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“I have a remarkable memory,” he says. “I use mnemonic devices.”
Phoebe watches Jane and Ji-hoon walk away.
* * *
After Ji-hoon uses Jane’s bathroom, he takes his leave, bestowing upon her the parting gift of a recitation of “I Hear America Singing” by Walt Whitman. It’s a little weird, but by now Jane is beyond expecting anyone to be anything but weird. Ji-hoon holds her eyes for a moment, nods briskly, then goes.
Scratching her head, Jane goes back to her Aunt Magnolia Coat umbrella, filling her hands with metallic and iridescent fabrics, letting her work tug at her, and thinking things through. Espions sans frontières. Spies without borders. Jane is no expert on the world of espionage, but she’s pretty sure spies wouldn’t even exist if there weren’t any borders.
Maybe she heard Grace wrong.
Before too long, her stomach informs her it’s lunchtime. Jane has no idea if Tu Reviens has an official lunch hour and she decides it doesn’t matter. She’ll go to the kitchen and bring something back to her rooms. She’ll eat while she’s working.
“Hungry, Jasper?” she says to the bed as she walks through the bedroom. Jasper pushes an inquisitive nose out into the light and snorts. “I’m going to the kitchen, if you’re interested.”
He bolts out eagerly, sticking so close to her that Jane feels a bit unsafe on the stairs and holds hard to the banister. On the second-story landing he almost trips her. “Jasper! I need my feet to walk. I can’t walk when there’s a sixty-pound dog attached to them. I want your company, you banana-head, but we can’t actually occupy the same space, do you get that?”
He hops on his front legs once, in a manner heralding an ominous intention to charge. Jane’s instinct takes over and she legs it across the bridge. But he doesn’t charge. He stays there on the east landing, hopping around in front of that tall umbrella painting, howling delicately, like an opera singer holding herself back before the big climax.
“Fuzzball,” Jane calls across to him, “you fit right in with everyone else in this house.” Then she continues on into the west wing, because she’s just had a thought. If the Thrashes and guests are currently at lunch in the banquet hall, Jane wants nothing to do with it. If there’s a back entrance to the kitchen, it might be at the bottom of the staircase at the end of the west wing. She’ll try it.
She isn’t paying much attention to the art on the walls, until something familiar brings her up short. It’s Aunt Magnolia’s photograph, blown huge.
Backing away to get a better vantage point, Jane soaks it up.
A tiny yellow goby peeks out from inside the cavelike mouth of a big gray fish. Aunt Magnolia took this photo in the waters near Japan. Jane remembers. And she feels like the little fish right now, bright and determined, but not altogether safe.
Jane is so proud of Aunt Magnolia, she could burst.
Then her perspective shifts and she notices a bulge in the matting behind the photo, as if the matting is way too small for the print. She’ll have to mention it to Mrs. Vanders. A framing mistake like that will damage the print, and Aunt Magnolia’s work deserves better care.
* * *
Jane was right about the back entrance: At the bottom of the staircase is a big metal door that deposits her into the kitchen. The dumbwaiter and a pantry are to her right. Two huge appliances to the left, presumably a refrigerator and a freezer, block her view of the rest of the room. She eases around them, then stops.
Patrick and Mrs. Vanders stand near the stoves with their backs to Jane, blocking her view of the person they’re speaking to. But Jane recognizes the voice of Phoebe Okada.
“Yes,” says Phoebe. “I think he’s the one. He says he’s South Korean, but I don’t believe him.” Then Phoebe hands a distinctive black thing to Mrs. Vanders that Jane also recognizes: Ivy’s camera.
Mrs. Vanders peers down at the camera and says crisply, “Yes, I’ve wondered about him. Patrick, find out what Ivy’s learned.”
“Now,” says Phoebe, “what about my appointment?”
“Mr. Vanders is busy,” says Mrs. Vanders. “He’s digging holes.”
“I saw,” says Phoebe. “Why, exactly?”
“He’s pretending to garden,” says Mrs. Vanders.
“So, my appointment is canceled because Mr. Vanders is playing make-believe?” Phoebe says blandly.
“We got a tip that Grace might’ve buried it in the garden or the backyard,” says Mrs. Vanders. “Mr. Vanders is looking for it.”
