31.

IT WAS HARD not to connect this incident with Judy Blue, the peripatetic cabdriver who had kept appearing in her life, always under strange circumstances. Had Judy Blue been driving the cab? Who was she? Wetzon knew coincidence played a peculiar part in life in New York City. She always seemed to meet people who knew people she knew. Her life was made up of giant links in a great chain of connections.

But Judy Blue? Was Judy Blue following her, and here was the real puzzle. Could it be connected in some way to Peepsie Cunningham? Come on, old girl, she thought, it was only a cab and there are thousands of cabs in New York City.

“Five, Ms. Wilson.” Hazel’s elevator man—there was no doorman— broke the spell. Most elevator buildings in Manhattan in good neighborhoods had either doormen or elevator men, depending on which a majority of tenants preferred. The best buildings had both. Hazel’s elevator man took the heavy shopping bag and carried it down the hall to Hazel’s door as Wetzon followed.

An insistent buzzing sounded from the open elevator. The elevator man set the bag down on Hazel’s brown sisal doormat and headed back to the elevator.

“Thank you.” Wetzon rang Hazel’s doorbell as the elevator doors closed.

Hazel, in the same pink-and-white robe and pink-ruffled cap, leaning on the cane, opened the door and gathered her in. Wetzon loved Hazel’s openness, her warmth, her joy in life. It was supporting, contagious. The joy is in the journey, Hazel always said.

“I can’t stay long. I’m due at Le Refuge at seven-thirty.” Wetzon hung her coat and beret on the Victorian oak coatrack in the foyer and pulled off her boots. It was already six-thirty. She picked up the bulging shopping bag and her carryall and followed Hazel’s slow progress into the kitchen, placing the shopping bag on one of Hazel’s carved oak kitchen chairs. She plopped herself in another chair and watched Hazel unpack the goodies.

“You look pretty perky,” she said, smiling at Hazel.

Hazel’s blue eyes sparkled as she peeked into a small paper bag. “Oh yum, brownies. I do love brownies.”

“I thought the shrimp and pasta salad looked luscious, so I brought you some.”

“Lovely.” Hazel opened the old-fashioned glass doors of her kitchen cabinets and took down china plates, placing one in front of Wetzon. “For tasting only,” she hastened to say as Wetzon started to protest, at which point the tea kettle began to whistle. “Tea?”

“Oh yes, but not old rope.” They laughed. It was their joke. Wetzon could never remember the name of the tea that Hazel had given her to taste long ago when they’d first met, but Wetzon had told her it tasted like oily old rope and it had stuck. Hazel loved old rope. She had first sampled it in India and had found it again in specialty stores here when she got back.

“Irish Breakfast?”

“That’s more like it.” Wetzon flexed and pointed her feet. She was just starting to warm up.

Hazel measured leaves from two tins into two covered individual teaspoon strainers, placing one in each teacup. Then she poured boiling water into each cup and set one cup in front of Wetzon. Wetzon took a deep breath, inhaling the steam.

“Oh, how I’d love to be having dinner here with you tonight instead of—” She stopped. She was embarrassed that she’d let Smith manipulate her into eating with Arleen and didn’t want to tell Hazel.

“You work too hard, Leslie dear.” Hazel opened the rest of the containers with little exclamations of pleasure. “Oh! Um! Ah!” Her face was blotchy, scaly in spots, red and pink and white.

“How are you feeling?”

Hazel ignored her and put a single shrimp and four green fusilli on Wetzon’s plate.

“Taste this. It’s wonderful.”

“Okay,” Wetzon said. “I get it. Well, kindly let me know when you’re ready.”

Hazel gave her a flinty look and Wetzon laughed.

“They think they’ve located Marion, through the State Department. Isn’t that wonderful? I’ll tell you, Leslie, it’s such a relief.” She dipped her fork into the chicken curry and lifted it to her mouth, closing her eyes, smiling, chewing slowly. “Um. This is quite my favorite.” She put her fork down and swirled the strainer in her teacup. “You see, Peepsie named me as one of her executors, and I’ll tell you truthfully, once Marion gets here I intend to resign and let Marion and the lawyer handle it. She left a sizable estate, mostly to Marion and a great deal to her favorite causes. The Metropolitan Museum, Connecticut College, of course. I had no idea there was so much money ...” Her voice drifted off sadly.

“I’m sorry, Hazel.”

“Oh dear. Life goes by so quickly.”

“‘The joy is in the journey,’ as you’ve always said.”

