"You were in there, didn't you see?"
"This is news to me, Ann."
"I saved the article and put it up on the wall in the office. Come in, I'll show you."
We went into the store and climbed the staircase to the offices. Ann walked to a wall behind her desk and pointed. The date at the bottom of the page was two months past. In a section of the magazine I didn't recognize entitled "What Are They Doing Now?" there it was – a large picture of me. I read that Sting was about to release a new album, Producer Eric Pleskow was working on a film about Chernobyl, and bestselling novelist Samuel Bayer was writing a non-fiction account of the murder of a girl in his boyhood hometown, Crane's View, New York.
I swore loudly and then asked if I could use the telephone. In a few seconds there was the hale and hearty voice of my editor, Aurelio Parma.
"Aurelio, you hamster dick, did you tell People about my new book?"
"How are you, Sam? Nice to hear your voice. It's been a long time, not that I mind your not returning my calls. Sure I told them. It's great publicity. Tell your fans what you're up to. Notice you were the only writer mentioned in the column?"
"I don't want to be mentioned! I didn't want anyone knowing about the book. You have no idea how you've complicated things."
His voice jumped down the staircase to the cold and distant bottom. "I have a job to do. Part of it is keeping you in the public eye. If you don't want to tell me how the work is going, that's your choice. But I have to sell it when you're finished. This is how it's done. Don't be naive."
Three days later back home in Connecticut, I hunkered down and returned to work on the book. At first I thought it would be best to throw out everything I'd written so far and start again. This time tell the story of four murders and how they eventually connected.
I worked on that premise for a week but.grew increasingly more uncomfortable with the idea. It's easy to lose sight of what you want when you think you want everything. Discovering the very real possibility that Pauline might have been "only" one of a series of victims threw me way off. Her killer was still alive, taunting Durant and me to come find him. Was his story the one that needed to be told instead? And what about the other victims? Were they to be only footnotes?
Veronica had said Pauline was my mermaid, a radiant mythical creature I had pulled from the water too late to be of any help. If I had loved her from afar back then, that affection only increased the more I learned about her now. Mermaid, Beehive, cheat, femme fatale, tutor to the retarded . . . In the end, I realized I wanted to tell her story and in the process try to do her justice. It would also be Edward Durant's story, but he was the moon to Pauline's earth: He may have affected her tides, but all of their light came from her.
I had a long talk over the phone with Durant Sr. about it.
"You're right, Sam. You either write about what you know, or what you wish you knew."
I felt so good about this breakthrough that I called Cassandra to ask if she would like to go to a Yankees baseball game. Her mother answered the phone and filled my ear with her waxy woes. Out of nowhere, a memory of an event in our marriage came and I laughed out loud in the middle of her whine.
When Cass was a little girl, she had to do a report for school about Russia. Always the conscientious student, she came to us wanting to know if the citizens of Moscow were called Mosquitoes. The best part of the story was her mother looked at me for a few seconds and I knew she was wondering if it was true. Great beauty is like a fat person sitting down on a crowded bus. Everyone else has to shove uncomfortably aside to let this fatty in. Everyone else in this case meaning good sense, taste, intelligence . . . I married a beauty and would be forever grateful to her for giving birth to our daughter. The rest was silence.
Cass was eventually able to wrestle the phone away and we made plans. We hadn't spoken much since I blew up at her for investigating Veronica. This conversation began edgily, but when she heard about the Yankees game she dropped her defenses and we were back on keel. Before we hung up, she hesitantly asked if Ivan could come. I said sure. I would have preferred just the two of us, but there was a man in her life now and she wanted him around.
I took the train into the city and met them at the Grand Central Station information booth. When I walked up, they were having an animated conversation. Cass wore overalls and a Boston Red Sox baseball cap. Ivan had on a black T-shirt with the name THE EVIL SUPERSTARS across it. On the back was the title of their album, Satan Is in My Ass. I realized they were speaking French. It was so impressive and flat-out cool that I couldn't resist putting my arms around both of them and moving us toward the subway.
The game was a pleasant bore and I spent much of the time watching the kids delight in each other. What is more exquisite than the first time you are in love? The first time you realize something this all-encompassing is possible and it's actually happening to you? The contrast between the kids was marvelous: Where Cass was all liveliness, Ivan was grave and thoughtful. She was so different with him than with me. For years I had watched her tread the earth carefully, afraid of taking any wrong step or saying the wrong thing. How great to see her ignoring caution altogether now, exploding with happiness and all the things she had to say right this minute. Naturally with Pauline and Durant so much on my mind, I kept seeing parallels between the two young couples.
Had they gone to baseball games together? Flirted the same way? Her hand on his arm six times in thirty seconds. His eyes gulping her down, his body tensing with joy every time she touched him?
During the seventh-inning stretch I went to the bathroom and then to buy a beer. Standing in line at the counter, I was idly checking out a good-looking redhead nearby when I heard Ivan's voice.
"Mr. Bayer?"
"Hey, Ivan. Call me Sam. Wanna beer?"
"No thanks. I would like to talk to you for a minute. I didn't want Cassandra to hear. You know your friend Ms. Lake?"
"Veronica?" Our eyes locked.
"Yes. She called me. I don't know how to say this, so maybe I should just say it: She told me to stop bothering you."
The vendor handed me a beer but suddenly I wasn't thirsty anymore. "Bothering me? How are you bothering me?"
"With your book. She said you didn't want me to help with the research. That's fine with me, don't get me wrong, I just thought it was kind of queer she was telling me and not you."
"She had no right to say that, Ivan. I never said I didn't want your help."
"She sounded adamant."
"Well, so am I. I need your help. There are some things I would appreciate your checking for me. I can't believe Veronica called you." We started back to our seats.
"She also said you didn't like my dating Cassandra."
"Look, forget what she said. I think it's great you two are together. For whatever it's worth, you have my blessing. I like you and the way you treat Cass. I wouldn't just say that."
He stopped and stuck out a hand. We shook.
The telephone rang at two o'clock in the morning. Late-night calls mean only two things to me – disaster or wrong number. I hate both.
"Hello?"
"With whom am I speaking?"
Confused, I said my name.
"I hope I'm not disturbing you –" Veronica's voice was nervous and stilted.
I hung up.
Hearing her voice at that empty hour threw a pan of cold water on me. There was no way I'd get back to sleep for a long time. I would have roused the dog and invited him to go for a walk. But knowing my roommate, he would have ignored the invitation or farted – his one great talent. So it was just me in the dark with a lethal dose of adrenaline in my veins and too much Veronica Lake in my head. Switching on the light, I sat on the side of the bed.