Kate noticed a run in a pair of folded stockings. “Poor Bessie,” she said aloud. “Her eyes were going, but she wouldn’t let me take her for new glasses. She said it was a waste of money to buy them when she probably wouldn’t last until Christmas.”

  Well, she was right, Kate thought with a sigh as she opened the next drawer and reached for the flannel night-gowns that had been Bessie’s uniform sleepwear. “My stars,” she murmured, “poor Bessie, she must have put this one back without noticing she’d worn it.” She shook her head as she brushed at the streak of powder on the neckline of a pink flowered gown with lace at the collar. “I’ll wash it before I pack it,” she murmured. “Bessie would have liked that.”

  She shook her head. No, actually I’m not surprised she tried it, then took it off, she said to herself. She never liked the lace. She said it scratched her neck. What surprises me is that she put it on in the first place.

  She still had the gown in her hand when a sound made her turn. Once again, Vic Baker was at the door, observing her. “I’m preparing my sister’s clothing to be sent to charity,” she said sharply. “Unless you and your wife also claim her nightdresses.”

  Without answering, Vic turned away. That man frightens me, Kate thought. There’s something scary about him. I’ll be glad to get out of here.

  That evening she went to the washing machine and was surprised to see that Bessie’s pink-flowered nightgown was missing from the small pile of laundry she had gathered and left there.

  I must be losing my mind, Kate thought. I could have sworn I’d brought it down. Oh well, I must have packed it. Now I’ll have to go through all those darn boxes looking for it.

  20

  On Friday, December 11th, Alvirah’s story about the baby left at the rectory door of St. Clement’s seven years ago appeared on the front page of the New York Globe. Almost from the minute the paper hit the stands, the phone calls began to pour into the special number at the rectory that Monsignor Ferris had hastily had installed.

  His longtime secretary answered the calls, announcing that she was recording every conversation, and passed on to Monsignor the ones that seemed most likely to warrant further consideration. When he called Alvirah on Monday morning, however, the monsignor sounded glum. “Of the more than two hundred calls we’ve received so far, not one has any merit,” he said. “Unfortunately, a lot of them have been from indignant people saying that they have no sympathy for anyone who left a newborn out in the cold, even if only for a few minutes.”

  “Have the police been around?” Alvirah asked.

  “The Administration for Children’s Services came by, and the caseworker I talked to was none too happy, believe me. The one thing we can establish is that there’s no record of an unknown infant girl being found dead or abandoned in New York City at that time.”

  “1 guess that’s something,” Alvirah said with a sigh. “I’m so disappointed this hasn’t led somewhere. And I thought it was such a good idea.”

  “So did I,” Monsignor Ferris said in agreement. “How is the mother doing? Incidentally, I’ve already figured out that she must be that young woman who was around here so often last week.”

  “But you still can answer honestly that you don’t know who she is, can’t you?” Alvirah asked with some concern. As usual, she was recording their conversation, just in case Monsignor said something that escaped her at first hearing.

  “You don’t have to turn off your mike, Alvirah. I don’t know who she is, and I don’t want to know. By the way, what is this I hear about you hunting for a co-op?”

  “My feet are walked down to stumps,” Alvirah admitted. “The Gordons are both nice people, but Monsignor Tom, I’ve got to tell you that while they may he fine at selling real estate, they are not the brightest things God ever put on earth. I swear they can take you into a pokey little dungeon and then tell you it’s charming, and, you know, the crazy part is that they believe it. Then they get all excited when they tell you that instead of the million-two the owner is asking, you can pick it up for only nine hundred thousand dollars.”

  “Real estate people have to be enthusiastic about the places they show, Alvirah,” Monsignor Ferris said mildly. “It’s known in some circles as optimism.”

  “In their case, try tunnel vision,” Alvirah responded. “Anyhow, I’m off with Eileen to see a place that she says has a spectacular view of Central Park. I can hardly wait. After that I’m going to go visit Kate and try to cheer her up.”

