“Well, you know,” Terry said. “Here you are. A complete turnabout. This time, the teacher didn’t have her assignment. So what did you say? That the dog ate your homework? Or did your mother write you a note and say you had the flu? What?”
I grudged a smile, which seemed to satisfy him. Then he looked around at the swarm of students. “Did I interrupt you? You seemed very much on your way somewhere. Am I keeping you?”
“I do have to hurry. They don’t give us luxurious lunch hours, and even with a prep period afterward… I’m in search of a book, a gift. If you like, come along. It’s right up your alley.”
“There’s a bookstore up my alley?”
“There’s a rare-book store on Locust.”
He looked thoughtful and slightly puzzled. “Bauman’s?” he asked.
I hadn’t ever noticed its name, just the books and the look of the inviting shop, but of course he’d be right. “I knew you’d know it.”
He shrugged and walked beside me. “You’re buying a rare book as a gift?” he asked.
I knew I was supposed to explain for whom I sought such an expensive luxury. What I didn’t know was how detailed a picture of my emotional life I wanted him to have. So instead of answering, I sidestepped. “I’m hoping to,” I finally said. “I’m not sure how much cash ‘rare’ translates into. Do you know? Not the million-dollar ones you mentioned when my class was at the library.”
He looked at me as if he were x-raying my brain, trying to see what and who was really inside there, figuring out for whom I was shopping and what that meant. “It varies,” he said, “but more than ordinary new books cost, for certain. What sort of book are you after?”
I sighed and shook my head. “Wish I knew. History, probably. Americana. Or poetry.”
His turn to sigh, for whatever reasons. He checked his watch. “I’m afraid you’ll have to explore on your own. It’s right over there.” He waved across the street, and I saw it. “I would see you to the door, like a proper gentleman, but I have to go back.”
“Really?” My disappointment was audible. Even I heard it. And then I realized he’d misinterpret it as romantic sorrow. “I was hoping…you know so much about this.”
“Sorry,” he said, his voice tight, and I knew that once again I’d managed to hurt his feelings. “I’ll…see you.”
“Hope so,” I said. And meant it, which didn’t help my mental muddle. “And thanks again for finding that book. Saved me from having to fall on my sword.”
And he was gone. I crossed the street and entered a wonderland out of the past: a town house lined with polished wood shelves filled with gold-etched brandy and burgundy and deep green leather-bound volumes. I inhaled the place. If I could live there, I’d be able to think through all my problems and reach sane and calm conclusions. Sherlock Holmes lived in rooms like this, lined with books like these. Anywhere else, he wouldn’t have been as bright. I wondered if they took boarders.
A charitable gentleman showed me volumes of Americana. Charitable because he continued to be helpful and considerate even after I gasped at the first price tag.
Mackenzie would have been in heaven there. The books were lovely to look at and hold, and their contents-—firsthand accounts of early explorations and discoveries—were precisely what delighted Mackenzie’s soul. The only snake I found in this bookish Eden was the realization that the less a volume has been read, the more valuable it is. A loved and much-used book with all the marks of wear and tear is devalued, but if the pages have never even been cut, up goes the price. So one might be a book lover—but not a book reader.
“This would be perfect,” I said. “Absolutely perfect for him.” I held a volume of verse that told the history of Daniel Boone. I was sure the poetry would be forgettable, but the combination of two of Mackenzie’s passions—poetry and history—and the impulse someone had felt to combine them were irresistible. Only the price tag, somewhat over six hundred dollars, was resistible, although in this emporium, that paltry amount made it a bargain-book-table special.
“I think it’s in Sabin,” the kindly gentleman said, pulling out a reference book, as if I truly were about to tell him to wrap it in special birthday paper. “Possibly also Howe,” he continued. “Let me look. You might enjoy learning more about it.”
The book had credentials. It had a book of its own!
