Your Eyelids Are Growing Heavy (4 page)

He thought about lying but told the truth. “Twenty-one.”

“You're twenty-one years old and you've had your doctorate for a year?”

He gave an embarrassed laugh. “I took every summer school course I could since I was fourteen. You can get through fast if you schedule things right.”

Megan didn't quite believe that, but she didn't contradict him. Gus was probably trying to avoid the boy-genius tag. “So now you're teaching—part-time?”

“For now. Until I decide what I want to do. Teaching's all right, for a while. Nobody'll offer me a full-time contract, because I'm too young. Industry doesn't want Ph.D.s—they don't trust them.”

Megan smiled. “How about writing the Great American Whatsit?”

“Maybe someday,” he said vaguely. “When I have something to say.”

She noted he'd said
when
and not
if
. Gus had lost most of his nervousness, as people generally do when given a chance to talk about themselves. “Gus, you heard me when I came in tonight? In the lobby, I mean.”

He nodded.

“And Sunday?”

“I hear when everybody comes in. The walls are thin.”

She tried to make her voice casual. “Did you hear me come in last Friday?”

“Friday?” He looked surprised.

“I can't remember what time I got home from work, and I'd like to know, that's all. You wouldn't happen to know, would you?”

He glanced away. “You didn't come home Friday night.”

“Now, Gus, how can you be sure of that?” she said tightly.

“The lobby is directly over my desk.” He nodded his head toward his bedroom. “The floor isn't carpeted. I can hear people moving around.”

“But how do you know
who
's moving around? How do you know when it's me?”

“Your walk,” he said. “There are only four women in this building—you and Andrea Brownlee and Mrs. Frazier and Mrs. Atkins. You all have a different walk.”

“And you didn't hear my walk Friday night?”

Gus looked uncomfortable. “No.”

“What about Saturday?”

“I wasn't here all day Saturday.”

“Saturday night?”

He looked even more uncomfortable. “I didn't hear you Saturday night either.”

Megan's face took on a pinched look and her eyes turned inward. She was silent so long that Gus began to fidget.

Finally he couldn't stand it any longer. “Megan, what's wrong?” he blurted out. “Why are you asking
me
whether you came home or not? Don't you know?”

Megan grunted; she hadn't handled
that
any too subtly. Oh, what the hell. “No, I don't know. All I know is that I woke up on the Schenley Park golf course Sunday morning. I have no idea how I got there.”

Gus's mouth dropped open and his bulging eyes bulged even more. “You woke up on … Megan, tell me about it.”

“I just did. I left work late Friday afternoon and I woke up in Schenley Park Sunday morning. I have no memory of anything that happened in between.”

He let out a low whistle. “Have you seen somebody about it?”

“I just now got back from talking to a psychiatrist.”

“What did he say?”

“She. She said get a physical examination, find out if there's an organic cause.”

“And then?”

Megan shrugged.

Gus leaned back on the sofa, completely unselfconscious for the first time since his guest had come in. Somehow Megan Phillips had managed to lose the best part of a weekend; it was a puzzle, all right. Gus loved puzzles.

“Okay,” he said, “think back to last Friday. What's the last thing you remember? It's time to go home—you pick up your purse, turn out the lights. Then what?”

“Then I went to the elevator, pushed the button, waited. When the car came, I got on and …” She trailed off, puzzled.

“Do you remember getting off the elevator?”

“No. No, I don't.”

“So whatever happened started while you were on the elevator. Was anybody on the elevator with you?”

“No, the car was empty. I'd worked a little late—almost everyone else had already gone.”

“Did you see anyone between your office and the elevator?”

Megan shook her head.

“Back up a little. Who's the last person you do remember seeing on Friday?”

Megan squinted her eyes. “One of the secretaries, I think. Yes. Ellie Mattheson. I dictated a couple of memos.”

“But after her, nobody? Are you sure?”

Megan thought a moment. “Yes, I'm sure. Ellie's the last person I remember seeing.”

