Imperfect Strangers

by Stuart Woods

  In the suite, they ordered coffee, then shared a bottle of port. Maggie, as she had promised, became more southern as she drank, and, Sandy thought, even more charming. He hoped the hell his son had the good sense to hold onto this young woman.

  "How long will you be in town?" he asked his son.

  "We're leaving for Stuttgart tomorrow, to pick up the car."

  "And then?"

  "France. Maggie wants to visit the wine country, so we're driving to Beaune for our first night."

  "Would you like me to set up a tour of a vineyard or two for you?"

  "Dad, that would be wonderful."

  "It certainly would," Maggie chimed in. "It will probably be a bore for Angus, since he's grown up around wine, but I'm really excited about it."

  "You get better and better," Sandy said.

  Sandy lay in bed and stared at the ceiling, as Cara slept soundly beside him. This business with Peter Martindale was becoming too complicated. Tomorrow he was going to have to tell Cara everything. In effect, he would be trusting her with his future. He hoped he knew her well enough for that.

  CHAPTER 37

  They were in the middle of breakfast before Sandy plucked up enough courage to begin talking.

  "I have some things to tell you," he said.

  She looked up from her eggs. "I'm all ears."

  "This is going to be difficult for both of us, and I hope you'll hear me out before you start making judgments about me."

  "I'll do my best," she said.

  "I'm… acquainted with your ex-husband," he began.

  Her eyebrows went up. "You know Peter? Why on earth didn't you tell me?"

  "We met on an airplane-God, it seems like a year ago, but it was only in May."

  "Oh," she said, relieved, "is that all?"

  "I'm afraid not," he replied. "There's a great deal more."

  "Tell me; I'll try not to interrupt."

  He began with the movie on the airplane, with his drunken spilling of his life story, then went on to Peter's sly suggestion.

  "He really proposed that?" she asked, shocked.

  "Yes."

  "He's even crazier than I thought."

  "Probably." Sandy resumed his story, took her through the reading of Jock's will and his meeting with Joan.

  "Oh, God, Sandy, I'm so sorry about Mr. Bailley's will," Cara said.

  "Don't be sorry, just listen." He struggled on, telling her of his meeting in the park with Peter, then, before she could interrupt him, went on to his reconsideration of the plan and his message to Peter, canceling their pact.

  Cara had put her fork down now and was pale. "Sandy, you did the right thing. Peter would have gone through with it."

  "Peter did go through with it," Sandy said.

  Cara's mouth dropped open. "Are you telling me that Peter murdered your wife?"

  "I am."

  "Didn't you go to the police?"

  "Don't you understand? I couldn't do that; Peter would have implicated me, and I'd be in jail, now, awaiting trial for conspiracy to murder."

  "But you backed out of the bargain!"

  "Of course I did, but Peter would have denied that. You know him; don't you think he could have convinced the police that I was his accomplice?"

  She nodded. "Yes, you're right; he could have convinced them. So how did you keep your part of the bargain?"

  "Wait a minute," she said, and she stood up, looking frightened. "Is that what you were doing in that garage in San Francisco? You were there to murder me?"

  "Cara, please sit down and listen."

  Slowly, she sat down, never taking her eyes off him, remaining on the edge of her seat.

  "I was there to warn Helena Martindale that her husband intended to kill her. I had no idea you and she were the same person. I had no intention of killing her or you." This was not quite true, he remembered. He had, after all, contemplated doing just that, but he could never let Cara know he'd even considered it, or they would be finished.

  She sat, obviously thinking hard. "Now I'm beginning to get it," she said. "You told Peter that you'd done it, didn't you? You told him I was dead."

  "In the circumstances, it seemed the best thing to do. I needed some time without pressure from Peter to figure out what to do about all this, and I did the right thing, because he bought it. He thinks that your body is in the trunk of your car and that your car is at the bottom of San Francisco Bay."

  She slumped against the back of her chair, dumbfounded.