Sabin was one of the thousands of reference books documenting these precious volumes, the man explained. Nonetheless, the name made me think of the oral polio vaccine guy, which in turn made me feel as if I was experiencing déjà think. “Don’t go to any bother,” I said. “I have to work on the budget, decide whether I can manage it. I’m a schoolteacher….” Maybe it was the paneling, the feel of the place, but I became a Dickens character—the pathetic match girl pressing her nose against a warm household’s windowpane. I put down the book, thanked the man, and left, filled with anger at my life. Why didn’t I make enough money for a gesture like that? It wasn’t even a selfish impulse—I wanted to be able to give a gift I was sure would please.
I knew there were worse problems than an inability to buy rare books, but still and all, I was more depressed when I left than when I’d entered. A bad way to spend a lunch hour. Then I realized I was close to Antique Row, that street of upscale hand-me-downs—more things I couldn’t afford, even if I wanted them—and among the collections there was Helena Spurry’s.
I hadn’t been in Traditions!, but I’d visited its neighbors with Sasha on a long and frustrating search for photo props. I’d marveled at the fine line that divides garage sales, thrift shops, and antiques boutiques, because along with finely crafted and classically styled furnishings, I’d found kitschy items I remembered from my parents’ home. There are many things to praise about my parents, but a sense of style isn’t on the list.
Before they moved to Boca Raton, they’d rid themselves of the selfsame googly-eyed cat clock I saw for sale on Pine Street with an impressive tag, and a kidney-shaped blond wood coffee table I saw with another ridiculous tag. My parents had put their clock and table out on the curb, free for the taking.
Nothing my untrained eye could spot seemed changed since the last time I’d looked through Helena Spurry’s windows. I remembered the ridiculously proportioned and water-stained armoire and the dining room table that ran almost the entire width of the store.
I peered around the annoying gold Gothic-style lettering that screamed TRADITIONS! across the plate glass. I tried not to see the exclamation point, because it made me feel I had to, well, exclaim!
It was difficult seeing clearly into the store. It had the muted lighting of most antiques stores—a dimness that makes me suspicious. What would bright lights reveal? But I thought I could see enough to realize the store was deserted, except for someone silhouetted as she crossed a doorway at the back. Helena, I supposed.
I don’t have the expertise or patience to comb through stores like this. I loved owning a few pieces of my grandmother’s, because of the connection, and their destruction when my house went kaput still makes me sad. I’d be honored to have an old piece that held emotional overtones—a gift, an inheritance, a token of affection, a souvenir. But I’m stunned that people pay extra to own a stranger’s crackling, peeling, fraying, or mismatched castoffs.
Or perhaps people don’t. This wasn’t a heavily trafficked stretch of sidewalk, and in fact I was the only one there except for two men leaning against a nearby wall discussing the coming baseball season.
Dust motes floated in the still, yellowish air of the shop. This was a place to keep its owner occupied, not a place expected to turn a profit. It gave one pause to wonder what Helena Spurry was doing with a high-end, empty shop.
And what she’d been doing in the Rare Book Department.
A check of the time—via my wristwatch, not any of the malfunctioning timepieces in Helena’s window—showed that I had to be back in twenty minutes. But there was always after school. I was in no rush to head home these da
ys. The tension floating in our atmosphere made Helena’s dusty shop sparkle in comparison.
I found a working phone in only five blocks of searching, and called Sasha. “Are you still—”
“Nope,” she said. “I am no longer the handmaiden of science.”
“Finished?”
“Sweet as a flower once more.”
“Then can you meet me around three-thirty at Traditions!, the antiques shop on Pine?”
“You sound like you’re on speed.”
“I respect punctuation. That exclamation point makes me crazy. Or, rather, crazy! Anyway, can you make it? Let’s pretend you’re looking for props for a shoot.”
“Why would we?” Then I heard a weary, ridiculously overdone intake of breath. “Don’t tell me. I can’t believe you! I saw your school in the paper with that murder—tell me you aren’t… what’s this about?”
“Okay.”
“What?”
