Two Women (33 page)

Jane looked down at her crumpled self. ‘I need to clean up.'

Her escape, seized Alice. There was nothing she could do about the razor or the cologne but the photograph was the important thing. The only thing. Why the sudden change in Jane's attitude? It didn't matter. Getting Jane out of the room was all that mattered. ‘You know where the bathroom is. And then we'll get going.'

‘I need to make some calls, first.'

‘I want you to.'

‘I …' started Jane, but stopped.

‘What?'

‘Nothing.'

It took Alice only seconds to snatch up John's proud, joke-of-the-moment photograph and stuff it into a side drawer of the desk, beneath manuscripts and proofs of articles she had written and which she'd worked over, every time she and John had been here, all part of the fake domesticity, his reading by the amber, crackling fire while she did her job.

Alice was glad the main bathroom was en suite. She couldn't have waited for Jane to emerge from the second one before being sick.

It had been a sleepless but productive night, the only potential problem a personal one for Gene Hanlan. Within an hour of his cut-off telephone conversation with Alice, Hanlan had organized an FBI plane to take him and a willing Rosemary Pritchard to Washington, for the CCTV loop to be photographically enhanced. It was while that was being done in the J. Edgar Hoover buildings that Hanlan endured the self-protective tirade from his regional supervisor, who'd failed to react to Hanlan's previous visit and who argued now that the Bureau was inescapably locked into a kidnap investigation that Hanlan had decided upon without superior authorization, which was against regulations, and that his career hung upon the safe return of Jane Carver. The confrontation was shortened by Rosemary Pritchard's positive identification of Alice Belling from just her features being brought up from beneath the veil, without needing to bother with hair colour change. The gynaecologist was, of course, able to provide the Princes Street address from her patient records and it was still early enough that night to obtain a judge's order to enter the apartment. Hanlan returned to Manhattan with a five-man forensic team and six seconded field agents to join the waiting Ginette Smallwood and Patrick McKinnon and the NYPD squad headed by Barbara Donnelly.

Hanlan had restricted the entry into Princes Street to just himself and Barbara Donnelly, in addition to the scientists, and assigned McKinnon to organize an incident room at Federal Plaza. By the time Hanlan and the woman returned there, ahead of the scientists, computers, desks and banks of pinboards had been installed in the conference room for the still-to-arrive clerks and support staff. McKinnon had already started the pinboards, fixing enlarged photographs of the Catskills range and then reducing the focus to the still extensive region dominated by the town of Paterson, from which they had already traced Alice's contact call.

There were also cots available for people to sleep in the mess.

It was 4.00 a.m. – by coincidence the time Jane Carver began edging out of bed in the Bearfort Mountains cabin – before the scientists arrived and a further hour before they produced the findings from their mobile laboratory facility. During that hour Hanlan declared the Bearfort Mountains their obvious target area, after seeing the location on the back of the now greatly enlarged photographs of Carver at the cabin.

‘So Alice knew John Carver,' said McKinnon, examining the display. ‘I've got five bucks says it was in a kind of a cosy way, too.'

‘That put Jane at risk?' queried Barbara, at once.

‘Might have done, from the jealous mistress syndrome, if Carver was still alive,' agreed Ginette. ‘But he's not.'

‘It's not unusual for a wife and mistress to know each other,' said the New York Police lieutenant.

‘All she keeps saying is that they need protection,' reminded Hanlan.

‘So why doesn't she come and get it, instead of running?' demanded McKinnon.

‘Today could be the day,' suggested Hanlan, hopefully. To the man leading the scientific team, whom he thought looked young enough to be his son, Hanlan said: ‘You got things to tell us?'

‘Worrying things,' announced the man, at once. ‘We got there second.'

‘Shit!' said McKinnon.

‘You sure?' asked Hanlan and wished he hadn't from the younger man's sour look.

‘Very professional entry, one of the best I've seen,' said the scientist. ‘We got picklock markings at the mouths of the mortice and the deadlock. We dismantled both. Very definite forced-entry groovings. The lobby mailbox had stuff dated more than two weeks ago. There's not one single message remaining on the answering machine. It's been wiped …'

‘Careless,' remarked McKinnon.

