Edited to Death (27 page)

Well, it was damn lame, but it got us through the moment. Calvin disappeared, magazines
under his arm. Gertie called after him, “Just a minute, young man. Are those archival
copies?”

“I’ll take very good care of them,” Calvin called over his shoulder.

Within minutes, Gertie, Glen, and I were plunged back into the day-to-day business
of the magazine. Negotiating squabbles between the copy editor and a writer who went
in for totally original, and excessive, uses of punctuation. Repaginating the magazine—deciding
what went where and in which order to accommodate a last minute burst of energy from
the ad sales staff, who had overpromised “right hand page, far forward” to all and
sundry. Looking at portfolios. Bitching about Uncle Alf’s tight hold on the purse
strings, and complaining—yet again—about what a lousy magazine town San Francisco
is.

“The weather’s too nice here,” said Glen. “You can’t produce a walloping lot of stuff
to read in a place like San Francisco. The sun shines, the cafés are full, there are
races to run and kites to fly on the Marina Green. No one wants to sit inside and
read.”

“It’s raining today,” I pointed out.

“And if more days were like this, we’d have a more literary city.”

“You think so?” Gertie asked skeptically.

“Absolutely,” said Glen. “Who produces the most literature in the Western world? The
English. And you know why? Because it’s cold and gray and foggy 360 days of the year.
There’s nothing to do but sit inside and read.”

“How about the Irish?” I teased.

“Ah, we’re prolific for different reasons,” he said. “There’s all that misery you’ve
got to work out. And Ireland is full of the kind of things that spur writers on—too
little money, too many pubs, and no guilt-free sex.”

“Very perceptive analysis,” I said. “I’m sure those things could be worked into the
curriculum in all the creative writing programs in America.”

Gertie stood. “Enough of this meaningless literary chit-chat,” she said, looking at
her watch. “I’m starved. Anyone for middle eastern food?”

Glen and I brightened. The best hummus and baba ghanouj were just around the corner
at the teeny-tiny Cafe Krivaar. The whole place smelled of garlic and roasting lamb,
although, in the spirit of international understanding, the Krivaar also offered Middle
Eastern versions of pizza. It was presided over by Grandpa Vic and his squadron of
family members, gifted poets who penned such signs as, “Don’t be a weinie/Try our
iced cappucini,” or, “Don’t be a poop/Try our soup.” Gertie volunteered to make the
run to Krivaar for takeout and Glen went back to his office.

I picked up the phone and, like an obedient little Girl Scout, called Inspector Moon,
spilled Calvin’s findings, and offered to courier a set of the magazines over to his
office so he could check out what we found. Soon Michael would be back on that awful
committee and I’d stop breathing guilt in and out with every puff of air. I sat back,
feeling like I’d finally done the right thing, looking forward to wolfing my pita
stuffed with hummus with a completely clean conscience. For a change.

22

Numerology at the Dinner Table

It was Thursday evening, my favorite of the week. Nothing but downhill ahead of us—one
more set of lunches to make, one more set of homework assignments to nag through,
sweet Friday and the weekend stretching ahead. I was watching Michael grate mozzarella,
parmesan, and reggiano for a heart-stopping, cholesterol-filled batch of his grandmother’s
baked ziti. Stuart and Anya were playing Parcheesi with the boys. Stuart’s loneliness,
thinly disguised under a nonstop stream of gossip about his new employer and a free-from-Quentin
unending series of bad Hawaiian shirts, wrenched my heart. He’d become a regular dinner
guest, teaching Josh the fine points of the hook shot and playing video games with
Zach.

“I feel as if we have another kid around when Stuart’s here,” observed Michael.

“Yeah, and he’s got the kids’ unclear concept of fair play,” I said. “None of them
has yet explained the rules of Parcheesi to poor Anya.”

“So how’s the detective biz?” asked Michael. “Since I know good and well you’re still
on the case despite—” and here he raised the grater and shook it at me threateningly,
“my explicit orders to leave it alone.”

