“Yeah, in a minute,” I said, slipping the purse out from under my jacket.
About then, Paul and three of his friends-Andy, Hakim, and Darryl-came bounding down the stairs from his bedroom, rounding the corner and heading for the door to the basement. Darryl had several video-game cartridge boxes in his hand, indicating to me that they were planning to park themselves in front of the downstairs television for the next several hours. Andy caught a glimpse of me as he passed the study door and shouted, “Hey, Mr. Walker!”
“Hi, guys,” I said.
“Nice purse, Mr. Walker,” Andy said. “Suits you.”
My heart skipped a beat. “Thanks,” I said, closing the door. I flicked on the desk lamp next to the keyboard, sat down in my writing chair, and set the purse on the table.
Sitting there, in the quiet of my study, the video game noises in the basement and the soft sounds of water running in the kitchen both muted by the closed door, with the handbag of a woman I did not know on the desk in front of me, I began to sweat. I took a couple of deep breaths, letting them both out slowly, in a bid to get my heart rate down a bit.
“Relax,” I said. Okay, I had done a stupid thing, a really stupid thing. But this was a problem that could be solved. In short order. Before Sarah got wind of it and had something she could lord over me the rest of our marriage.
I unzipped the top of the purse and peered inside. I didn’t want to look very closely. I had a sense of the invasion I was perpetrating. All I wanted was a wallet. For a name and an address. The purse had some heft to it, there was a lot of stuff in there, but my interests were very specific. I just wanted to track down the owner.
There were some tissues, a couple of white tubes down in the bottom I realized were tampons (oh man), a film canister, a couple of letter-size white envelopes stuffed with papers, a small makeup bag, a set of car keys with a “VW” emblem on the side, and a red leather wallet. Gingerly, I reached into the bag and took it out.
I unsnapped and opened it. There was the usual assortment of credit cards. I took one out, a Visa, and read the name: Stefanie Knight. Okay, Stefanie, now we just have to find out where you live. I rooted around in the wallet. There was a twenty and a five, a mini-pocket for coins that was heavy with pennies, and there, tucked in with the cash, was a hard plastic card that looked like a driver’s license.
I took it between my thumb and forefinger and held it under the lamp. Her photo wasn’t terribly flattering; driver’s license pictures never are. Her hair wasn’t quite as blonde when it was taken, and there were dark lines under her eyes, like the picture was taken during a police lineup rather than at the DMV. But there was a passing resemblance to the woman in the off-white suit that I’d walked past in the grocery store.
And I had the same feeling, looking at the photo, that Sarah said she’d had upon seeing the woman, that she knew her from someplace. I studied the photo for several seconds, tried to place her. I felt as though I’d seen her someplace recently, but exactly when and where wouldn’t come to me. It’s like when you see your mailman at the mall; you know you know him, but seeing him out of context throws you, hinders recognition.
Next to the photo was her actual license number, a long jumble of numbers and letters, and below that, her name-KNIGHT, STEFANIE J.-and an Oakwood address on a street I didn’t know: 2223 Deer Prance Drive. If not our own neighborhood, it sounded like a street in a new development someplace.
So, I had a name and an address. All that was left was for me to do my civic duty and return the purse to her. In an hour, this would all be over, and there’d be nothing else to do but laugh about it.
12
I WROTE STEPHANIE KNIGHT’S ADDRESS ON a piece of paper and tucked it into my pocket. Then I put the wallet back into the purse. I was going to have to take the purse back out to the car again, and needed something to put it in so I wouldn’t have to keep hiding it under my jacket. I opened the closet in my office and found, tucked way in the back, a Nike gym bag that was stuffed with some old track pants, sweat socks, and a couple of T-shirts. It brought back memories of a time when I believed in physical fitness.
I yanked the clothes out to make room for the purse, felt myself getting a bit queasy, and then wondered whether it wasn’t bad enough that I had stolen Stefanie Knight’s purse. Did I have to return it smelling like moldy cheese?
So I threw my clothes back into the gym bag and looked for something else. I found a heavyweight plastic shopping bag with a drawstring top that had come from a shoe store, and stuffed the handbag into that.
I had a map book in the car to help me find Deer Prance Drive. Hanging on to the bag from the drawstring, I slipped out the study door, careful not to be glimpsed from the kitchen, and made my way out to the front step. I’d toss the bag into the car and-
“Hey,” said Sarah. She was standing at the end of the driveway. How did she get out there? Did she have a transporter in the kitchen? And she was talking to Trixie, dressed in a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt.
“Oh, you’re out here,” I said. Trixie gave me a knowing smile.
“Zack,” Trixie said.
“Trixie was telling me you guys had coffee the other day.”
I nodded. Things seemed to be spinning.
“You people who work from home,” Sarah said, pretending to scowl. “No bosses to answer to, coffee breaks whenever you want them. No commute into the city. I should be so lucky. What I don’t get is, and this is something I’ve talked about with Zack, when you work from home, don’t you start feeling isolated, with no coworkers to talk to?”
“Well,” Trixie said, “that’s not always the case.”
“Sure,” I said. “I’m on the phone a lot through the day. You’re still talking to people, even if it’s not face-to- face.”
“Of course, you have people coming to your house,” Sarah said to Trixie.
“That’s right. And it can get pretty busy, they start stacking up like planes.”
Sarah chuckled. “You know, I wouldn’t miss commuting in to
Trixie nodded with mock enthusiasm. “Sounds great. I’d be happy to show you the ropes.”
“I really should get going,” I said.
“Where would that be, exactly?” Sarah asked. “I thought you were going to start the barbecue for the steaks. And what’s in the bag? You taking back some shoes?”
“No, it’s an old bag. I’ve got something in here to take back to Kenny’s.”
“You were just there.”
“I know. I was telling him that that Batman kit I bought a while ago came without some of the parts it was supposed to have, and he said trying to order individual parts would be impossible, so he said just return the whole kit and he’ll try to get a replacement.”
“And you need to do this now.”
“He closes pretty soon, and I was thinking I might work on it tonight, after dinner.”
“I always liked Batman,” Trixie said. “Although I guess my favorite was Catwoman. Something about the outfit.”
Sarah sighed. “If you can, be fast, ’cause I’m getting hungry.”
I tossed the bag into the back seat, then worried Sarah would look in it. But so long as she believed it had something to do with Batman, I was safe. “I’ll just get the barbecue going,” I said, and ran back into the house, through the kitchen, and out through the glass doors to the deck. I opened the lid on the barbecue, turned on the gas, and, forever the optimist, pressed the red ignition button.
Nothing.
I clicked it a second time, then a third. “Goddamn thing.” Why did I think it would suddenly start working now, just because I had an urgent errand to run? This’ll work forever, the salesman said when we bought it. How long ago had that been? Three months, four?
By now, there was enough propane circulating in the atmosphere that if the red button beat the odds and actually worked on the fourth try, they’d be picking up pieces of me in Trixie’s backyard. I turned the valve off