‘Not if there was a voice that didn't want to be recognized, trying to reach her,' said Hanlan.

‘We're shipping the tape back to Washington. They've got higher specification audio equipment than we carry. They may be able to pull something up.'

‘Fingerprints?' asked Barbara Donnelly.

‘Just two sets,' said the scientist. ‘Always together. All old.'

‘One Alice's, one Carver's,' predicted Ginette.

‘Inevitably,' agreed Hanlan. ‘How about untouched valuables: stuff worth stealing?'

The scientist nodded. ‘Some jewellery, a diamond ring, in an old setting, could be a family heirloom. Some gold chains. Television, video, computer … we're shipping the computer back to Washington, too, to get the hard drive looked at. People don't realize how much stays behind, even if you think you've deleted it …' The man hesitated. ‘You want my guess, the guys who got in before us were doing what we're trying to do. Find Alice.'

‘And Jane,' corrected McKinnon.

‘And there's something that just might help,' offered the scientist, turning to the pinboard and the grinning photograph of John Carver. ‘See this …?' he demanded, pointing to an image in the background, among the trees. ‘Doesn't show so well, scarcely at all in fact, at the size of the prints in the apartment. Looks like a fallen branch. It isn't. That's the tail of a Volkswagen Beetle. Could be white or grey. Definitely light-coloured. Nothing else visible for a better identification.'

‘Carver's not a Volkswagen man,' declared McKinnon, positively.

‘No vehicle documentation anywhere in the apartment?' asked Barbara Donnelly.

The forensic expert shook his head and Ginette said: ‘Responsible drivers carry their documents with them.'

Hanlan said: ‘We're on to vehicle registration when the clock strikes.' Which wouldn't be for some hours yet, he realized.

‘Here's how it looks to me,' said Barbara Donnelly, eager to prove herself. ‘Crazy though it's sounded, it looks to me that Alice has been telling a reasonable story from the beginning. Carver's death might have been a definite accident but the other two've got questions. She talked about organized crime and we know now other people are looking. We've got to get to her – and Jane Carver before they do.'

Hanlan decided to let the woman have her moment and hoped she hadn't seen McKinnon's patronizing smile. Hanlan said: ‘And here's what we're going to do. We've got an identifiable picture of Alice, lifted from the loop. And we can get one of Jane. Paterson's our marker, with the Bearfort above it. This is the number Alice has, so I stay here. I want everyone else up there by the time people get out of bed, showing them the photograph. Obvious spots, stores, gas stations … Ginette, you stay here with me. Work the credit-card companies … gas cards … We find somewhere she's used more than once we've tightened our focus …' He jabbed at the map of Paterson and the mountains beyond. ‘A lot of tracks but not a lot of roads. I'm going to put a Bureau prop up, something slow enough to be able to carry out aerial observation. Maybe there won't be a lot of old-style Volkswagens and we'll get lucky. When we get the registration we'll alert Highway Patrol, all the local forces, without telling them why. We draw blanks at Paterson, we move out, further up the mountains …' He isolated McKinnon. ‘You co-ordinate it, Pat. You need more people, which you probably will, you call me …' He hesitated. ‘And I'll call you if Alice comes on. You'll be right there, to pick her up.' Just like in the movies, Hanlan thought. Except they weren't in the movies, working to a script. Hanlan accepted that after the bawling-out in Washington he was going to need all the luck he could get. He had a defence and an appeal against anything the assholes there tried to stick on him but disciplinary procedures always left a stain, even if they were dismissed. And according to the book, which those at the J. Edgar Hoover buildings always went by, he had broken regulations. Hanlan looked around the assembled law-enforcement officers. ‘Anything else?'

‘Carver's safe deposit,' remembered Barbara Donnelly. ‘That's where the Crown Jewels are supposed to be, according to Alice. Who can surely now be taken seriously? Why don't we go back to counsel about a court order, for access?'

‘Good idea,' accepted Hanlan. With his bare ass on the line, why hadn't he thought of it first?