“Anything unusual happen during the day?”

“Not a thing.”

Gus had reservations about that one but decided to let it ride for the moment. “All right, go ahead to Sunday morning. You woke up on the golf course. Where, exactly?”

“On the fairway of the fourteenth hole. A groundskeeper woke me up.”

“Did you know him?”

“Never saw him before. Then I went to the clubhouse and called a cab. There was a man in the clubhouse reading the Sunday paper—that's how I found out I'd lost two nights and a day instead of just one night.”

“You came home in a cab. Where was your car?”

Megan looked at him alertly. “It's interesting you should ask that. Monday morning I found it parked around the corner, on Bellefonte Street. I
never
park on Bellefonte.”

Gus felt a little stir of excitement. Behind the apartment building was a parking area that wasn't visible from the street; you had to drive through a little alley to get to it. Sometimes the residents of the building would leave their cars out front for a minute, on Howe Street, while they rushed in to get something and right back out again. But there was no need for any of them to park on Bellefonte.

“You know what that means, don't you?” Gus said. “Somebody else drove your car here, somebody who doesn't know about the parking area in back. All the parking spots on Howe must have been taken, so he had to drive around the corner to Bellefonte.”

Megan nodded. “I've been wondering about that. But who?”

“More to the point, how? Where were your car keys?”

Megan's eyes grew wide. “I never thought of that. They were in my purse.”

“So somebody brought your car home for you and then returned the keys to your purse,” Gus mused. “Or else he managed to break into your car and hot-wire the engine. Was the window by the driver's seat rolled down a little, maybe an inch?”

Megan thought back. “Sorry, I don't remember.”

“What about scratches in the paint, some sign that a coat hanger or something had been used to unlock the door?”

“Didn't notice anything.”

They were both silent for a while. Then Gus said, “I think it's safe to conclude you didn't spend the weekend alone in the wood picking mushrooms—wrong time of year for that anyway. There's somebody out there who knows what you were doing. He made sure your car got home safely—but not you. Don't you find that peculiar? Why would he be so conscientious about returning your car but leave you asleep on a golf course?”

“Maybe we got separated,” Megan floundered. “Assuming I spent my time with this unknown somebody.” She laughed shortly. “Maybe it's
Three Faces of Eve
all over again. Maybe I have a complete, separate personality I don't even know about, one that picks up strangers in bars for wild, drunken, orgiastic weekends.”

“Yet when I offered you a hair of the dog you said you didn't have a hangover.”

“And I didn't. I was a little stiff from sleeping on the ground, but that's all. Gus, I don't drink. Not at all. Not even wine any more.”

Gus leaned forward eagerly. “Seems to me the first thing is to find this guy. You could advertise in the paper.” The look of distaste on Megan's face made him retreat. “Sorry. Just a suggestion.”

She smiled wryly. “You're enjoying this, aren't you, Gus?”

He grinned sheepishly. “Just as a puzzle to be worked out. I know this can't be easy for you. You must have been scared as hell. But it's not an impossible problem. Was there anything in your purse to indicate where you might have been?”

“You mean like a motel room key?” she said sardonically, and laughed when he got that uncomfortable look again.

“I meant like ticket stubs or a matchbook advertising the Kit Kat Klub or something like that.”

Megan shook her head. “I thought of that. There wasn't anything.”

“Only one other thing I can think of right now. Where do you leave your car while you're at work?”

“In one of those underground lots in Gateway Center.”

Gus groaned. “Those places are huge. I don't suppose the people in the booths would notice if somebody else drove your car out?”

“Not a chance. They don't even look at you when they take your money.”

They mulled it over a little longer but got nowhere, and Megan stood up to go. Gus asked her if she had a picture of herself he could have.

“A picture?” She looked at him suspiciously. “Gus, what are you planning?”

“Well, if I'm going to play detective, I have to do the things detectives do. And the first thing they always do is ask for a picture.”

“You're going to prowl around Pittsburgh flashing my picture and saying have you seen this woman?”

