Opening the trunk, Jeff set his suitcase inside, then walked around to the front of the car, opened the door, and leaned on the horn.
The noise was loud and irritating on the quiet, lovely winter morning. He kept it up, his dark gaze mad for sure now.
'Mindy!' he shouted over the sound of the horn. 'Mindy, please come with me!'
Three or four minutes rolled by. Mindy, wherever she was inside, chose not to respond.
Finally, shoulders slumping, a tearful expression tightening his face, Jeff slid inside the BMW and started the engine. From the exhaust pipe a putt-putt of cold-morning exhaust could be seen and, anticipating the work of the defroster, Jeff wiped away steam from the inside windshield.
He had not given up entirely. The engine running smoothly now, he sat in the driveway and gave the horn one last try, a mournful, foghorn bass that seemed to rattle the windows of Diane's house. There was a pleading tone to the horn now, a futile summoning that Mindy, for whatever reason, was obviously not going to answer.
Slumping toward the steering wheel, Jeff started pounding the dashboard with his fists, a five-year-old throwing a tantrum.
Then, abruptly, he quit his pounding, sat back, put the car into gear, and started backing out of the driveway.
He had gone perhaps ten yards when smoke started pouring in thick gray clouds from the trunk.
Slamming on the brakes, jumping from the car, Jeff ran to the rear of the car, jammed in the key, and threw back the lid.
The smoke became massive now, and for a moment Jeff was lost to Diane-all but his trousers from the knees down-inside the smudgy gray-black smoke.
She heard him curse once and then she saw him emerging from the smoke. He carried the suitcase. It was on fire and was the source of all the smoke.
He hurled it into a snowbank and began scooping up soft white snow to put out the fire. It did not take long. Jeff worked with a certain manic compulsion, as if he needed something physical to do at this moment to keep from going clinically insane.
The fire out, Jeff closed the lid, stood looking up at the house a long moment, then went around and got back behind the wheel again.
He started the engine, put the car in reverse, and started out of the driveway again.
This time he reached the edge of the street before the engine caught on fire.
They were almost pretty, the red and yellow flames against the pure white snow, the pure blue sky.
His life was in no way endangered-he got out of the car in plenty of time-but the engine was most likely ruined, fire and smoke pouring up from under the hood.
He raised his eyes to his house. In the doorway now stood Mindy, dressed in a pale blue robe, gaunt from her loss of weight. She beckoned to him to return and so he did, leaving the car in the driveway to burn out.
He went inside his house and closed the door.
It had been a very short trip.
Dinner that Saturday night was braised beef tips, a salad, and whole-wheat bread that Diane had made from scratch.
She had not used the dining room since well before her husband's death. Now, the candlelight made the room luxurious with the gleam of light on mahogany, of rich warm shadows.
During the meal, Diane told Robert what had happened that day to Jeff McCay's trip.
'He just disappeared into the house,' she explained. 'Then around four this afternoon, he went out and pushed the car up the driveway, away from the road.'
'Sounds pretty strange.'
'That's what I hoped you'd say.'
He glanced up from his salad. 'Why?'
'Because then you can go over there and find out what's going on.'
He shrugged. Tonight he wore a white shirt, gray cardigan sweater, and chinos. She felt far more comfortable with him than she wanted to admit to herself.
'Mindy would come to the door and that would be that.'
'Meaning what?'
'Meaning that she'd say, yes, their car did catch on fire and that, yes, everything is all right now.'
'In other words, she wouldn't let you inside?'
'Right.'
'On TV, detectives are always getting search warrants.'
He laughed. 'Maybe on TV, Diane. In real life, judges don't hand those out without a good reason.'
'But something's going on over there.'
'But what's going on exactly?'
'You said yourself it was 'pretty strange.''
'Yes, I did. But that doesn't mean I can show cause.'
'But-'
He put his fork down and reached across the table, his hand brushing hers there in the romantic shadows. 'A little girl lives in the house. She's sick. Two adults live with her. They're kind of funny sometimes, kind of odd. Today their car caught on fire. Nobody was injured, and later in the day Jeff pushed the car back up the drive. Now, does that sound like it's worth giving me a search warrant over?'
'You forgot about him running out into the night stark naked.'
'A good point, but what does it prove? That he walks in his sleep? Obviously, he wasn't injured, and apparently nobody else was. You yourself saw Mindy in the doorway.'
'She looked gaunt.'
'Gaunt, but not in any trouble?'
'Well…'
'Or looking as if she needed help?'
'Well…'
'Or in any way asking you for help?'
'No, but-'
'I think you see what I'm talking about, Diane.'
'But we know that something's going on over there.'
'No, I'm afraid we don't know anything. What you're really saying is that we suspect, and as yet we don't have any hard evidence for even intelligent speculation. Just fears.'
The timer went off, announcing that the chocolate cake she'd baked was ready for frosting.
Once they got off the subject of the McCays, they had a fine time.
Two hours later, snug in Robert's arms on the couch, White Christmas with Bing Crosby and Grace Kelly on television, she said, 'Do you really think everything's all right over there?'
He smiled. 'No, I don't. But right now there's nothing I can do about it except wait until you call me and tell me they're gone. Then we'll pay their house a quick, unofficial visit and make sure Jenny's all right.'
'Jenny.' Diane sighed. 'It'd really be nice to see her again.'
Twenty minutes later, Robert raised her face to his and kissed her tenderly on the lips.
'Is that going too fast?' he asked.
'No, that's just going the legal speed limit.' She smiled.
He kissed her again.
Terry, the one they'd gotten to replace Ringo, the dog they'd said had run away.
At first, the sounds startled her, loud and sharp as gunshots on the silence. But then the sounds only reminded her of how much she disliked the little dog. Not his fault that he was so aggravating-always drooling all over your hand if you tried to pet him, always tearing your nylons, jumping at you in the street — but she would never feel any affection for him no matter what.
Not quite knowing why, she first rang the bell. She supposed it was her good middle-class training. Even when you're breaking into a place, always be polite.
It was one of those afternoons when she really enjoyed domestic work. In the morning she dusted and
