“That hurt.”
I slipped off my wet raincoat and slung it on Sally’s hat tree, a hundred years old at least and undoubtedly purloined. I placed my hat on the hook above my coat, taking care to give my curls an artful little shake. Well, you can’t blame me for that, at least. My hair was my best feature: brown and glossy, a hint of red, falling just so around my ears, a saucy flip. It distracted from my multitude of flaws, Monday to Sunday. Why not shake for all I was worth?
I turned around and sashayed the two steps to the table. Also purloined. Sally had told me the story yesterday, over our second round of martinis: the restaurant owner, the jealous wife, the police raid. I’ll spare you the ugly details. In any case, our table was far more important than either of us had a right to own—solid, square, genuine imitation wood—which now proved positively providential, because my mysterious gift from the post office (the parcel, not the blonde) would have overwhelmed a lesser piece of furniture. As it was, the beast sat brown and hulking in the center, battered in one corner, stained in another, patched with an assortment of foreign stamps.
“Well, well.” I peered over the top. “What have we here?”
Miss Vivian Schuyler, read the label. Of 52 Christopher Street, et cetera, et cetera, except that my first name appeared over a scribbled-out original, and my building address likewise.
“It looks as if it’s been forwarded,” I said.
“The plot thickens.”
“My mother’s handwriting.” I ran my finger over the jagged remains of Fifth Avenue. “My parents’ address, too.”
“That sounds reasonable.” He remained a few respectful feet away, arms crossed against his blue chest. “Someone must have sent it to your parents’ house.”
“Apparently. Someone from Zurich, Switzerland.”
“Switzerland?” He uncrossed his arms and stepped forward at last. “Really? You have friends in Switzerland?”
“Not that I can remember.” I was trying to read the original name, beneath my mother’s black scribble. V something something. “What do you think that is?”
“It’s not Vivian?”
“No, it ends with a t.”
An instant’s reflection. “Violet? Someone had your name wrong, I guess.”
For a man who’d just walked coatless through the dregs of an October rain, Doctor Paul was awfully warm. I wore a cashmere turtleneck sweater over my torso, ever so snug, and still I could feel the rampant excess wafting from his skin, an unconscionable waste of thermal energy. Up close, he smelled like a hospital, which bothered me not at all.
I sashayed to the kitchen drawer and withdrew a knife.
“Ah, now the truth comes out. Make it quick.”
“Silly.” I waved the knife in a friendly manner. “It’s just that I don’t have any scissors.”
“Scissors! You really are a professional.”
“Stand aside, if you will.” I examined the parcel before me. Every seam was sealed by multiple layers of Scotch tape, as if the contents were either alive or radioactive, or both. “I don’t know where to start.”
“You know, I am a trained surgeon.”
“So you say.” I sliced along one seam, and another. Rather expertly, if you must know; but then I had done the honors of the table at college since my sophomore year. Nobody at Bryn Mawr carved up a noble loin like Vivian Schuyler.
The paper shell gave way, and then the box itself. I stood on a chair and dug through the packing paper.
“Steady, there.” Doctor Paul’s helpful hands closed on the back of the chair, and it ceased its rickety-rocking obediently.
“It’s leather,” I said, from inside the box. “Leather and quite heavy.”
“Do you need any help? A flashlight? Map?”
“No, I’ve got it. Here we are. Head, shoulders, placenta.”
“Boy or girl?”
“Neither.” I grasped with both hands and yanked, propelling myself conveniently backward into Doctor Paul’s alert arms. We tumbled pleasantly, if rather ungracefully, to the disreputable rug. “It’s a suitcase.”
? ? ?
I CALLED my mother first. “What is this suitcase you sent me?”
“This is not how ladies greet one another on the telephone, darling.”
“Each other, not one another. One another means three or more people. Chicago Manual of Style, chapter eight, verse eleven.”
A merry clink of ice cubes against glass. “You’re so droll, darling. Is that what you do at your magazine every day?”
“Tell me about the suitcase.”
“I don’t know about any suitcase.”
“You sent me a package.”
“Did I?” Another clink, prolonged, as of swirling. “Oh, that’s right. It arrived last week.”
“And you had no idea what was inside?”
“Not the faintest curiosity.”
“Who’s it from?”
“From whom, darling.” Oh, the ring of triumph.
“From whom is the package, Mums?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea.”