Deadly Grace. Taylor Smith
much less Paul Revere, would they?”
Cruz opted not to speculate about which ignorant bureaucrats he was referring to. And while they were on the subject, wasn’t Twomey on the government payroll, too? “Did you ever get it back?”
“No. Your people still haven’t come through for us.”
Cruz had the feeling he was supposed to feel guilty, but he was damned if he was going to apologize for not showing up with Twomey’s missing teapot.
“I’m trying to get in touch with Miss Meade,” he said.
“Yes, so the girl said. Jillian is one of my curatorial associates, but she’s not in today. Is there something I can help you with?”
“Can you tell me where I might find her?”
“She’s out of town.”
“A business trip?”
“No, personal. What’s this about?”
Cruz gave him the same stock answer he’d given the caretaker—the same answer he gave anyone with no need to know and without the sense to realize they had no need to know. “It’s a routine matter. When do you expect her back at work?”
“I’m not sure. Friday, maybe? Monday, at the latest, she said.”
“Where did she go?”
“To Minnesota to see her mother. I had the impression there was a problem at home, although Jillian didn’t come right out and say, and I certainly wasn’t about to pry.”
“What kind of problem?”
Twomey moved to the desk and perched on the edge of it. “As I say, I didn’t press her on it. I do know that her mother had a cancer scare last year, so perhaps there was a recurrence.”
“Where in Minnesota, do you know?”
“A small town called Havenwood. It’s about a hundred miles from Minneapolis, I think Jillian said. She grew up there.”
“She wasn’t born there,” Cruz noted.
Twomey arched a brow, and the disapproving lines around his mouth deepened. “No, she wasn’t, as a matter of fact. Been doing your homework, I see. She was born in France. Her mother was an English war bride, her father an American pilot with the OSS—the Office of Strategic Services. That’s—”
“The forerunner of the CIA, yes, I know,” Cruz said. He might not know plate from pewter but he wasn’t a total idiot. “So the family came back to the States after the war?”
“Jillian and her mother did. Her father was killed in action over there. His parents invited Mrs. Meade to bring the baby—Jillian, that is—and come live with them. That’s how she ended up out there, although Jillian left after high school. Attended Georgetown University, and then she came to work here.”
“What does she do here? You said she’s a curatorial associate. What does that mean, exactly?”
Twomey shrugged. “She puts together exhibits for our permanent and roving collections. Researches background materials, writes pamphlets and monographs. We have several different departments here, a couple of dozen researchers, but Jillian is really quite the best of the lot. Her specialty is the military and social history of World War II. She’s been working on an oral history for the past four or five years, collecting interviews with people who were involved in various anti-Nazi operations in the European theater. It’s fascinating work, you know. That generation isn’t going to be around forever, and she’s doing invaluable work, collecting their reminiscences. I’ve been encouraging her to develop it into a book or a doctoral thesis.”
“She’s been looking at operations in the European theater?” Cruz said, his interest piqued now.
“Yes. It started with recently declassified OSS files here in Washington that I’d arranged for her to have access to. Jillian began sifting through them and then got permission to follow up with some of the retired operatives. She’s amassed quite an amount of interesting material. As I say, I think she has the makings of a book. Jillian’s published several monographs and co-authored a couple of exhibit-related books under the auspices of our presses here, but I think this is going to be her breakout work.”
“You seem very impressed with her.”
“Absolutely. In the field of history, Agent Cruz, there are good researchers, good interviewers and good writers. Rarely, though, do you find all three in one person. Jillian is that rare exception. Unfortunately, unlike others of far lesser talent, she doesn’t seem to realize her own gifts. I must confess, I despair sometimes of her reaching her full potential. It’s a question of self-confidence, isn’t it? But I’m trying to encourage her in any way I can.”
“So, you’re sort of Henry Higgins to her Eliza Doolittle?”
Twomey arched his brow slightly. “If I can mentor someone with Miss Meade’s talents, Agent Cruz, then I am happy to do that.”
Right, Cruz thought. The guy’s in love with her. If she attracted a prig like this Twomey, he could just imagine the kind of dry, repressed, severe old maid this Jillian Meade was going to turn out to be. But that said, she hardly sounded like someone who’d be out creating mayhem and leaving dead bodies in her wake. “Had she been to Europe lately?”
“Yes. She was over in London and Paris last month. She’s working on a new exhibit we’re pulling together here on American covert support to the French Resistance. We’d been offered access to some materials at the Imperial War Museum in London and the Quai d’Orsay. I sent Jillian over to take a look. She was obviously the best person for the job, but I was encouraging her while she was there to follow up on her own research, as well.”
“What did she tell you about her trip? Anything unusual happen while she was over there?”
“Like what?”
Like, two people were murdered and she was among the last people to see them alive, Cruz was tempted to say. But he was there to get information, not offer it. “Anything unusual,” he repeated, shrugging. “Anyone she met, or anything she might have seen that was out of the ordinary.”
“I haven’t really gotten the full rundown yet on how she made out over there. She just got back a few days before Christmas, and then she was leaving to spend the holidays with her mother. I was off with friends and then attending a symposium at Harvard last week. I’d no sooner gotten back into town than Jillian told me she had to go out to Minnesota and look in on her mother. Ships passing in the night, you see.”
“The girl outside said she was due back Friday?”
“Or Monday,” Twomey replied, nodding.
“Do you happen to have a number for her mother in Minnesota?” Cruz asked. Whatever else was going on, it was stretching credulity to think this Meade woman was going to be a murder suspect. Maybe this was one of those cases he could dispatch with a quick telephone interview, then move on to other, more pressing cases.
Twomey moved behind his desk, rummaging around in loose papers. “Yes, she did leave a number. She’d sent some new brochures off to the printer, and I wanted to be able to get in touch with her if there was any problem with them. Look, what is this about? Why is the FBI, for heaven sake, taking an interest in Jillian Meade?”
Cruz shrugged. “Just a routine inquiry, as I said.”
“Aha, there it is!” Twomey spotted a scrap of paper taped to the corner of his telephone. Withdrawing a fountain pen from a burled walnut holder on his desk, he copied a number on a piece of paper and handed it to Cruz.
“Appreciate the information, Mr. Twomey.”
“It’s Dr. Twomey, actually.”
“Right,” Cruz said. He was already at the door with a hand on the knob, but he paused to examine a row of framed photographs and certificates he hadn’t noticed on the