  “I wish you would. She keeps reading her copy of Bessie’s will and finding a new way to get her feelings hurt. The latest is that Bessie’s signature was written with such force that the pen almost went through the paper. ‘It’s as if she couldn’t wait to give her house to strangers,’ she said.”

  After hanging up, Alvirah sat for twenty minutes, lost in thought. Finally she put on her coat and hat and walked out onto the terrace.

  The wind blew against her face, and she shivered, even though she was warmly dressed. I’m a failure, she told herself. I thought I was doing Sondra a favor-now she’s gotten her hopes up, and for nothing. She’ll be even more heartbroken. Her grandfather and boyfriend will be arriving tomorrow, and she has to keep up appearances in front of them as well as practice for the concert on the 23rd.

  And I also gave Kate a smidgen of hope that I’d find some way to break this new will, but after looking at just about every empty co-op on the West Side, the only sure thing I came up with is that Jim and Eileen are nice people who must just luck into sales, because they sure don’t listen when you tell them what you want to see.

  “Nothing so far,” she admitted sadly to Kate, when she stopped by the townhouse. “But as I always say, it ain’t over till it’s over.”

  “Oh, Alvirah,” Kate said. “I think it’s over. What bothers me is that I feel as if I’m living on an emotional roller coaster. I keep thinking of Bessie on that last Monday when I left her sitting there, watching her shows-you know how much she enjoyed One Life to Live and General Hospital-and going on about them, talking a mile a minute, telling me all about each character, and how they were all the time doing these terrible things to each other. And all the time she was planning to do something terrible to me.”

  That night Alvirah had one of her crime-solving bouts of insomnia. At one in the morning she finally gave up, went out to the kitchen, made tea and rewound her tape from the beginning.

  Hercule Poirot, she thought. Think like him!

  At seven, when Willy came out of the bedroom rubbing his eyes, he found a triumphant sleuth. “Willy, I may have a handle on this,” she announced with an excited smile. “It starts with Bessie’s signature on the will. You can’t tell much from a copy. This morning I’m going to march myself right down to probate court and get a good look at the original. You never know what I might find.”

  “If there’s anything to find, you’ll find it, honey,” Willy said, his voice still sleepy. “My money’s on you.”

  21

  He had been offered something big-a bigger job than he had ever been in on before, bigger even than the one he had done for the fake computer company. It wasn’t his usual style, but Lenny decided to take the risk-one big payoff, and he’d be set for years. Besides, he had decided it was time to take off for Mexico, especially now that Star’s mother was in town and was on the hunt for her.

  The story in the New York Globe had really rattled him. It described everything about the way Star was left on the rectory stoop; all the details were there. Suppose one of the nosy neighbors in his apartment building started counting on their fingers and remembered that it had been exactly seven years ago that he had arrived with his infant daughter-that thought really bothered Lenny. And who knew?

  Someone might even remember the shabby blue stroller with the stain on the side.

  There even had been a lot of talk about the case on some of the radio shows. Don Imus in particular had zeroed in on it. He had the police commissioner on his program, and the commissioner had said that if the person or persons who had taken the baby were found, they might be charged with kidnapping and face the possibility of a long prison term.

  “When you find any valuable object that isn’t yours, even if you don’t know who the owner is, you’re supposed to turn it in,” the commissioner said. “That’s the law. And what could be more valuable than a human infant?”

  He and Imus had talked about the note, which had been quoted word for word in the article. “The fact that the mother wanted a good home for her child doesn’t mean just any home,” the commissioner had said. “That child became a ward of the city when the mother gave it up, and speaking for the city, we want her back. I would hope if anyone has even a suspicion of who might have that child, he or she will call in immediately. I guarantee no one will know who made the call, and the reward will be given without publicity.”

