“Yes, him,” I confirmed. “Did he come in here?”
“Nope. We would have freaked if he did.”
“Shout if you see him. I’ll be right back.”
The door to Penny’s studio was closed. I flung it open, rushed inside, and found her at the easel.
So dimensional was the image of the villain owl that it seemed to be flying at me from out of the canvas, beak wide to rend and eyes hot for blood.
Certain that she knew the cause of my breathless entrance, Penny spoke before I could say a word: “Did the coffeemaker assault you or have you used the dishwasher again and flooded the kitchen?”
“Big problem,” I said. “Milo. Come quick.”
She put down her brush and hurried after me. When she saw Milo tinkering in peace and Lassie without hackles raised, Penny sighed with relief and said to me, “The punch line better be hilarious.”
“Stay here with him. Brace the door with that chair when I leave.”
“What? Why?”
“If someone asks you to open the door, even if it sounds like me, don’t open it.”
“Cubby—”
“Ask something only I would know—like where we went on our first date. He probably can’t imitate my voice—I mean, he’s not a comic-book supercriminal, for God’s sake—but you never know.”
“He who? What’s wrong with you?”
“There was an intruder. I think he’s gone, but I’m not sure.”
Her eyes widened as might those of a mouse in the sudden shadow of a swooping owl. “Call 911.”
“He’s not that kind of intruder.”
“There isn’t any other kind.”
“Besides, I might have imagined him.”
“Did you see him or not?”
“I saw something.”
“Then it’s 911.”
“I’m a public figure. The media will follow the cops, it’ll be a publicity circus.”
“Better than you dead.”
“I’ll be okay. Use the chair as a brace.”
“Cubby—”
Stepping into the shorter of the two upstairs hallways, I pulled the door shut. I waited until I heard the headrail of the straight-backed chair knock against the knob as she jammed it into place.
Dependable Penny.
Reason argued that a renowned critic and textbook author like Shearman Waxx was not likely to be a psychopath. Eccentric, yes, and perhaps even weird. But not homicidal. Reason, in its true premodern meaning, had served me well for many years.
Nevertheless, from a hall table, I seized a tall, heavy vase with a fat bottom and a narrow neck. Flat-footed athlete that I am, I held it as I would have held a tennis racket—awkwardly.
In addition to Milo’s quarters, this back hall served two small guest rooms, a bath, and a utility closet. Quickly, quietly, I opened doors, searched, found no one.
As I turned toward the longer of the two second-floor hallways—off which lay the master suite, Penny’s studio, and another bedroom that we used for storage—I heard a noise downstairs. The short-lived clatter rose through the back stairwell, from the kitchen, and the silence in its wake had an ominous quality.
Ceramic vase held high, as if I were a contestant in a Home and Garden Television version of a reality show like Survivor, defending my home with any available decorative item, I cautiously descended the stairs.
Waxx wasn’t in the kitchen or in the family room beyond. All appeared to be in order.
The swinging door between the kitchen and the downstairs hall was closed. I didn’t think it had been closed earlier.
As I eased open the door, I saw Waxx at the far end of the hallway, exiting my study on the right, crossing the foyer.
“Hey,” I called to him. “What’re you doing?”
He didn’t reply or glance at me, but disappeared into the library.
I considered calling 911, after all, but the nonchalance with which Shearman Waxx toured our house began to seem more weird than menacing. When Hamal Sarkissian called Waxx strange, he most likely meant eccentric.
In his reviews he assaulted with words, but that did not mean he was capable of real violence. In fact, the opposite was usually true: Those who trafficked in hostile rhetoric might inspire others to commit crimes, but they were usually cowards who would take no risk themselves.
Still armed with the vase, I followed the hallway to the foyer and pursued Waxx into the library.
In some higher-end Southern California neighborhoods, a library is considered as necessary as a kitchen, a symbol of the residents’ refinement. About a third of these rooms contain no books.
In those instances, the shelves are filled with collections of bronze figurines or ceramics. Or with DVDs. But the space is still referred to as the library.
In another third, the books have been bought for their handsome bindings. They are meant to imply erudition, but a visitor’s attempt to have a conversation about any title on display will inspire the host either to talk about the movie based on the book or to retreat to the bar to mix another drink.
Our library contained books we had read or intended to read, a desk, a sofa, two armchairs, and side tables, but it did not contain Shearman Waxx. Evidently he had gone through the door between the library and the living room.
As I stepped into that adjacent chamber, I saw movement beyond the double doors to the dining room. Waxx entered the china pantry that insulated the dining room from the kitchen, and the door swung shut behind him.
By the time I crossed the living room and half the dining room, I saw Waxx through a window. He was outside now, walking toward the front of the house.
When I dashed to the next window and rapped on a pane as he passed, the critic did not deign to look at me.
I put down the vase and hurried into the living room once more. Waxx was not running, just walking briskly, but he passed the windows before I could get to one of them to rap for his attention.
In the library, through a window that faced the street, I saw him crossing the front lawn toward a black Cadillac Escalade parked at the curb.
Library to foyer to front door, I said, “No, no, no. No you don’t, you syntax-challenged sonofabitch.”
As I came out of the house onto the stoop, I saw Waxx behind the wheel of the SUV.
Again the day was becalmed. The dead air felt thick, compressed under the flat leaden sky. In the gray light of late afternoon, the fronds of the phoenix palms hung as motionless as if they were cast iron.
Later, I could not recall hearing the engine of the Escalade. The SUV pulled slowly into the street and began to glide away like a ghost ship glimpsed cruising a strange sea.
On the lawn, a flock of large black crows appeared not to have been disturbed by the critic’s passage. As I stepped from the stoop onto the walkway, the birds erupted from the grass in a tribulation of wings so great that my eardrums shivered.
Hoping to catch up with Waxx when he braked for the stop sign at the corner, I ran into the street. Without pause,