“Okay.”
I broke the connection, and dialed the number he'd given me. Of course, since he hadn't had to use the area code, I hadn't copied it down. Being in a hurry, when I dialed, I left it out. There was the familiar oscillating tone.
“Area code,” said Hester, her spoon between the soup bowl and her mouth. I noticed the spoon didn't even slow.
“Right.” I redialed.
“Hello,” said a muted voice. It was Huck, and she was half whispering. “Houseman. You wanted me to call?” “Yeah. That was fast. So, how you like Lake Geneva?” Still whispered.
“Great, so far.”
“You get around. Look, Tat called, she had some stuff to tell me, and I told her she could trust you. She can, can't she?” “Sure.” Tat? It sounded like she knew Tatiana better than I had thought.
“Okay, look, she wants to meet you in about a half hour. Jessica's got stuff to do, and Tat wants to talk with somebody. She's getting scared,” said Huck.
Well. “Okay, fine. Where at?”
There was a pause. “Before I tell you, you gotta know that Tat's in love with Jessica, all right? I mean, really in love with her.”
I wasn't exactly thunderstruck, but I was surprised. “Oh?”
She sighed. “You gotta know that so what she says makes sense.”
“Okay.”
“She wants to meet you at the observatory. You know where that is?”
“Yep. If you mean the big one? The Yerkes Observatory.” Oh, yeah.
“Yes. She'll be at the rear steps, I'll call her right now, gotta go, thanks, be good to her.” Dial tone.
“So?” asked Hester.
“Jessica and Tatiana did call her,” I said. “She wanted to make sure they were telling her the truth, for one thing.”
“She wonders about that, too?” asked Harry.
“Huck says that Ostransky, Tatiana, wants to meet us at Yerkes Observatory.”
Hester put down her soupspoon, got a map out of her purse, and said, “Looks like we take fifty west to sixty-seven, then sixty-seven south into Williams Bay. Follow it on West Geneva Street. Piece of cake.”
THIRTY
Wednesday, October 11, 2000
15:12
Yerkes Observatory is run by the University of Chicago. It's an incredible building, sort of dumbbell shaped, with a long hall connecting two observation areas. The building itself is an architectural delight. Built in 1895, it's a golden sandstone, ornately carved, complete with gargoyles, griffons and other mythological critters, as well as astronomical and astrological signs, cherubs, and just about anything else that would lend a Victorian Gothic air to the place. The domes themselves are very ornate, with pillared arches running around the lower levels, and making them look a lot like the exterior of the Leaning Tower of Pisa. The whole place has a Jules Verne atmosphere, and you can almost see the famous astronomers Hale, Barnard, and Burnham out of the corner of your eye.
We all got into Hester's car, and followed the map. As we turned in the long drive, Hester got a good look at the place, and said, “Wow.”
“Cool, no?” I gave her the basic details I'd gotten years back when I took the tour. “Some momentous stuff happened here, but in a quiet way.”
“It is quiet,” said Harry.
We parked right in front of the main entrance. There were only three or four cars there, and space for about twice that many.
The mirror image of the main entrance was on the other side of the building, so we walked on the lawn around the main dome, and approached the deserted rear of the building.
Sure enough, Tatiana was sitting on the stone steps, about fifty yards from us. She'd apparently pulled a pair of black slacks on over her dancing tights, and had on a pair of ankle-high, laced walking boots. She was in bright afternoon sunlight, and her hair shone like neon. She held her hand to her forehead to shade her eyes as we approached, and stood.
“Hi,” I said.
“What can we do for you?” asked Hester.
Tatiana didn't appear at all nervous, just in a hurry.
“Okay, look, I don't have a lot of time, and there's a couple of things you should know about what's going on.”
“You've got our complete attention,” I said.
“Let's take a little walk,” suggested Tatiana. We did, she and I walking together down a winding walk that crossed the big lawn, Hester and Harry following about a step behind. “Okay, first… well, you should know that we picked up Dan Peale on our way home, and gave him a ride.”
“You and Jessica? When you left Freiberg?” Always make sure.
“Yes.”
“Where did he spend the night?” asked Hester.
“Here,” said Tatiana. “In Lake Geneva.”
We stayed on the sidewalk, and meandered through a stand of trees.
“Wait just a second,” I said. “Your attorney told us that you two left early that morning. How could he have spent the night here, and then you gave him a ride?”
Tatiana snickered. “Early that morning? You might say that, I guess, and still be truthful. We left about ten after midnight.”
Ah. Attorneys. Always the most deceptive when they tell the truth.
“And where did you pick Dan up?”
“Right at the mine entrance, where we knew he'd be,” she said. “Just pulled over, and Jessica honked the horn. He came over the fence in a few minutes, and we were on our way.”
“How did you know that?” I asked. “Where to find him, I mean?”
“Cell phones,” said Tatiana, with eyebrows raised and an unspoken “duh” dangling from the end of the sentence.
Ah, again. I was going to have to buy one of those damned things, just so I wouldn't keep forgetting they existed.
“Where is he now?” I asked.
“I don't know. I think Jessica does, but I don't.”
“When did you last see him?” Hester asked.
“About seven-thirty this morning,” was the reply. “That's what I want to talk to you about. He's got one of Jessica's cars, and I'm afraid he's going to drag her down with him.”
She wasn't about to break down or anything, but she did seem to be getting toward an edge.
“Why do you say that?”
“He wants her to stay with him forever,” said Tatiana. “She's really mad at him right now, and that's good, but she let him have the car, and that's just because they spent last night together, and he's working on her emotions.” She took a deep breath. “Jessica's such a wonderful person, and he's going to get her in trouble because she cares.”
“How do you know she's mad at him?” I asked, leaving out any reference to them spending the night together. Their sleeping together really didn't strike me as an anger reaction. That, plus an image of a caring Jessica Hunley was hard to achieve.
“Oh,” said Tatiana, “you should have seen her when he got in the car down at the mine. She slapped him.