  Something else dawned on Lenny that Tuesday morning as he stirred sugar and hot milk into a cup of strong coffee he was taking to Lilly. His aunt’s health was worse

  – she hardly had gotten out of bed the last few days-and he knew that if she went to the hospital and talked about Star to anybody, social workers probably would come to the apartment to check on her.

  When he reached Lilly’s bedroom, her eyes were closed, but she opened them when she heard his footsteps. “Lenny, I don’t feel good,” she said, “but I know if I go to the doctor, they’ll put me in the hospital. I want to be able to see Stellina be the Blessed Mother in the pageant, so I want to wait awhile to go. But when I do go in the hospital, I want you to let her stay with Gracie Nunez till I get back. You promise?”

  Lenny knew that the pageant was next Monday afternoon, the 2lst; that was also the day of his big job. He also knew that there wasn’t even a chance Lilly would be able to go to the pageant, but if she could hold off that long before going to the hospital, everything would be great for him. Once the job was done, he would make Lilly go to the hospital, and when she was securely out of the way, he and Star would be on the road, probably by midnight. She’s my lucky star, Lenny thought, and I’ve got to keep her with me.

  He placed the coffee cup carefully on the wobbly night table next to the bed. “I’m going to take good care of you, Aunt Lilly,” he promised. “It’ll break Stellina’s heart if you’re not there to at least see her in that nice outfit you sewed for her. And I agree that when you do go to the hospital, it would be a good idea if she stays with Mrs. Nunez until you come back. I have to work, and I don’t want her to be here all alone.”

  Lilly looked pathetically grateful. “Grazie, Lenny, grazie,” she murmured, patting his hand.

  The white tunic and blue veil were on a hanger on the clothes tree next to the dresser. As Lenny looked over at them, a gust of wind from the slightly open window sent the veil fluttering, and he watched as it drifted to the right and touched the chalice on the bureau.

  Another warning, Lenny thought. The fact that the police had been at St. Clement’s seven years ago because of the theft from the church had been prominently mentioned in the Globe article. The history of the chalice, and even a picture of it, had been a featured story on another page of the paper.

  Lenny would have liked to grab the chalice and get rid of it, but he knew he couldn’t risk that. if it disappeared, then Lilly would cause a stink, and Star would tell all her friends.

  No, the chalice had to be put on hold too. But only for now. When he and Star finally did take off, there was one thing he knew for sure: That chalice was going to end up at the bottom of the Rio Grande.

  22

  Sondra could no longer bear to read a newspaper or turn on the television or listen to the radio. Alvirah’s story about the baby had set off a media furor that made her cringe with shame.

  On Monday night she had fished in her suitcase and found the unopened bottle of sleeping pills the doctor had prescribed, for when she had one of her occasional bouts of insomnia. She never had taken even one of them, preferring to tough it out rather than yield to the temptation to use something she considered a crutch. But by Monday, she knew she had no choice. She simply had to have some sleep.

  When she awoke at eight on Tuesday morning, however, her cheeks were wet with tears, and she remembered that in her vague, troubled dreams she had been weeping.

  Groggy and disoriented, she finally managed to sit up and tentatively put her feet over the side of the bed.

  For several seconds, the hotel room seemed to spin around her, the flowered draperies blending with the striped fabric on the couch in a kaleidoscope of color. I would have been better off either to have stayed awake all night-or to have swallowed every pill in the bottle, she thought fleetingly. But then she shook her head. I’m not that much of a coward, she told herself.

  A long, hot shower, with the water pelting her face and soaking her hair, helped to restore some sense of focus. She pulled on a terry-cloth robe, wrapped her hair in a towel and forced herself to order scrambled eggs and toast with the usual juice and coffee.

  Granddad and Gary are arriving tonight, she reminded herself. If they see me like this, they’ll keep asking what’s wrong until I break down and tell them the whole story. I’ve got to practice well today. And I’ve got to practice especially well tomorrow, when Granddad will be listening. I’ve got to give the kind of performance that makes him feel that all the years of teaching me and sacrificing for me were worth it.

