Never Tell a Lie

by Hallie Ephron

  Jody pulled open the door of the hall closet. “Might as well start right here.” She shoved the coats aside and pulled out suitcase after suitcase that were stored in back. “Nada.”

  Ivy followed her into the living room. The blinds were open. Ivy picked up the newspaper with David’s unfinished crossword puzzle that sat on the coffee table. “I thought…” she started.

  “You thought what?” Jody said.

  “Nothing,” Ivy said. Jody glared at her. “It’s just that I was sure I’d closed the blinds in here. And thrown the paper into the window seat.”

  “When?”

  “Yesterday.”

  “Maybe David took them out again,” Jody said.

  “Maybe,” Ivy said. She followed Jody’s gaze to the closed window seat. It was easily roomy enough inside to hide someone. “Sure. That’s probably what happened.”

  “Uh-huh.” Jody edged closer to the window seat. “I’m sure you’re right.” She and Ivy exchanged a look.

  An arm’s length from the window seat, Jody darted her hand out and threw open the lid. They both peered in. Empty.

  Ivy tossed the newspaper inside, and Jody let the lid drop shut.

  They checked the den and the dining room, then the kitchen and the mudroom, making sure that no one was hiding among the coats hanging on hooks by the side door.

  “Nothing up this sleeve,” Jody said.

  On the way back through, Jody kicked open all the base kitchen cabinets. She raised the dumbwaiter’s bottom panel. Just watching Jody nonchalantly poke her head into the opening and look up and down the shaft made Ivy’s stomach lurch.

  Ivy forced herself to look in, too. Nothing there but the cable. An oil smell from the basement furnace wafted up. She slid the panel shut and wiped a skim of sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand.

  “On to the basement,” Jody said. She turned on the light at the top of the stairs and started down. Ivy followed.

  The basement floor was packed dirt. A feeble amount of gray light made it through narrow, ceiling-high windows. Pipes and electrical conduits crisscrossed overhead, and lightbulbs dangled from black wires.

  Jody yanked light cords as she went, and, one after another, bare bulbs came on like connect-the-dots. Overhead sagged fiberglass insulation that David had tacked between the beams to keep cold and damp from seeping into the house. Lally columns marked the location of the house’s load-bearing walls.

  Jody marched the perimeter of the space, and Ivy’s back ached from tension as she followed—down one side, past the oil tank, a metal drum on legs that was about the size of Jody’s Volkswagen; across the back, past the toolbox Ivy and David had bought at Sears, a shiny red metal cabinet on casters with five drawers and CRAFTSMAN emblazoned in silver letter blocks near the top. With all the junk they’d cleared out for the yard sale, there were no longer so many places to hide.

  Up the opposite wall. Jody pushed aside pieces of old paneling that leaned against the opening to the base of the dumbwaiter’s chimney-like shaft. There was the dumbwaiter, nothing more than an open cube, sitting idle where it had probably rested for decades.

  Across the front of the house was solid wall. Any windows would have looked out under the front porch.

  Back upstairs they went. In the front hall, Ivy turned Bessie so the statue was once again facing forward. Then she followed Jody to the second floor.

  They checked the baby’s room and its narrow closet. The little twin-masted sailboats Ivy had stenciled on the wall seemed to bob serenely against the yellow background.

  Ivy looked out the window. The wing chair in Mrs. Bindel’s living-room window was empty. Outside, she heard birds, the muted roar of someone’s leaf blower, and a dog barking.

  She followed Jody across the landing to the guest bedroom. It looked untouched. Her parents’ mahogany bedroom set and the pink and yellow patchwork quilt from the thirties that Ivy had picked up at a yard sale were reassuringly familiar. The other spare bedroom had nothing in it but a disassembled crib and changing table, boxes of Pampers, and bags of baby clothing and toys. Enough for triplets.

  In the bathroom the sink was dry to the touch, one towel was neatly folded, and a second one lay crumpled on the hamper where David had left it.

  Ivy stood beside Jody in the doorway to the master bedroom and looked in. The pillows were arranged artfully on the bed—did she ever leave them like that? At least the shades were still drawn.

  “Now I smell it,” Jody said, wrinkling her nose. “Perfume.”

