Mrs. John Doe (14 page)

Nora froze, staring at the young man across the table from her.

“What do we do now?” she whispered.

Craig grinned and reached for his plate. “We eat, of course. Have a sandwich,
Mother
.”

Nora nodded and made herself busy with the food, watching the activity across the room out of the corner of her eye. The smiling Betty sashayed over to the bar and patted a stool. Now Nora had to turn her head to follow the action behind her.

“Sit yerself down here, Sammy,” Betty cooed, “and I'll fetch ye a lovely ham-and-Stilton, just the way ye like it.” Her father was already setting a full mug down there. With a grunt, the big policeman ambled over and took the stool she indicated. When he turned to her, her bosom was practically in his face. He stared.

“Not tonight, love, thanks all the same,” he said to her cleavage. “I'm full on Margie's chicken and chips.” He nodded toward the party beyond the window. “I'll just have a sip, then another look round the beach. Can't be too careful tonight. Ye heard about my email from the Yard?”

“Aye, ye told us before. They're lookin' out for some French woman. Well, good luck findin' her. There's quite a few strange people in town tonight—and of course we have these three!” She waved an arm at the regulars on the barstools beside him, and everyone laughed.

Nora ate her sandwich, fully aware that the constable at the bar behind her was now looking over at their booth. She could feel the eyes on her, a welcome sensation in a theater but unsettling in this beachfront pub. Across from her, Craig was spooning up soup with enviable nonchalance, paying no apparent attention to anything else, but she knew he was listening. The band outside launched into an old Beatles song, and the music made it difficult to follow the conversation on the other side of the room, but she heard enough.

Constable Dawson must have pointed to their booth, because Betty laughed and said, “Them? Hardly! How old is this French escaped convict or whatever she is?”

“The Yard said forties, with light brown hair.”

Nora didn't risk turning to look, but she imagined the remarkable Betty once more thrusting her breasts in the man's face. In a stage whisper that Nora could have taught her, she said, “Well, that let's
her
out, don't it? She's off by thirty years! No, Sammy, I don't think this is yer night for catchin' wanted criminals—not here anyway.” Everyone laughed again.

“Try the Dover ferries,” one of the regulars said. “Check the boots of all the cars comin' over from Calais. That's how
I'd
do it.” More laughter.

Craig leaned across the table and whispered, “I actually considered that.” There was a twinkle in his eye. Nora stared at him, trying to imagine herself folded into the trunk of a car, in a boat, on open water. She shuddered.

“Well, I'd best be sure,” the constable said. He drained his mug and stood up, none too steadily. “I'll have another look at the docks. Betty, have ye any o' that apple tart left over from yesterday?”

“Aye,” she said, “and I've just made a fresh pot o' tea. Go see if the French lady's washed ashore out there and wants to surrender to ye. I'll have it all here for ye when ye return from yer rounds.”

“Good girl,” he said, and he clomped across the room to the door, nodding over at their booth as he passed. “Evenin'.”

“Good evening,” Craig said, and Nora smiled her best old-lady smile. As soon as the door closed behind the constable, Craig leaned forward. “Okay, we should go soon. If the A2 is clear, I can have us in London before midnight.”

Nora nodded and picked up her soup spoon, looking out at the dock. Two small boats had just arrived, and people were climbing up to the dock and arriving on the beach to join the party, which was now in full swing. She wondered how Louis Reynard had known about the beach party, then—with a swift glance at the bartender behind her—she decided she'd rather not know. Louis Reynard and Mr. Palmer were in some dark business together, and it was probably very lucrative. So, Louis had told Bill Howard about this place, and Bill had told him to sail right in and drop his passengers at the dock. Small craft were constantly coming and going tonight, the perfect cover for their own arrival. Very clever.

She'd only eaten one sandwich, so she pushed her other one across the table. Craig, who had already devoured both of his sandwiches, immediately started in on it. She smiled, thinking, He eats like Jeff. These men were very busy, and they often forgot about things like meals and a good night's sleep. When food was put in front of them, they ate heartily, and when they remembered to sleep, they were dead to the world. Nora watched the sandwich disappear, feeling a sudden rush of affection for this stranger.

