Rachel Alexander 03 - A Hell of a Dog

talk.”
    “She?She who?”
    “The missing link we’ve been looking for.” I reached into my pocket for my keys. “Please,” I said, handing them to Chip. “I’ll be home as soon as I can.”
    “But—”
    I put my fingers over his mouth.
    “I have to go.”
    I put my hand up for a cab. When one pulled up to the curb, I opened the door, and the dogs jumped in.
    “I’ll grab the next one,” I said, practically shoving Chip inside. I tossed the bag of chips onto his lap. “Change of plans. You can have these after all. Beer’s in the fridge. And wait up for me, okay? Otherwise I’ll be locked out.”
    I told the driver where to go and slammed the door.
    We could have shared a cab. I could have dropped him off in the Village and continued on alone. But I needed to think about what I was going to say. And I didn’t want to give Chip a chance to reconsider letting me go on alone.
    Once inside the second cab, I pulled out my cell phone again, punching in the number, then listening to the lonely sound that told me the phone was ringing on the other end. Unless she’d shut it off.
    “Please be there,” I whispered. “Please pick up.”
    “Hello?”
    I was so startled when she answered that I didn’t respond immediately.
    “Hello? Is anyone there?”
    I took a breath before answering.
    “It’s Rachel Alexander,” I said. “I don’t know if you remember me. We met at a dog show, a few years ago. I’m at the symposium that Sam Lewis organized, and—”
    “What do you want? Why are you calling so late?”
    “I’m sorry about that. But it’s really important that I see you, as soon as possible. Tonight, if I can.”
    “Tonight? Why? What is it?”
    “Something’s wrong,” I said. “I need your help.”
    There was silence on the line as the cab sped across the Brooklyn Bridge. I was almost there, and she hadn’t agreed to see me yet
    “Something’s wrong?” she repeated.
    “Yes, very wrong.”
    “What does it have to do with me?” she asked.
    “I’m not sure. That’s what I need to find out.”
    The cab took the first right off the bridge and then veered left.
    “Can’t you tell me on the phone?”
    “No, I can’t. Look, I’m five minutes away. Will you see me, please?”
    “Rachel, do you know what time it is?”
    “I do.”
    ‘Well then, can’t it wait until morning?”
    “I’m sorry. It’s already waited much too long.”
    There was another silence. I thought perhaps she’d put the phone down.
    “Do you know where I am?” she asked at last.
    “I do,” I told her as the cab turned the corner onto Cranberry Street.
    “Are you coming straightaway, then?”
    “I’m nearly there.”
    Literally, I thought, as the cab stopped in front of her house. But I had the feeling it was figuratively so as well.



YOU CAN SEE HOW LUCKY I WAS

    S he stood in the doorway in a long, pink nightgown, her bare feet sticking out at the hem, looking more like a child than a grown woman. The same dark curls framed her face, but her clear blue eyes no longer looked as innocent as they did when she’d been a child.
    “What’s this all about?” she asked.
    “May I come in?”
    Her mouth opened, but nothing came out. Then she stepped back inside to allow me in.
    She turned and walked into the living room, taking the place where she’d been before I came, her half-finished cup of tea waiting for her. I looked around die room and then back at her. It was too late in every way to start beating about the bush, something I had little patience for anyway. I took a breath and, standing in the middle of the room, began.
    “How did Beryl come to take your place at the symposium?” I asked.
    “Mummy’s here?”
    I nodded and pulled a chair closer to the couch, sitting across from where she sat, her legs curled under her, her cheeks pale, her eyes red, as if before I’d come she had been crying.
    She stared at me for a few seconds before speaking. “She never said she was here.” I could see her struggling with more than she was saying. “I thought she was calling from England.” She hadn’t talked at all on the tape. It seemed she’d never wanted to appear on camera. After all, she’d only been five or six, a pretty thing, but too shy for all the hoopla that must have accompanied the filming of her mum’s training classes for the BBC.
    “Come here, Christine,” Beryl had said, looking off to the side, at the child who wasn’t coming. “Come and wave good-bye to everyone.