Dead Man Waltzing

“Sooner would be better,” I hinted.

She shrugged. “You could approach Mr. Turner Blakely about it.”

Been there, done that. I gave in gracefully and thanked her.

Eulalia Pine pushed her glasses up her nose. “I’ll see what I can do. And I’ll have an appraisal report for you later this week. Say Thursday or Friday?”

“That’s fine,” I said, anxious to tell Maurice about the imminent arrival of the typewriter with, hopefully, the cartridge that would reveal some, at least, of the manuscript’s secrets.

After Eulalia Pine left, I called Danielle to thank her for setting up the appointment, and then Maurice to tell him about the typewriter.

“Excellent work, Anastasia,” he said.

“I think you were right about the manuscript being the key to Corinne’s murder,” I said, and told him about the break-in.

After a few questions about my well-being, he hung up, saying he had an appointment with Detective Lissy. “Don’t worry,” he forestalled my next comment. “Mr. Drake is going with me.”

Chapter 24

I didn’t have time to worry about what Lissy might want with Maurice, or to straighten up the mess left by the intruder, because Vitaly would be arriving any moment for the photo shoot with Sarah Lewis. I applied makeup in record time, then brushed my long blond hair and secured a fake hibiscus above my left ear. Slipping into the lime green samba costume with the halter top and the fringed pants, I made it upstairs moments before Vitaly arrived in a matching outfit, with a green shirt open to his navel and black slacks. I filled him in on the night’s excitement while he slicked his hair back with gel, all the while grinning at his reflection in the mirror.

“You are stayings with Vitaly and John,” he announced when I finished.

I was touched by his concern, but said, “I can’t come to Baltimore, Vitaly. I’ve got too much to do here. Besides, I can’t imagine the intruder will come back.”

“He is not searching your bedroom yet, da?” Vitaly leveled an unusually serious look at me.

The thought made the hairs on my forearms prickle; no, the intruder hadn’t gotten to my bedroom.

A knock at the outer door signaled Sarah Lewis’s arrival, and I went to let her in. She wore jeans again, and a photographer’s vest whose pockets bulged. She carried a bag with lots of zipped compartments, and her braid swung forward as she bent to set it down. “Hi, Stacy. You look great. That green is a wonderful choice. Where do you want to do this?”

I led the way into the ballroom, and she looked around curiously, greeting Vitaly with a smile. “Good light.” She peered out each of the windows, stripping the drapes as far to the side as she could to let in more light. “We’ll do a few shots in here, and then I think it might be fun to get some down there.” She pointed out the rear window to the tiny courtyard. “That tree would look marvelous in the background. And it would be a bit different from the standard ballroom backgrounds.”

“You is being the expert,” Vitaly said agreeably.

At her command, we posed and danced and smiled while she moved around us, finding different angles. My smile started to feel stiff by the time she said, “Okay, let’s go out back. Did you want to use a different costume?”

We nodded, and Vitaly ducked into the bathroom to change while I whisked down the interior stairs. I donned the red dress with plunging neckline and the black ruffle that detached to become a cape. My hair had to change, too, to match the character of the paso doble, and I quickly twisted it into an updo, sticking an elaborate enameled comb into it. Most of my makeup was okay as it was, but I slicked a dark red lipstick onto my lips before hurrying out of my bedroom.

I stopped so quickly I stumbled. Sarah Lewis stood at the threshold to the parlor, camera raised to take photos of the mess within. She must have followed me down from the studio. “What are you doing?” I asked, my brows snapping together.

She whirled at the sharp note in my voice. “Taking photos. For your insurance company. Vitaly told me about your break-in. That must have been scary.”

I eyed her, uncertain whether to believe her or not. Her expression was guileless. She couldn’t be interested in the manuscript, I reminded myself; she was far too young to feature in any of Corinne Blakely’s memories. “Thanks,” I said. “It was scary.” I moved toward the kitchen and she followed me. “Oops.” I’d forgotten the table blocked my back door. Together, Sarah and I heaved it out of the way and exited through the back to find Vitaly waiting in the courtyard, his matador costume a dramatic splash of black and red against the green grass and blue sky of the late-spring day.

“I love photographing trees,” Sarah said as she positioned Vitaly and me under the draping limbs of the old magnolia. “I like to think about all the history they’ve seen. Who knows what this old guy might have observed in his day?” She patted the tree’s rough trunk. “Slaves washing sheets on laundry day in this very courtyard, British soldiers occupying the town during the War of 1812, a midwife slipping through the night to help a scared sixteen- year-old wife give birth.”

I stared at her. “You sound like a historian,” I said.

“Smile. I was a history major at William and Mary before I got bitten by the photography bug. My mom-she’s a history professor at Georgetown-got me a job as a tour guide at Christ Church one summer. George Washington used to go to services there, you know.”

I was pretty sure everyone in Old Town Alexandria knew that bit of trivia, but I said only, “A history professor, huh? Not a dancer like her brother?” I dropped into a deep lunge, looking up into Vitaly’s face with simulated passion. He steadied me when my foot slid off an exposed root.

Sarah lowered the camera and stared at me. “My mom doesn’t have any brothers.”

I was confused. “But your uncle Marco-”

Understanding dawned and she laughed. “No, no, he’s my uncle by marriage. He’s married to Mom’s sister, my aunt Marian.”

“But you look-” My eyes widened and I gasped. Vitaly, thinking I’d hurt myself, hauled me upright. I leaned into him for a moment to hide my face.

“Is it hurting, your head?” he asked.

“No, I’m fine,” I said, plastering a fake smile on my face. “Just dizzy for a moment.” I resumed the pose.

It seemed like Sarah hadn’t heard my last half-comment, because she didn’t react. My mind raced, and I knew none of the photos she took in the last five minutes of our session would be usable, because my head wasn’t in the paso doble. I was mentally back in the early 1980s, when Ronald Reagan was president, disco was king, and Sarah Lewis and I were infants. We wrapped things up minutes later, and Sarah packed up her equipment, promising to have proofs for us to review the next day. Vitaly dashed off to meet John, and Sarah followed me back upstairs to the studio so I could write her a check for the sitting fee. I was saying good-bye to her, trying to catalog her features without seeming to stare, when Maurice pushed through the door. He and Sarah exchanged greetings, and he held the door for her as she slipped out, descending the stairs bolted to the house’s exterior.

I grabbed Maurice by his blazer lapels and dragged him into my office. “Maurice! Could Sarah Lewis be Marco Ingelido’s daughter, rather than his niece? I always thought she looked like him, but I thought that was because his sister was her mother. But her mom’s not his sister; her mom’s his wife’s sister.”

Surprisingly, Maurice didn’t look surprised. I took him through it again. “But you can see she’s related to him by blood,” I finished. “She’s got his coloring, his facial structure.”

“I tried to tell you about their relationship,” he said, “that day Mildred and I went to get the typewriter from Turner.”

I stared at him in astonishment. “I thought you meant they-Ingelido and Sarah-were having an affair. So it’s common knowledge that she’s his daughter?” So much for Marco’s being desperate to stop the memoir’s publication to keep his secret.