blacktop, and watched a taxi run a red light. It was Sunday, so traffic was light and pedestrians were scarce, and within five minutes, I was heading crosstown on 42ndStreet.
I said to Jill, “Do you have any questions for me?”
“Like what?”
“Like what’s going to happen next. What to expect. That kind of stuff.”
“If I need to know anything, you’ll tell me. Correct?”
“Correct.”
“Can I make a suggestion?”
“Of course,” I said.
“You’re keeping it in first gear too long.”
“Sorry.”
I turned right on Sixth Avenue and headed up to Central Park South, paying attention to my gear changes. Within a few minutes, we were in front of the Plaza Hotel, and I had the valet park the car. I carried our overnight bags into the opulent lobby and followed Jill to the reception desk.
I didn’t want her paying with her credit card, which could be traced, so she arranged to pay by check, which would be secured by her credit card imprint. I showed the desk clerk my Federal credentials and asked for the manager. He arrived in a few minutes, and I said to him and the clerk, “We are traveling incognito on government business. You will not tell anyone who inquires that Mrs. Winslow is checked in here. You will call the suite if anyone makes such an inquiry. Understood?” They understood and noted it in the computer.
Within ten minutes, we were in the living room of a two-bedroom suite. She found the bigger bedroom, which she claimed without saying a word, and we stood in the living room.
She said, “I’ll call room service. What would you like?”
What I liked was in the room bar, but I said, “Just coffee.”
She picked up the phone and ordered coffee and assorted pastry.
I said to her, “Will your husband be home yet?”
She looked at her watch and said, “Probably not.”
“Okay, what I need you to do is call home and leave a message for Mark. Say something that indicates that you need some time away from home and that you’ve gone to the country with a girlfriend or something. I don’t want him to be alarmed, and I don’t want him calling the police. Understand?”
She smiled and said, “He won’t be alarmed-he’ll be shocked. I’ve never left home before… well, not without a pre-arranged story. And he won’t call the police because he’d be too embarrassed.”
“Good. Use your cell phone.”
“You said-”
“You can keep it on for about five minutes-ten tops.”
She nodded, took her cell phone from her bag, turned it on, and dialed. She said, “Mark, this is Jill. I was bored today, and I decided to take a ride to the Hamptons and visit a girlfriend. I may stay overnight. Call my cell phone if you’d like and leave a message, but I’m not taking calls.” She added, “I hope you had a good morning of golf with the boys, and that Bud Mitchell didn’t aggravate you again.” She looked at me, smiled, and winked. “Bye.”
Clearly Mrs. Winslow was having some fun.
She asked me, “Was that all right?”
“Perfect.”
On the other hand, if Nash had gotten around to putting two and two together, he’d be at the Winslow house now, soon, or later, and Mr. Winslow would be hearing another story, and he’d be asked to help the authorities find his wayward wife. But I couldn’t worry about that now. I said to Jill, “Please turn off your cell phone and don’t forget to turn it off every time you use it.”
She turned it off and put it in her bag.
Mrs. Winslow went to her bedroom to freshen up.
The doorbell rang, and I let the room service guy in and signed the check.
I walked to the windows and looked out over Central Park.
I felt like a man on the run, which wasn’t surprising, since I was on the run. Ironically, my whole professional life had consisted of me chasing other people who were on the run, though most of them were so stupid that I never really learned much from them about how not to get caught.
But I learned
Jill came into the living room, looking like she’d done a powder-and-paint job, and we sat at the dining table and had coffee and pastry. I was actually hungry, but I didn’t hog the whole plate of sweets.
She asked me, “Your wife is arriving tomorrow?”
“That’s the plan. About fourP.M. ”
“Will you meet her at the airport?”
“No. I can’t show up at a pre-arranged place.”
She didn’t ask why not, and I could tell she was getting it. I said, “I’ll have her met and taken here. Neither she nor I can go back to our apartment.”
She nodded, looked at me, and finally said, “John, I’m frightened.”
“Don’t be.”
“Do you have a gun?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
I explained, then added, “I don’t need a gun.”
We made small talk awhile, and then I said to her, “Take the cassette tape I gave you, and have it locked in the hotel safe.”
“All right. What are you going to do with A Man and a Woman?”
“I’ll take care of it.”
She nodded, then said to me, “I’d like to go to church. Then take a walk. Is that all right?”
I said to her, “To be honest with you, if these other people somehow discover where we are, then it doesn’t matter what you do.”
I put her cell phone number into my cell and she put mine into hers. I said, “Remember, don’t keep it on more than five minutes.”
Actually, in Manhattan, with a few hundred thousand cell phone signals bouncing around, it could take fifteen minutes or more to triangulate a cell phone location, but better safe than busted. I continued, “And don’t use your credit cards or an ATM machine. Do you have cash?”
She nodded, and asked me, “Would you like to come with me?”
I stood and said, “I need to stay here and make some calls. I’ll call you a few times, so check for my messages every half hour and call me back as soon as you get my message.”
She said, “You’re worse than my husband.”
I smiled and said, “If you need to call here, call the room phone. But if I don’t answer the room phone, then try my cell. And don’t come back to the room if I don’t answer the phone. Understand?”
She nodded.
I said, “On your way out, don’t forget to have that video cassette put in the hotel safe. Then, put the receipt in a hotel envelope and have it sent up to this room.”
Again, she nodded.
I said to her, “Plan to be back here no later than fiveP.M. ”
“I think I’m going back to Mark.”
I smiled. “See you later.”
I went into the bedroom, sat on the bed, and dialed Dom Fanelli’s cell phone. He answered, and I said, “Sorry to interrupt your Sunday.”
“Hey. You’re calling from the Plaza?”
“I am. Where are you?”
“I’m at the Waldorf. What are you doing at the Plaza?”
