When she brought the drinks, Trina handed me a slip of paper. 'He was in about an hour ago,' she said. 'Before then he called a couple of times. He's very anxious for you to get in touch with him.'
'I unfolded the slip of paper.DougFuhrmann's name and a telephone number.
I said, 'Thanks. It's nothing that can't wait until morning.'
'He said it was urgent.'
'Well, that's one man's opinion.' Diana and I poured our bourbon into our coffee, and she asked me what it was about. 'A guy who's been close to your husband,' I said. 'He was also getting close to the girl who was murdered. I think I know why, but I want to talk to him about it.'
'Do you want to call him? Or see him for a while? Don't pass him up on my account, Matthew.'
'He can wait.'
'If you think it's important- '
'It's not. He can wait until tomorrow.'
EvidentlyFuhrmann didn't think so. A little later the phone rang.
Trina answered it and made her way to our table. 'Same caller,' she said. 'Do you want to talk to him?'
I shook my head. 'I was in,' I said. 'I got his message and said something about calling him in the morning. And then I had a drink and left.'
'Gotcha.'
Ten or twenty minutes later we did leave. Esteban was swinging the midnight-to-eight shift at the desk of my hotel. He gave me three messages, all of them fromFuhrmann .
'No calls,' I told him.'No matter who. I'm not in.'
'Right.'
'If the phone rings I'll figure the building's on fire because otherwise I don't want any calls.'
'I understand.'
We rode up in the elevator, walked down the hallway to my door. I opened it and stood aside to let her in. With her at my side the little room looked starker and more barren than ever.
'I thought of other places we could go,' I told her. 'A better hotel or a friend's apartment, but I decided that I wanted you to see where I live.'
'I'm glad, Matthew.'
'Is it all right?'
'Of course it's all right.'
We kissed. We held each other for a long time. I smelled her perfume and tasted the sweetness of her mouth. After a time I released her. She moved slowly and deliberately around my room, examining things, getting a sense of the place. Then she turned to me and smiled a very gentle smile, and we began undressing.
Chapter 14
All through the night one of us would wake and awaken the other.
Then I woke up for the last time and found I was alone. Pale sunlight filtered by bad air gave the room a golden cast. I got out of bed and picked my watch up from the bedside table. It was almost noon.
I had almost finished dressing when I found her note. It was wedged between the glass and the frame of the mirror over my dresser.
Her handwriting was very neat and quite small.
I read:
Darling-
What is it that the children say? Last night was the first night of the rest of my life. I have so much to say, but I am in no condition to express my thoughts well.
Please call me. And call me, please,
YourLady
I read it through a couple of times. Then I folded it carefully and tucked it into my wallet.
There was a single message in my box.Fuhrmann had called a final time around one-thirty. Then he had evidently given up and gone to sleep. I called him from the lobby and got a busy signal. I went out and had some breakfast. The air, which had looked to be polluted from my window, tasted clean enough on the street. Maybe it was my mood. I hadn't felt this well in a long time.
I got up from the table again and calledFuhrmann again after my second cup of coffee. The line was still busy. I went back and had a third cup and smoked one of the cigarettes I had bought for Diana.
She had had three or four the previous night, and I had smoked one each time she did. I burned up about half of this one, left the pack on the table, triedFuhrmann a third time, paid my check, and walked over to Armstrong's just to check if he was there or had been in yet. He wasn't and hadn't.
Something hovered on the edge of consciousness, whining plaintively at me. I used the pay phone at
