now.
'We didn't know-' Knight began awkwardly, then glanced at Sigrid for help.
'Are there any books you'd like?' asked Sigrid. 'Can we bring you anything from your apartment?'
'Thank you both, but I'm sure Molly will do it.'
She smiled at the back scratcher and kaleidoscope and seemed charmed by Sigrid's cherry tree inside the glass dome. 'I was stationed in Japan for two springs,' she told them, mesmerized by the tiny pink petals that swirled around the tree. ' Washington, too, of course.'
But the gift wrap and tape on the small box defeated her. 'I can't.' she said wretchedly. 'It takes two hands.'
She lifted her left hand. 'I can't write with this.'
Her eyes focused on her slender fingers, at the chipped red enamel; and she gave a strangled sob. 'I can't even take off my own nail polish.'
Afterward, Alan Knight was to insist that somebody must have rubbed a magic lantern and that the girl who suddenly appeared in the doorway with a small valise and an enormous bouquet of asters and fall chrysanthemums must have been a genie.
'Commander Dixon?' she chirped. 'Hi! A Mr. Haines Froelick sent me. I'm from Elizabeth Arden. Mr. Froelick thought a nice facial might cheer you up.
I can do your nails, too, if you want.'
'Now there's a man who clearly knows a thing or two about hospital presents,' said Knight, as he and Sigrid waited for the elevator to take them down.
26
AS they hurtled downtown in the gray Navy station wagon assigned to Lieutenant Knight, Sigrid found herself increasingly exasperated. 'That's hardly a logical decision,' she told him.
'I don't care,' Knight replied. 'Anyhow, it may not be logical, but it's certainly reasonable.'
He peered out at a passing street sign. 'Weren't we supposed to turn there, Schmitty?'
'No, sir,' said their patient helmsman as he navigated the tricky waters of Greenwich Village.
'You can't dismiss Froelick as a suspect simply because he did something nice for Commander Dixon,' Sigrid said.
'The hell I can't! If you can take Molly Baldwin off your list because she's too immature, I can take Haines Froelick off mine because he's thoughtful. Somebody empathic enough to send over a beautician is too damn decent to bomb a roomful of people.' Pleased with his circuitous logic. Knight grinned at her.
Unconvinced, Sigrid leaned back, shaking her head. 'How long did you say you've been doing intelligence work?'
'This the right place, ma'am?' asked Petty Officer Schmitt, drawing up before the gracious Greenwich Village brown-stone that housed the Sutton apartment.
'This is it.'
Before leaving the hospital, Sigrid had checked in with headquarters and learned that Nauman had left a message that Val Sutton was back and wanted to see her.
When Sigrid rang the doorbell on the second floor, Nauman himself answered.
'That was quick.' His welcoming smile dimmed as Alan Knight loomed up behind her.
'Sir,' said Knight, touching his hat in a half salute.