It was the first time they'd had a breakfast meeting, and an early one at that, close to seven, and Charlie Petrie at once apologized if it was inconvenient. He said: ‘Got some business in Jersey. Want to get ahead of the traffic.'

‘You got a lead?' asked Burcher, at once. Both men had chosen continental, bread and pastries and coffee.

Petrie shook his head. ‘Covering bases. We've agreed your idea of making a formal approach to the Northcote firm.'

It would put him in an identifiable position, Burcher thought. He wished now he hadn't suggested it. ‘It won't be easy.'

‘You got a better idea?'

‘Even if their lawyers go for it, they'll look to see what it is. They've got to.'

‘And when they see what it is they'll realize how compromised they are. And have been for years. It can all be resolved sensibly, between reasonable men.'

‘I'll work it out,' promised Burcher.

Petrie poured more coffee for both of them. Vito Craxi was right. Petrie decided. After this Burcher was superfluous. And he knew far too much. He said: ‘We know you will, Stan. It's been a good and successful relationship.'

Stanley Burcher thought there was a finality in the way the other man spoke.

Twenty-Four

‘Y
es?'

The voice was relaxed to Alice's knock. Alice could imagine Jane lying back in the bath, soaking. ‘I'm leaving some pants outside the door. A sweater. And some underwear.'

‘That's kind.'

‘We're about the same size.'

‘Yes.'

‘I'm going to get cleaned up myself now. Get ready to go.'

‘All right.' Still relaxed.

Alice had run her own bath before collecting up the change of clothes for Jane. She lowered herself carefully, ribs aching, into the water, hotter than she normally had it, hoping the heat would ease away the discomfort of her retching. Where would she be sleeping, bathing, tomorrow morning? Not this early, she hoped. But safe. Both of them hidden away where no one could find them. She'd handled it very badly, Alice conceded. It was hardly a situation that could have been handled well but she should have done better than she had. Nothing she could do about it now. A pity that John had always insisted on showering and shaving in the second bathroom –
You need your space in the morning, because you're a grouch!
She didn't think she had been: hoped she hadn't. There was so much she wished for, so much it was impossible to turn back the clock to correct. Put right. Alice's mind butterflied, from thought to thought. When was she due? She couldn't remember. Hadn't bothered with notes in diaries because she was always so regular since undergoing treatment by Rosemary Pritchard, every twenty-eight days, almost always conveniently in the morning, maybe a passing twinge but never any serious stomach cramps. One of my luckiest patients, Rosemary Pritchard had called her. Warned her, too, sometimes, when she'd admitted being careless about her contraception, but she hadn't been careless, certainly not before John died as far as she could recall. Hadn't bothered, afterwards. No need to bother, ever again. She'd never go with another man. The idea revolted her, like so much else so easily, sickeningly, revolted her. Easy enough to understand why she was being sick. The fear from what she'd gone through. Was still going through – and she still knew what could happen to her, although at that moment she didn't feel frightened. She was, of course. Subconsciously. That's what it was, subconscious, justified fear. But all about to disappear today.

Alice felt fine, not sick at all, when she got out of the bath and put her jeans and sweater back on. A quarter before eight, she saw, when she restrapped her watch. She'd wait until eight, to ensure Gene Hanlan would be at the field office, although there'd probably be a contact arrangement to reach him at any time. Should she pack anything? It made obvious sense because although she was going to be protected there wouldn't be an opportunity to buy new things so quickly and she'd need fresh clothes, fresh underwear. Jane would be able to get what she needed packed for her, by one of the staff at East 62nd Street, and collected by someone from the Bureau. No cause to concern herself any more about Jane.

Jane was sitting in one of the fireplace chairs, barefoot like Alice, when Alice re-emerged into the main room, and Alice's first thought was that she
was
relaxed. If she had known, it would have all been different. Jane was looking around, her head moving with the intensity with which she was examining everything. Jane said: ‘Pity it didn't work out.'

‘What?'

‘You and your partner. This is the sort of place a couple could be very happy in, hidden away from everyone, everything.'