“I won’t tell you.” But I did. I briefly explained, including the part about my having unwittingly set up Adam Evans as prime suspect. “And I’m intimidated by stores like this. I don’t know the language. I would seem a phony for sure. I don’t know furniture makers and periods and what’s kitsch instead of junk. But if you were looking for props, it’d be different. Maybe I could get her chatting, because I saw her at the library—and she was wearing a scarf that could strangle a horse.”
There was an overlong silence. “This kid,” she finally said. “He could be dangerous, and he’s definitely getting you into trouble, so why not just back off and—”
“Never mind.” Sasha was fearless when it came to the opposite sex. Stupid, to be brutally honest. Reckless and always endangering herself. But that was where her sense of adventure ended. “I’ll figure out a way—”
“Oh, hell, I’ll meet you,” she said.
As I knew she would.
“Wanted to talk with you, anyway,” she added. “I had time for a lot of thinking while I was socially unacceptable, and I decided to move.”
“Why?” She lives in a luxury condo that was her father’s. Between two of his many marriages, he gifted her with it—wrote it off his taxes. In any case, it allows her to live in a manner she could never otherwise afford on her uncertain and irregular earnings. Maybe she was going to rent it out and live more humbly. I could understand that.
Emily Fisher’s place was available. I was ashamed of the thought. It felt disrespectful of the dead. Nonetheless, good apartments are not easily come by. “If you want to stay on this side of the city, I know of a building near Washington Square.”
“I’m thinking London.”
I tried to think of what section of Philadelphia was called London.
She read my mind, or rather my absent, malfunctioning mind. “The London that’s in England,” she said. “I need a major change of scene. I can’t believe I’m in my thirties and I’ve never gone anywhere. I still live in the city I grew up in, even though my parents have moved on. I still see the same people. Haven’t tried anything really scary, if you exempt men, and I haven’t seen anything, if you again exempt men. It’s time. Feels like maybe my last chance, in fact.”
I was sorry I’d called her. Her words and decision made me sad. Which is not to say I didn’t understand. Even my mother would understand these days. That made me sadder still.
“We’ll talk,” I said. “After school.”
London. I tried the word out on my way back to Philly Prep. London. It sat on my tongue, melting into it like imported hard candy, tart and sweet. Now there was an idea. Cambridge, Oxford. How narrow my horizons were. I hadn’t considered anything that far, that new and different. I wondered if my parents’ largesse included overseas adventures or whether my mother would balk because long-distance calls would be prohibitively expensive.
I let my mind float across the Atlantic to an entirely new life, and my mood and stride lightened up. That live-in-the-moment, be-here-now credo was passé. Didn’t work. My new mantra was: Be anywhere else, and be there soon.
* * *
By the middle of the afternoon, I decided I was having a decent day. Nobody had served me with papers saying I was being sued; Havermeyer had avoided me as assiduously as I was avoiding him; Nancy and Jill’s expose was not yet in print; Lia’s book had been found; a man—Terry—had definitely flirted with me; Adam was still missing, which at least meant the police didn’t have him, so there was time and opportunity for other ideas to reach the law; and on the more ordinary, teacherly front, there were actually interesting responses from my tenth graders, whose assignment had been to write their entries for the hypothetical Philly Prep alumni newsletter of 2075. Although a few had skirted the assignment by having a classmate convey the sad news that they were long since dead and hadn’t made much of their short lives, others exerted their creativity in trying to think ahead.
Since retiring from the chairmanship of the Interplanetary Interior Designers Alliance, I’ve been on the lecture circuit, showing slides of my beach house on Alpha Centauri and the use of asteroidal materials in furniture construction…
I have five daughters. Two of them are Nobel prize–winning scientists, one is an Olympic skater, one is an opera singer, and my youngest plays Nana on Days of Our Lives. They’ve produced seventeen grandchildren (all girls—girls rule!). I had my family while simultaneously pursuing my Oscar-winning film career (of course, my husband helped by staying home and doing all the cooking—thanks, hon!), but I’m taking things easier these days on the other side of the screen, as a film critic on Channel Three. Not many good roles for ninety-year-old women, so instead I see every film that’s made, and get paid for it. Pretty good, huh?
