Part 4 (2/2)

”We checked with the guys about the dance teacher.” Adele consulted her notes. ”Home alone, from 21:30 on. Her only confirmation is the cab driver who took her home, and he's taking the week off. Cab company says he went to Guelph to see his sister. They're trying to track him down.”

”Anya Daniel have a car?” Orwell asked.

”No, Chief,” Stacy said.

”Lives where?”

”Behind the hospital. River Street.”

”His car was still in the parking lot, right?”

”Yes, sir. They checked it out. No evidence anyone else was in it.”

”To get to the motel and back she'd need a ride. How'd she get back?”

”We figure he hooked up,” Adele said. ”Wouldn't be the first time. Someone with their own car.”

”And if it was a spur-of-the-moment thing they might have had a drink somewhere,” Orwell threw in.

”Dr. Ruth says he left her office around four,” said Stacy. ”Didn't see him again, but . . .”

A sharp knock on the door. ”Come ahead,” Orwell said.

Dutch Scheider half-opened the door, took brief note of the two detectives. ”The Metro guys want to take me back to the motel,” he said. ”Walk me around back or something.”

”Sounds sinister,” said Orwell.

”That's how we do it downtown,” said Adele.

”Well, we'll know where to start the search if you turn up missing,” Orwell said. ”Wait a sec. Tell me, Dutch, if you were going to have a drink and didn't want it to become public knowledge, with a married woman, say, where would you go?”

”Never given it much thought, Chief, seeing as how my loving wife would strangle me with my own shorts.”

”Sure sure, I know, but think about it for a minute. Is there any place within driving distance where you'd feel reasonably safe?”

”Not in this town. Maybe Omemee. There's a nice little place just opened. Lemongra.s.s, I think it's called. Supposed to be good. And there's that Italian place in Port Perry. Couple of places there, come to think of it.”

”Thanks, Dutch. Off you go. Take your own car. Stay in touch.”

”Will do, Chief.” He looked back. ”I'd start with the Omemee place,” he said.

Orwell turned to the detectives. ”Why don't you two take a drive over there and see if anyone had a discreet rendezvous late last night.”

It was one thing to be cool in front of policemen, she was good at that. It was better to be resolute and unafraid with them, they were like dogs, if you cowered they bit you. Alone was different. After she locked the studio door she started to shake. Why would they kill him? Because of her? Her hand was trembling, holding the cordless phone while she paced the wooden floor. ”The police were here,” she said. The receiver was damp where she clutched it. ”You believe me now? He found me. Sooner or later they always find me.” She watched herself pa.s.sing in the wall mirrors. ”The police were asking about me?”

”Yes.”

”What did you tell them?”

”Nothing.” Dr. Ruth's voice sounded tight. ”Whatever you've said to me is privileged communication, doctor/patient. I confirmed what they already knew, that you saw me regularly. Beyond that I couldn't tell them anything about you.”

”They think I killed the man.”

”Did you?”

”Of course not.”

”You might have thought he was another a.s.sa.s.sin, coming for you.”

”It was a possibility.” She stood in the middle of the studio floor. From this position she could see herself from three angles. Automatically she pulled her shoulders back. ”If he had come to me last night, I think . . . I would have let him do . . . whatever he had come to do.” She took first position, second position, sur les pointes, then flat, then on her toes again. ”I was ready. I was waiting. I waited all night for him to come.”

”To kill you?”

”Maybe,” she said. She began to dance, a practice cla.s.s adagio, slow, measured steps. ”Because I'm tired of waiting. It takes its toll. I have trouble sleeping. I try drinking myself to sleep: that doesn't work. I tried those pills you gave me, they make me stupid and slow and I still don't sleep. I am always looking behind me, beside me.”

”I can't do anything for you, Anya, until you're ready to tell me.”

”I came to this town because I had no reason to come here,” she said. ”It was a place on a map.” She moved the phone to her right hand and stepped to the barre on demi pointes, began to work through the basic exercises, the foundation. ”Anyone who followed me here would have done hard work to find me.”

”I have to go, Anya, I can see you tomorrow. I have an hour in the morning. I think you should come in.”

”And someone did. Someone found me. So I say, okay, that is enough now, I give up.”

”Come and see me tomorrow morning, ten o'clock. Okay?”

”I was very good, you know,” Anya said. She watched herself in the long mirrors as she lifted her leg. ”I might have been a ballerina.”

”You were.”

”In the old sense of the word. Over here it just means a dancer, but in the Mariinsky, it is different, it is a t.i.tle. It means something.”

”Anya? Will you come?”

”It means something,” she said.

She wouldn't come in, the doctor knew it, she could hear it in the woman's voice. She'd been spooked. The shooting of the detective would be all the proof she needed that a.s.sa.s.sins were in town, watching her, waiting for her in the shadows. It was unfortunate. So close to a breakthrough, so very close.

The road to Omemee was clear, traffic was light. Stacy drove, Adele leaned against the window staring out at acreage blotched with patches of old snow, muddy cattle pens, livestock gathered around broken bales of hay. ”You like it up here?” she asked. ”All this . . . scenery.”

”It's okay,” Stacy said. ”I'd rather be down in the city, doing what you do. But I'd probably have to start all over.”

”Maybe not. The Chief thinks a lot of you. He'd back you.”

”He doesn't want me to leave.”

”Would he stand in your way?”

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