Julia felt oddly calmed watching him work. “No, she meant she would get it by pleasing him in some way, reassuring him of her loyalties. I’m sure of it. She was thinking about coddling, not violence.”
“That’s a thin line. She might have gone back armed with feminine wiles—plus a gun, just in case.”
“Don’t even say that. I don’t for an instant believe she’d shoot anyone.”
Philip folded the omelet, divided it in half, and slid each portion onto a plate. A sprinkle of herbs, two forks from a drawer, and he set the plates onto the table with a flourish.
“Goodness.” Julia wondered if she could eat any of it.
“Appearances do suggest she’s the killer, my dear.”
She wanted to denounce him for allowing the thought to form, but she could not. Though he could be exasperating at times, Philip’s mind was always sharp. He made no judgments; neither did he simply accept Eva’s innocence. Was Julia rushing too blindly to her friend’s defense?
She remembered Eva’s eager secret about her trip to Paris with Jerome. There was something poignant in her urgency, as if she were trying to outrun fate, to affirm their bond before anything could sever it. Beneath her preoccupied calm, had Eva been afraid? How excruciating to have reached the very brink of her dream. She’d nearly bubbled last week with the jubilant sense that she was about to break free into something new and wonderful. Her new life, her literary arrival, was so close. Timson’s anger about the manuscript had seemed only an obstacle to Eva, not a defeat. Why would she destroy all that by killing Timson, especially when she felt confident she could appease his anger?
Julia forced herself to taste the omelet. That was the wrong question. Instead she should ask, Was Eva’s envisioned future—a published novel, marriage, and a new career—worth risking everything for? Would she have killed Timson rather than let him crush her dreams?
At first Julia had felt certain that no, Eva’s gentle nature and decency made such a thing unthinkable. It was the pretty answer, but was it entirely honest? Any human heart was a maelstrom of raw and even base impulses. Julia had faced difficult choices herself last fall. Then she’d considered her situation dire, though now Eva’s crisis put that dilemma into perspective. Her choice between marriage or accepting Philip’s control of her purse strings hardly involved the risk of prison or death. Maybe Eva’s options had truly been unthinkable: kill a man, or let him destroy everything that mattered to her. How would Julia choose? How would anyone? Gentleness and decency might be no match for such a choice.
Julia managed a second bite, barely. “At first glance, perhaps. But that oaf of a policeman seemed ready to string her up without bothering to look beyond those appearances.”
“I know Hannity,” Philip said. “I’ll grant you he has ham hocks for manners, but he’s not the buffoon you suppose.” He cored several strawberries and slid the plate toward her. “Is the manuscript valuable?”
“Goldsmith paid her an advance for it, so he must figure it will sell well. Valuable in that sense, I suppose. But surely her jewelry is worth far more, and it’s easily turned into cash. The novel makes money only after it’s published.”
“That does seem to be the kicker,” Philip agreed. “Hannity’s probably right. No thief would haul away a bunch of papers unless he was after them. Most likely the jewelry was just gravy. It’s hard not to assume Timson was killed by someone who wanted that manuscript.”
Julia bit into a huge strawberry. At its sweet and juicy perfection, tears welled in her eyes, which she brushed away.
Where was Eva? Was she hiding or abducted? Was she injured—or even alive? That was the most painful question of all. Something deadly had occurred in Timson’s rooms last night. Had Eva found her way to safety, or had she been caught up in his violence?
Julia pushed away the berries. “She’s in terrible trouble. How can I help when I know almost nothing useful about her? I don’t know where she lives or whom she might turn to. Pablo boasts about discovering her, but I’m not sure he’d dirty his precious hands for her now. I have to do something, Philip. But what?”
He didn’t answer for a moment, perhaps discarding one of his usual flippant replies. There were many clichés available. Mercifully he offered none of them. “If she’s found,” he finally said, “and she says she’s innocent, you can believe her.”
“That’s not enough.”
“From a top-drawer white woman, it can be a great deal.”
Julia stared at him. How easy it was to reduce others to convenient categories—Negro writer, Jewish publisher—but she seldom thought of how neatly she too fit into a conventional box: top-drawer white woman. Reduced to wholly impersonal features. And yet without even noticing, she moved, as did everyone, in a world that treated her accordingly. How easy to believe the world was simply as it was for her, a woman for whom doors were whisked open with a deferential nod or quiet miss. Philip’s words reminded her that she too was forever sized up and sorted, no less than the blackest Negro or the most orthodox Jew. The difference was that doors swung open for women like Julia; they slammed shut for women like Eva.
“I’ll believe her.” Julia’s voice dropped. “And do what I can to help her.”
Philip looked at her thoughtfully. “Are you sure she needs your help? Or even wants it?”
Julia had a sudden memory of Austen holding her back when she’d have rushed to Eva’s defense that first night in Duveen’s apartment, after they’d witnessed anger flaring between Eva and Jerome. He’d been right: Eva could steer her own course through whatever tension simmered there. But this was different. It wasn’t a matter of respecting Eva’s right to speak and act for herself. From the hard set of Sergeant Hannity’s jaw, she feared Eva would not get that opportunity.
“I don’t mean fight her battles for
