Do You Promise Not to Tell? (14 page)

“I’m at Pascack Valley Hospital.”

“Where’s your mother?”

“She’s talking to the doctor in intensive care.”

So it was bad.

“What happened?”

“There was a fire in Olga’s apartment. I don’t know how it started. But she. . ..” His voice trailed off and Farrell could hear he was struggling not to cry. Poor kid.

“How badly is she burned?” Visions of raw flesh, oozing blisters, and painful skin grafts flashed through her head. Burns were the worst. The pain was beyond excruciating. Farrell’s bedroom was warm, but she shivered with the thought.

“I don’t know. But she’s unconscious and the doctor told Mom that it doesn’t look good.”

At that, Peter couldn’t hold it in anymore. Farrell heard his breaking voice.

“Farrell, it’s my fault. I know it is. I should have kept my promise.”

The car service dropped Farrell at Pascack Valley Hospital. Pat and Peter were waiting in the lobby.

“Thanks for coming all the way out here,” Pat said as she enveloped Farrell in a hug. “Peter told me he called you. It makes us both feel better having you here.”

“It’s no big deal. How’s Olga? How bad are the burns?”

“Thank God, she isn’t burned. It’s the smoke that was the problem. She must have fallen as she passed out, and hit her head. She’s not waking up.”

“What are the doctors saying?”

“It doesn’t look good. Someone Olga’s age doesn’t just bounce back.” Pat’s voice shook.

Peter reached out and put his arms around his mother. She rested her head against her son’s shoulder. “Oh, Peter, this is so sad.” Pat began to weep.

Farrell saw the anguished expression on Peter’s face.

“This isn’t your fault, you know,” Farrell whispered.

Pat looked puzzled. “
Your
fault? How could you ever think this was
your
fault? It was an accident.”

Peter nodded silently. Farrell watched the young man and wished he would tell his mother what was bothering him. Get it out. He’d feel so much better.
Instead, he hung his head and said nothing.

Pat scrutinized her son’s face. “Peter, sweetheart, of course it wasn’t your fault. The fire chief said that the candle that Olga always kept burning started the fire. You had nothing to do with that.”

Professor Tim Kavanagh drove up the Garden State Parkway, compelled to get to Pat and Peter. He hoped Pat wouldn’t think he was too presumptuous. After all, they’d only had one date.

But when Pat called to say she wouldn’t be able to make their second dinner together, he could hear the worry in her voice. And knowing Peter’s relationship with the old lady, Kavanagh knew they both could use some moral support.

He wanted to be close by.

He thought of the pile of ungraded quizzes that sat atop the desk in his study and sighed heavily. They’d have to wait.

This was his life. One semester followed another. Each new Russian Studies class barely met the minimum enrollment requirement. With the Cold War over, very few students seemed interested in Russia, past or present. Only occasionally did you get a kid who really loved the subject. A kid like Peter.

Of course, Seton Hall’s School of Diplomacy looked very promising. He’d been involved in getting the new school off the ground when the United Nations Association went looking for an academic partner to educate future specialists in international relations. The professor readily agreed to be a faculty fellow, offering courses specifically designed for the
increasing number of students who were coming to Seton Hall from around the world and who were now giving the university a more global reputation.

Tim tossed a token into the Hillsdale Plaza toll basket and rolled up the car window against the cold night air. A champagne-colored Lexus LS400 pulled out in front of his maroon Altima, beating him to exit 168. He’d love to buy a Lexus, he thought, yearning, but a tenured professor with a salary of $60,000 a year couldn’t very well be driving around in a $50,000 car. It wouldn’t make sense. People would talk.

No. He’d have to content himself with his growing Fabergé collection. Knowing that he and the Russian royal family had that in common gave Tim Kavanagh much pleasure and satisfaction. If it was good enough for the czars, it was good enough for him.

There wasn’t much worth saving in Olga’s apartment. What the fire hadn’t charred, the smoke had blackened and the firemen’s hoses had soaked.

Farrell and Tim accompanied Pat and Peter to survey the wreckage.

“It’s a miracle she survived this at all.” Farrell whispered what was on the others’ minds.

Farrell and Peter went straight in the direction of the bedroom. The wooden bedframe looked like the charcoal remains in the bottom of a barbecue pit. A small mirror had managed to stay anchored to the wall, but thick, black soot kept it from reflecting anything.

The bedroom closet was shut tight. Farrell and Peter looked at each other before prying it open. Olga’s clothes were carefully and precisely hanging from the rod, some hats and Olga’s brown leather pocketbook were lined up on the overhead shelf. Peter bent to rummage under the blanket on the closet floor. He found what he was looking for. He quickly opened the yellow velvet carrying case.

It was empty.

“It’s gone!” he whispered to Farrell.

The four continued to pick their way through the scorched debris on the floor, looking for recognizable remnants of Olga’s life. The air was thick with the
acrid stench of the burned wool rug, now soggy beneath their feet. They didn’t say much as they went about their grim reconnaissance. Only an occasional cough broke the silence as their lungs rejected the apartment’s toxic air.

Peter opened the refrigerator door. A stick of gleaming, yellow butter on a clear, glass dish. A piece of salmon peeked through Saran Wrap, ready for Olga to prepare for her solitary dinner. Half a loaf of dark, pumpernickel bread waited to be spread with the homemade eggplant caviar that filled three thick Mason jars.

Peter stood staring into the refrigerator.

“Come on, sweetheart,” Pat said as she put her arm around her son’s shoulder. “There’s nothing more we can do here. Let’s go.” Then she added in true motherly fashion. “Here, honey. Take Olga’s caviar with you. She always loved to make it for you and she’d want you to have it.”

Looking over at Farrell and Tim, she offered, “You take some, too.”

