29

On Wednesday afternoon, Penny Hammel phoned her friend Rebecca Schwartz and invited her to come over for dinner. “I cooked a nice pot roast for Bernie because the poor guy’s been on the road for two weeks and it’s his favorite meal,” she explained. “He was supposed to be home by four o’clock but wouldn’t you know it, his darn truck started having problems in Pennsylvania. He’s got to stay in King of Prussia overnight while they figure out what’s wrong. Anyhow, I pulled out all the stops for the dinner and I’m not going to eat it alone.”

“I’ll be there with bells on,” Rebecca assured her. “I don’t have anything in the house for dinner, as it happens. I was going to get takeout from Sun Yuan, but honest to God, I do that so often I feel as if I’ll turn into a fortune cookie.”

At 6:15 the two friends were sipping Manhattans in Penny’s combined kitchen-family room. The mouthwatering aromas emanating from the stove combined with the warmth of the fireplace filled both women with the sense of well-being.

“Oh, have I got a story to tell you about the new tenant in Sy’s farmhouse,” Penny began.

Rebecca’s expression changed. “Penny, that woman made it clear that she was holing up there to finish her book. You didn’t go over, did you?”

Even as she asked the question, Rebecca knew the answer. She should have guessed that Penny would want to get a look at the new tenant.

“I had no intention of paying a visit,” Penny said defensively. “I brought over six of my blueberry muffins just to be neighborly, but that woman was downright rude. I mean I started by saying that I didn’t want to interrupt her but thought she might enjoy the muffins, and I’d put my phone number on a Post-it on the bottom of the plate. If I were the one moving into a strange neighborhood, I’d like to know that there was someone to call if an emergency came up.”

“That was real nice of you,” Rebecca conceded. “You’re the kind of friend everyone should have. But I wouldn’t go there again. She’s a loner, that one.”

Penny laughed. “For two cents I would have asked her for my muffins back. And anyhow, when you think about it, she has a sister she can call if she needs help.”

Rebecca drained the last of her Manhattan. “A sister? How do you know she has a sister?”

“Oh, I saw a toy truck on the floor in the hall behind her and I told her that I’m a good babysitter. She told me that the truck belonged to her sister’s kid. Her sister helped her move in and had left it.”

“That’s funny,” Rebecca said slowly. “When I gave her the key, she said she had a meeting with her editor and would be arriving late at night. I drove by early the next morning and saw her car in the breezeway. There wasn’t another car there. So I guess her sister and her kid came later.”

“Maybe there is no sister and she likes to play with toy trucks herself,” Penny laughed. “I can tell you, with a nasty attitude like hers, I bet she doesn’t have many friends.”

She got up, reached for the cocktail shaker, and split the last of the Manhattans between them. “Dinner’s about ready to be put on the table. Why don’t we sit down and get started? But I do want to catch the 6:30 news. I’d love to know if they arrested that crazy woman who kidnapped her own child. I can’t believe that she’s still running around loose.”

“Neither can I,” Rebecca agreed.

As they had expected, the photos taken in Central Park allegedly showing Alexandra Moreland lifting her son Matthew out of the stroller were the lead story on the evening news. “I wonder what she did with him, poor kid?” Penny sighed as she swallowed a succulent bite of pot roast.

“Moreland wouldn’t be the first mother to kill her own child,” Rebecca said soberly. “Do you think she was nuts enough to do that?”

Penny did not answer. Something about those photos was bothering her. What is it? she asked herself. But then the segment about the missing child ended and she clicked the television off with a shrug. “Who needs three minutes of sales pitches about sex pills and nose sprays?” she asked Rebecca. “Then you hear all the problems that stuff can give you, like heart attacks and ulcers and strokes, and you wonder who would be dopey enough to buy them.”

For the rest of the meal the two good friends gossiped about their mutual friends in town, and whatever it was about the photographs that had disturbed Penny retreated into her subconscious.