Rachel Alexander 05 - The Wrong Dog

to.
    But why would he want Sophie dead?
    I called the dogs into the house, gave them each a biscuit, and headed back to Sophie’s to have a talk with Joe in broad daylight.

Chapter 16
    I'm Doing Some Work for the Landlord

    Underneath the bells for all the apartments in Sophie’s building, there was a small plaque that directed me to the building next door, Apartment B, for the super. I walked to that doorway, found the bell, and rang it, not knowing what I’d say if anyone answered.
    Improvise, my former boss used to say when, in the beginning, I’d once asked him how to get where I had to go. You’re a college graduate, he’d added, I shouldn’t have to be telling you how to do the job.
    The intercom crackled.
    “Who’s there?” The accent was Russian and so thick she sounded as if she had several golf balls in her mouth.
    “I need to get into the cellar,” I said. I’m quick, you have to give me that.
    “Con Ed?”
    She was doing my job for me, giving me the excuse I needed to check around downstairs. But I was wearing jeans and a T-shirt. Con Ed? I didn’t think so.
    “I’m doing some work for the landlord and I have to check something in the cellar.”
    “I buzz you in.”
    I pushed open the door, followed the long hallway back, and opened the gray door on the left that led under the stairs and said Basement on it. I felt my way down in the dark.
    She was waiting for me in the open doorway, someone who lived underground like a mole in this dank place, a woman of about fifty, or who appeared to be fifty because life hadn’t been kind.
    “What you need in cellar?”
    “I have to check the tools. I’m doing some carpentry work for, well, over at the office, and I don’t have the right saw.”
    Lame, I thought, wondering if she’d go for it.
    She began to shake her head, making a sound in her throat that sounded as if something had gotten stuck there—my story, no doubt.
    “No, no, no. Tools belong to Sergei. I can no let you take saw. You come back in one hour. Talk to him about saw.”
    “Sergei?”
    “My husband.He super for this building and next-door building. He fixing toilet upstairs. You come back in one hour. He give you saw.”
    “I spoke to a man named Joe yesterday. He said he was the super here.”
    “No, no, no. Sergei. No Joe.”
    “What about... ?”
    “No Joe here,” she said, looking frightened and closing the door.
    I made my way back up the dark, worn steps and headed for the dog run so that I could show Herbie’s photo to a new group of dog owners; after sixteen more people told me they’d never seen the man in the picture, I went back to my cottage to pick up Bianca, to take her uptown to the school where Sophie taught in the hope that one of Sophie’s students would have something worthwhile to tell

Chapter 17
    We Were Her Family, She Said

    I got to the school before three and positioned myself near the front of a group of mothers waiting to pick up their kids, Bianca at my side, so that the kids would see us when they came out the main door. When Ruth joined me at five to three, stopping to say hi to several of the parents, Bianca strained at the leash to get to her, becoming very excited and jumping up on her when she got close. To my surprise, Ruth knelt down and let Bianca kiss her face. And she stayed there, crouched down, while Bianca put her paws around her neck and leaned her big face against Ruth’s, her tail wagging as if she’d just found a long-lost friend, which, apparently, she had.
    The kids burst out from the double doors as if they’d been shot from a cannon, some heading right for the curb where buses were already waiting for them. I waited impatiently, but every time I looked at Ruth, she shook her head. Finally, two boys came out, heavy backpacks slung over their shoulders, one eating a cookie. Ruth touched my arm, but the boys were so involved in their conversation that, heading for their bus, I thought they’d see nothing but each other. Then one of them looked around, saw Bianca and began to pull on the other boy’s arm.
    'The tall one’s Everett, the one with the hearing aid is Bob,” Ruth whispered.
    “Can I pet your dog, lady?” Everett said in the thick, uninflected way of people who can’t hear their own voices.
    “Sure thing.”
    He slipped off his purple backpack and knelt next to Bianca, letting her sniff the back of his hand, then slowly, as if he was concentrating very hard, he lifted the hand she’d smelled