Alyssa did more than hide her home life from the women she worked the charity circuit with. She hid the charity circuit from her family as well. Nick, of course, she did not hide. She needed him as an escort when she went to parties and she needed him to figure out the money when there was money to figure out, because she wasn’t very good at it. Caroline and Paul and James were another matter. Alyssa supposed they knew she did these things. Their newspaper reading was as selective as everybody else’s, but Paul at least glanced through every page of any paper he bought, just in case he saw something that inspired him. Caroline probably restricted her reading to Dear Abby and Ann Landers and Dr. Joyce Brothers. As for James—there was no telling what James did, but once he had made a joke about the company she kept, so Alyssa assumed he had heard or read something. The point was that no member of her family except Nick knew anything in particular about what she did, and Alyssa wanted to keep it that way.
Alyssa had every reason to believe that her family was no more interested in learning about her life than she was in having them learn about it. That was why she was so shocked when she came out of The Silver Unicorn after her luncheon meeting for the steering committee for the Turkish ball to benefit the American Heart Association and saw That Woman waiting at the curb. That That Woman was waiting was undeniable. As soon as Alyssa came through The Silver Unicorn’s doors, That Woman straightened like a soldier and walked half a step forward.
That Woman was how Alyssa Hazzard Roderick tended to think of Candida DeWitt. It was not for the usual reasons. Candida didn’t look like the Other Woman. She looked like a Main Line matron. Alyssa had not cared for her stepmother, Jacqueline. In her opinion, Jacqueline was so awful, Paul was a saint for not having had affairs with every female he’d come across during the entire course of his second marriage. Except, of course, that he may have. The problem with Candida DeWitt, to Alyssa’s mind, was when she had surfaced. Just around the time Jacqueline died. Just around the time the police were looking for a good motive to hook on to Paul. Alyssa was sure Paul would never have been arrested if Candida hadn’t been on the scene, making such good newspaper copy.
It was too bad, really. On a metalevel, so to speak, Alyssa rather liked Candida DeWitt.
Candida moved forward again, getting closer. Women from the committee were coming out of The Silver Unicorn in little clubby clumps. They all seemed to be laughing in that oddly harsh way women do when they reach middle age and go to too many parties. Candida came up to Alyssa’s side and said, “Alyssa? I don’t know if you remember me.”
“Call me Ali,” Alyssa said in a pleasant voice, very much lower than the one Candida had used. “Or call me Mrs. Roderick.”
Candida’s eyes lit with understanding. “I see. They don’t know who you are. You seem to have done better with that than I have.”
“Done better with that?”
“You don’t think it’s been any different for me, do you?” Candida asked. “I try to put my lack of social engagements these days down to the fact that I’m getting older, but I know it’s not that. None of the kind of men I’m attracted to is the least bit interested in having a mistress who might very well have killed her last lover’s wife.”
“But you couldn’t have killed her,” Alyssa said. “That was proved absolutely at the time.”
“So what? People just cough politely and say, well, you never really know. And they’re suspicious enough to believe it. Will you walk with me a little while? There’s something I want to talk to you about.”
“Why me? Why not Caroline or James? Why not Paul?”
“I don’t know why you,” Candida said, “but you’re the one I seem to talk to. And I will admit I think you have the most sense. If we go west, we’ll be heading in the right direction for you to find a cab when the time comes. All right?”
It was true. When Candida DeWitt wanted to talk to one of the family, Alyssa was the one she talked to. When the family wanted to talk to Candida, they sent Nick. Cars had begun to pull up at the curb. Nobody offered to give Alyssa a ride. They knew she always refused.
Alyssa and Candida began to walk west, not hurrying, not strolling exactly. It was far too cold to stroll.
“Did you tell the family about my book?” Candida asked after a while. “I suppose they might have known under any circumstances. It was announced in a few places.”
“I told them,” Alyssa said. “They weren’t very happy.”
“I wouldn’t have expected them to be.” Candida shrugged. “Really, there’s no way to make everybody happy in situations like these. You just have to go ahead and do what’s right for you. That’s all I’m doing, you know.”