I'll Walk Alone - Mary Higgins Clark [102]
“She was nice to me.”
Alvirah opened her purse and took out the folded front page of the Post. “Zan was arrested last night and is charged with kidnapping. Just take a look at her face. Can you see how much she’s suffering?”
Tiffany glanced down at the picture, then quickly looked away from it.
“Tiffany, the detectives told Zan that you think she may have drugged you.”
“She may have. That’s why I was so sleepy. There may have been something in that Pepsi and then that cold pill. I bet it was a sedative.”
“Yes, that’s what I understand that you told the detectives, but Tiffany, Zan remembers it clearly. You asked for a soda because you were thirsty. You followed her into the kitchen and she opened the refrigerator door for you. You took the can out and you opened it yourself. She never touched it. Isn’t that true?”
“I don’t remember it that way.” Tiffany’s tone of voice was now defensive.
“And you asked Zan if she had any cold medicine. She gave you a Tylenol, but she never kept nighttime Tylenol in the house. At your request she gave you the one that is a cold medication. Now, I grant you that those antihistamines can make you a little drowsy, but you asked for medication. Zan didn’t offer it.”
“I don’t remember.” Tiffany was sitting up straight now.
She remembers, Alvirah thought, and Zan is right. Tiffany’s trying to rewrite history to make herself look good. “Tiffany, I wish you’d look at that picture again. Zan is suffering from these accusations. She swears she is not the woman in that picture taking Matthew. She doesn’t know where he is, and the only thing that’s keeping her going is the hope that he’ll be found alive. She will be put on trial and you’ll be a witness. I just hope that you think carefully when you’re under oath, and if Zan’s account of that morning is accurate that you will tell the truth. Now, I’m on my way. I promise that when I write this story, I will stress that Zan has always blamed herself, not you, for Matthew’s disappearance.”
Tiffany did not get up with her.
“I left you my card, Tiffany. It has my cell phone on it. If there’s anything else that you think of, call me.”
At the door she was stopped. “Mrs. Meehan,” Tiffany called. “It may not mean anything, but—” She got up. “I have some sandals to show you. Zan gave them to me. When I saw those pictures of Matthew being taken out of the stroller, I noticed one thing. Wait a minute.”
She went down the hall and came back a moment later with a shoebox in one hand and a newspaper in the other. She opened the shoebox. “These sandals are exactly the same as a pair Zan has. She gave them to me. When I thanked her, she said that she had bought a second pair the same color by mistake, and not only that, she had another pair exactly the same except that it had wider straps. She said it was practically like having three pairs of the same shoes.”
Not knowing what to expect and not daring to hope that it would be significant, Alvirah waited.
Tiffany pointed to the newspaper she was holding and said, “You see the shoes Zan, or the woman who looks like her, is wearing when she’s bending over the stroller?”
“Yes. What about them?”
“See how the strap is wider than it is on this pair?” She took a sandal from the shoebox and held it up.
“Yes. It is different, not much, but Tiffany, what about it?”
“I noticed and I can swear that Zan was wearing the ones with the narrow straps the day Matthew disappeared. She and I left this building together. She rushed into a taxi and I pushed the stroller to the park.”
Tiffany’s face became troubled. “I didn’t tell that to the cops. I’ve been so mad about the way people think of me that I know I was blaming Zan. But last night when I began to think about it, it didn’t make sense. I mean, why would Zan have come back home that day and changed into her sandals with the wide strap?”
Her eyes searched into Alvirah’s pleadingly.
“Does that make sense to you, Mrs. Meehan?”
68
On Saturday morning, Detective Wally Johnson pushed the intercom button under the name ANTON/KOLBER 3B in the foyer of the brownstone