  He gave her a moment, then went on. "So, as long as Peter thinks you're dead you're safe from him; do you understand that?"

  She tried to speak and failed, so she nodded.

  "I mean, it's not a permanent solution to the problem; one way or another, sooner or later, he'll find out you're alive. I brought you to London to keep that from happening for a while longer." He looked at her closely. "Are you all right?"

  She nodded. "I'm just running through it in my mind-who knows I'm alive that might inadvertently let Peter know? I don't think there's anybody. Saul Winner won't say anything-not on purpose, anyway, and Thea certainly won't, but that won't keep me from running into some mutual acquaintance on the street in New York who might mention it to Peter."

  He was relieved that she was analyzing the problem. "I confess I actually thought of finding some way to kill Peter, but he was way ahead of me. He told me he'd written his own account of what happened to Joan, implicating me, and deposited it in his lawyer's safe."

  Cara managed a wry laugh. "Well, Sandy, it was sweet of you to think of murdering my ex-husband, but it would be exactly like Peter to actually do what he said he did-the letter with the lawyer, so please put the idea out of your mind."

  "I wish I could," Sandy said ruefully "I have fantasies about strangling him with my bare hands or booting him off the Golden Gate Bridge."

  She laughed again. "Believe me, I've had the same fantasies."

  "There's something else you should know," Sandy said.

  "Oh, God, not something else!"

  "I'm afraid so. Peter is in London. In fact, he was in the restaurant downstairs last night when we were having dinner. He just walked in with another man and sat down."

  Cara was alarmed. "Did he-"

  "No, he didn't see us. I had the maitre d' move a screen to block his view, and he's not staying in the hotel."

  "Thank heaven for small favors," she said, relaxing again.

  "But I'm inclined to think that if Peter is in London, we should be back in New York. How much more do you have to do in the shop to have what you need for the New York designs?"

  "I've taken photographs and made sketches," she said. "That's really all I need."

  "Then maybe we'd better forgo your sightseeing on this trip and head home. There's a flight early this afternoon."

  "Then let's go. I suppose it would be too much of a coincidence for Peter to be on the same flight."

  "I think that's stretching it, even for Peter."

  "I'd better start packing," she said.

  "I'll call my travel agent and let the hotel know we're checking out."

  They both stood up to begin their tasks, then they stopped and looked at each other. Sandy held out his arms and she came to him, hugged him. He was relieved to know that, after hearing his story, she still wanted to be in his arms.

  "You know," she said, "I'm glad all this is out in the open. I felt so alone before, fighting Peter all by myself; I'm glad to have some help."

  Sandy felt the same way.

  CHAPTER 38

  They left the Connaught in a limousine, in plenty of time for their flight. Traffic was lighter than Sandy had expected, and the drive to the airport was shorter than usual. At the airport, they went through security, then were checked into first class, and Sandy never stopped looking around the terminal.

  They settled into a corner of the first-class lounge, since they were early for their flight, and nibbled on sandwiches. Sandy arranged himself facing the door.
If they were going to run into Peter Martindale, he wanted to see him first.

  Their flight was called on time, and they took the short walk to the gate. Aboard the aircraft, Sandy put their carry-on luggage into an overhead bin and chose two seats that allowed them to view the other passengers in the compartment. First class was underpopulated on that day, he thought; only four other passengers shared the compartment with them. Sandy ordered Buck's Fizzes, and they sipped the drinks while the business and tourist classes boarded. To Sandy's relief, no other passengers entered the first-class compartment.

  Exactly on time, the aircraft pushed back from the boarding chute and began to taxi toward the runway. Then, abruptly, the big jet made a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree turn and started back the way it had come.

  "Ladies and gentlemen," a voice said. "This is your captain speaking. We've been directed to return to the boarding gate to pick up a passenger. We anticipate only a short delay, and we should be in the air inside half an hour. We apologize for any inconvenience."

