Chương 5
“You have no cross ventilation,” she had said.
“I have rent I can afford.”
“You have a fire escape held together by rust.”
“Character.”
“Hospital bill.”
Now Claire sat where Evelyn had once repaired a loose purse strap with dental floss and read the report of a death that apparently had not happened.
The accident occurred at 11:42 p.m.
Vehicle: blue 1997 Honda Civic.
Registered owner: Leah Ann Mercer.
Two women believed to be inside.
The driver was presumed lost in the river.
One body had been recovered from the passenger side three hours later.
Identification had been made provisionally from personal effects and confirmed the following day by Charles Harrow.
Claire read the sentence twice.
“No dental records.”
Daniel had already noticed.
“Not in this file.”
“No DNA.”
“Doesn’t look like it.”
“How could they declare someone dead like this?”
Daniel did not answer immediately.
“I don’t know what the local standards were then, and I’m not going to invent an answer.”
Claire glanced at him.
“Thank you.”
He pointed farther down the page.
“But this is strange.”
The recovered woman had been wearing a denim jacket containing Evelyn Harrow’s wallet.
No necklace was listed.
Claire looked at him.
“Eleanor said Charles told her they recovered the jade.”
“Yeah.”
They continued.
The funeral-home property sheet listed:
One silver chain with green pendant, transferred by family.
Not recovered from body.
Claire sat back.
“Transferred by family.”
Daniel nodded.
“Someone brought a pendant to the funeral home.”
“Eleanor?”
“We’d have to ask.”
Claire stared at the words.
At 10:26 p.m., she called Eleanor.
The answer came before the second ring.
“Claire.”
“Who gave the funeral home the jade?”
Silence.
Then Eleanor said, “Charles.”
“You saw him do it?”
“No.”
“Did you ever see the pendant after Evelyn disappeared?”
“I saw a green stone in a velvet case the morning of the funeral.”
“Was it hers?”
“I thought it was.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
A pause.
“No.”
Claire pressed her forehead with two fingers.
“Why didn’t you look?”
Eleanor’s voice changed.
“I could barely stand.”
Claire closed her eyes.
There it was.
A fact that refused to be satisfying.
She wanted negligence. Arrogance. A lie. Something she could condemn.
Instead she pictured a mother preparing to bury a twenty-year-old daughter.
It did not erase anything.
It made anger less convenient.
Eleanor said, “Charles handled everything.”
“Why?”
“Because I let him.”
The answer came fast.
Too fast to be prepared.
Claire looked at Daniel.
He could hear Eleanor through the speaker.
“Can we meet?” Eleanor asked.
Claire almost said no.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
Another silence.
“My daughter left because of us.”
“Us?”
“My husband and me.”
Daniel leaned forward.
Claire said, “What happened?”
Eleanor exhaled slowly.
“Not over the phone.”
“You don’t get to control the setting.”
“No.”
The word landed differently this time.
Eleanor said, “Then you choose.”
Claire looked around her kitchen.
The mismatched chairs.
The stack of unopened mail.
Evelyn’s old ceramic mug near the sink because Claire still had not been able to throw it away.
“Here.”
Eleanor was silent.
“Here?”
“My apartment.”
Daniel’s eyebrows rose.
Claire ignored him.
“Tomorrow. Seven.”
“All right.”
“And no lawyer.”
“All right.”
“No assistant.”
“Yes.”
“No driver waiting downstairs.”
A pause.
“I do need someone to drive me.”
Claire frowned.
“You don’t drive?”
“I haven’t driven at night since 2003.”
Claire stared at the phone.
Eleanor said nothing else.
“Fine.”
At six fifty-eight the next evening, a black sedan stopped across from the laundromat.
Eleanor got out alone.
The driver left.
She stood on the sidewalk in a charcoal coat and looked up at the narrow wooden stairs as if considering whether they had passed inspection.
Claire opened the door before she could knock.
“You came.”
“You invited me.”
“I wasn’t sure rich people understood literal invitations.”
Eleanor looked at her.
For one second Claire expected offense.
Instead Eleanor said, “We mostly understand invitations better than boundaries.”
Claire almost smiled.
She hated that too.
Daniel was already inside.
Eleanor took off her coat and draped it over the back of a chair. Without the ballroom, without the jade earrings and the careful updo, she looked less like Eleanor Harrow and more like a woman who had slept badly.
Claire placed the pendant on the table.
Eleanor noticed.
She wore her own.
Daniel closed his laptop.
“Mrs. Harrow.”
“Eleanor is fine.”
“Not yet,” Claire said.
Eleanor nodded.
“Mrs. Harrow is fine.”
Claire sat.
“What happened before Evelyn left?”
Eleanor looked down at her hands.
“She was pregnant.”
Claire’s chest tightened.
“You knew.”
“I suspected. Charles knew.”
“How?”
“He had someone follow her.”
Daniel’s expression changed.
Claire said, “Why?”
“Because he believed she was seeing someone he didn’t approve of.”
“Who?”
“Benjamin Mercer.”
Claire stared.
“My father’s name was Ben.”
Eleanor closed her eyes briefly.
Claire stood.
“No.”
“Claire—”
“My father died when I was four.”
“I don’t know anything about what happened after Evelyn disappeared.”
Claire walked to the sink.
She did not need water but turned on the faucet anyway.
Her father existed in only a handful of memories: a rough cheek, paint on his jeans, the smell of motor oil, a yellow raincoat.
Evelyn never said much about him.
He died in a roofing accident in Vermont.
That was one fact Claire had never doubted.
Behind her Eleanor continued.
“Benjamin’s older sister was Leah Mercer.”
Claire turned off the water.
The room went quiet.
Daniel said, “The registered owner of the car.”
Eleanor nodded.
Claire gripped the edge of the sink.
“So my mother was with Leah.”
“I believe so.”
“What was the argument?”
Eleanor’s gaze moved to the jade.
“Charles told Evelyn she would end the pregnancy.”
Claire felt something inside her go still.
“And you?”
Eleanor looked at her.
“I told her we should discuss what was best.”
Claire laughed without humor.
“What did that mean?”
“It meant I was a coward.”
Claire’s eyes burned.
“Did you tell her to have an abortion?”
May you like
“No.”
“Did you tell her she could keep the baby?”
