Son of Stone (Stone Barrington 21)

Peter thought about it for a few seconds. “That’s fine. Just call your mother and tell them you want to do dinner and a double feature with me, and you’ll be home by eleven.”

“All right,” she said. “With the rest period, this will take about four hours. Why don’t you go to a movie or something, then come back for me?”

“All right,” he replied.

“Wish me luck.”

“You’ll be fine.”

They kissed, and she went back through the door.

Peter sat, a little breathless, and planned how they were going to do this. He checked his watch, then he left and walked down to the multiplex cinema on East Eighty-sixth Street. He had half an hour’s wait before the movie he wanted to see started, so he had a snack nearby, then returned for the film.

When Peter came out of the movie it was dark, and he still had another hour before Hattie could leave the clinic, so he walked slowly back in that direction, window-shopping, taking his time.

When he arrived at the clinic he sat down in the waiting room. A woman opened a glass partition. “You’re Ms. Springer’s friend, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” he replied.

“I’m afraid there’s been a complication, and she’s been taken to the emergency room.”

Peter’s heart jumped into his throat. “Where?”

“She’s at Lenox Hill Hospital,” the woman replied.

Peter ran down the stairs and looked desperately for a cab. It had started to rain, and there were none.

He began to run. Lenox Hill was in the upper Seventies, he wasn’t sure which street. He alternately sprinted, jogged, and walked, and the sweat was coming through his clothes.

He asked a cop for directions and got them, then he stood and caught his breath for a minute and called home.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Dad.”

“Peter? Where are you? I was expecting you home from school.”

“Hattie and I went to a movie, and we want to go to a double feature now, so I’ll grab a bite between movies.”

“Is that all right with her parents?”

“Yes, she’s already talked to them.”

“All right, I’ll see you later.”

Peter ended the call and began to run again. He still had two blocks to go.

59

T im Rutledge stood in the rain across the street from Stone Barrington’s house and huddled under the flimsy umbrella he had paid a street vendor ten dollars for. As he watched, the light in a street-level window went off, and a woman emerged from the adjacent door and locked it. She put up her umbrella and hurried up the block toward Third Avenue.

Rutledge waited for her to disappear around the corner, then he crossed the street, went down a couple of steps, and peered through the window where the light had gone off. There were two or three pieces of office equipment with small screens that gave off enough of a glow for him to make out a desk, filing cabinets, and a pair of chairs. The woman must be Barrington’s secretary, because his residence and office addresses were the same, with an A added to the office street number. He tried the door, but it was securely locked.

Rutledge looked up the block and saw a police car coming, so he ducked under the steps to the upstairs residence until it had passed. On the other side of the steps was a garage door that, apparently, belonged to the house. He stepped back to the sidewalk and looked at the first-floor windows. Lights were on somewhere to the rear of the house, but he saw no sign of life. A light burned over the front door.

Turtle Bay, he knew, had a common garden, surrounded on two sides by rows of houses. The Second Avenue side was made up of a row of shops, and the Third Avenue side was taken up by an office building.

Rutledge walked around the block until he stood at a point even with the rear of Barrington’s house. Some of these common gardens had an entrance opening to the street, and he walked down the b