She wondered if Jeff was eating, wherever he was. Had he been abducted, taken prisoner? It certainly seemed that way. An unknown South Asian man on a late-night train platform in East Anglia—what were the chances Jeff himself had arranged that meeting? None. He'd bought a ticket for London, fully expecting to go there, then from there on to Paris. Instead, he'd vanished. If he was being held somewhere, what were they doing to him? Was he being tortured? Did people still do those things? Yes, they did. There was that scandal a while back, and that was the American military. If the good guys were capable of it, what would terrorists do to an American if they wanted information from him?

No, she couldn't think about that now. She had to get back to London. Bill Howard's people were looking for her husband, and she needed to be there when they found him.
Alive,
please, God.

God?
Nora was suddenly falling back on her Catholic upbringing, the religion of her parents that she'd shunned in her youthful decision to be agnostic. The nuns and priests in the parochial schools she'd attended would be so proud of her now! Their little rebel was calling on the Almighty in her time of need. Apparently, it was true that there were no atheists in foxholes. Or agnostics, for that matter.

They finished their meal and paid in cash, and Nora left a pile of notes under the candle for Betty to find. They used the pub's restrooms—the doors were labeled
P
IRATES
and
W
ENCHES
—and bid their host a grateful farewell. Then they went back through the archway and across the darkened dining room to the door that led out onto the high street.

This cobblestoned lane ran parallel to the one on the seawall at the other side of the pub, and it comprised the rest of the “downtown” area of the little village. It was lined with shops, and the residential cottages and two-story dwellings were spread out in smaller streets behind it, heading away from the beach. There was no one about; the entire population of the town was apparently down at the party or asleep. Nora shivered in the night air and put on her coat.

“There,” Craig said, pointing off to their right.

The garage where Betty's young man worked was easy to find. It was the last building in the row along the street, closest to the road that led to the motorway, and next to it was a crowded parking lot. Two gas pumps stood on the narrow sidewalk beside the wide-open double doors, and light spilled out onto the street. They heard a blast of heavy metal music from inside as they crossed the cobblestones and entered.

The young man, Adam, was a rough-looking lout, all ear studs and spiked hair and leather wristbands, but he was surprisingly polite. He immediately turned off the music and ran over to the brown car that stood in the center of the room next to a pickup truck. He opened the passenger door for Nora, and Craig slipped him some money and got into the driver's seat.

When the old Ford Focus pulled out of the garage and turned onto the high street, it briefly caught Constable Dawson in its headlight beams. The burly policeman stood in the lane beside the Lucky Dolphin, staring after them with bleary eyes as they drove toward the motorway.

She woke in another strange environment, just like the previous morning in France, and once again she had to think a moment before she remembered where she was. London—she was back in Gower Street, at the Byron Hotel.

But not in her usual room. The second floor—or, in British terms, the
first
floor—of the Byron had a long corridor with five doors on each side. Her usual room, number 3, was in the center at the front of the building, facing Gower Street. Now, thanks to a call from Craig's cellphone on the road last night, Mme. Blanche (as in DuBois) Williams (as in Tennessee) was ensconced in room 8, directly across the hall from room 3. Her favorite stage role in
A Streetcar Named Desire
had been on her mind ever since her impromptu dialogue in the French guesthouse yesterday. “Mme. Blanche Williams” was a seventy-four-year-old widow from Paris, in London to consult a specialist about her arthritis if anyone should ask. Always keep your lies simple: another bit of advice from her husband.

Craig hadn't liked the idea of her returning to the Byron last night, but he'd really had no choice. Nora had pointed out that any other hotel or guesthouse in London would require authentic identification and payment, and that could set off an alarm bell somewhere. The Tindall family had allowed her to put the new room on account, to be paid for later, when it was safe to use her credit cards.

She'd briefly considered her husband's apartment in Soho, but he'd always refused to let her so much as set eyes on it; he insisted on staying here with her when she was in London. Besides, how would she get in there without help from his colleagues? It was a grim fact that Nora was now dodging the good guys as well as the bad guys. Anyone outside Bill Howard's little team was a potential threat to her remaining in England, and she had no intention of leaving.