Second Sunday of Lent

Jack came in drenched from the cold rain and his double jog around the Central Park reservoir. He loved his Sunday-morning run. It gave him an opportunity to get rid of some tension and organize his thoughts. His thoughts lately were primarily about his Fauxbergé case.

Meryl Quan was an invaluable source of information. She’d provided Jack with a list of all Churchill’s recurring Fabergé customers and sellers. She said that her boss had okayed it. Of course, if McCord was going to use it down the line in court, he’d have to get a subpoena.

If it came to that, a court order wouldn’t be a problem. Churchill’s and the FBI had a good working relationship. It was mutually beneficial. When Churchill department experts suspected stolen property had been consigned for auction, they advised the FBI right away. The Bureau, in turn, called the auction house about property known to have been purloined.

On the one hand, Churchill’s had a private relationship with its clients, but on the other hand, it didn’t want hassles, didn’t want to be receiving and selling illegal merchandise. And, usually, Churchill clients consigning objects for sale didn’t even know that they had unwittingly purchased stolen goods.

It constantly amazed Jack how eager the public usually was to cooperate with the FBI. Sure, the Bureau had taken some serious hits since the days when J. Edgar Hoover had reigned over the agency. Back then, the American people had viewed the Federal Bureau of Investigation with awe and absolute respect. But when Hoover died, and some of the not-so-pleasant realities of how the Bureau conducted its business came to light, the FBI’s sterling reputation had gotten a little tarnished. The bungling at Waco and Ruby Ridge had added to the public awareness that the nation’s justice force was comprised not of the infallible special agents of the Hoover myth, but mostly of dedicated and well-trained men and women who sometimes made mistakes.

Still, it seemed to Jack that on the whole, the public was eager to believe in the FBI. The average American citizen took comfort in the idea the federal government was doing its best to protect them. And they wanted to help when they could.

Then Jack’s more cynical nature kicked in.
Let’s face it,
he thought,
no one wants to piss off the FBI
. They were just too scared.

They should be.

Jack thought of Farrell Slater. She wasn’t cooperating any. The KEY producer with the big brown eyes didn’t seem to care one way or the other if she angered the FBI. From her position with a network news organization, she probably felt secure that the FBI wasn’t going to give her a hard time.

Don’t be too sure, Farrell
.

Monday

It was so easy to get past hospital security. All you had to do was tell them you were a relative and they let you through.
Just act as if it’s the most natural thing in the world that you are coming to visit. Tell them Olga’s doctor said it was okay.

Once you got past the front desk, you were home free. The nurses and orderlies, overworked and understaffed, were too busy to question why you were there.

Olga lay frail and thin against the stark white hospital sheet. The blue cotton blanket was tucked neatly around her where it would most likely remain undisturbed until the morning when a nurse would come in to pull it back to tend to the old woman, perhaps giving her a sponge bath, maybe massaging her aged limbs.

Gray-tissued lids hooded Olga’s deep-set eyes. Would they ever open?

Chances were that nature would take its course. Olga had lived a long life. It would have ended soon anyway. This was only going to speed things up a little.

But if she did come out of it, if she did pull through . . . It was essential to know when it was time to finish the job.

Another Monday morning at KEY News. There weren’t that many Mondays left.

Farrell would rather not see anyone in the halls of the Broadcast Center. When she bumped into someone she knew in the cafeteria or the ladies’ room, she could tell they were uncomfortable. They didn’t know what to say. Farrell was being kicked out of what was, to them, the be-all and end-all. KEY News.

Farrell understood. It was seductive stuff, the television news business. It gave you cachet when it came time to swap occupations when introductions were being made at cocktail or dinner parties.

But how many dinner parties did she actually go to, anyway?

It was more the feeling of being on the inside, knowing what was going on before the public heard it reported, that had always given Farrell a charge. She had that feeling now. The excitement of knowing she was on to something. The urgency of getting her facts straight so she could go with the story, beat the competition.

She was fairly certain she had an exclusive going on this Moon Egg story. She was eager to broadcast it. But she grudgingly admitted to herself that Range was right. She needed more to go on than some videotape of Olga holding her egg. The other part of the
story had to be figured out. Had the president of Churchill’s authenticated the egg knowing it was a forgery? Or had he simply made a mistake that would cost him his professional reputation and ruin the standing of the esteemed auction house? Where had the bogus egg come from? And who had bought it, unwittingly paying six million dollars for a fake?

Then there was the scariest, saddest part. Olga. Farrell prayed it was just a coincidence the fire had broken out at the Russian woman’s apartment when it had. She hoped it was only a fluke, that it had nothing to do with Olga’s coming forward with her precious Moon Egg.

Farrell tried to reassure herself. The video of Olga holding the Imperial Egg hadn’t been aired on
Evening Headlines
. The public hadn’t seen it yet. So the video could not have led anyone to Olga.

The fire had to be an accident. Please, God, it had to be.

Clifford Montgomery paced the Persian carpet in his Churchill’s office. Haggard and worried, he hadn’t slept well since Farrell Slater’s visit. What was she up to? What was she finding out? He had to know. It didn’t help matters that he was absolutely inundated by things that had to be attended to, what with the various Russian auctions coming up. He had taken to falling asleep several nights a week on his office couch, freshening up in the mornings in his small dressing room—one of the perks of being the president of Churchill’s. He had a place to leave some clean shirts and a Brooks Brothers suit, and a place to take a shower, right next to his office.

Was he going to switch on
KEY Evening Headlines
some night soon and listen while anchorwoman Eliza Blake announced the biggest scandal to hit the art world in years? Was everything he had worked so hard to achieve going to come tumbling down for all the world to watch on their television screens? Would the audience be fascinated by his ruin?