"How did you find him, anyway?" Tess thought Mr. Mole looked vaguely familiar, like an old Star reporter who had gone to work as a Public Information Officer for the state when the paper folded, then later dropped out of sight completely.
"A guy who doesn't charge for information? Oh honey, he's famous in my little network. Scares the piss out of people. A few more like him, and the whole system collapses." Whistling to himself-"Hey, There" was today's selection-Uncle Donald headed back into DHR and another long day of underemployment.
Tess and Jackie were in unspoken agreement that it was bad luck to be too optimistic. They had thought they were close before, only to find themselves completely stymied. So they did not discuss Mr. Mole when they stopped for lunch at the Women's Industrial Exchange, or anything about the case at all. Which left them with very little to say.
"I can't believe this place almost closed down," Jackie said, for the second time since they had been seated.
"It's okay, if you've got a thing for tomato aspic."
"I have to admit, I always feel cheated when I don't get Miss Marguerite as my waitress." Jackie was chattering, as Tess had once chattered to her, trying to get a response. "Do you think they reserve her for the big shots, like Jim McKay, since she had her little cameo in Sleepless in Seattle?"
"I don't know," Tess said listlessly. "Why would you want to be waited on by a ninety-seven-year-old woman, anyway? Besides, she's retired."
"It's all part of the experience."
"It just reminds me to start a retirement fund so I'm not waiting tables at ninety-seven."
"You haven't done that yet? Girl, you really need to get with it. I hate to be the one to tell you, but this is your life. You may be waiting for something to happen, but it already has. Your life is here."
They fell silent, Jackie fiddling with her tomato aspic, Tess eating a Charlotte Russe, because it was what she really wanted and she didn't see the need of faking her way through a BLT or a tuna salad for the privilege of dessert. She was a big girl now, she could eat what she wanted, when she wanted.
"You sure you don't still have an eating disorder?" Jackie asked.
"This is proof positive that I'm cured."
Another awkward silence. She and Jackie had just been getting to the point where they could almost speak, instead of fencing clumsily with one another. But since Jackie's revelation-was it really just four nights ago?-Tess could barely make eye contact with the other woman. Long disdainful of the modern mania for apologies, she now saw some sense in it. She wanted to apologize to Jackie for everything-for her grandfather, for being born poor and black, which had led to her job at Weinstein's Drugs and her treatment at the hands of Samuel Weinstein. That Jackie didn't see herself as a victim was further proof she was, to Tess's way of thinking. Like someone with Stockholm Syndrome, she had fallen in love with her oppressor. Well, not in love, but something like it. A form of bondage she had confused with love.
"I always forget," Jackie said, putting down her fork. "The Women's Industrial Exchange is famous for its tomato aspic, so I order it. But I don't actually like tomato aspic."
Tess picked at her Charlotte Russe. Either it wasn't as good as she remembered, or else everything was beginning to taste like sawdust.
At least the media circus had finally decamped outside Tess's office. With no charges immediately forthcoming against Luther Beale, the television reporters had decided to pursue other scenarios, all tricked out with libel-proof question marks. Is there a serial killer in East Baltimore? Tess had heard that rhetorical question posed just this morning, as she dressed for work. The answer, of course, was no, unless one wanted to change the definition of serial killer, but no one actually cared about answers in the case of Luther Beale.
It was a relief to sit quietly at her desk in the twilight, to be free for a few minutes of the endless visitors who had paraded through here over the past two weeks. Beale, Jackie, Detective Tull, Keisha Moore, Sal Hawkings. So many people desiring her help, so few willing to pay for it. At least Beale and Jackie had given her money.
But they hadn't been much more honest than anyone else. Beale and Jackie had revealed their true motives only when necessary. Sal had wanted to find Eldon, but she still didn't understand why that involved coming in through her bathroom window. Well, he wouldn't be visiting again any time soon. The bathroom window had a spanking brand-new deadbolt and was now nailed in place. Tess believed in overkill.
Now Keisha Moore, she had been straightforward. She had wanted money. For a new dining room set. She had even been precise about the amount, $119. But then, lies were always precise. That was one of the secrets of "the women who walked," piling on the details until you were dizzy, or just bored enough to pay them to leave you alone. They really wanted cash, and not for the things they claimed to need. Maybe Keisha had been so angry at Tess's bait-and-switch with the furniture because there was no dining room set, no down payment coming due. Maybe it had been another ploy to get cash, quick. But why? She had been dressed up, and the oversized purse she had carried was big enough to be an overnight bag.
Keisha had come to Tess because she had heard something, something about Beale and Destiny and money. It always came back to that for Keisha: My son is dead. What's it worth? But what had she heard? How much did she really know?
Tess grabbed Esskay's leash off its peg by the door and tucked her gun in the outside pocket on her knapsack. It wasn't the safest ten blocks between Butchers Hill and Keisha's rowhouse, but the almost summer-sky was still light and Esskay could look intimidating from a distance. They took off at a semitrot, although the dog kept slowing down to enjoy the strange smells of an unfamiliar route.
Tess could hear Laylah's cries a block away. The baby sounded frantic, but exhausted, as if she had been screaming for hours and no one had come. Great. Keisha was back to her old ways, despite all her promises and assurances.
"She ain't been crying that long," said an old woman sitting on the stoop next door, as Tess charged up Keisha's steps. "It's good for her. Keisha spoils that baby something awful."
Laylah was having trouble catching her breath now, so her cries came out in little stutters, weaker and weaker. Tess pounded on the door, then brought her leg up and kicked it, flat-footed. It buckled slightly, but held, apparently the best-made door in all of East Baltimore.
"You got a warrant?" asked the Dr. Spock of the stoop. Tess ignored her, running around to the alley in back. Keisha's house had a small square of concrete for a backyard, surrounded by a chain-link fence. The gate was fastened with a padlock, but the fence was only waist-high. Tess hooked Esskay's leash to the gate, then climbed over it. The kitchen door was open, the storm door pulled to and locked. Tess glanced through its murky panes, seeing nothing. She thought she could force it by sheer will, but this door also held fast, no matter how she yanked at it or kicked. She ended up using her gun to break the lower pane of glass and reached in to depress the button that held the door in place.
She found Laylah in a small room at the top of the stairs, sitting in a wooden crib from the fifties, the pre-Consumer Safety kind with wooden slats and toxic decoupages of pastel animals with lunatic grins and silky eyelashes. Tentatively, Tess reached for her, thinking a stranger might make the baby more hysterical. But the little girl dug her tiny fingers into her arms, as if Tess were a log floating by in a flash flood.