  Ivy turned on the overhead light and watched Jody enter the bedroom, watched her pick up the bottle of Opium perfume from the dresser and remove the stopper. “This is it,” Jody said, waving the stopper in Ivy’s direction. “Definitely.”

  A shot of scent wafted over to Ivy.

  Jody stoppered the bottle. She checked under the bed, then opened each closet and rooted around inside.

  Back out on the second-floor landing, the house felt quiet. Too quiet, Ivy thought as she followed Jody up the attic stairs.

  “Row, row, row your boat…” Ivy began to sing.

  Jody stomped up the steps ahead of her and joined in, singing and clapping, turning on lights as she went, and filling the big attic bedroom with sound as she checked under the bed and in the closet. “Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily…”

  “Row, row, row…” Ivy started over at the top of her lungs.

  When they got to the unfinished part of the attic, Ivy hollered, “Ollie ollie oxen free, free, free!” The space looked just as Ivy remembered it when she’d been up there last, vacuuming.

  “That’s it,” Jody said. She turned to face Ivy, placing her hands on her hips. “I think we’ve done it. No big hairy monsters.”

  Ivy felt giddy with relief as Jody high-fived her. Before heading down the stairs, she took one last look around. Her gaze snagged on the box of books sitting on the landing.

  Hadn’t David told her that a buyer at the yard sale was interested in the last box of books? Wasn’t that his excuse for having to go into the house anyway, so giving Melinda a quick tour was no problem?

  Then why was a box of books still there?

  20

  Ivy came down the stairs in a daze.

  David said he’d brought those books out for a buyer, but obviously he hadn’t. He said he’d seen Melinda leave the house, but he didn’t. He said he hadn’t booked himself a ticket to the Cayman Islands….

  “What? You look like you’re in pain,” Jody said, waiting for her at the foot of the stairs.

  Ivy rested her hand on her belly. “Just another Braxton Hicks. Surprised me, is all.”

  “You’re sure it’s false labor?”

  “Positive.”

  “So how about some lunch or—” Jody started.

  Ivy cut her off. “Listen, you’ve been great. Thank you. Seriously, thank you so much. I feel much better now. I feel safe, and I’m definitely not in labor. I’m fine.”

  “Fine.” Jody raised her eyebrows.

  “Or at least as fine as I’m going to get.”

  “And you want me to leave.”

  “And I want you to leave. I love you, but—”

  “I’ll get you back for this,” Jody said as she walked to the door and pulled it open. She turned back.

  Ivy gave her a thumbs-up and waved. “Go.”

  “E-mail me. And don’t forget to eat something,” Jody said, and headed out to her car.

  Ivy stood in the open door and watched the VW take off. The same woman Ivy had seen Sunday morning from her porch was once again plugging along on the opposite sidewalk, pushing her double stroller. Looking so normal in her jeans, baggy white T-shirt, and red bandanna worn Indian style over her forehead, the woman stopped and gave Ivy a frankly curious and not particularly friendly stare.

  Ivy shivered and shut the door, double-locking it with the key.

  The floor of the front hall was littered with suitcases Jody had hauled from the closet. The
re was David’s duffel bag. Ivy pulled it aside and returned the rest of the luggage to the closet.

  Last was Ivy’s overnight bag, the one she’d packed a few weeks earlier. She’d followed, to the letter, their childbirth teacher’s strict instructions. Inside were a nightgown that buttoned down the front, a toothbrush, some red lollipops to suck on between contractions, and a nursing bra. Their plan had been for her to call David the minute her water broke or when she started having regular contractions. She’d counted on having him there with her, keeping track of her labor pains, calling the doctor, driving her to the hospital, holding Ivy’s hand through the whole ordeal and encouraging her to relax, to focus, and to remember to breathe. Counted on having David playing the role of father to her mother of their little girl.

  She and David…

  Ivy wiped away a tear with the back of her hand. She threw her overnight bag back into the closet and yanked the coats together on the rod. She was about to slam the door when she noticed David’s high-school football jacket, hanging from the rod. The once-supple leather arms were flaking, and the satin lining had nearly disintegrated, but Ivy had refused to let him throw it away.