  Sandy stiffened. He thought they'd gotten away clean, but now they were headed back. He had no doubt, somehow, who the new passenger would be. The aircraft trundled along the tarmac for a while, then came to rest at a boarding gate. The engines were never turned off. The usual noises of the boarding chute being attached came through the hull of the airplane, then receded.

  Sandy braced himself. Then, to his surprise, not one but half a dozen passengers entered first class, and none of them was Peter Martindale. Instead, they were six Arabic-looking men in an odd assortment of suits, a couple of them cheap and ill-fitting, others sharply tailored. Sandy thought he recognized one of them, a balding, heavyset man with a thick moustache, but he could not place the face. The men took their seats, the airplane was pushed back again, and soon, as the captain had promised, they were in the air, flying west.

  The stewardess was handing out menus and entertainment programs when Sandy turned to Cara. "Does the man in the front row look familiar to you? The one with the moustache?"

  Cara shook her head. "Probably some Middle Eastern politician. With our luck, there's probably a bomb on board, too."

  Sandy laughed. "With our luck," he echoed.

  "You know," Cara said, perusing the program in her hand, "I've never seen Strangers on a Train. In the circumstances, maybe I should."

  "Thank God we have individual screens," Sandy said, rolling his eyes. "I'm watching Singin' in the Rain." He placed his film order, adjusted his headset, and reclined his seat to a comfortable angle. Somewhere during the Hollywood party scene, he fell sound asleep.

  When he awoke, lunch was being served, and the Arab party was making a good deal of noise, talking loudly and drinking a lot of champagne. So much for Muslim rules against alcohol, Sandy thought.

  When they had finished lunch, Cara got her briefcase down from the overhead storage compartment and set it on her table.

  "This seems like a good time to do a little business," she said. "It's long overdue, in fact."

  "What's up?" Sandy asked.

  "You haven't seen the sketches for your apartment." One by one, she showed him nicely executed drawings of her designs for each room of his home.

  "I love them," he said. "I love them all. Don't change a thing, unless there's something extra you want. After all, I want you to feel as much at home there as I do."

  She smiled at him. "I'm glad you like them. In fact, I think I unconsciously projected my own tastes into these designs. I wonder why?" She showed him photographs of upholstered furniture she was recommending, and he approved them all. "I didn't bring fabric samples," she said. "We can go over those when we get home."

  Sandy shook his head. "Don't bother showing them to me. Choose the fabrics you like and order the furniture."

  "All my clients should be as easy as you," she said.

  "Nobody is as easy as I am," he replied, "and you don't have any other clients. That's the way I want to keep it, too."

  The pilot made up lost time, and they arrived at Kennedy on schedule. Their luggage came up quickly, and they were soon through customs, but not quite as quickly as the party of Arabs from first class, who had apparently received VIP treatment from the officials. Sandy, pushing a luggage cart and with Cara on his arm, emerged into the arrivals area just behind the group of men, and he was unprepared for the reception that met them. Flashbulbs were going off, and ahead of the Arab party he could see a phalanx of newsmen standing impatiently behind a rope held by a pair of policemen, shouting questions at the Arabs.

  The next part of their reception seemed to happen in slow motion. A dark-skinned man among the reporters, wearing a trench coat and carrying a camera, suddenly dropped the camera and produced some sort of automatic weapon from under his coat. By the purest chance, Sandy happened to be looking directly at him as this occurred, and he knew immediately what would happen next. He let go of the luggage cart, turned toward Cara and knocked her down with his body, falling on top of her.

  As they fell, gunfire erupted in the terminal, followed immediately by loud screams and general chaos. Sandy did not look around him; he kept his head down and Cara's face in his chest. No more than ten seconds later, the firing stopped, but not the yelling. Sandy waited another ten seconds before raising his head.

  The first thing he noticed was that his left forearm was covered in blood, and after a second's thought, he decided it was not his. Many people were on the floor, and only a few were beginning to get up. The two uniformed policemen, pistols drawn, were standing over a huddled figure, kicking him and screaming at him. The armed photographer, Sandy assumed. Other policemen were running into the terminal from outside.

