Chapter Four（2）

We went to Café Noir. Claude greeted us with menus, beaming at what he imagined to be my first date in eight months. I’m not sure if Riordan picked that up but he brusquely excused himself and started for the washroom, feeling his way through the gloom.

“Oooh la la,” twinkled Claude, leading me to an empty booth. “Très magnifique.”

“He’s a cop,” I cut him off. “One of the detectives investigating Robert’s murder.”

Claude looked aghast. “Why did you bring him here?”

His voice rose to a small shriek on the last word.

“Shhhhh,” I hissed. “Listen up. They know about the letters.”

“They’ve got them?”

“I saw them in a shoe box at Robert’s. Riordan made a point of telling me that they’d already been through all Robert’s stuff.”

“It was a trap?”

I opened my mouth but broke off as the men’s room door opened and Riordan stepped out. Claude jerked guiltily up from the table and hastened away toward the kitchen, giving my police escort a wide berth.

A second later Riordan dropped down across from me and said, “So tell me, Jonny Quest, just exactly what were you up to in Hersey’s apartment?”

“I already told you. You people have me pegged as the fall guy — or gay.”

His dark brows rose. “Excuse me? Have you been arrested? Have you so much as been officially interrogated? Even after I find you breaking and entering —”

“I have a key.”

He sucked in a peremptory breath. “Come on, English, I’m trying to be straight with you.”

I flicked him a deliberate look under my lashes. “Well, you can see what a waste of time that is.”

Our glances held — locked. After a moment Riordan laughed. Short and crisp, but a genuine laugh.

“You’re kind of a smart ass when you’re not flat on your face.”

Claude returned with gigantic foam-topped mugs of cappuccino. “De-caf for you, mon petit,” he informed me. He slopped Riordan’s in front of him and stalked off. I just hoped he hadn’t laced the detective’s with strychnine.

I sipped my decaf. I hate decaf.

“While I’m thinking of it, what’s the name of your doctor?” Riordan took out a notebook and pen.

“Why?”

“Why do you think?”

I gave him the name of my doctor and he put the notepad away. That was a relief. I didn’t know if I was up to another interrogation right then.

I said, “There’s such a thing as patient-doctor confidentiality.”

“Relevant medical records can be subpoenaed. A doctor is not a priest. Besides, this might work to your advantage. You never know.” He rubbed the back of his neck, his restless gaze wandering over the other tables, the other customers. I deduced he was uncomfortable lest he be mistaken for one of my kindred. He needn’t have worried. Café Noir was not a “gay” restaurant, whatever that is.

“Have you found whoever it was that Robert was meeting that night?”

“We have only your word that Robert left to meet someone else. He went back to the Blue Parrot looking for you.”

I put my cup down with a bang. “Tell me this. Do you have any other suspects or am I it?”

“You know I can’t tell you that.”

“I’m not asking you to name names. Are you considering the possibility that I didn’t kill Robert?”

His face hardened. “Hell yes. If we weren’t, you’d be wearing orange PJs right now.”

Not exactly words of comfort but I relaxed a fraction. If he planned to arrest me we’d be going directly to jail, not sipping cappuccino like civilized folk. For some reason I had been granted a reprieve. Why? Because the cops’ grounder case wasn’t such a ground ball after all? Riordan felt around in his pocket and then set something small and white on the granite table between us. I felt him observing me for any change of expression.

“What is it?”

“You don’t know?”

“I know it’s a chess piece.”

“You play chess?”

I answered warily, “Yeah.”

“What piece is this?”

I picked it up. “Queen.” It was one of those cheap pressed plastic pieces. Nothing unique or memorable about it.

“You and Robert play chess?”

“When we were kids. I haven’t played in years.”

“Why’s that?”

I shrugged, replaced the piece on the table top. “I don’t know. No one to play with.”

“Boo hoo.”

I re-revised my original opinion. Riordan was indeed an asshole. But he was probably pretty good at reading people — and manipulating them.

He added, “A piece exactly like this was found on Hersey’s body.”

“On his body?”

“Clutched in his hand.” Riordan studied me, and a weird half-smile curved his lips. “As Hersey lay dying, his assailant pressed this into his hand and folded his fingers around it. Held it closed. There were bruises on Hersey’s hand.”

“Fingerprints?”

“No fingerprints.”

I swallowed hard. Riordan reached across and pocketed the game piece. “Keep that to yourself. We haven’t released it to the press yet.”

“Why tell me?”

I couldn’t read the expression on his face. “Because I think you know what this chess piece means.”

I shook my head. “No. Unless the reference is to a queen. To Robert’s being gay.”

“That’s one explanation obviously.”

“I don’t have another.”

Riordan sipped his cappuccino. He did not look like a cappuccino kind of guy. “You think about it, Adrien-with-an-e. I bet it comes to you.”

