The waitress said, “May I get you anything else?”
I shook my head, so did Julie. The waitress put the check down, near me, and I put a ten down on top of it.
Julie said, “They wouldn’t. They couldn’t do that. They wouldn’t know what to do.”
“They could hire a consultant. Their chauffeur has done time. Name’s Mingo Mulready, believe it or not, and he would know what to do.”
“But they don’t know.”
“Maybe they don’t. Or maybe the guy that was following you around was your brother’s. You haven’t been living at home.”
“Spenser, I’m thirty years old.”
“Get along with the family?”
“No. They didn’t approve of my marriage. They didn’t approve of my divorce. They hated me going to Goucher. They hate me being a model. I couldn’t live with them.”
“They worry about you?”
She shrugged. Now that she was thinking, she wasn’t crying, and her face looked more coherent. “I suppose they did,” she said. “Lawrence likes to play father and man of the house, and Mother lets him. I guess they think I’m dissolute and weak and uncommitted—that kind of thing.”
“Why would they have a thug like Mulready driving them around?”
Julie shrugged her shoulders. “Lawrence is all caught up in his Vigilance Committee. He gets into situations, I guess, where he feels he needs a bodyguard. I assume this Mulready is someone who would do that.”
“Not as well as he used to,” I said.
The waitress picked up my ten and brought back some change on a saucer.
“If they did take Rachel,” I said, “where would they keep her?”
“I don’t know.”
“Sure you do. If you were your brother and you had kidnaped Rachel Wallace, where would you keep her?”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Spenser … ”
“Think,” I said. “Think about it. Humor me.”
“This is ridiculous.”
“I walked a half-mile through a blizzard because you asked me to,” I said. “I didn’t say it was ridiculous.”
She nodded. “The house,” she said.
The waitress came back and said, “Can I get you anything else?”
I shook my head. “We better vacate,” I said to Julie, “before she gets ugly.”
Julie nodded. We left the coffee shop and found an overstuffed loveseat in the lobby.
“Where in the house?” I said.
“Have you seen it?”
“Yeah. I was out there a few days ago.”
“Well, you know how big it is. There’s probably twenty rooms. There’s a great big cellar. There’s the chauffeur’s quarters over the garage and extra rooms in the attic.”
“Wouldn’t the servants notice?”
“They wouldn’t have to. The cook never leaves the kitchen, and the maid would have no reason to go into some parts of the house. We had only the cook and the maid when I was there.”
“And of course old Mingo.”
“They hired him after I left. I don’t know him.”
“Tell you what,” I said. “We’ll go back to my place. It’s just over on Marlborough Street, and we’ll draw a map of your brother’s house.”
“It’s my mother’s,” Julie said.
“Whoever,” I said. “We’ll make a map, and later on I’ll go take a look.”
“How will you do that?”
“First the map. Then the B-and-E plans. Come on.”
“I don’t know if I can make a map.”
“Sure you can. I’ll help and we’ll talk. You’ll remember.”
“And we’re going to your apartment?”
“Yes. It’s quite safe. I have a woman staying with me who’ll see that I don’t molest you. And on the walk down we’ll be too bundled up.”
“I didn’t mean that.”