So, the Byron it was. When she'd called the hotel last night from the car, the dependable Lonny Tindall had answered. He'd run upstairs to prepare the new room for Mme. Williams, and he'd sneaked Nora's clothes over from room 3. The bundle of jewelry and the iPhone from the hotel safe were waiting at the front desk when she arrived at midnight. Lonny stared at her strange disguise, but then he grinned; he clearly found it—and her new, assumed name—more amusing than curious. Good.

She went to the new room and checked for messages on her iPhone. But first, she put on her wedding ring, and her spirits rose the moment she felt the familiar band of metal around her finger once more. It was a connection, a physical one. The man who wore its mate was out there somewhere, as worried about her as she was about him. And she would find him, if she had to march into hell itself to do it.

There were four messages: three texts from Dana
(Hi, Mom, call me. Mom, r u there? Mom, whr r u???)
and one voicemail from Vivian Howard
(Hi, darling, it's Viv. Bill says you're still in London for a couple more days, so give me a buzz when you get this and we'll do lunch or whatever. Ciao!).
It was too late to call Viv, but it was seven o'clock in the evening in Great Neck, Long Island. She was careful not to call from the iPhone, remembering Jeff's last written message, the one they'd found clutched in the hand of the dead Solange.
Trust no one else, and don't use your phone
. She placed the long distance call from the hotel's landline beside the bed. Aunt Mary answered; she and Dana were just sitting down to dinner.

“Noreen, dear, how lovely to hear from you! Your daughter has been frantic for the last two days, but I told her you were busy over there. She's grabbing at the phone, so here she is. I'll talk to you lat—”

“
Mom!
Oh, thank God!
Where have you been?
I was ready to call
Scotland Yard!
First Dad, now you—nobody over there is taking my calls! Have you two, like,
disowned
me or something? What gives?”

It took Nora several minutes to calm Dana down, lying about where Dad was (“Oh, you know, work, work, work!”), but she promised they'd be home soon, hoping she'd be able to honor that promise. She repeated her order that Dana must not use her devices—no calls, texts, tweets, or Facebook—or tell anyone where she was. Dana didn't understand; for a twenty-year-old, one week without electronics was the equivalent of ten years in Sing Sing. But she agreed, with many pointed questions and martyred sighs, to do as instructed. When Nora had finally extricated herself from her daughter's melodramatics, she'd fallen across the bed, exhausted. She'd slept for nine hours.

Now, in the bright morning sunlight streaming in through the windows, Nora felt a new surge of energy. She took a long hot shower and put on her black brushed-denim suit and her beloved boots, pinning up her hair before donning the gray wig. The elderly makeup was quickly done—the lines, the crow's feet, the pale cheeks and lips. The wire-rimmed granny glasses and the crocheted gray shawl over the cloth coat completed the old-lady effect. She was reaching for her bag to go down to breakfast when the hotel phone by the bed rang.

Craig, she thought. He'd left her here last night and gone off to Bayswater for a good night's sleep in his own bed. They were to meet up later today, after he'd reported in at Bill's office. She reached for the phone. “Hello, Cr—”

“Mrs. B.? It's me, Lonny Tindall.”

“Oh. Good morning, Lonny. Why are you whispering?”

“I'm at the front desk, and I don't want the bloke to hear me. There's a delivery for you from some florist. I told him you were away, just like you said to, and I offered to keep 'em here at the desk for you, but he wants to take 'em up to your room. I thought I should check with you. We don't usually allow tradesmen above stairs—”

“Wait a sec, Lonny.” She lowered the phone, thinking. She hadn't told Lonny Tindall anything about her dilemma, and she wasn't going to tell him now, but she needed to see whom this was. She didn't believe for one moment that anyone in England had actually sent her flowers—not Jeff, certainly. She thought a moment and then raised the receiver again. “Okay, here's what I want you to do…”

Ten minutes later, she was standing at the door of room 8, peering out through the peephole at the door to the room directly across the hall. Lonny and the man with the flowers arrived there, and Lonny opened the door to room 3 with a key card. She couldn't really see the florist, only the back of his head and the vase of pretty flowers he carried in front of his face. Lonny waited in the doorway while the man—tall, black haired, dark skinned, dark suit—disappeared inside room 3 for a few minutes. Then he came back out, facing the peephole, and Nora finally saw the face she was fully expecting to see.

