The Right Jack

30

SIGRID changed her mind as the taxi cruised down the avenue. She didn't want to go home to Roman's curious face, she wasn't hungry enough to have dinner out, and there was no movie she wanted to see. Headquarters might have been an alternative, but dressed like this she would provoke even more curious looks. What she really wanted was a quiet, nonthreatening person who would talk about common unemotional things until she quit feeling as if she wanted to burst into tears.

Half of any solution lies in formulating the problem.

She leaned forward and asked the driver to take her to Metro Medical.

Visiting hours were not over until nine o'clock, so the hospital was still abuzz with daytime chatter, snatches of television music and the rattle of juice carts.

Sigrid had decided that if Tilliew as asleep, she wouldn't disturb him. Happily, she found him awkwardly endeavoring to replace the telephone on the bedside table and his mild blue eyes registered surprise as he recognized her.

"Lieutenant! But he said-I just tried to call you. He said you were out."

"I am," she said dryly.

"I'm glad you came by," he beamed, waving a piece of paper.

The expression on his bruised face was one that Sigrid had come to expect whenever he discovered a significant bit of data that everyone else had overlooked.

"What is it, Tillie? What have you found?"

"You said it would be easier if you knew for sure who the bomb was meant for, right?"

"Right." Sigrid knew he savored the telling so she did not spoil his enjoyment by rushing him.

"Well, look at this pairings roster you got from Graphic Games. Look at Wolferman."

Sigrid looked. "Zachary Wolferman, Number 101," she read.

"Now the commander."

"Commander T. J. Dixon, Number 102."

"And me?"

"Charles Tildon, Number 102."

"Now look at Professor Sutton."

"John Sutton, Number 161?"

"Somebody must have changed the six to a zero. You still have the seating chart from Friday night, don't you?"

"The one that was on that little easel affair? I'm sure we do. It's a bit smudged and crumpled though. It got knocked over and stepped on a few times."

"You should still be able to tell. Somebody had to change Sutton's number to 101 and somebody else's to 161. One of those two numbers ought to be visible."

Sigrid grasped his point. "And that'll tell us if the killer made the change on the pairing print-out or after the hotel's artist had finished making the display chart."

Tilly leafed through the folder till he found a rough sketch of how the tables had been set up and numbered. "Number 161, would have been at Table 7," he said, passing it over to her.

"Right in the middle of the room. It would have done a lot more damage if the bomb had gone off there," Sigrid mused. "I thought the killer had a total disregard for human life, but it would appear I was wrong."

She smiled at her partner. "So we finally know that John Sutton's the right jack. I don't suppose you found his killer in those notes and papers?"

"Not yet, but I'll keep working on it. Looks more than ever like Flythe, doesn't it?"

"He may be the killer, but he isn't Fred Hamilton," she said and brought him up to date on her trip to Mantausic and the interview with Victor Earle.

They talked until Sigrid saw the weariness in Tillie's face and stood to go.

"I'm glad you stopped by, Lieutenant and I like the way you changed your hair."

Her whole appearance seemed to register for the first time-her wine-colored dress, the high-heeled shoes, the musky scent of perfume.

"You look very nice tonight," he saidw istfully. "You must be going someplace special."

"I did," she smiled. "I came here, Sleep well, Tillie."

"Good night, Lieutenant."

By the time Sigrid got home a little after nine, Roman Tramegra was totally exasperated. He had wanted to experiment with a new guacamole dip but the telephone had driven him to distraction.

"So there you are! Oscar's been calling every twelve minutes for the last hour. He sounds frightfully upset."

Roman had been out when she came home to change earlier, so this was his first view of her new appearance and his hooded eyes widened in appreciation.

"My dear Sigrid! I never dreamed! That color is you. And your eyes-your hair! Words simply fail me."

Sigrid immediately wished that they would.

The telephone began to ring. "If that's Nauman, tell him I'm not back.". "He'll only call again,", Romang rumbled, but did as he was told. "No, she isn't home yet," he lied irritably. "No, you certainly may not come over and wait. Oscar, I promise you-the very minute she walks in, I'll have her-"

He paused and looked at the receiver. "I say, old chap. Are you quite sober?"

When at last he got off the line, Roman asked crossly, "What on earth is this all about?"

"Nothing important," she said airily, leaning over to dip a tortilla chip in his guacamole.

It was delicious and she suddenly remembered that she'd had nothing except a glass of dreadful wine punch and a nibble of almond-toasted brie since lunch.

"Don't add a thing to that for the next three minutes," she urged, slipping out of her shoes and down to the bedroom.

There, she changed into a soft yellow robe and switched on her answering machine. The kitchen extension, which was also on her line, began to ring as she came back along the hall.

"Don't answer it," she called and ther inging stopped as the machine took over.

There were two more attempts on her line before it finally went silent. Sigrid sampled several versions of the dip and had a long relaxing conversation with Roman about the effects one might achieve with cosmetics. As usual, he added to her knowledge from his fund of inexhaustible trivia.

One of the things the Mantausic beautician had sold her was a tube of green lipstick. Sigrid was intrigued with the way it turned red on her lips, but Roman was less impressed.

"The Chinese have had rouge like that for ages. Made from safflower, I believe. It used to be sold on little cards and had a brilliant metallic green luster; but as soon as it was moistened and applied to the skin, it turned a delicate pink."

"Nothing new under the sun," she said, which led to Cleopatra's kohl eyeliner and Elizabeth I's attempts to stay the calendar with henna rinses.

"What newswoman was it who said men get gray with age while women get blonder?" Sigrid wondered.

"Up to forty, only your hairdresser knows for sure. After forty, it's a safe assumption."

"Is it?" asked Sigrid, thinking of Doris Quinn's natural-looking daffodil yellow at the gallery tonight.

"My dear Sigrid, I'm delighted by your new interest in this field-may one assume it's connected with Oscar's agitation?-but do not be led down any primose path. There is no fountain of youth in your little jars and tubes."

"Makeup can take off years. Everyone says so."

"At a distance perhaps, or in very subdued light; but it's only an illusion, my dear. Only an illusion."

"What about Lucienne Ronay? She's fifty, almost as old as Mother, yet she looks ten years younger."

"Every rule has an exception, although if you stood quite close to her, I'm sure you'd detect wrinkles even there. The Dixon woman you described-"

"Commander Dixon?"

"Yes. Now you said-"

The telephone's abrupt ring made them both jump.

Roman looked at her reproachfully. "Don't you think you should set his mind at rest?"

Sigrid considered.

"No," she decided and switched off the bell.

They put away the food and cleaned up the kitchen, but every now and then, from his quarters beyond the kitchen door, they could near the plaintive bleat of Roman's telephone.

When Sigrid fell asleep that night, she hugged to herself for the very first time in her entire life the blissful and deliciously feminine knowledge that she was making someone crazy."