The Secret History - Donna Tartt [70]
“I’m getting sleepy, Bun,” I said. “See you tomorrow, maybe.”
He blinked at me. “Hope you’re not coming down with this damn bug, old man,” he said curtly.
“Me, too,” I said, feeling sorry for him, unaccountably so. “Good night.”
I awoke at six on Thursday morning, intending to do some Greek, but my Liddell and Scott was nowhere to be found. I looked and looked and, with a sinking feeling, remembered: it was at Henry’s house. I had noticed its absence while I was packing; for some reason it wasn’t with my other books. I had made a hurried but diligent search which I finally abandoned, telling myself I’d be back for it later. This put me in a fairly serious fix. My first Greek class wasn’t till Monday, but Julian had given me a good deal of work and the library was still closed, as they were changing the catalogues from Dewey decimal to Library of Congress.
I went downstairs and dialed Henry’s number, and got, as I expected, no answer. Radiators clanged and hissed in the drafty hall. As I listened to the phone ring for about the thirtieth time, suddenly it occurred to me: why not just run up to North Hampden and get it? He wasn’t there—at least I didn’t think he was— and I had the key. It would be a long drive for him from Francis’s. If I hurried I could be there in fifteen minutes. I hung up and ran out the front door.
In the chilly morning light, Henry’s apartment looked deserted, and his car was neither in the drive nor in any of the places up and down the street where he liked to park when he didn’t want anyone to know he was home. But just to make sure I knocked. Pas de réponse. Hoping I wouldn’t find him standing in the front hall in his bathrobe, peering around a door at me, I turned the key gingerly and stepped inside.
No one was there, but the apartment was a mess—books, papers, empty coffee cups and wineglasses; there was a slight film of dust on everything, and the wine in the glasses had dried to a sticky purplish stain at the bottom. The kitchen was full of dirty dishes and the milk had been left out of the refrigerator and turned bad. Henry, generally, was clean as a cat, and I’d never even seen him take off his coat without hanging it up immediately. A dead fly floated in the bottom of one of the coffee cups.
Nervous, feeling as if I’d stumbled on the scene of a crime, I searched the rooms quickly, my footsteps ringing loud in the silence. Before long I saw my book, lying on the hall table, one of the most obvious places I could have left it. How could I have missed it? I wondered; I’d looked all over the day I’d left; had Henry found it, left it out for me? I grabbed it up quickly and had started out—jittery, anxious to leave—when my eye was caught by a scrap of paper also on the table.
The handwriting was Henry’s:
TWA 219
795 × 4
A telephone number with a 617 area code had been added in Francis’s hand, at the bottom. I picked the sheet up and studied it. It was written on the back of an overdue notice from the library dated only three days before.
Without quite knowing why, I set down my Liddell and Scott and took the paper with me to the telephone in the front room. The area code was Massachusetts, probably Boston; I checked my watch and then dialed the number, reversing the charges to Dr. Roland’s office.
A wait, two rings, a click. “You have reached the law offices of Robeson Taft on Federal Street,” a recording informed me. “Our switchboard is now closed. Please call within the hours of nine to—”
I hung up, and stood staring at the paper. I was remembering, with some unease, the crack Bunny had made about Henry needing a lawyer. Then I picked up the phone again and dialed directory assistance for the information number of TWA.
“This is Mr. Henry Winter,” I told the operator. “I’m calling, um, to confirm my reservation.”
“Just a moment, Mr. Winter. Your reservation number?”
“Uh,” I said, trying to think fast, pacing back and forth, “I don’t seem to have my information handy right now, maybe you could just—” Then I noticed the number in the