“Of course.” She smiled. “We had so much fun always, all of the Peepsies.” She sighed and picked up her fork again. “Why don’t you tell me about Little Odessa? I want to hear everything.”

Wetzon spun out the story, dramatically, picking at the spread of food on the table as she did so. Hazel interjected light comments until Wetzon came to the attack outside the ladies’ room, and Hazel’s pale blotchy face turned white under the frilly cap.

“Oh my, this is terrible. Leslie dear, I feel responsible for your getting involved in this. I’m worried about you. I will never forgive myself if ... Have you told your nice young man?”

“No, I haven’t told my nice young man.” Wetzon smiled, gently mocking Hazel’s words. “He’s on a big case and I haven’t seen him, but really, there’s nothing to worry about. It was an attempted mugging and that could happen anywhere. And he didn’t get anything and I’m not hurt. See?” She did not roll down the neck of her sweater. In spite of Wetzon’s reassurances, Hazel was becoming more and more agitated. “Hazel, come on, please, I promise I’ll tell him, but it’s not related.” She then described what happened to the Tsminskys.

“Dreadful. Those poor people. They come all this way, from such a terrible place, and then this.” Hazel clucked and shook her head.

“It sounds like a Mafia hit and Teddy says it may have been Russian Mafia. Smith thinks it’s KGB.” She grinned at Hazel. “Smith sees Russian spies under her bed. I suppose it’s because her ex-husband was with the CIA.”

“Now, Leslie dear, tell me the truth, you didn’t find Ida, and there is nothing to make you believe Peepsie was murdered. Or is there something you’re not telling me?”

“Hazel.” Wetzon paused. She looked at her hands and then at Hazel. “Yes, there is something I’m not telling you.” She told Hazel about the blue Gucci shoe she had found on the street.

Hazel looked stunned. “But they found Peepsie’s slippers. They were on the street near her ... oh dear ... I see what you mean, what if they were thrown out after ...”

“Exactly. The question is, where is the other shoe? It wasn’t anywhere in the apartment or on the street. O’Melvany told me they looked everywhere.”

“But why would anyone have done such a thing? Peepsie couldn’t hurt anyone ... she couldn’t even remember who I was sometimes. She was so helpless and frightened ...”

“She was very frightened. Don’t you remember? She started to tell us something when Ida came back into the room—”

“Yes. She thought you were Marion. She started to say something about—” Hazel closed her eyes, thinking, opened them, and shook her head.

“I know. I’ve been trying to remember.” Wetzon ran her fingers around the smooth lip of her flowered teacup. “I’m going to meet Teddy later tonight,” she said, “at the studio. He thinks Peepsie may have been murdered also.” She stopped, considering. “When we first got together, the night after the blizzard, Teddy told me about some of the scams against the seniors—whoops—” She looked at Hazel and grinned. “I know you hate that word. I’m sorry.”

Hazel’s eyes twinkled suddenly. “We who are in our twilight years forgive you for the moment—but don’t let it happen again.” She shook her finger at Wetzon.

Wetzon blew her a kiss across the table. “You are younger than anyone I know—and that’s the truth.” She finished her tea and looked at the large oak school clock on the pale yellow wall. “I have to get going.”

Hazel pulled a change purse out of the pocket of her robe and gave Wetzon a ten-dollar bill.

“No,” Wetzon said, waving her hand. “This is on me. You do next time.”

“That’s a deal.” Hazel folded the bill back into the change purse and slid the change purse into the pocket of her robe. “You haven’t told me why Teddy thinks Peepsie was murdered.”

“I don’t know. That’s what I’m going to find out. He wasn’t able to talk. He said he’d have all the pieces tonight.” She pushed back her chair and stood up. “It’s very complicated, Hazel. Ida has the same last name of a stockbroker I’m working with. Let’s wait until we hear what Teddy has.”

She went into the foyer and got her coat and beret and came back into the kitchen. Hazel hadn’t moved from the table. She had that look on her face. “I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”

“Leslie, do you think you should go there alone late at night? Isn’t the television studio in the West Fifties where that gang called the Westies are?”

“Smith will not allow me to go alone, or so she says. I’m supposed to call her after I finish dinner.” She kissed Hazel’s cheek. “Be good.”

“How could I be anything else?” Hazel’s voice sounded rueful. Wetzon could feel her eyes on her as she left the room. Actually, she hadn’t made up her mind about Smith, and at the moment she was inclined to meet Teddy alone.