Donald must have somehow arranged for this; it was the only explanation.
She moved toward the large, rectangular box. Its lid was lifted on one corner and a fold of white tissue paper protruded as if testing the air.
“What the hell is that?” she heard Donald say behind her.
An act? It wasn’t her birthday or their anniversary. She couldn’t think of any reason she should receive a gift from her husband except for pure impulsiveness, which wasn’t entirely beyond Donald.
“One way to find out,” Mary said, and lifted the lid off the box.
Inside was more white tissue paper. She unfolded it and recognized the crimson silk kimono she’d admired two days ago in Bloomingdale’s.
But Donald hadn’t been with her. Had she mentioned the kimono?
“It’s beautiful,” she said, pulling the kimono from the box and holding it up so they could both admire it. “But how did you know?”
“Know what?”
“That I wanted it and decided it was too frivolous for the money.”
“Why would I know?”
“Because you ordered it from Bloomingdale’s.”
He came over to stand next to her and reached out and touched the smooth material. “Much as I’m tempted to take credit, Mary, this isn’t a gift from me.”
She looked up at him. He seemed to be telling the truth. And why would he deny buying the kimono now that she’d accepted it?
“It must be from a secret admirer,” he said. He didn’t seem to be kidding.
“An admirer with a key?”
“Obviously. Or maybe he bribed the super to let him in.” Spurred to action by that possibility, he went to the phone.
Mary laid the kimono over the box and stared at it, listening to Donald in the background as he questioned the super.
When he came back, he said, “Nobody was let into our apartment.”
“If the super was bribed,” Mary said, “maybe he’s lying.”
“He didn’t sound like he was lying,” Donald said. He looked hard at Mary, his brow furrowed so his eyes were squinted. “You sure you didn’t order this and forget about it?”
“I wouldn’t forget, Donald. Besides, that would explain the kimono, but not how it got inside the apartment.” Maybe you ordered it and forgot, like with the bouquet. Everyone had their little mental glitches; maybe this was one of Donald’s-mystery gifts. Maybe he’d instructed the super to admit the deliveryman and had only pretended to phone downstairs. Maybe the flowers had been from him, too. Roses, a silk kimono…There could be worse faults in a husband. “Even if you didn’t give this to me,” she said, “thanks.”
“Don’t thank me for what I didn’t do.” He seemed genuinely irritated. “The kimono isn’t from me any more than the roses you found in here before we moved in.”
“Do you think we should change the locks?”
“We should consider it.” While I bide my time and see if more mysterious gifts turn up after your shopping expeditions. He thought he’d known everything about Mary, though they’d only been together a little over a year. Maybe he was learning something new. Maybe she was having a secret affair.
He immediately rejected the idea. After all, she’d told him about the roses.
If she had bought the kimono, or if she was some kind of kleptomaniac, sick, that could be dealt with medically.
But he had to know.
What if he hired a private detective to follow her and find out if she behaved in any way peculiar during her shopping? It was something to consider.
If Mary was ill, he wanted to help her. And if there was some other reason for the unexplained gifts-first the flowers, now the kimono-he sure as hell wanted to know what it was.
Either way, he was afraid of what he might learn.
Renz sat on the sagging sofa, opposite Quinn in Quinn’s apartment, glancing about while gnawing his lower lip.
“You’ve certainly done wonders with the place,” he said. “With each visit I see improvement. Is that a new bent lampshade? Was that wall always a mossy green? And is it my imagination or are the roaches smaller?”
“You said you had something important to discuss,” Quinn said, marveling that this was his friend and protector in the NYPD and not his enemy. What kind of dung had he gotten himself into?
“Is this what they call shabby cheap?” Renz asked, refusing to let go of his own cleverness. Then he looked sheepish, wilting beneath Quinn’s baleful stare. “Oh, all right. It’s this.” He held up the folded newspaper he’d brought with him.
“That the Times?”
“The Voice. ”
“You’ve always struck me as a typical subscriber.”
Renz shrugged. “The poetry in my soul.” He dropped the paper on the glass-ringed coffee table. “What’s interesting in this edition is another installment of the saga of Anna Caruso.”
“The papers like her story,” Quinn said. “I can understand that.”
“Then you should also understand this. The more they like her story, the less they like yours. In this particular piece you are the villain. There’s an old photo of you coming out of the precinct house just after your hearing. You look angry, and about to unzip your pants.”
Quinn knew the shot. The photographer had caught him coming down the concrete steps and swinging his arms. His right hand, which was about two feet away from his body when the photo was taken, appeared in only two dimensions to be adjusting his fly.
For a few seconds he felt again the injustice of his situation, the old futility and rage. I’ve become the victim of my own good intentions-can’t the fools see that? He’d never been naive enough to think something would inevitably right the wrong done to him, but he hadn’t counted on self-pity enveloping and smothering him.
He became aware of Renz smiling at the expression on his face.
“I thought that was your end of the bargain,” Quinn said. “To get me out from under the rape charge that was never filed.”
“And so can’t be disproved,” Renz pointed out.
And Quinn knew the accusation wouldn’t have been disproved if charges had been filed, even though he was innocent. Every cop knows truth is usually one of the early victims in the legal process. For a while he’d forgotten that, and it had cost him. He was still paying and, as Renz knew, was almost tapped out and dealing from desperation.
What Quinn didn’t know was that Renz thought he was guilty. That was why he’d come to him. To catch a sicko like the Night Prowler, you had to think like him, get into his mind, and be him. And who better to do that than his spiritual brother?
Set a sicko to catch a sicko.
“I’ve been watching the media on this one,” Renz said. “If I might brag a bit, I’m something of an expert when it comes to media in this town.”
“I give you that,” Quinn told him.
“What I see happening, even though it’s still in the beginning stages, is you gradually morphing from heroic and beleaguered ex-cop, getting his second chance, to lecherous bully with a badge, getting a few more free whacks at the public. And all at the cost of a sweet young thing who withers at the thought of you, and is, to boot, very photogenic.”
“She’s withering at the thought of somebody else.”
“Don’t we both know it?” Renz shook his head sadly. “And don’t we both know it doesn’t make any difference unless you step it up and catch this loony who’s offing happy couples in their prime?”
“That’s why you came here? To light a fire under my ass?”
“Something like. Tell me why I shouldn’t.”
Quinn gave him a progress report. Though even to him it didn’t sound much like progress.