A tip that Grace buried something? Jane saw Grace herself, digging holes in the rain. Jane mentioned it to Mr. Vanders this morning; she said to him, “I saw a little girl digging in the garden yesterday.” Then Mr. Vanders froze in astonishment. So is it Jane, then, who provided this “tip”? About what?
“You’re kidding,” says Phoebe.
“No,” says Mrs. Vanders dryly.
“She’s a clever pain in the ass, isn’t she?” says Phoebe. “How old is she, eight?”
“She’s taking years off my life,” says Patrick proudly.
“Regardless,” says Phoebe, “I scheduled this appointment weeks ago. I need to talk to Mr. Vanders.”
“There’s nothing we can do,” says Mrs. Vanders. “Someone needs to look for that sculpture. If we can’t put it back together, our contact isn’t going to help us move the children.”
“Well, you’ve made an inconvenient choice as to who’s the gardener.”
“Mr. Vanders is no happier about it than you are,” says Mrs. Vanders. “But he’s trying to approach the digging as a meditative activity. He would not otherwise have time to meditate on a day like today. Meditation improves his sessions.”
“Well, that’s no use to me if my sessions are canceled, is it?” says Phoebe.
“You could go dig with him.”
Phoebe makes a scoffing noise. “Sure. No one would think it was out of character with my snob persona if I dropped to my knees in the garden next to the butler and started digging. Why isn’t Patrick digging? Are you too pretty to dig, Patrick?”
“Patrick also has his hands full at the moment,” says Mrs. Vanders. “It’s the day before a gala, Phoebe. I appreciate your needs, but I’m certain you appreciate ours as well. Everyone at Espions Sans Frontières is making sacrifices. Cook has barely had time to touch his saxophone and my yoga has most certainly suffered.”
Then Mrs. Vanders shifts to one side and Phoebe and Jane are looking straight into each other’s faces.
Phoebe smiles, with a sincerity Jane’s never seen in her face before. “You keep popping up,” she says, “don’t you. You have a talent for sneaking.”
Patrick and Mrs. Vanders spin around. Their faces are unsurprised, unreadable.
“I’m not sneaking,” Jane says. “I wanted some food. So I came to the kitchen.”
Patrick glances at Mrs. Vanders, then walks toward Jane, past her, almost brushing against her. “You’ve got an awfully quiet tread,” he says, “for someone your size, and wearing those boots.”
“My aunt Magnolia taught me not to push myself onto any environment,” Jane says, earning a small chuckle from Phoebe.
“Tell me when Mr. Vanders is free, please, I beg you,” Phoebe says to Mrs. Vanders, then turns and exits through the kitchen’s main door. Patrick has also made his exit, through the back door.
Jane is alone with Mrs. Vanders. She lifts her chin and holds the housekeeper’s steely eyes. There’s no more point in pretending.
“I know Grace Panzavecchia is in this house,” says Jane. “I know she took the Brancusi sculpture. I know Phoebe and Philip Okada aren’t who they’re pretending to be, and neither are you.”
Mrs. Vanders stares at Jane, with a silence so obstinate that it’s somehow aggressive. “Tell me,” she says, “how do you feel about it?”
“What does it matter how
I feel?” cries Jane. “Is this a therapy session or something?”
Mrs. Vanders smiles, grimly. “It could be, if you wanted it. Mr. Vanders is a licensed psychologist, specializing in these things.”
“Specializing in what things? People who lie?”
“Specializing in the needs of political agents and government operatives,” says Mrs. Vanders.
“Oh, come on,” Jane spits out, truly at the end of her patience. “You’re all playacting some silly game.”
“Well, playacting is part of the job, it’s true,” says Mrs. Vanders with another grim smile. “Your aunt Magnolia was quite good at it.”
“Aunt Magnolia didn’t playact,” says Jane automatically.
“Your aunt is dead,” says Mrs. Vanders. “It’s time you knew who she really was. I’ve meant to get in touch with you for months now, but I guess I’ve had too much on my plate. Magnolia would be furious at the delay, rest her soul.”
Jane has this strange feeling, as if she’s in a car, careening in slow motion toward a tree. “Stop it.”
“The servants of Tu Reviens are a secret espionage-advocacy group,” says Mrs. Vanders. “We provide confidential, non-partisan services for agents, operatives, and assets of all political loyalties, mostly during this house’s seasonal galas. We’re called Espions Sans Frontières, Spies Without Borders. Your aunt Magnolia—”
