“I’m sorry.”
“Yes, it was terrible.”
“What was the topic of the conference?”
“Something to do with child welfare-the Northwest Symposium on Child Welfare, I believe. Grant was always an advocate for children.”
“Terrible,” I said. “And this was in May?”
“Early June. Grant was on in years-his eyesight and hearing weren’t too good. We prefer to think he never saw it or heard it coming.”
“How old was he?”
“Eighty-nine.”
“Was he still in practice?”
“A few old patients stopped by from time to time, and he kept an office in the suite and insisted on paying his share of the rent. But mostly he traveled. Art exhibitions, concerts. And conferences.”
“His age made him a contemporary of Andres de Bosch,” I said. “Did he ever mention him?”
“If he did, I don’t recall it. Grant knew lots of people. He was in practice for almost sixty years.”
“Did he treat especially disturbed or violent patients?”
“You know I can’t discuss his cases, Dr. Delaware.”
“I’m not asking about specific cases, just the general tenor of his practice.”
“The little that I saw was pretty conventional-children with adjustment problems.”
“Okay, thanks. Is there anyone else who could talk to me about him?”
“Just Dr. Langenbaum, and he knows about as much as I do.”
“Did Dr. Stoumen leave a widow?”
“His wife died several years ago and they had no children.
Now I really do have to get going.”
“Thanks for your time, Dr. Wolf.”
“Yes. .. hmm. Good luck on. .. working this through.”
I got my car keys, left a lot of lights on in the house, and turned on the stereo to loud jazz. The dog was sleeping noisily on his towel bed, but he roused himself and followed me to the door.
“Stay and guard the home front,” I said, and he harrumphed, stared for a moment, finally sat down.
I walked out, closed the door, listened for a protest, and when I didn’t hear any, went down to the carport. The night had cooled, massaged by sea current. The waterfall seemed deafening and I drove away listening to it diminish.
As I coasted down toward the Glen, a sense of dread dropped over me, dark and smothering, like a condemned man’s hood.
I paused at the bottom of the road, looking at black treetops and slate sky. A faint bit of light from a distant house blinked through the foliage like an earthbound star.
No way to gauge its distance. I had no real neighbors because an acrewide strip of county land, unbuildable due to a quirky water table, cut through this section of the Glen. Mine was the only buildable site on the plot plan.
Years ago the isolation had been just what I wanted. Now a nosy streetmate didn’t seem half bad.
A car sped down the Glen from the north, appearing suddenly around a blind curve, going too fast, its engine flatulent with power.
I tensed as it passed, took another look backward, and hooked right, toward the Sunset on-ramp of the 405 south. By the time I got on the freeway, I was thinking of Robin’s smile and pretending nothing else mattered.
Slow night at the airport. Cabbies circled the terminals and skycaps looked at their watches. I found a space in the passenger loading zone and managed to stay there until Robin came out, toting her carry-on.
I kissed her and hugged her, took the suitcase, and put it in the trunk of the Seville. A man in a Hawaiian shirt was looking at her over cigarette smoke. So were a couple of kids with backpacks and surfer hair.
She had on a black silk T-shirt and black jeans, and over that a purple and red kimono-type shirt tied around her waist. The jeans were tucked into black boots with tooled silver toes. Her hair was loose and longer than everwell past her shoulder blades, the auburn curls bronzed by the light from the baggage claim area. Her skin gleamed and her dark eyes were clear and peaceful. It had been five days since I’d seen her, but it seemed like a long separation.
She touched my cheek and smiled. I leaned in for a longer kiss.