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today. So she
showered again, dressed simply, and threw a carry-on bag onto her
bed. She had thought all day about what to take, and the items she
put in the bag were gravid with memories. Three books went in
first. One, an anonymous Victorian novel, the second a fairy-tale
romance, the third a collection of short stories about gay men. All
were about surrender and mastery. All of them were worn with
handling. A leather collar, bearing a golden “M” in gentle
scrollwork followed. A small box of jewelry. A woven leather
wrist-cuff, worked into a complex mystery braid. Her favorite
pillowcase, dusky rose in color, a whispery cotton that felt smooth
and comforting beneath her cheek. Then, she tossed in her latest
journal and a box of her favorite pens, her address book, wallet,
and banking items. Her passport and ID. Her prescription
medications she tossed in just in case, and followed them with her
spare reading glasses.
    It was such a minuscule collection, really.
Hardly the markings of a complex life.
    The Rolodex seemed monstrously huge next to
the phone.
    But there was no time now!
Robin locked the door and ran to the elevator, trying to close out
all thoughts of the one job she hadn’t even thought of all
day. Maybe
tomorrow ,
she said to herself, waving down a cab. Or the next day.
    She stopped at the hotel, as she had
planned, and picked up Parker’s garment bag, and then continued on
uptown. The West Side traffic was hellish, and she kept glancing at
her watch the whole ride. But she arrived in the neighborhood with
plenty of time to spare, and the doorman in the beautiful old
building only gave her the slightest look as she walked into the
stately lobby.
    It was a beautiful pre-war
building, and as she admired the scrollwork inside the elevator,
she idly wondered about the costs of living up here. Nothing I could
afford , she
noted while she looked for the apartment number. She used both keys
and let herself into a spacious, airy home with a long hallway
leading to a living room that had a magnificent corner view of the
river. Below her, trees swayed in the park and cars rumbled past on
the expressway, but the river gleamed, a dark, sparkling line of
reflections.
    This is beautiful! Robin dropped the
luggage and ran over to the windows to look out and down. I could never,
never afford a view like this! She turned into the room to look around.
Whoever decorated this room knew enough not to take away from the
visual centerpiece. Woven rugs lay scattered across a pale,
polished wooden floor, and the furniture was arranged so that no
one needed to sit with their back toward the scenery. Natural
canvas and heavy wooden frames dominated the look, rather
southwestern. A desk stood in the corner opposite the windows; it
would never lack for natural light.
    Robin spotted several genuine
pieces of antique painted pottery on a shelf in a glass-fronted
cabinet, and the framed photos on one wall were classic (if
somewhat standard) Ansel Adams. On the other hand, there was a
definite lack of western kitsch in the room―no bronze replicas of
Remington statues, no horseshoe mandalas strung with colored yarn
and rabbit fur scraps. It showed not only an interest, but a
knowledgeable one, guided by a sense of authenticity and money. It
could have been brought together by a good decorator, except that
some of the collectible pieces were just slightly out of period and
style, something a perfectionist wouldn’t stand for.
    Slavery must
pay , was her
first thought. Funny, though. I hadn’t figured Parker for the southwestern
type. I would have guessed he was an anglophile, and had a place
filled with big comfy chairs and a zillion books, all arranged by
topic, author and edition date. And, thinking of the man... well, I
guess he’s not here yet. A glance at her watch showed that he wasn’t due
for another fifteen minutes.
    OK, that leaves me a few seconds to learn my
way around. First, grab the garment bag and search for the