True-Life Adventure

everyone else was trying to set new world’s records for gin-and-tonic consumption. I admired her a lot because she never let things get her down. The South, I mean. New Orleans. Sororities and fraternities. I had trouble… relating, I think it’s called now.”
    “Misfit, huh?”
    She looked at me gratefully. “I never could figure out what anybody or anything was all about till I came to San Francisco.”
    “And Lindsay?”
    “She was too smart for the kind of garbage everybody else was handing out down there, but she just didn’t let it bother her. She used it for her own benefit, somehow. Pretended to fit in even when she didn’t. Didn’t get in arguments about race or religion. Just swam with the tide. Wish I could have done it.”
    “Did you ever think it was odd that Jacob had custody of Terry?”
    “Uh-uh. If you ask me, Lindsay just wasn’t cut out for motherhood. She struggled along with that joint custody till Jacob remarried, but he didn’t exactly have to twist her arm to get her to see it his way after that. Terry just kind of cramped her style. It was Jacob who wanted kids in the first place.”
    “Are Terry and Jacob very close?”
    “Oh, yes. She’s a prodigy, you know— supposed to be as smart as he is.”
    “A young scientist at Kogene told me he used to have her work in his lab with him. But I didn’t put much stock in it. I mean, a seven-year-old…”
    Sardis nodded. “It’s true. I don’t know how much she really understood— all I know is that Jacob claimed she was on her way to becoming a scientist. He had her in there a lot.”
    “Oh, lord. I’ll bet she’s a horrible little brat.”
    “Not really, no. A little strong-willed, but pretty well-adjusted for a genius.”
    “If Lindsay didn’t want her in the first place, and then had problems with her, don’t you think it’s pretty strange that she snatched her?”
    She considered. “Come to think of it, yes. I’d have to say it’s an un-Lindsay type of thing to do. It interferes with her career and her social life, and it’s impetuous. Or seems impetuous, anyway. Definitely not like Lindsay. It’s scary.”
    I knew what she meant, but I didn’t say anything.
    “I mean, maybe she didn’t snatch her. Maybe she’s in some kind of trouble.”
    I avoided her eyes.
    “She could be dead, couldn’t she, Paul?”
    I didn’t answer.
    “Do the police know about this?”
    “Well… no. And I’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell them.”
    “Why?”
    I couldn’t tell her I was having a childish feud with Howard Blick. In fact, I couldn’t think of one good reason why she shouldn’t tell them. “I have my reasons,” I said. I sounded dumb even to myself.
    “What reasons?”
    “Uh, it might endanger Lindsay’s… uh…” There were big hunks of time between the words; any fool could tell my heart wasn’t in it, but I was committed and so I was going through with it.
    Sardis got up and towered over me. “Endanger your precious story, you mean. No wonder you worked for Birnbaum. You’re as low-down as he was.”
    This took me by surprise. But I handled it intelligently. “Huh?” I said.
    “Why don’t you ask me about A&L?”
    I would have, but she got up and left before I could. It wouldn’t even be unreasonable to say she stalked out, if you go in for that kind of colorful phrasing.
    Now what the hell was A&L? And why did she think Birnbaum was low-down if she didn’t know him? And why did she agree to have lunch with me if she knew I didn’t want my C.I. done?
    These were a few of the questions I turned over in my head while I paid the check and waited for my change. I also wondered what else she knew about this case and whether she knew where to find Lindsay. She didn’t, I thought— otherwise, she wouldn’t have been talking police with so much enthusiasm.
    Police. I thought about them all the way home. Once again I tried to think of one good reason not to call them and tell them what I knew. Then I tried to think of a half-baked reason. I didn’t complete either mission.
    At this point, I really was impeding a murder investigation. Blick had been right about the motive for the murder and I had confirmed that he was right in an effort to prove him wrong and I was currently just being a bad sport.
    I was going to have to swallow my pride and tell him. I resigned myself to it and vowed to do it instantly, the second I got home. Oh, what a good boy was I.
    As usual, I parked on Chenery