Her nemesis, the purse snatcher.

Lonny Tindall would indeed make a good spy. He never even glanced over at the door of room 8—where she stood, holding her breath—as he escorted the “florist” back downstairs. She gave him five minutes and then ran to the phone.

“Is he gone?”

“Yes, ma'am. I stalled him as long as I could, and it was long enough.”

“Good. What did he do in the room?”

“Oh, he was slick, I'll say that for him! He wiggled over to the table and made a big show of placing the bowl down and fussing with the blooms, but he did a total scope of the place. Eyes darting everywhere—the closet, the loo, even under the bed. I told him you'd be back in London tomorrow or the next day, and he handed me a card from Sunshine Flowers in Oxford Street and told me to contact him as soon as you were back. ‘I don't want my mums to
droop
!' he says. ‘I might have to bring
fresh
ones if she's away too
long
!' I said I'd call him the minute I clapped eyes on you, and he took off. It's none of my business, Mrs. B., but I'm here to tell you that bloke isn't any florist. Those blooms aren't mums, they're
carnations,
and there's no Sunshine Flowers in Oxford Street that I ever heard of. I'll throw away the flowers in the dustbin behind the hotel, just like you said. And you were right—there wasn't an enclosure card. I don't know what this is all about, but it's fun. So, how did I do?”

“You were great, Lonny; you should open a detective agency. I'll be down in a few minutes. Could I have eggs and sausage—what do you call it, a fry-up?”

“You got it, Mrs. B.”

She was getting used to her bizarre new appetite. It seemed the more nervous she was, the hungrier she became. She'd just seen the man who'd knocked her down in the park and tried to rob her, who'd probably followed her to Paris and back, whose employers or co-conspirators were even now holding her husband captive—and she was starving. Well, go with it, she decided. Eat when you can; you never know what's coming next. Besides, Craig Elder the younger was now on the job, and he'd let her know where the man went.

She'd called him right after telling Lonny to bring the “florist” up to the room and to take his sweet time about it. Craig must have broken several traffic laws getting there from Bayswater, but he'd been outside the hotel in the Ford Focus by the time Lonny finally let the man leave. A bellboy—another Tindall grandson—had taken the car from Craig, who was now tailing the man on foot.

She bundled up her jewelry and the iPhone to put them back into the hotel safe, where she should have left them in the first place. Her husband had warned her not to use the phone, and she hadn't, not exactly. But her shadow and his friends knew she was back at the Byron, and she had a fair guess how they'd learned that. Last night she'd switched on the iPhone just long enough to get her messages, which was apparently long enough for these people. She'd have to be more careful. At least she hadn't waltzed back to the hotel as Nora Baron and gone into room 3. If she had…

The hotel phone rang. It was Craig with bad news.

“He vanished. Got me all the way down past the museum, and then he must have ducked into a shop doorway, or he slipped round a corner before I could see him do it. Damn it!”

Nora suppressed a sigh; that was the last thing he'd want to hear. “It's all right, Craig. You'll find him again.”

“That's for sure, and when I do, I swear to God I'll—”

“Yes, of course,” she said, amazed at how steady her voice was. She was staring at Mme. Blanche Williams in the mirror, the elderly lady clutching the phone receiver. “You just come back for the car and go on to your office, Craig. I'll call Bill there soon, and we'll decide what to do next.”

It was a lie, but the actress easily made it sound like the truth. She'd already decided what to do next. The “florist” had apparently been aware of Craig Elder following him, which meant that Craig was no longer viable as a tail.

But somebody else was.

She stared at her image in the mirror some more as she hung up the phone. Then Mme. Blanche Williams hobbled downstairs for breakfast.