I surveyed the floor, where little wisps of grated cheese had drifted downwards with
each shake. “Raider,” I called, “cheese on the floor.” Raider padded in and began
a serviceable cleanup.

“As if you’d even look at a woman who followed explicit orders,” I said. “Besides,”
I ventured, taking a sip of Chianti, “shows what you know. Calvin and I did turn up
a very fine clue, and I very virtuously, and very correctly, called Inspector Moon
up straightaway.”

“Uh huh,” said Michael, “And then what?”

“Well, unlike what happens in detective novels where the amateur sleuth outwits the
cops, it turned out that Moon snatched our clue and ran with it. Energetically.”

Michael continued to grate. “So what was the clue and what did he find out?”

I explained about the weird numbers in the O, and that Moon had listened very intently,
examined the magazines, and cranked up the computers.

“But they haven’t figured anything out yet. He’s got one of those hackers-turned-good
guys trying to feed the numbers in all sorts of ways.”

“How about just asking Orlando?” said Michael. “Maybe there’s some innocent explanation
for the numbers.”

“Well, that’s what I thought. But whatever answer Moon got, he didn’t tell me, and
it must not have satisfied him, because he’s got those gearheads working on solutions.
Although,” I sipped my wine, “he explained the 24/72 rule to me.”

“And that would be.…”

“How come you’re not a criminal lawyer? You’d know these things.”

“Because one significant shortcoming of being a criminal lawyer is that most of the
time you hang out with criminals. And may I remind you that even being associated
with a felony hasn’t precisely enhanced my career.”

“Of course, you get to hang out with people looking for tax loopholes,” I countered.
“A much classier group of folks.”

“Maggie.”

“Okay, okay. Anyway, most homicides are solved within twenty-four hours, according
to Moon. Because the usual suspects are easy to figure out—the boyfriend, the wife,
the pissed off coworker, etc.”

“The cruelly wronged husband,” added Michael.

I tried to ignore him. “Then, if you don’t make that deadline, you start looking real
hard while the evidence is fresh, and that takes you to seventy-two hours.”

“And then?” he asked.

“Well, if you haven’t figured it out in seventy-two hours, the likelihood that you
ever will drops dramatically. I think they’re keeping this case live just because
Quentin was a high profile guy.”

Michael sighed.

“What?”

“I know why the police are keeping the case alive,” he said. “It’s you I worry about.
Why can’t you leave it alone?”

“I don’t know,” I confessed. “I’ve wondered that myself. I guess I feel as if Quentin
was pretty dangerous to me—to us.”

“You have no idea,” muttered Michael, giving the parmesan a particularly vigorous
swipe down the grater.

“So now he’s dead. And as long as we don’t know the why or the who, something still
feels dangerous to me. Unfinished.”

Michael looked at me. “It’s not your job to finish.”

“I know,” I said. “And frankly, the magazine has kept me so busy, I haven’t had much
time to get into trouble. And believe it or not, I do think the cops know what they’re
doing.”

“But?”

“But I feel as if I endangered everything that matters to me.”

“You did,” he said.

Michael folded the last of the cheese into in a giant casserole dish.

“In some weird, terrible way the murder brought good things to me,” I said.

“Your job?”

“Yes, my job. But also, it meant that there wasn’t this awful secret between us any
more. So if the murderer isn’t thrown in jail—”

“Forgetting due process,” interrupted Michael.

“Oh, you know what I mean. If the murderer isn’t brought to justice, then it’s as
if this tragic thing happened and I benefited from it, and nobody’s paying in any
serious way.”

“Well,” said Michael, “it’s another happy ending for you, isn’t it?”

“For us,” I corrected.

Silence.

“I do like my life, Michael,” I faltered. “And I can’t tell you how awful I feel about
you being dragged into all of this.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” he said. “And I’m looking forward to you remembering it.
Now how about getting the oven door for me?”

