Walking the Labyrinth Read Free Page B

kinds of accusations, but I can’t even know who he is. Or she. Who does he think murdered her? My aunt, no doubt, for the inheritance.”
    “He doesn’t know. But like I said, I haven’t been able to find Thorne. She disappeared somewhere between here and Los Angeles.”
    “So what are you saying? Are you trying to hurt my aunt? She’s eighty-seven years old—she doesn’t need someone like you making trouble for her.”
    “Why do you think it would make trouble?”
    “Oh, please. What else? Here’s someone claiming to be related to us, claiming to be owed money—Well, my aunt doesn’t have any. That’s all I’m going to say.”
    “I don’t suppose you asked your aunt about a scrapbook,” Stow said.
    “Good-bye,” Molly said, and put the phone down.
    After she hung up she took the article Stow had given her out of her purse. She turned it over, wrote “Callan Allalie” and drew a vertical line connecting him to her mother and father, Joan and Bill Travers, killed in a car crash when she was three. She drew another descending line from her parents’ names, wrote “Molly A. Travers” under that. A horizontal line linked Callan to Fentrice; another joined him and Thorne. Molly thought for a moment, then put a question mark after Thorne.
    She turned the page over, looking for the author of the article. Without stopping to think she picked up a copy of the Oakland phone book. To her surprise an Andrew Dodd was listed. She dialed the number.
    The phone rang five times, and then a wavering male voice said, “Hello?”
    “Hello,” Molly said loudly. “Is this Andrew Dodd?”
    “Nothing wrong with my hearing. Who is this?”
    “My name’s Molly Travers. I want to ask you some questions about an article you wrote.”
    “Which one?”
    “The Allalie Family. The magicians.”
    “Allalie, is it? Say, that brings back memories.”
    “Can I talk to you about them?”
    “Sure, why not? How about tonight?”
    “Tonight?” Molly said. It would mean not being home if Peter called. Hell, let Peter wait, she thought. Let him see how he likes it. “That would be fine,” she said.
    After work she skipped dinner and drove to Andrew Dodd’s apartment in her old Honda Civic. Dodd lived in a renovated building of yellow-gray brick in downtown Oakland, not far from the old Tribune building. A yellow sign in front of the apartment said SENIORS XING; over that was a lozenge showing a silhouette of a man crossing the street.
    She found Dodd’s name and apartment number and pressed the buzzer next to it. “Who is it?” a woman’s voice asked.
    “Molly Travers.”
    “Please register at the desk when you come in,” the woman said. A buzzer sounded, and Molly pushed open the front door.
    The registration desk was to her left, past a bank of mailboxes. She went over and gave her name and Andrew Dodd’s, and the receptionist picked up the phone and punched a three-digit number.
    Andrew Dodd seemed to be taking a great deal of time to get to the phone. Molly studied the lobby with its faded maroon carpets and plush worn couches, its round wooden table and wilting centerpiece. “Mr. Dodd says to go on up,” the receptionist said finally. “The elevators are through that hallway.”
    She took the elevator to the third floor and rang the bell to Dodd’s apartment. Nothing happened. She rang again, then knocked. “In a minute,” Dodd’s voice said. “In a minute.” She heard something being dragged across the floor and then the door opened.
    Andrew Dodd looked far older than her aunt Fentrice. His gray hair was sparse on top, long and uncombed over his shirt collar. He had white stubble on his face, and deep lines, almost like scars, running from his nose to the sides of his mouth. At least he had smiled once, Molly thought. The sound she had heard was his walker, which he leaned on heavily.
    “Come in,” he said. “I’d offer you something but all I have is club soda.” The walker had wheels on its two