I nodded.
'Okay,' I said. 'I know you and Trent Rowley were intimate.'
She stared at me calmly. O'Mara continued to give me the benign eyeball.
'How do you know that?' Ellen said.
'Reasonable supposition,' I said. 'I tailed him to the Hyatt in Cambridge last week. You and he were in room seven-seventeen together for about three hours.'
'And you choose to give that fact the most lurid interpretation possible.'
'I do.'
She looked at O'Mara.
Speaking softly, he said, 'Trust the truth, Ellie, remember?' She looked into his eyes for a little while.
'There is no deceit involved,' she said. 'My husband and I have an open marriage.'
O'Mara looked proud.
'And your husband is aware of that,' I said.
'Oh, don't be small-minded. It is very unbecoming.'
'So he didn't object to you spending time with Trent Rowley.'
'No. Of course not.'
O'Mara spoke in his deep gentle voice.
'Are you familiar, Mr. Spenser, with the ancient tradition of courtly love?'
'Love is available only without the coercion of marriage?' I said.
O'Mara hadn't expected me to know. He was far too deeply centered to blink, but he did pause for a moment.
'Only in circumstances where love is unbidden by law or convention can it truly be given and received.'
'That too,' I said.
'In my work I apply the courtly love tradition to contemporary marriage. Only when a wife is free to choose another can she be free to choose her husband.'
'Heady,' I said. 'Do you have any idea why someone would wish to shoot Trent Rowley?'
'Lord, no,' Ellen said.
'Enlightened as he is about courtly love,' I said, 'your husband wouldn't put several jealous slugs into Rowley's head, would he?'
'Don't be coarse,' she said.
'He did hire a guy named Elmer O'Neill to follow you around,' I said. I had no idea where I was going. I was just poking into the anthill to see if any ants came out.
'Excuse me?'
'Elmer O'Neill, private eye. We met at the Hyatt, me tailing Rowley, Elmer tailing you.'
'That can't be true,' Ellen said. 'My husband and I have traveled far beyond the petty constraints of jealousy.'
'Then why would he have you followed?' I said. She looked at O'Mara. He nodded gently.
'It seems apparent,' he said, 'that Ellen cannot attest to the truth of your allegation.'
'I wasn't asking her to,' I said. 'I was asking her why she thought her husband might do it.'
'A quibble,' O'Mara said. 'I believe we are through with this interview.'
'That so, Mrs. Eisen?'
She looked at O'Mara again. He nodded gently again. 'Yes,' she said. 'Please go.'
There was a small schoolyard impulse, a vestige of my more heedless youth, that made me want to say no, and see what O'Mara did. But it wouldn't take me anywhere useful, so I nodded pleasantly instead.
'Thanks for your time,' I said.
'What are you going to do?' she said.
'I'll be traveling beyond the petty constraints of rejection,' I said.
15
I went over to Kinergy to talk with Bernie Eisen. The security guy at the front desk took my phone call, and in a minute or two a shiny bright guy with short hair and rimless glasses appeared. His hair was so blond it was nearly white. His suit and shirt were banker gray, with a silver tie. Everything was ironed and starched and pressed and fitted. His cropped mustache was perfectly trimmed. His black wing tips gleamed with polish. His nails were manicured. He had small eyes magnified by the glasses.