  She pulled it from the hanger and held it in her arms, inhaling deeply the smell that she so associated with the person she’d fallen in love with. She’d worn that jacket to so many football games. Sat with it draped around her bare shoulders after the first time they’d made love.

  She could picture herself in six months, the baby sucking on a binkie and Ivy dragging that red and white jacket around like a security blanket.

  She hung the jacket back up and then carried David’s duffel bag up the stairs and dropped it on the landing. In her office she sat at her computer and jiggled the mouse. With a static crackle, the screen came to life.

  She opened the browser and clicked HISTORY. A window opened on the side of the screen showing recently visited Web pages. She clicked TUESDAY and scrolled through the list. Gmail. Google. The Boston Globe. Weather. Sites she visited just about daily. MapQuest—she’d gone there to get directions to visit Mr. Vlaskovic.

  Then she saw it. Ivy sat there trying to catch her breath, trying to make herself accept evidence that was staring her in the face. There, right in the middle of the listing, was what she’d hoped she wouldn’t find—Caymanislands.com. And right after that, Travelocity.

  Ivy shut the browser window and pushed away from the desk. From this very computer, David had booked himself a ticket out of this nightmare. He hadn’t even bothered to cover his tracks.

  If it had been her, she’d have booked tickets for two.

  Barely able to see through a veil of tears, Ivy returned to her bedroom, ignoring the phantom smell of perfume. She threw David’s duffel bag onto the bed, unzipped it, and tossed in clean underwear, socks, a pair of pants, and a pullover. She went into the bathroom for his toothbrush.

  Choking back sobs, Ivy put her hand over her mouth. Who was this man whom she’d loved unconditionally since high school? She searched for clues from the past and could find none. This one’s a keeper—that had been Grandma Fay’s assessment of David.

  Could they both have been so wrong?

  Damn him. What did he think anyway? That he could abandon the baby and leave her behind to deal with the consequences? The despair and confusion that swirled inside her coalesced into a hard lump as she threw David’s razor and toothbrush into his shaving kit, dropped them into the duffel bag, and zipped it shut.

  Quickly, she changed into fresh clothes, washed her face, and brushed her hair hard, until her scalp stung. The face staring back at her from the mirror looked tense and determined.

  She carried the bag into the hall and dropped it over the railing. It landed with a thud in the middle of the downstairs hall.

  And don’t forget to eat something—she remembered Jody’s parting words. She’d need all the strength she could muster to get through the rest of what this day had in store for her.

  She went into the kitchen and knocked back some orange juice. Like medicine, it left a bitter taste in her mouth. She chased it with a handful of nuts.

  Then she checked that the front door was double-locked and let herself out the side door. She threw the duffel bag into the backseat and was about to get in the front when the sound of screeching tires startled her.

  There was frantic barking, then howling. A car horn blared.

  A week earlier those sounds would have sent her hurtling onto the street to see what was wrong. Instead now she fought the urge to flee into the house. She made herself creep forward to the edge of the porte cochere.

  There was Mrs. Bindel’s dog, Phoebe, sitting back on her haunches in the middle of the street, growling and snapping, teeth bared, ears flat and low on her head, staring into the maw of a black Range Rover. The driver’s-side window rolled down, and Ivy knew from the man’s angry expression and Yankees cap—wearing one in Red Sox territory was an invitation to a fight—that the guy wasn’t leaning out to pat the dog on the head and give her a cookie.

  The minute the man saw Ivy, he started to bellow. “That damned deranged dog of yours is going to get itself killed. What the hell is the matter with you people?”

  “She’s not my dog. And you don’t need to shout,” Ivy said.

  She approached Phoebe cautiously. A few feet away, she bent over—in her present state, crouching wasn’t an option—and extended a hand. “Shh, it’s okay, I’m a friend. Remember me?”

  Ivy had no idea if this was the correct way to approach a frightened dog, but it seemed to be working. Phoebe’s ears lifted slightly—a result of confusion, perhaps, now that there were two targets.

  “Good dog. Good puppy,” Ivy said, inching closer. The dog yipped and whined and backed up, tail between her legs.

  Ivy held out her hand. “Come on, Phoebe.” At the sound of her name, the dog lowered her posture a bit and the ears came up more. “That’s a good girl.”