* * * * *

The first Saturday of each month meant brunch with She Who Must Be Placated.

Lisa, my mother, has never forgiven me for a number of things, but being gay is not one of them. My main offense was my decision at age twenty-five that I was well enough to live outside the parental holdings. Worse, to start a “grubby little shop” on the money left to me by my paternal grandmother. As Lisa has no interest in my life as an autonomous adult, our brunches make for rather superficial conversation. Yet neither of us quite likes to give up this delicate tradition of chitchat over blueberry cream cheese blintzes and pots of Earl Grey tea.

Today, the weather being sunny, we brunched on the terrace overlooking the scrubby green hills of Porter Ranch. The February breeze whipped the white linen and scattered Sombreuil rose petals from the garden into the blueberry sauce. Lisa, still trim as a dancer in an Aran knit sweater and lavender leggings, was pouring tea into fragile china cups as I stepped through the French doors.

“I was beginning to think you weren’t coming, darling. What do you think of my hair?” she invited as I kissed her cheek.

“You look like Audrey Hepburn’s little sister.”

“Liar.” She preened.

I steadied the table as a gust of wind rocked it. The china rattled in genteel protest. “Maybe we should do this inside.”

“Why? I love this weather. It’s very nearly spring. The daffodils are out.”

“So is a hurricane advisory.” But I sat down across from her, shook out my napkin — barely kept it from blowing away.

Lisa placed a cup in front of me. “And how are you darling? You look tired. You’re not overdoing again?”

“No. I’m fine.”

“You know what the doctors said.”

“Mm. How was the SPCA Ball?’

Lisa sat back and laughed her pretty silvery laugh. “Darling, it was a fiasco! You’d have laughed yourself sick. You must come next year, now promise, Adrien!”

“We’ll see.”

“You always say that.” She pouted briefly. She’s the sort of woman who looks delightful pouting — of which she is well aware. “It would do you good to get out. To meet people. To have fun.”

She was probably right about that, but somehow I didn’t think hanging out with a bunch of cat-crazy geezers was going to cure what ailed me.

I murmured noncommittally and picked up the gold-edged pink tea cup. The handle was too small to actually get my fingers through. I always felt like I was playing house at these brunches. All that was missing was a giant imaginary friend. I could have used a friend here.

Leaning forward, her violet eyes brimming with a melting tenderness, she said earnestly, “I know Mel hurt you terribly when he left.”

Oh God. “Lisa, really …”

She sat bolt upright. “Darling! I’d nearly forgotten. I have some awful news.”

I waited, my gaze wandering over the manicured lawn, the pool glittering in the sunshine, the apricot and coral rose bushes trembling in the wind.

“You remember that little friend of yours from high school? Oh what was his name? Well, he’s dead.”

“I know.”

Her eyes went wide like a startled fawn. “How can you know? I only heard from Jane Quinn this morning and she’d only talked to Annette Penick last night.”

I’d forgotten the maternal communication system, even more complex and infallible than Holmes’s Baker Street Irregulars.

“He worked for me, Lisa,” I reminded her patiently.

“Worked for you? When?”

“Up until he … died.”

“In Buffalo?”

“You’re thinking of Sioux City.”

“I am? I’m sure Jane said Buffalo.”

“It was Sioux City, but he’s been living in West Hollywood for the past nine months.”

My mother bit her lip, looking adorably perplexed. “Darling, what are you babbling about? This happened a couple of months ago — and he died in Buffalo. Oh, Adrien, you’ll never believe! At least … ” She paused, looking troubled. “Darling, you don’t wear dresses, do you?”

I choked on my Earl Grey. “I’m not a transvestite, no. Neither was Robert.”

“Who?”

“Robert Hersey. The friend who died.”

“Robert Hersey is dead?” Her tea cup hit the saucer with a clatter. She gaped at me. “Darling, when? That’s horrific. Why you were such chums. Whatever happened? Not … .” Her voice sank. “AIDS?”

Sidetracked, I tried to explain, leaving out the awful parts, which didn’t leave much to say. Lisa was appalled and wanted to know all the awful parts. I did manage to avoid telling her I was the police’s favorite suspect, but with all the hedging it took awhile before I remembered the original point of our conversation.

“Lisa, you said another friend of mine had died?”

She hit mental rewind and her eyes grew saucer-like once more. “Oh! Yes. In Buffalo.” She gazed at me sympathetically. “I shouldn’t laugh because it’s really quite tragic. What if it was suicide? Think of his poor mother. It’s just that it’s so undignified. And what a spooky coincidence! Skippy or Corky or Whatever-His-Name was Corday fell out the window of some posh hotel. Twelve stories down in a polka dot cocktail frock and white pumps. White pumps, darling, and that was weeks past Labor Day!”