“Thank you.” She nodded as he left the room, and she looked at the FBI agent again, and as he watched her, he knew that there was more than she had told him. He wondered how straightforward he could be with her, if she would lie, or swoon, or attempt to leave the room in a rage, but she did none of those, she only listened to him. And watched him. He was a powerful, compelling, very handsome man in a rugged way, but she wasn't paying any attention to his looks, only to what he was saying.
“Mrs. Patterson, sometimes there are things we don't want to say to people we don't know, things we don't want to admit about ourselves or people we love…but in a case like this, it could make all the difference. I don't need to tell you what's at stake here. You know… we all do. Will you please give it some thought, and see if there's anything else you want to tell me?” But before she could say anything, he left the room, and promised to come back as soon as he'd spoken to Patrick and Edith. And she sat there in Malcolm's den, wondering how much she should say to him, but knowing that she had to trust him.
Both Patrick and Edith were still very drunk when he walked in, but they were coherent enough to know where they'd been, what they'd done, and who they'd been with. O'Connor wrote it all down as Taylor talked to them, and Patrick acted outraged that an APB had been put out on him, he said it could ruin his reputation, which neither O'Connor nor Taylor cared about for a single moment. They both suspected he could be a nasty piece of work, given the chance, as could Edith.
“Why were you out with him tonight?” Taylor asked her as she crossed her legs and tried to look sexy in the dress she'd stolen. It was the one Marielle had worn the night before, to the Whytes', and she had asked Edith to send it to the cleaners. She was planning to send it to them, but she had worn it first, as she had with lots of other gowns before. She just hadn't had the courage to “borrow” the ermine. “Weren't you supposed to be on duty?”
“Yeah, so what?” Patrick said. “What difference did it make who sat with the kid? So if she'd been there she'd have wound up gassed and all trussed up like a chicken. What for? For the lousy salary they give us?” He was still too drunk to realize that what he said could damn them both, but Edith was sobering fast and looking very nervous.
“I didn't know… I should have… I guess… I just thought it being almost Christmas…”
“Where did you get the dress?”
“It's mine.” She tried to brazen it out. “My sister made it.” Taylor nodded understandingly, and then sat down across from her, as though he knew her better than he did, and had no intention of buying her story.
“If I ask Mrs. Patterson to come in, will she agree with that, or is the dress hers?” The girl bowed her head and started to cry in answer, as Patrick became increasingly belligerent.
“Oh for chrissake, you sniveling bitch, cut it out… so what… so you borrowed her dress. You always give 'em back. Shit, you'd think we was working for the Virgin Mary. And listen,” he waved a finger menacingly at John Taylor, “don't you buy any of that holy Madonna crap from her. Twice this week I seen her with her boyfriend. Once she even took the kid, so don't you go insinuating it was us. You talk to her and ask her about the guy she was kissing in the church on Friday, and in the park yesterday, with Teddy.” Nothing registered on O'Connor's face as he made a note of it, and John Taylor stared at him with silent interest. He knew that if he kept his mouth shut, there would be more, and he was right, there was, less than a minute later. “The guy looks like a lunatic if you ask me, ranting and raving at her, shouting, he looked like he was threatening her, then trying to kiss her. Poor Teddy looked scared out of his wits he did, if you ask me, the bastard is crazy.”
“What makes you say that he's her boyfriend?” The voice was cool, but the eyes were icy. “Have you seen him with her before?”
Patrick thought about it and then shook his head. “No…just the other afternoon in church and yesterday in Central Park. But she could have seen him other times, and he really seemed to know her. She don't always let me drive her.”
“Does she drive herself?”
“Now and then,” he thought it out again, “she goes for walks sometimes. But she don't go out much.
Feels sorry for herself a lot, I think. She gets a lot of headaches.” It was certainly an interesting portrait he painted. Somehow, John Taylor had gotten the impression she was stronger.
“Have you ever seen her with other men?” He seemed sorry to admit that he hadn't, except this one. And then Taylor threw him a curve, with a question he didn't want to answer. “Have you ever seen Mr. Patterson with other women?”
There was a long, pregnant pause, when Patrick looked at the still sobbing Edith. She was sure she was going to lose her job over the dress she had taken. She was far more concerned with that than the disappearance of the little boy when she was supposed to have been there to watch him.
John Taylor repeated the question again, in case Patrick needed to be reminded. “Have you ever seen your employer with another woman?”
“Not that I can remember…” And then, “…except his secretaries of course.” But that was all information Taylor knew he could delve into later. The matter of the boyfriend, however, did intrigue him. She seemed too cool for that, too smart, too clean, and too decent. But you never knew, and now he certainly had to ask her. He hated these things, forcing answers, causing pain. But the entire situation that had brought him here was painful, and if he could help find the boy for them, then it was worth it.
He stood up and looked at the driver he had come to loathe in a single moment. They were a slimy pair.
But instinct also told him that it was unlikely they were involved in the kidnapping. It was possible they'd taken a bribe, had left a door open somewhere for a hundred bucks, but he wasn't even sure they'd done that. They were just out, taking advantage of their employers, in a purloined dress, a borrowed car, having shirked their duties to the child, but he doubted if there was more to it than that. Lucky for them, or he'd have been glad to nail them.
He went back to the library after telling O'Connor to let them go. He'd interrogate them again in the morning. They had both already insisted that they'd seen nothing unusual that night, or in the days before. The only thing unusual, Patrick repeated, was Marielle's meeting with her “boyfriend.”
“What did you make of that?” O'Connor asked in an undertone before Taylor left the kitchen.
“It's probably all lies, but I'll ask her.”
“She don't look the type.” O'Connor shook his head. Maybe the boyfriend had taken the kid. It was certainly a possibility if she was involved with someone other than her husband. And you never knew. It was always the quiet ones who surprised you.
“No, she doesn't look the type,” Taylor agreed almost sadly. But if it was true, he was even more anxious to talk to her before the return of her husband. As he walked into the library, he saw her sitting there, almost as though she hadn't moved, but she seemed to be shaking harder than ever. The house was warm, but she was clearly in shock, and in spite of himself, he felt sorry for her.
“Would you like a drink, or a cup of tea?”
“No, thank you,” she said sadly. “Did they know anything?” she asked him hopefully, but he shook his head. “Do you think it's possible they took him and left him somewhere, and came back?” It was a thought she'd had while he was talking to them, and she was anxious to share it.
“Possible, but not likely. I'll see them both again tomorrow morning. But I think they've probably just been out dancing and drinking.” Like her, he was disappointed. It would have been so simple if they had him.
“Neither of them is very fond of me.” Few people were, in Malcolm's house, but she was embarrassed to say it. Malcolm was their only boss, as far as they were concerned. No matter how kind she'd been to them, they were still cold and rude and surly, and more than they knew it, it hurt her.
Being married to Malcolm wasn't always the easy life it appeared. There had been many long nights when she'd been unhappy and lonely. There'd been years of them now, and yet she was faithful to him, and honorable, decent, and a good mother to Teddy. But no one gave her credit for that. Sometimes, she thought, not even Malcolm.
