Death Wears a Beauty Mask and Other Stories by Mary Higgins Clark Page B

have had a good reason to just run away like that.”
    Hubert Twaddle nodded. “Mrs. Cooper, you are a very observant woman and you obviously dislike Grant Wilson. Tell me more about him.”
    â€œBad tempered. A bully.”
    â€œIf this is true, why would Miss Saunders have continued to work for him?”
    â€œI think it’s ’cause he has the biggest modeling agency and gets his people the best jobs.”
    â€œHow well do you know Larry Thompson?”
    â€œOh, he’s her favorite photographer. He’s a hard one to figure out. He kind of sits back and takes everything in, if you know what I mean. I know he had a hard time for a while. He and his wife split up. Then she got sick and they got back together. She died last year. But if you ask me, he’s another one who is sweet on Miss Alexandra. But then they all are.”
    â€œHave you ever met the pilot of the plane, Marcus Ambrose?”
    â€œOh, he’s been around. He calls her a lot.”
    She frowned and bit her lip. “There’s one thing you probably already know because we spoke to the cops about it. Miss Alexandra had someone stalking her last year. He’d leave creepy messages on the phone saying how much he loved her. Then he pasted notes on the terrace door at night. It was scary. The calls and notes just stopped. They never found him.”
    â€œMrs. Cooper, thank you. You’ve been a great help. Those young people are resting in the guest bedroom. By now the police will have completed this phase of the investigation. May I suggest that you tidy up the living room and, late as it is, prepare a light snack for them? From what Michael Broad told me, they have not eaten since lunch.”
    Emma sprang up. “Happy to help. When you think that poor girl is still on their honeymoon . . .” Obviously grateful to be able to take some action, she got up and with purposeful steps left the room.
    Twaddle had stood up with Emma. He waited until she was out of earshot, then said, “We will interview the building employees who were on duty. I suspect they will not be able to tell us anything. The door to the back terrace cannot be seen by the doorman. Tomorrow morning we will interrogate the three men who seem to be most closely involved with Alexandra Saunders: Grant Wilson, Larry Thompson and Marcus Ambrose.”
    Friday
    Grant Wilson lived on Fifth Avenue, in the apartment house next to the one where Jackie Kennedy had moved shortly after her husband’s assassination. It gave him a secret thrill to occasionally leave it at the same time she was leaving hers and have a chance to wish her a pleasant day.
    It had just happened this morning, and he was savoring the memory of the glamorous former first lady as he started his mile-and-a-half walk to the office. Then he was stopped by the doorman running after him to say that two detectives from the District Attorney’s Office urgently needed to see him.
    His mouth suddenly went dry with fear. He turned. They werestanding at the entrance to the apartment building. Not wanting to say anything in the presence of the doorman, Wilson invited them up to his apartment before he demanded to know why they were there.
    Before they had a chance to answer, he burst out, “It can’t be that something has happened to Alexandra?”
    Hubert Twaddle had already wondered if this might not be the response from the head of the modeling agency. After all, Wilson’s star model had been missing for three days. He had left countless messages begging her to be in touch and reminding her that the Beauty Mask campaign was in jeopardy. Now, seeing the sudden pallor that came over Wilson’s face, Twaddle concluded that the man might be genuinely afraid of what he might hear.
    â€œClearly you have not heard the news, Mr. Wilson,” Twaddle said. “Miss Alexandra Saunders was murdered in her apartment last night.”
    Wilson sank into a