Fall Guy

off, who could blame her? We all did what we had to in order to survive.
    I wondered if the facade would hold up when she got here, when she was in the place where her brother had lived and died, a place, as far as I could tell, where she'd never been. I wondered what sort of surprises Maggie would discover among her brother's belongings, and if she'd cry the way Lili and I had, tears we thought would never stop.
    I wondered if she and Tim had said anything beyond hello at the wake because it was that very night that Maggie had sat down to write her brother the note I had found in the mailbox the first day I was here. „We have to talk,“ she'd said. Why hadn't they talked that afternoon? Even with a house full of people, they could have found a moment to themselves, surely he could have stayed later, if that was what it would have taken.
    Tim's closet was nearly empty, the clothes and shoes packed up for Housing Works. I decided to put those bags and suitcases into the bottom of his closet, to get them out of the way. It was ten to ten. I walked through the apartment feeling pleased. I thought that aside from the wear in the living room rug, the dust I was sure was on all the books, particularly those on the higher shelves, and the fact that the place could have used a paint job, it might pass muster with Maggie. I sat on the couch to wait for her to come when my cell phone rang.
    „Success the other night?“
    „You mean the bone? Yes, he found it.“
    „Any problems?“
    „None at all. Thanks for this. It was just what he needed, what we both needed.“
    „Good,“ he said, „that's good. And the false hides, did either of them fool him?“
    „You did that, too? No. He pretty much went straight for the bone. An ulna?“
    „A radius.“
    I didn't think I'd get an answer had I asked him where he'd gotten it. So I didn't. I waited, wondering what he had to say that couldn't have waited. I was going to see him in a few hours, unless something came up at work. Was that what he'd called to say?
    „I'm at Tim's apartment,“ I told him. „Are you still planning on coming later, for the memorial?“
    „Yes, I am.“
    „But?“
    The bell rang. I went to the intercom and hit the button that unlocked the front door, thinking I should have asked who was there, even though it was ten, the time Maggie had said she'd be here. Though I hardly knew her, I couldn't imagine her not showing up on time.
    „We found Parker's aunt.“
    There was a knock at the door.
    „Where was she?“ I asked, opening the door for Maggie. I held up one finger, to tell her I'd be off the phone in a minute.
    „In the Hudson,“ Brody said. „I wanted you to know before you read it in the paper.“
    I waited, but he didn't continue. „What would I find, if I read about it in the paper?“
    „Not too much.“
    „Some details about her career, I imagine.“
    I heard a phone ringing on the other end, someone yelling.
    „But not that she was dead when she went into the water,“ he said.
    „Oh.“
    „Her neck had been broken first.“
    Maggie was still standing in the doorway, just looking. I motioned for her to come in, then closed the door behind her.
    „Was there ID? Did they know who it was right away?“
    „Yes. And yes.“
    „Odd.“
    „Not as odd as you think.“
    „How did, um, she get found?“
    „Is someone there?“
    „Yes. Exactly.“
    „Mary Margaret?“
    „Yes, that's right.“
    „There was a mark on one ankle. Someone had tried to weigh her down but the rope didn't stay tied.“
    „Someone? You mean Parker?“
    He didn't answer me right away. I heard him strike a match. „The putz couldn't even do that right,“ he whispered. „How hard is that, to tie a knot that stays tied?“ I pictured him shaking his head, taking a drag on the cigarette, the ashtray on his desk brimming over. Or maybe he'd just dumped it. Maybe there was a cloud of ash rising from his wastebasket as we spoke. „She'd been in the water about a week, time enough in this weather for her to come back up to the surface. A civilian spotted her, called it in on his cell.“
    „So it seems Parker had a place to stay the very first night.“
    „So it seems.“
    „He told me he'd stayed with a friend.“
    „Told us he'd gone drinking with his buddies, that they'd stayed out all night.“
    „He ought to get his stories straight.“
    Maggie was holding the picture of her mother, standing with her back to me. I turned around, too, facing the