I watched Michael put the casserole in the oven. When he was done talking about something,
there was not a lot of room for revisiting the topic.

“Salad?” I inquired.

“I’m taking that as an offer to make one,” he said. “I’ll take that chair and that
Chianti and just watch. I figure as long as you’re occupied here in the kitchen, you
can’t be out chasing down murderers like Hercule Poirot.”

“I believe,” I said, compliantly rummaging through the crispers, looking for green
things that hadn’t yet wilted, “that Poirot was a guy. Don’t you know any chick detectives?”

I held up a cucumber. Michael grinned. “Too large to be Poirot’s instrument. Must
be mine.”

“Very funny. I was just wondering if you knew the current status of Zach’s feelings
about cucumbers in the salad. In or out?”

“In. But he likes the side fluted in that artsy-fartsy way you girls do them,” he
groused.

“Oh, forgive me. I didn’t realize I was compromising your precious son’s masculinity
by art-decorating the vegetables.”

I liked the feeling in the kitchen: a little serious talk, a little chat, a little
bicker, a little teasing. It felt the way it was supposed to feel to me, before I’d
strayed off the moral straight and narrow. I thought about Hot Licks and about Stare,
about the attractions of the unknown, the hip and the cool. Tempting, but still, my
own gem, little kitchen and life could feel awfully good. Besides, unless I dyed my
hair and rearranged what passed for curves on my body, I couldn’t keep up in that
world. As I thought, I trimmed radishes, sliced peppers, and broke off chunks of lettuce.

“You know,” I observed, “no one eats iceberg lettuce any more.”

“No one?” asked Michael. “That seems to be untrue,
prima facie
. I believe we ourselves are about to eat iceberg this very evening. Or, wait, is
that the point? We’re nobodies
because
we eat iceberg?”

“Plus,” I continued, “there’s virtually nothing of food value in iceberg. We need
to eat dark, leafy greens—spinach, kale, that stuff.”

Michael sipped his wine. “Uh huh. Well, why don’t you pick an evening when I’m working
late to introduce that ‘stuff’ to the boys. I’d just as soon not be here to hear their
response.”

And with that, the kitchen door flew open and the little gourmands in question swept
in, shouting about their victory over Anya and Stuart.

“Josh,” I suggested, “you know, if you were nice guys you’d explain the rules to Anya.
I still don’t think she gets the intricacies of Parcheesi. That’s why she keeps losing.”

Josh flopped in a kitchen chair and shook his head. “Huh-uh, Mom. We’ve explained.
She just doesn’t pay attention.”

I poured Stuart a glass of wine and handed it to him.

“And how about you, Stuart? What’s your excuse?”

He sat at the table. “For losing or for not explaining the rules to Anya?”

Zach was struggling with the refrigerator door.

“Honey,” I called. “Stay out of there, we’re two minutes away from dinner.”

When we sat down, I decided to unleash the not inconsiderable brainpower of the boys
on my problem. “Okay you guys,” I said. “Listen up. I want you to tell me all the
things in the world you think have numbers attached to them.”

“Huh?” Zach, baffled, swigged his milk and then swiped the remaining mustache on his
sleeve.

“Zach, is that a napkin on your lap?” I reminded him. “Numbers. You know, like football
players and combination locks and telephones and, well, anything you can think of.”
I waved my fork at Michael, Anya, and Stuart.

“You guys can play, too.” I shot Michael an “Is this okay?” look. He shrugged.

“I give up,” he said. “Go, fight, win.”

“What do we win, Mom?” asked Josh, ever the negotiator.

“I don’t know. Something nifty. Come on, just say what comes into your head.”

“Peach ice cream for breakfast!” said Zach.

“That’s no number,” I protested.

He giggled. “I know. That’s the prize I want, Mommy.”

“You got it,” I said. “Anything you want for breakfast on Saturday for a whole month—if
I get a right answer out of this.”

And with that, the dinner table was electric. Athletes, shoes, calculators, telephones,
ATM cards, fax machines.