  Phoebe inched toward Ivy and sniffed, then licked her hand. Then she seemed to let go and collapse, legs going out from under her.

  Ivy grabbed for the dog’s collar and started to haul her from the middle of the street.

  Phoebe yelped and mewled. The dog had to weigh at least forty pounds, and the poor thing trembled. Her fur bunched in distress over expressive brown eyes, and she huffed hot doggy breath in Ivy’s face.

  “Idiot!” the man said, shaking his head in disgust. “Get a leash.” Tires screeched as he took off.

  “Get yourself a leash,” Ivy muttered. “Or better yet a muzzle.”

  Ivy patted Phoebe’s head and tried to calm the dog’s trembling. She couldn’t remember ever seeing Phoebe alone outside. Where was Mrs. Bindel?

  She pulled Phoebe to Mrs. Bindel’s front door, rang the bell, and waited. No answer. She knocked. Still nothing.

  Maybe Mrs. Bindel was in the backyard. Ivy carried the dog off the front porch. They were halfway around the house when the dog barked, squirmed free, and took off yelping.

  Ivy followed. Behind the house Mrs. Bindel’s forsythia, quince, and rhododendron bushes were clipped into tight spheres. Ivy ducked under the old-fashioned clothesline strung across mown grass from which no dandelion would dare rear its head.

  Phoebe grunt-snorted to the poured-concrete steps by Mrs. Bindel’s back door and sank down in the grass, snuffling. Mrs. Bindel lay there on the lawn, looking small and fragile, her head resting on the bottom step.

  Ivy rushed over to the stricken figure. She wavered, and vertigo overtook her as she registered the grotesque angle of Mrs. Bindel’s head, like a doll’s head that has been twisted backward.

  She made herself bend forward and press her fingertips to Mrs. Bindel’s neck. The papery flesh was cool, not cold. Mrs. Bindel’s face was damp, even though the misty rain had stopped. There was definitely a pulse.

  Relief coursed through Ivy when she realized that Mrs. Bindel’s head wasn’t really twisted. It was just that her wig was slewed sideways, covering part
of her face.

  Gingerly, Ivy lifted the wig. Just a few strands of white hair sprouted from Mrs. Bindel’s scalp, and there was an angry purple contusion. Her pale face looked almost like a baby’s in repose.

  Ivy adjusted the wig properly. Her neighbor would have been mortified if complete strangers, even if they were ambulance attendants, saw her without it.

  She had to call an ambulance. Her cell phone was in the car. As Ivy stood, Phoebe yipped and got up, too.

  “Phoebe, sit!” To her surprise, the dog did. “Good girl. You wait here.”

  Phoebe snorted and lay down, head on her paws beside her mistress.

  That’s when Ivy noticed that smell. Again. Sandalwood and spice.

  She leaned forward and lifted one of Mrs. Bindel’s inert hands. The scent seemed to be coming from Mrs. Bindel’s fingers.

  21

  A police cruiser and an ambulance arrived within minutes of Ivy’s 911 call. Paramedics quickly checked Mrs. Bindel and strapped an oxygen mask over her pale face. She seemed so small and insubstantial, as if a stiff breeze could whisk her away.

  “Is she going to be all right?” Ivy asked one of the uniformed EMTs.

  “You a relative?” he asked.

  “I live next door. I found her and called it in.”

  “She’s got a steady pulse.” He didn’t look as if he’d convinced himself. “But she’s pretty old.”

  But she’s pretty tough, Ivy wanted to shoot back.

  The man and his partner started to carry the stretcher from the yard.

  Ivy sat cross-legged on the grass beside Phoebe, watching as Mrs. Bindel was loaded into the back of the ambulance. The dog looked up at Ivy, anxiety radiating from big dark eyes, then set a paw on Ivy’s knee. Ivy scratched Phoebe behind the ears.

  Detective Blanchard pulled up in his gold Crown Vic just before the EMTs closed the ambulance doors. He got out, nodded in Ivy’s direction, then conferred with one of the attendants. The EMT pointed to the back steps, then to the top of his own head, the spot where Mrs. Bindel had been bruised.