Secret Combinations by Gordon Cope Page B

question,” said Kenyon. “I don’t have room for all this in my apartment in San Francisco. I guess I’m going to have to sell some of it, but I don’t know what.”
    â€œI understand; it’s important to look carefully,” agreed deWolfe. “One never knows what one might find.” He pulled out a gold pen and leather-bound notepad. “Perhaps it would help if I walked around and made a note or two?
    â€œYeah, go right ahead.” Kenyon glanced at his watch, remembering he hadn’t heard from Marge in San Francisco. He also wanted to collect his e-mail. “Do you mind if I go? I’ve got some stuff I have to do.”
    DeWolfe waved absently over his shoulder as Kenyon departed.
    Kenyon went upstairs and dug a netbook out of his luggage. He glanced around the room; there was nowhere to plug it in. The bedside table holding the phone was too tiny, and the coffee table in the bay window was too low.
    He wandered down the hall; there were three closed doors. The first door let to an oversized linen closet filled with towels, sheets, toilet paper, and a vacuum cleaner. The second concealed a steep stairwell that climbed to the attic floor above. Curious, he put down his computer, then, advancing with his left leg to avoid straining his injury, he made his way up.
    The third floor had been set up as a studio. A large wooden easel, now empty, dominated the center of the room. An old wooden chest covered with tubes of oil paint sat off to one side. A white lab coat hung from a peg. A second room, adjacent to the studio, had been fitted out as a workshop for framing paintings. The air in the studio was stale and dusty; it had the melancholy air of disuse.
    Returning to the second floor, Kenyon walked to the end of the hall; a loose floorboard let out a loud squeak as he opened the third door. This time he was lucky; it led to what was obviously Lydia’s home office. It was a small room with wooden wainscoting and a Persian rug, dominated by a large oak desk and a pigeonhole shelf. A large window looked out onto the back alley.
    Kenyon carried his netbook over to the desk. He noticed immediately that the office contained no home computer; it didn’t even have a printer or a cable jack. Lydia’s Filofax, a diary bound in black leather, was the only item resting upon the desk surface. He sat down in the desk chair and idly opened the daybook. The back flap was stuffed with business cards, phone numbers, and credit card receipts. He placed the diary into an empty slot in the pigeonhole shelf.
    Kenyon spotted Lydia’s American passport tucked into an adjacent pigeonhole. He flipped it open to study her photo. The color picture had been taken two years before, when Lydia had last renewed her passport. Her blond hair was longer, but her picture bore little resemblance to the oil portrait Kenyon had seen in O’Neill’s office. Her expression was almost defiant; Kenyon wondered what she had been thinking that moment.
    Just then, the phone rang. Startled, Kenyon picked it up. “What?”
    â€œHow-are-ya?” said Gonelli, in her thick New York accent.
    â€œGreat, Marge. I’m the proud owner of this big house in London. Man, the drapes alone are worth more than my car.”
    â€œSounds hoity-toity.”
    â€œYou bet. I hired this guy just to count the ashtrays.”
    â€œListen to the big-shot,” said Gonelli. “You’ll never want to come home.”
    â€œAre you kidding me? I miss you guys already.” It was true. Kenyon hadn’t even spent a night here, and already he was homesick.
    â€œWe’ll see,” said Gonelli. “You’ll meet some rich cutie with a snooty accent and forget the bunch of us.”
    â€œDon’t count on it. Hey, I hear Dahg got sprung.”
    â€œYeah, but he ain’t going far.”
    â€œWhat about Deaver? How’d he take it?”
    Kenyon could hear Marge spit a piece of