  Sandy got to his knees and looked down at Cara. "Are you all right?" he asked..

  "I nearly smothered, I think, but I'm all right. What happened?" She got up onto an elbow and looked at the Arab party. "Oh, dear God," she half-whispered.

  Sandy helped her to her feet and put his arms around her.

  "Sandy! You're hurt!" Cara yelled. "Your arm!"

  "It's not my blood," he said. "I'm all right." He looked down and saw whose blood it was. The familiar-looking Arab from first class lay at his feet, his chest a mass of blood, part of his head shot away.

  Suddenly, a man in civilian clothes flashing a badge was in their faces, shouting, "You two! Over there! Into that office, now!"

  Sandy hustled Cara toward the room, grateful to get away from all the screaming and blood.

  CHAPTER 39

  Are you people all right?" the policeman asked, closing the office door behind them and shoving the luggage cart into a corner. He indicated Sandy's bloody arm. "Do you need a doctor?"

  Sandy shook his head. "It's not my blood."

  "I expect it belongs to the gentleman out there," the cop said, showing them to chairs and pulling up one for himself. "Let me see your passports, please."

  Sandy had both passports in an inside coat pocket, and he handed them over.

  "Mr. Kinsolving," the cop said, reading from the document, "were you traveling with those men out there?"

  "No," Sandy said. "We were about to take off from Heathrow, but we turned around and went back for that party. Who are they?"

  "The leader, the one without the face, is called Said. He's high up in one of the Palestinian organizations; the others are aides or bodyguards."

  "Armed bodyguards?"

  "Their weapons were taken from them in London."

  "Why wasn't security better?" Sandy asked.

  The cop sighed. "We were told that they'd missed their plane in London and that they'd be on the next one, an hour later."

  "A breakdown of communication, I guess," Sandy replied.

  The cop nodded. "What did you see as you came out of customs?"

  Cara spoke up. "I didn't see anything; the first thing I knew,

  Mr. Kinsolving had pushed me down and was lying on top of me."

  "What is your relationship with Mr. Kinsolving?" the cop asked
.

  Sandy broke in. "We're business associates. We had been to London to photograph a shop I own there, in preparation for redesigning my New York shop to resemble it."

  "What business are you in?" the detective asked.

  "The wine business."

  "Do you have a business card?"

  Sandy produced one.

  "And what did you see that made you push the lady to the floor, Mr. Kinsolving?"

  "I saw a photographer drop his camera and take a weapon from under his coat."

  "And when did the shooting start?"

  "As we were falling, I think. It happened very quickly."

  "You have very good reactions, Mr. Kinsolving. Are you sure you didn't know Said?"

  "I did not. I thought he looked familiar, but I suppose I must have seen his picture in the papers."

  "Did you know the photographer?"

  "No. Officer, if I had had the slightest inkling that what happened was about to happen, I would not have been standing directly behind Mr. Said, I can promise you."

  "I need both your home addresses," the cop said.

  "Here's my address," Sandy said, handing him a personal card. "You can reach the lady through me. Do you need us any longer?"

  "No. Thanks for your cooperation. If you'll wait a few minutes I'll send you home in a patrol car."

  Sandy had no wish to arrive at his apartment house in a police car. "Thank you, but there should be a car waiting for us out-side, if we can get out there."

  The detective rose, went to the door and brought in a uniformed officer. "Take these people through the cordon and find their car for them; if the car's not there, find them a cab." He shook hands with both Sandy and Cara and helped Sandy turn the luggage cart around.

  Sandy followed the policeman through the chaos that still prevailed in the terminal. The paramedics had arrived, and bodies were being loaded onto stretchers.

  "How many were killed?" Sandy asked the cop.

  "Said and three of his party," he replied. "Another guy was hit pretty bad, and one of the bodyguards wasn't hurt. The shooter isn't expected to live."