she wanted an attractive man to talk to she could talk to Inspector Benet. She’d given him silver hair and solemn brown eyes. She’d made him perfect. She’d found something appealing about a man with a thick head of hair. In the years since she’d stopped writing, the part she’d missed the most had been Benet—but then, she did still talk to him when she wanted. Occasionally he answered. Between the fictional characters and her lost loved ones, Maggie could spend a great deal of time talking to the air, and why not? Perhaps that was heaven, conversation with those you loved, real or not. Why would she want to disturb that?
Past the shops in Tarrytown, the Junior League thrift store, a church where she’d gone to a funeral, a synagogue, a park, another park, a place where a traitor had been shot during the Revolutionary War. Past Sunnyside where docents dressed in nineteenth-century clothes took you on tours of Washington Irving’s home. Farther south on Broadway, entering her village, passing by the church that she loved so well. Admiring the way the steeple reached to the sky. An old-fashioned building made of stone and marble, for an old-fashioned woman with an old-fashioned life.
She’d only ever had one fight with her husband, and that had been over whether or not to have a child. Stuart thought he was too old. She’d pressed him. She wanted a child, hoped for a daughter. She knew he’d be a good father, and he was. In so many ways, more patient and loving than she was. How he’d loved walking with his beautiful little girl up and down the hills of their village, along the aqueduct that ran through it, and alongside the river, skimming rocks, fishing, sometimes swimming. He’d tried hard to split Juliet away from Peter. He’d never understood Peter’s virtues, only seen his faults. Thankfully, Stuart died a year before Juliet did. Maggie’s first thought, when the phone call came from Doc Steinberg about Juliet, was that she was glad he hadn’t lived to see it. Glad to think that Stuart was already in heaven, waiting to welcome his daughter.
She stopped writing about Inspector Benet after Juliet died. She tried to keep going, but every time she started a new book, she found herself killing him off. She couldn’t foresee an ending in which Benet lived. Every time he went out to solve a case, he got hit by a bus, or stabbed or, in its final iteration, hit by lightning. Her publisher suggested coming up with a different hero. Maybe she’d done all she could with Inspector Benet, but she didn’t want to leave him. She’d wanted him to die.
Her publisher suggested she was depressed and should get some help, but she didn’t want help. She wanted to mourn.
She turned down Main Street. The river shimmered in front of her like a dream. Every color was as carefully delineated as a needlepoint: here silver blue; there midnight blue; here sky blue. Everything so clear. She couldn’t get over the beauty of this river, its timelessness. It was impossible to own, to understand; it could only be appreciated. She thought of Peter. She would have to go talk to him. She prayed his conflict with Bender wasn’t too terrible. Suddenly she felt weak, dizzy, couldn’t go any farther. She wasn’t more than two blocks from home, but she worried she’d crash the car. She pulled in to the first spot, surprised to see a crowd in front of her, even more surprised when they all turned to look at her curiously. Then they began to do something very odd. They began to clap.
Chapter 11
Maggie assumed the crowd was applauding someone behind her, so she turned her head, expecting to see something remarkable. But all she saw was Sal Martini, slumped against a streetlamp, squinting up at the sun. She turned back to the crowd, wondering if she was hallucinating, but then the crowd parted and there was Hal Carter. He was having his annual furnace drive, she realized, and he was trying to dragoon her.
“It’s our local
Past the shops in Tarrytown, the Junior League thrift store, a church where she’d gone to a funeral, a synagogue, a park, another park, a place where a traitor had been shot during the Revolutionary War. Past Sunnyside where docents dressed in nineteenth-century clothes took you on tours of Washington Irving’s home. Farther south on Broadway, entering her village, passing by the church that she loved so well. Admiring the way the steeple reached to the sky. An old-fashioned building made of stone and marble, for an old-fashioned woman with an old-fashioned life.
She’d only ever had one fight with her husband, and that had been over whether or not to have a child. Stuart thought he was too old. She’d pressed him. She wanted a child, hoped for a daughter. She knew he’d be a good father, and he was. In so many ways, more patient and loving than she was. How he’d loved walking with his beautiful little girl up and down the hills of their village, along the aqueduct that ran through it, and alongside the river, skimming rocks, fishing, sometimes swimming. He’d tried hard to split Juliet away from Peter. He’d never understood Peter’s virtues, only seen his faults. Thankfully, Stuart died a year before Juliet did. Maggie’s first thought, when the phone call came from Doc Steinberg about Juliet, was that she was glad he hadn’t lived to see it. Glad to think that Stuart was already in heaven, waiting to welcome his daughter.
She stopped writing about Inspector Benet after Juliet died. She tried to keep going, but every time she started a new book, she found herself killing him off. She couldn’t foresee an ending in which Benet lived. Every time he went out to solve a case, he got hit by a bus, or stabbed or, in its final iteration, hit by lightning. Her publisher suggested coming up with a different hero. Maybe she’d done all she could with Inspector Benet, but she didn’t want to leave him. She’d wanted him to die.
Her publisher suggested she was depressed and should get some help, but she didn’t want help. She wanted to mourn.
She turned down Main Street. The river shimmered in front of her like a dream. Every color was as carefully delineated as a needlepoint: here silver blue; there midnight blue; here sky blue. Everything so clear. She couldn’t get over the beauty of this river, its timelessness. It was impossible to own, to understand; it could only be appreciated. She thought of Peter. She would have to go talk to him. She prayed his conflict with Bender wasn’t too terrible. Suddenly she felt weak, dizzy, couldn’t go any farther. She wasn’t more than two blocks from home, but she worried she’d crash the car. She pulled in to the first spot, surprised to see a crowd in front of her, even more surprised when they all turned to look at her curiously. Then they began to do something very odd. They began to clap.
Chapter 11
Maggie assumed the crowd was applauding someone behind her, so she turned her head, expecting to see something remarkable. But all she saw was Sal Martini, slumped against a streetlamp, squinting up at the sun. She turned back to the crowd, wondering if she was hallucinating, but then the crowd parted and there was Hal Carter. He was having his annual furnace drive, she realized, and he was trying to dragoon her.
“It’s our local
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