Hard news - Jeffery Deaver [59]
Twenty minutes later, the doorman returned, just as she finished.
“Still studying?” he asked snidely.
“I just finished.”
“So tell me, yeah, which company you with? One of the big ones? Am I right?”
“It’s a big one,” Rune said.
“Is in Jersey, right?”
“How’d you guess?”
“I’ve been around. I seen a lot. You can’t fool me.”
“I wouldn’t even try.”
SCORCHING PAIN ROAMED AROUND IN HER BACK. THE INside of her ear was sweating. Her voice had gone from low soprano to throaty alto and she’d have to clear her windpipe with a stinging snap every few minutes. Rune had been sitting in her cubicle at the studio, speaking into a phone, for nearly eight hours straight.
Hello I’m a producer for Current Events the news program Mr. Zuckerman Norris Williams Roth Gelinker we’re doing a segment about the Lance Hopper killing you probably remember the man killed in the courtyard of your building several years ago I’m hoping you can help me what I’m looking for is…
It was late, after eight o’clock. Past bedtime for Courtney. The little girl sat at Rune’s feet, tearing scheduling sheets into the shape of Easter bunnies.
… How long have you lived in apartment 3B, 3C, 3D, 3E, 3F …?
“Rune, bunny.”
Whispering, hand over mouthpiece: “Beautiful, honey. I’m on the phone. Make a momma Easter bunny now.”
“That is the mommy.”
“Then make a daddy.”
Rune’s poll of the tenants so far:
One was Miss Breckman. Eight had unlisted numbers. Twenty weren’t home when she called. Thirty-three had moved into their apartments after Hopper’s death. Eighteen hadn’t been home the night of the killing (or said they hadn’t). Nineteen were home but didn’t see anything related to the murder (or said they didn’t).
That left twelve on her list.
A bad number. If there’d been only three she would’ve called them. Twenty, she’d have given up and gone home to sleep. But twelve …
Rune sighed and stretched, hearing some remote bone protest with a pop.
Courtney yawned and tore a bunny in half with fidgety glee.
Quitting time, Rune thought. I’m going home. Then she thought of Sutton’s raspy, bitchy voice and fuming eyes and she picked up the phone.
Which was fortunate because when she asked Mr. Frost, 6B, if he knew anything about the Lance Hopper killing he paused for only a moment then responded, “Actually … I saw it happen.”
“YOU PUT THAT IN A BOTTLE AND YOU’VE GOT YOURSELF something,” she said.
Rune had walked into the apartment, right past the elderly man who’d opened the door, and stepped up to a glass case. Inside was an elaborate model of a ship—not a rigged clipper ship or man-of-war but a modern cargo ship. It was four feet long. She said, “Audacious.”
“Thank you. I’ve never made ships in bottles. To tell you the truth, I don’t like hobbies.”
She introduced herself.
“Bennett Frost,” he said. He was about seventy-five years old. He wore a cardigan sweater with a moth hole on the shoulder and cheap gray pants. He was balding and had dark moles on his face and head. He leaned forward, a vestigial bow, as he shook her hand. He held it for a moment longer than one normally would have and looked at her closely. The touch and the examination, though, were not sexual. He was appraising her. When he was done he released her hand and nodded at the glass case.
“The Minnesota Princess. Odd name, don’t you think, for a ship that spent most of her time in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic? My very first ship. No, I shouldn’t say that. My very first profitable ship. Which is, I suppose, better than my first ship. I named her Minnesota because I was born there.”
He walked into the large apartment. Rune followed him. In the cluttered living room she noticed suitcases.
“You going on a trip?”
“I have a place in Bermuda. Haiti was my favorite. The Oloffson—what a hotel that was. Not true any longer, of course. I never used to go to British colonies but you know how things are elsewhere.” He looked at her with slits of eyes, a