Murder at the Library of Congress - Margaret Truman [64]
“Careful what you say,” Consuela said lightly. “Your dessert’ll end up on the evening news.”
“I have the feeling that could happen no matter what I say. Sorry to run out on you. See you both tomorrow.”
“… we don’t often have dessert,” Mac Smith said as he, Annabel, and Lucianne sat at the dining room table, “usually only when we have guests.”
“I’m glad I prompted you to have it tonight,” Lucianne said. “This mocha cake is wonderful.”
“From our own bakery right here in the Watergate,” Annabel said. “More coffee?”
It had been a pleasant evening. Mac and Annabel had expected the highly charged journalist to dominate the conversation, but that wasn’t the case. She was quiet and unassuming, showing intense interest in her host and hostess’s lives and careers, and the story of how they met and conducted their courtship. But she did have, of course, her own stories to tell, especially about some of the most harrowing assignments she’d been on around the globe.
They took their second cups of coffee in the living room, fortified by small snifters of brandy. Lucianne went to the sliding glass doors leading to the terrace and said, “Beautiful view.”
Mac opened the doors and they stood outside looking down at the Potomac. The air was clean from an hour of rain earlier.
“How’s your investigation of the murder going, Lucianne?” Mac asked.
“Better, it seems, than the police’s.”
“I’d love to hear about it,” he said. “I’m always interested in a murder investigation.”
“Like quitting smoking but still wanting one years later?”
“Something like that.”
“Mind if I smoke? I’ve been on my good behavior all evening.”
“If it isn’t too chilly out here.”
“I’m comfortable.”
“I’ll get a sweater,” Annabel said, going inside. When she returned, Mac had brought three fresh glasses of brandy to the terrace and arranged chairs around a small green metal table.
“I told Mac about our conversation this afternoon,” Annabel said, “that you feel wanting to know things is something we have in common. I’m not sure I agree with you about me, that I have some genetic need to delve into murder, but then again, maybe I do. So, let’s discuss the murder of Michele Paul and see what we can teach each other.”
“Okay,” Lucianne said, lighting her second cigarette, “what about this artist, Reyes?”
Mac and Annabel glanced at each other before Annabel said, “Michele Paul seemed to have an inordinate interest in him.”
“Why do you think that is?”
“I don’t have an answer for that,” said Annabel.
“What do you base it on?”
“Papers in his apartment. He did a fairly exhaustive study of the artist.”
“Interesting,” Lucianne said. “I spoke with a contact I have in the Miami PD this afternoon.”
“Lucianne knows a few people, Mac,” Annabel said, a smile in her voice.
“Doesn’t surprise me,” said Mac. “What did your Miami source have to say?”
“This conversation stays out here on this lovely terrace,” Lucianne said. “I’d hate to have something I’ve uncovered end up on somebody else’s newscast.”
“No guarantees,” Mac said. “If you want to make sure no one hears it from us, don’t tell us. That’s a rule I learned years ago when I was still trusting prosecutors.”
Lucianne laughed. “Fair enough. My guy in Miami tells me that the person behind the art heist is named Warren Munsch, a small-time loser with a minor league rap sheet. Mr. Munsch, it seems, took the painting to Los Angeles, then headed for Mexico City. They know that because he booked flights using his own name. No master terrorist he.”
“Where did he go from there?” Annabel asked.
“They lost track of him. The original information came through a Mexican source, some private detective there who operates as an informer for stateside police departments. According to this source, Munsch went to Mexico City with the intention of getting on a plane to Cuba. He’s got a lot to run from. A security guard was killed during that theft.”
“Let me get this straight,” Mac said. “Munsch steals a painting by a second-rate