Dirty Work

23

Carpenter was jarred awake by the slamming of the door. Her hand was immediately on the Walther. She was in bed, naked, and she could hear somebody whistling in the sitting room of the Carlyle suite. It was only Mason. She got out of bed, brushed her teeth with the hotel’s toothbrush, found a robe hanging on the back of the bathroom door, and walked into the sitting room, running her hands through her hair. She hadn’t borrowed a hairbrush.

“Good morning,” Mason said cheerfully. His jacket and Eton tie were draped across a chair, and his shirt was open at the collar.

“Good morning,” she said, not meaning it. She had never seen him, in any circumstances, without his Eton tie.

Mason waved a hand at the rolling table. “We’ve got eggs, kippers, and sausage, and that wonderful fresh orange juice they get from Florida.”

She was surprised to find that she was hungry, and she sat down and began lifting dish covers, dropping them on the floor.

“Sleep well?”

“Yes, but not long enough,” Carpenter replied. “You?”

“Like a top. The sofa was quite comfortable.”

“Mason, have you ever been uncomfortable in your entire life?” she asked. Wherever they went, Mason always seemed to bring along his father’s campaign furniture, or a down sleeping bag, or a portable bar.

“Not since the Army,” Mason replied thoughtfully.

She knew he had served in the SAS, the Special Air Services, Britain’s toughest commando outfit. “Describe to me a single occasion when the Army managed to make you uncomfortable.”

“Northern Ireland,” he said after a moment’s thought. “I was in Londonderry, keeping an eye on a house where we thought one of those Real IRA chaps might turn up. It was raining, and my Land Rover had a leaky canvas top, and the rain kept dribbling down my neck. Oddly enough, I was more comfy after the bomb went off. I was upside down, but the canvas top was more comfortable if you were lying on top of it, with the vehicle over you. It didn’t leak that way.”

“Oh,” she said. She took a big bite of eggs with a little kipper. “Had any overnight reports?”

Mason paused for a moment, then assumed a more somber mien. “Tinker is dead,” he said, “and Thatcher is in hospital, a couple of blocks from here, at Lenox Hill.”

Carpenter swallowed hard and put down her fork. “She got both of them?”

“Well, she got Tinker. She didn’t quite get Thatcher, if you see what I mean. He’s still alive.”

“How did she do it?”

“Ice pick, apparently. You can still buy them at ironmongers’ here. Did you know that?”

“I did not.” She thanked God that her firm did not require that she write letters to the families of those killed on duty. “So La Biche went back to the Harvey flat after all?”

“It would seem so.” Mason sat down and began to eat. “Funny thing,” he said. “I’m ravenous, in spite of the news.”

“It’s a psychological thing,” she said. “Relief to be alive when others are dead instills a feeling of well-being, increasing the appetite. It’s why people bring food to the families of the deceased. I feel a little hungry, myself.” She began eating again.

“You’re out of the Lowell,” Mason said. “Where do you want your things sent?”

She gave him Stone’s address.

“Think that’s a good idea?”

“I haven’t got a better one at the moment. How am I getting out of here?”

“We’ve got hold of a fishmonger’s van. It will pull into the garage downstairs in . . .” He consulted his wristwatch. “ . . . fifty minutes. The fish will come out, and you’ll go in, and the van will proceed to the Waldorf, where you and more fish will be delivered. You’ll change to a taxi there, to go . . . wherever you want to go.”

“All right,” she said.

“I hope you don’t mind the smell of fish.”

“I can stand it as far as the Waldorf. Has anybody talked to Thatcher?”

“Oh, yes. He remembers very little, just the pain. He never saw her coming. Are we going to tell our policemen friends about the Harvey woman?”

“I have already done so,” Carpenter replied. “Lieutenant Bacchetti’s people will swarm over her flat at mid-morning.”

“They’re going to find fuck-all,” Mason said, stabbing at a sausage.

“I’ve already told Dino that, but they have to go through the motions. I wouldn’t be shocked if they found signs of Tinker and Thatcher’s being there. They were obviously not up to this one.”

“I wouldn’t be too hard on them,” Mason said. “This woman is quite . . . extraordinary. What were your impressions of her when you met her at Clarke’s?”

“I’ll tell you, if you won’t tell anybody else.”

“All right.”

“She was good—so good that I didn’t twig until she invited me for coffee somewhere else, which would have been the Harvey flat, I think. I wasn’t actually sure until she got into a cab and followed me here.”

“Then she is very good, indeed.”

“She was so ordinary.”

“That’s what’s extraordinary about her, I suppose,” Mason observed. “Someone who can hunt people down as coldly as that, while seeming so ordinary. You think she has an organization here?”

“I’d bet she has a name or two to ring up if she needs something, or if things go sour,” Carpenter said. “She’s too good not to have some sort of backup. Did we flag the Harvey passport?”

Mason stopped eating. “I’m not sure,” he said, sounding guilty.

“That means you didn’t do it.”

“Well . . .”

“Do it now.”

Mason got up and went to the phone, but it rang before he reached it. He listened for a moment, then held out the phone to Carpenter. “It’s for you.” He rolled his eyes upward, as if to God.

Carpenter got up and went to the phone. “Yes?”

“It’s Architect.” Her boss, in London.

“Yes, sir?”

“A flight landed at Heathrow this morning with one Virginia Harvey listed on the manifest. “I believe she’s called Ginger?”

“Yes, sir.”

“She got onto the airplane, but she didn’t get off—at least, she didn’t make it to immigration. Her body was found in a ladies’ room off the corridor leading from the gate to baggage claim. Her passport was in her handbag, but the photographs didn’t match the corpse.”

“They wouldn’t, since they were of a different woman.”

“Of course, but you’re missing the point.”

Carpenter sucked in a breath. “I think I just got it,” she said.

“We’re tracking two other single women who were on the flight,” Architect said. “Both cleared customs and immigration. One has turned up at her London hotel, the other hasn’t been found.”

“That makes sense.”

“So it seems we’ve taken her off your hands, for the present, at least.”

“It would seem so. I’ll be on the next flight.”

“I think you’re better off in New York at the moment. You and Mason take a few days. I’m sorry about Tinker. I take it Thatcher will be all right in a few days.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ll be in touch if there’s news.” He hung up.

Carpenter replaced the phone in its cradle.

“What?” Mason asked.

“La Biche apparently went from killing Tinker and wounding Thatcher straight to Kennedy Airport, took a flight to London, and after leaving it but before reaching baggage claim, murdered another woman, took her purse, and left Ginger Harvey’s in its place. She’s loose in London.”

“Mmmm,” Mason said. “I suppose I should have flagged the Harvey passport last night.”

“She thought we wouldn’t move that fast,” Carpenter said. “And she was right.”