I enjoyed both my terms as the first female president of the United States and want to thank my former Philly Prep classmates for their support. All your photos are in my presidential library. Come visit! And I owe all my success to my tenth-grade English teacher, Ms. Pepper, may she rest in peace.
That wouldn’t get her a higher grade, but I admired her for trying.
I liked their dreams, as ridiculous as they were. Might as well reach for Alpha Centauri. I wondered what I would have written at their age, whether I had dreams I could no longer recall. Well, I decided, whether or not I did, I was going to start cultivating them right away. That very moment.
I felt a lot better about everything as I prepared to leave the building for the second time that day. En route to the exit, I checked my office cubicle and was relieved to find no summons to Havermeyer, no furious note from the Evanses. Life was giving me a break.
Rachel Leary put a hand out and touched my shoulder as I was leaving the office. “Did you hear?” she asked, making the question sound like a sigh.
There went the day. “What?”
“About him.”
“Havermeyer?” I had a wild surge of elation. He’d quit. He’d been fired. He’d relocated to Bolivia.
“Adam.”
“Adam what? Oh, God, what?”
Her hand flew to her mouth. “You didn’t hear. I thought one of his classmates would have…” Her complexion was still frighteningly pale, and she had dark circles under her eyes. That pregnant glow was taking its time about gracing her. But just then she looked worse than her normally pallid self. She looked heartsick.
“He didn’t…he didn’t kill himself, did he?” My worst fear. That boy in the rain. That boy with nowhere to go.
She shook her head. “He robbed a dentist’s office.”
It was so ridiculous compared to suicide, I laughed out loud, imagining him stealing false teeth, toothbrushes, floss. “A sudden surge of interest in personal hygiene?”
Helga the Office Witch strained to hear. Helga was deaf to requests—but boy, could she overhear. I steered Rachel out to the hallway.
“Why in God’s name?” I whispered once we were out of Helgaland. Luckily, the remaining students who milled around, heading for the street, were consistent. They’d never had and still
didn’t have any interest in what I had to say.
“He and this creep he’s staying with stole nitrous oxide. Laughing gas. It’s used at raves, those dance parties?”
I nodded.
“But it can be lethal. And with Adam’s chemistry already off…” She shook her head again. “Somebody—I have no idea who—described him, and the police are sure it was our Adam.”
I thought about it. “The police already think he’s a murderer. Stealing nitrous oxide isn’t going to make it any worse on him. At least I can’t see how it would.”
Rachel shook her head. “I meant he’s playing with death. He’s out on the streets, hanging with bad sorts, and he has no judgment. He could have died last night. I gather the friend dragged him home—to Adam’s home—thinking he was dying. He was lucky this time.”
“How’d you find this out?”
She inhaled sharply. “His mother called Havermeyer. Adam was there. Havermeyer told me because I’m supposed to know that kind of thing about the students, but I gather that everything was couched as an accusation—somehow this is all your fault. Well, a bit apparently is mine—I did inadequate counseling, hence this entire mess.
“Like dominoes, is what Mrs. Evans said. Because I did not do my job well enough, you were able to physically and emotionally attack her son without fear of recrimination, and then, mad with that triumph, you upped the ante and involved him in a homicide case, which forced him to live dangerously, on the street, associating with unsavory people, and because of that, he nearly killed himself last night.”
What could I say? There was a possibility she was right. I took a series of deep breaths. “Where is he now?” I finally said.
She shook her head. “Gone again. As of this morning. Parents swear they don’t know where. But listen, Mandy, there’s more.”
More. The more was never something insignificant, tacked on.
“Something else.”
Something worse. I did not want to hear. I wished I knew how to faint dead away, but I am unfortunately too sturdy for that, so I had to listen to whatever was coming.
Adam and Evil (An Amanda Pepper Mystery) Page 15
