Murder in Foggy Bottom - Margaret Truman [4]
“Go on, we’re fine,” Hope said. “Don’t be late to your meeting.”
Harry took her arm and pulled her aside, away from the girls and others in the line. “Look,” he said, “I know you’re upset, and I don’t blame you. But going to your parents’ place isn’t the answer.”
“Harry, we’ve been over this a hundred times. I just need to be away for a spell to help me sort this out.”
“Wouldn’t it be better if you stayed and we kept talking it out?”
“Maybe, maybe not, I don’t know. All I do know is that I have to clear my mind. A couple of weeks with Mom and Dad will help, I’m sure, and the girls will love it.” Her eyes filled, and she quickly ran fingertips over them to keep the tears from spilling out. “We’ll get through this, Harry. I know we will. If I didn’t believe that, I wouldn’t be talking about just a few weeks away.”
He looked into his wife’s eyes and swallowed against tears of his own forming. “You know I love you,” he said, “more than anything in the world.”
She nodded.
“Let’s not let my stupidity ruin the good thing we have going together, you, me, them.” He nodded to where the girls were giggling at something the man in front of them had said.
“Go,” she said. “I’ll be fine.” She managed a smile, which sent a current of relief through his body. Then she kissed him and said, “I love you, too, Harry. Everything will be all right.” She meant it. Although there would be the requisite period of recriminations, and should be, her determination not to allow a single indiscretion to take away what they had built as a family was as strong as her husband’s.
They rejoined their daughters and he kissed both girls again. “Call tonight,” he told Hope.
“I will.”
“You girls be good and do what Mom says. But not when she says get lost.”
“Those are a fine-lookin’ couple of young ladies,” the grinning, chubby businessman ahead of them said, Alabama coating his words.
“Thanks,” Syms said.
“First time on an airplane?” the man asked.
“No,” Hope answered. “They even have their own frequent flier accounts.” To Harry: “Go!”
“Call.”
“I will, I will.”
Syms backed away, waving, and almost tripped over a suitcase belonging to another passenger. He left the terminal, got in his car, and headed for his meeting at company headquarters in White Plains, torn, wishing he’d been able to get away and accompany his family— wishing Hope had wanted him to, yet ready for the short separation. His in-laws were nice people, no bad mother-in-law jokes for him. Maybe when the negotiations were over he’d just get on a plane and surprise them. Even though Hope said she didn’t want him there, he thought she’d like it if he arrived unexpectedly.
At least he hoped she would. He’d have to think that through. No room for more missteps at this juncture.
As Syms turned back onto 684, Al Lester looked up at a twin-engine Saab turboprop taking off from the airport. It passed directly over him, low, engines whining at full throttle, and banked left to the west, a standard takeoff pattern when the wind blew from west to east.
Lester, sixty-eight, was enjoying his retirement, finally having time for his passion: fishing the lakes, streams, and reservoirs that were, perhaps surprisingly, plentiful in Westchester County, Manhattan’s primary source of potable water. Minnesota might be the land of ten thousand lakes, but New York State and Westchester within it were no Sahara. But you couldn’t just go out and fish the reservoirs. It took a special license from New York City’s Bureau of Water Supply. Among many restrictions was a prohibition on powerboats. You paddled or didn’t fish. Lester believed in fishing regulations and followed them faithfully, knowing that the licensing requirement had been initiated during World War Two, when it was feared a foreign power might poison the city’s water supply. No such fear existed today, but