But he didn’t.
He prowled back to his own basement, making a mental note to himself to make sure to do something with the music he’d found.
He went back upstairs and pulled out his copy of the picture of Betty, Genevieve and Brad, and studied it some more. When he’d first seen it, he’d been ready to drag Brad out of whatever watering hole he might have been frequenting and tear him to pieces. But Leslie had been right. He had nothing to go on here. Or not enough, anyway. No proof. He had to get a few more answers before going postal on the guy. No, before notifying the cops so they could arrest him.
He was still restless. He tried a long hot shower and lying down to watch the news, then a book. Nothing held his attention.
He was never going to sleep.
At last he rose. Hell, he’d gone several nights without sleep before in his life. He could do it again. He dressed, deciding that even though it was late, Didi and Heidi were probably still out on the streets.
Watching for a black sedan.
On his way out of the house, he paused. There, on a table by the door, was a picture of Matt. He’d been in the Middle East, reporting on the condition of the children there. He’d ridden with the Marines and had written a series of articles that chilled, tore at the heart and demanded thought. He had never been hesitant about going into danger. “Hell, Joe, if we can send our soldiers over there, you bet I’ll go. It will be an honor to ride with them.”
He’d been shot at, spat on and, his personal favorite, nearly run over by a mad camel. But the stories had been important to him. And as he’d said at the time, he’d been able to come home. Not all their countrymen would.
Joe picked up the picture of Matt with a host of children and stared hard at it, as if staring at the man himself.
“Why couldn’t you have been an asshole?” he said aloud. A moment later, he put the picture down and headed out the door. As he did, it occurred to him that he had to forget the black sedan and tell Didi and Heidi to get off the streets for a while. Didi’s job interview was coming up; he hoped that would change life for her.
But then there was Heidi. He wondered if Genevieve O’Brien would have been able to change the woman’s life if she hadn’t disappeared.
Leslie was convinced that she was alive.
But how long could she remain so?
Sitting up in bed, Leslie remained still and listened. The sound had disappeared.
She waited, certain it had come from the basement, hoping it would come again. She glanced over at Nikki, who was still sleeping. Leslie hesitated, thinking that she had promised Joe to keep the door to her room locked.
But she wasn’t alone in the house. Nikki was here, and so was Adam, who was sleeping just down the hall.
She crawled out of bed carefully, found her robe and slippers, and tiptoed to the door. For a moment she thought about waking Nikki, but she had the strange sense that the house wouldn’t “speak” to her unless she was alone.
She must resemble a ghost herself, she thought, wafting down the staircase and heading to the foyer. She looked out to the street, almost expecting to see someone leaning on a lamppost, or to discover that Joe’s car was parked across the street, despite the fact that she had friends in the house with her.
But the street was quiet.
In the shadows cast by the dim night-lights, she held very still for several seconds. Then she thought she heard it again and frowned. This time the sound was somehow different.
Muffled, faint, like an echo.
She went down the hallway to the kitchen, then into the servants’ pantry, and hesitated again before lifting the hatch. As always at night, the basement entry loomed like an abyss.
She went for one of the lanterns and then carefully walked down the stairs.
The crates remained from their work that day, but Brad had carefully tended to their tools. The cold and empty hearth seemed all the more depressing because of the broken bricks along one side.
She stood still, waiting, until once again she heard the sound.
She moved to the wall to the right of the hearth, facing northeast, toward the dig and the old subway lines.
As she stood there, literally putting her ear against the brick, she became aware of something in the room. A presence. She turned.
Elizabeth was standing there, though not, as Leslie might have expected, hovering over the crate that contained her bones. She stood, watching Leslie, a sad smile on her face.
“Hello,” Leslie said very softly.
The woman’s smile deepened. “Thank you.”
Leslie shook her head. “I couldn’t have done it without your help.” She hesitated for a moment. “Without Matt’s help.”
The apparition stood still for a minute, then said, “He loves you very much.”
“I…Matt?” Leslie said, her heart skipping a beat.
But Elizabeth didn’t reply. The strange sound of distant sobbing came again. Still muffled, like an echo of the past.