Belatedly, it occurred to Gus that his request might seem presumptuous. “Hey, I'm sorry. I didn't mean anything. I just thought I could help.”

“I know. But I didn't mean to drag you in on this. It's not your problem.”

“Don't say that.” He looked affronted. “I
want
to help. Megan, I won't embarrass you. I can be discreet. Even though you might not think so to look at me.”

She laughed and gave in. “All right, come upstairs. I'll find you a picture.”

CHAPTER 3

Megan was looking over the monthly distribution summaries when a shadow fell across her desk.

It was Bogert. “You just had to go over my head, didn't you? You couldn't wait to stick it to me.”

This was the first time she'd seen him since the fiasco on Monday, three days earlier. “Well, Bogert, I did keep telling you there were things to be considered other than security. I can't
make
you listen.”

“So you run to the president the first chance you get. You really jumped at the chance, didn't you?”

“Oh, come off it. What was I supposed to do? Let an entire shipment of vaccine be ruined just to save you embarrassment?”

“You could have told
me
.”

“How? You made it quite clear you were going to stand by that truck you wanted so much and stop any attempt to get the shipment switched back. Or have you forgotten making that little threat?”

“I didn't threaten you,” he snorted. “You're hysterical. You don't remember things right.”

Megan looked at him coolly. “You don't give a damn about that vaccine, do you? You don't care how many kids might have come down with polio—you haven't even thought about it.
You haven't even thought about it,”
she repeated.

Bogert was angry; his face turned red and his whole body tensed. “There's something wrong with you, lady. You better get your head straightened out. See a doctor.”

Megan stared at him with unconcealed disgust. It was one of the most underhanded tricks men had ever played on women, and they'd been playing it a long time.
You aren't behaving the way I want you to behave, so that means something is wrong with your mind. You're sick, get help, take a pill
. Shoot her up and shut her up.

“Now you've gone too far,” Megan said quietly. “I was willing to settle for peaceful coexistence, but not now. Be very careful not to make any more dumb mistakes, Bogert. Because I'm going to be watching for them.”

He leaned over her desk and pointed a stubby finger at her face. “I'm not going to forget this,” he hissed. He turned on his heel and left.

“And I'll make sure you don't,” she murmured to his retreating back.

It took her several minutes to calm down. Megan didn't thrive on ugly scenes, but there was a sort of perverse satisfaction in finally having it out with Bogert.

Yet almost immediately she began having regrets. What if he found out about her blackout? That's all he'd need to claim she was a security risk and get her fired.
You can't trust the shipment of drugs to someone who's likely to go off her nut at any minute
, he'd say. And if she left Glickman with the stigma of “mental troubles” attached to her, what would her job prospects be then?

Perhaps she should have soft-pedaled the whole affair, tried to smooth things over—no, damn it. No. He was responsible for his acts, just like everyone else. She'd outfoxed him by being sneaky, and she could do it again if she had to. She
would
do it again—first chance she got. She couldn't afford to be passive now: she had to get Bogert before he got her.

Those missing thirty-eight hours suddenly took on an immense importance. What if she really was a security risk? Megan shook her head in dismay—how insidious was the mere suggestion of mental instability. But she had blacked out for thirty-eight hours, there was no getting around that. What if it had happened while she was at work?

Worse—what if it happened again?

Dr. Snooks looked at Megan Phillips in surprise. “You work for a pharmaceuticals manufacturer and you still say you don't take drugs?”

Megan smiled. “They don't exactly leave samples lying about, you know. It's all very tightly controlled. The lab workers say it's easier for a street dealer to get hold of drugs than someone working at Glickman Pharmaceuticals. Besides, I work in the business offices, not in the labs.”

Megan's physician had been unable to find any organic cause for her blackout, so the problem was back to the psychiatrist. Dr. Snooks was trying to find out as much as she could about her new patient, to get an idea of the best way to proceed. After a period of administering a tolerable third degree, she made up her mind.