  Sondra got up and walked to the window. Today is Tuesday the 15th of December, she thought, as she looked down at the street, already bustling with midtown traffic and pedestrians rushing to work.

  “The concert is next Wednesday,” she said aloud. The day after that is Christmas Eve-that’s when we’re supposed to go back to Chicago, she thought. Only I’m not going. Instead, I’m going to ring the bell of St. Clement’s rectory, something I should have done seven years ago instead of running two blocks to a phone. I’m going to tell Monsignor Ferris that I’m the baby’s mother, and then I’ll ask him to call the police. I can’t live with this guilt for one day longer.

  23

  At ten o’clock on Tuesday morning, Henry Brown, a clerk at the Surrogates Court on Chambers Street in lower Manhattan, looked up and said, “Good morning,” to a determined-looking woman of about sixty, with red hair and a somewhat prominent jaw. A keen judge of human nature, Henry noted the smile lines around the woman’s mouth and the crinkles around her eyes. He knew that these hinted at a pleasant disposition, and that the irritation he saw in her face probably was just of the moment.

  He thought he had her pegged: She’d be a disgruntled relative who would want to examine the will of a relative who had cut her off.

  He quickly learned he was right about the desire to see a will, but the woman was not a relative.

  “My name is Alvirah Meehan,” Alvirah explained. “It’s my understanding that wills filed for probate are public documents and I have the right to examine a particular one if I choose,”

  “That’s quite right,” Henry said pleasantly. “But of course it must be in the presence of a member of the staff.”

  “I don’t care if the whole city government is hanging over my shoulder,” Alvirah said brusquely, but then softened. After all, it was not the fault of this helpful clerk that the closer she got to seeing Bessie’s actual will, the more steamed up she felt herself becoming.

  Fifteen minutes later, Henry Brown positioned beside her, she was studying the document. “That word again,” she muttered.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “It’s just that the word ‘pristine’ sticks in my craw. You see, I would swear that the lady who wrote this will never used that word in her entire eighty-eight years.”

  “Oh, you’d be astonished how literary some people get when they write their wills,” Henry said helpfully. “Of course, they do come up with some lulus, mistakes like ‘irregardless’ or ‘to reiterate again.’” He paused, then added, “I must say, though, that ‘pristine’ is a new one. I’ve never seen that word used before.”

  Alvirah had tuned out when she heard the dismaying opinion that it might be considered customary to put some unfamiliar and perhaps highfalutin words into a will. “Now, what’s this?” she asked. “I mean, look at this last page. The will is already signed.”

  “That’s known as the attestation clause,” Henry explained. “By the terms of New York State law, the witnesses must complete this page. It attests that they’ve witnessed the signing of the will, and the testatrix, in this case, Mrs. Bessie Durkin Maher, must also sign it. In essence it’s a reconfirmation of the witnessing of the will. Without it, the witnesses would have to appear in court at the time of the probate, and, of course, when wills have been standing for years, the witnesses may have moved or died.”

  “Take a look at this,” Alvirah ordered, holding up two pieces of paper. “Bessie’s signature on the will and then on this-what did you call it?-attestation clause. See there? The ink is different. But they had to be signed at the same time, right?”

  Henry Brown studied the two signatures. “Definitely these are two different shades of blue ink,” he said. “But perhaps your friend Bessie decided her signature on the will, which while totally legible, was written in rather light ink, so she simply changed pens. There’s nothing illegal about that. The witnesses signed with the same pen,” he pointed out.

  “One of Bessie’s signatures is firm, the other wavy. It’s also possible that she signed these papers at two different times,” Alvirah said.

  “Oh, that would be illegal.”

  “I couldn’t agree more!”

  “Well, if you’re quite finished, Mrs. Meehan…“ Henry did not complete the sentence.

 

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