“No, no. Work fast,” he said earnestly. “I’m worried about Melanie.”
“I’ll work as fast as I can,” I said.
When I hung up, I took out the photograph of Melanie and Carl Sebastian on the beach. They still looked happy. To the extent you can tell such things, they seemed to be very much in love.
I decided to wait a few days, drive around, ask questions in all the wrong places, let Catano keep up with me and then I’d give up and tell Sebastian I had lost her trail. I would send him a report. A few days after that, maybe a week or two, Catano and Sebastian would find her. Melanie would be dead. I hoped it would be on the beach but it would probably be a hit-and-run.
I tried not to think about it, but trying didn’t help.
EPILOGUE
Sally and I went to a movie, something at Burns Court, something in French set in the distant past, costumes, horses, palaces, love, tragedy. We ate popcorn. My mind was on a beach.
Both of us ate lightly at the Bangkok Restaurant. I couldn’t finish my pad thai. I always finished pad thai.
“Lew, where are you?” she asked.
“Sorry,” I said. “I’m coming back.”
“Remember,” she said. “I told you the kids are away for the weekend.”
“I remember,” I said.
She played with her food for a few seconds and looked at me.
“I’m not ready, Lew,” she said.
“I’m not either.”
The restaurant was Saturday-night crowded. No one was paying any attention to us. Sally had worn a blue dress with a wide belt. Her earrings dangled with blue stones that caught the light. Her dark hair looked different than it had the day before. It had been cut and brushed back off of her ears.
“Let’s be friends for a while,” she said. “See where it goes. See when we’re ready. I don’t even know if my body remembers how to do it.”
“I’ve heard you never forget.”
“Disappointed?”
“Yes and no. Relieved in a way. You want to talk about your husband?”
“Yes, if you want to listen.”
“I want to listen.”
“You want to talk about your wife?”
“I think so.”
“You want to go first?” she asked.
The waiter brought us more tea and I said,
“Catherine. Her name was Catherine.”
