Bad News

In a way, it was an easy life. The nonprofit corporation maintained the place and provided the family with an income, in addition to the roof over their heads. In season, volunteers worked as cashiers and docents, so the family never actually had to look at any of the thousands of visitors who trooped through the downstairs every year. Also, Russell Thurbush’s reputation meant the family was automatically welcomed at the uppermost social levels in both Philadelphia and New York; Viveca could attend a museum opening a week, if she cared to.

But in another way, as Frank had increasingly felt, Thurstead was a kind of soft prison, an indentured servitude. Frank had his M.B.A., but there was little enough business to conduct, and that was all done by the Thurstead Foundation. The family could never go very far from the house for very long, but, on the other hand, they weren’t free to alter it or add to it or do any of the things normal families did with normal houses. No wonder Frank wanted his own place, in New York City, and his own job, with Standard Chemicals, and his own life, which Viveca believed he was sharing at the moment with a woman named Rachel.

This so-called trial separation was well into its second year now, with many visits all year long from Frank and summertime excursions for the girls to Frank’s apartment in New York, all the new little systems and rituals in place. Viveca knew that Frank was right when he said he’d left Thurstead more than he’d left her, but, damn it, it sure felt as though he’d left her.

“There,” she said, pushing the list across the table to Mrs. Bu

“No, we’ll be fine,” Mrs. Bu

We’ll be fine. Viveca got up from the table, feeling vague and a little uncertain, probably because of the coming storm. She wandered through their rooms to the parlor, with its large windows overlooking the view that had attracted Russell Thurbush in the first place. The four hundred acres owned by the Thurstead Foundation covered this entire eastern slope of the mountain, plus land around to the south. From here, the view was southeastward over a roughly tumbling downslope falling away to the deep gorge of the river, and then the rocky face of Pe

Mrs. Bu

One of the windows in this room consisted of a large pane of pale yellow glass; through it, even a day like today was su

She felt like a princess in a fairy tale, locked in a tower, which for a semi-single mother of three was a little late in the day. She’d already been rescued by her prince, who was now in New York City with a woman named Rachel.

Above Pe

40

The storm reached Port Jervis at eight, but Kelp and Murch did not. Dortmunder and Tiny and Murch’s Mom had taken rooms at a motel south of town, which, the clerk had assured them, would be full of skiers once this weekend’s storm passed through. “We’ll be outta here by then,” Dortmunder said.

They’d eaten an early di

And waited. The motel had cable, so at least they didn’t have to watch network television, but, on the other hand, there wasn’t very much out there on the airwaves that this particular trio could all agree on. So they sat around and watched things none of them particularly cared about, and from time to time whoever hated the current program the worst would get up and go over to look out the window and say, “Sure is snowing,” or “Still snowing,” or “Looka that snow.”

There was no deadline problem here; it was merely that the wait was boring. Just so Kelp and Murch showed up before dawn, at least an hour before dawn, the plan could still work the same as ever.

They were definitely going to cut Thurstead’s electricity and phone. They had no doubt a place like that would have a backup generator, but backup generators can’t carry the entire normal load of even an ordinary house, so what would they use their limited supply of electricity for? The refrigerator, the water pump in the well, the furnace igniter, a few lights. The exterior motion sensors in the trees might or might not be included, probably not, but even if they were, it didn’t matter. The plan included the idea that they’d be eyeballed from the house. But the electricity and phone being off would mean that the security office would certainly be shut down, and all the people present at Thurstead would be compressed into a smaller than usual space. That was all Dortmunder and the others needed, or at least that was the idea.

At eleven, they gave up on the wonders of worldwide broadcasting to watch the local news instead, which was all about the storm that continued to rage outside. There were dramatic pictures of trees lying on automobiles, intrepid reporters standing in wind-whipped snow to report to you, snowplows chugging along, ambulances with many flashing red lights, and some cheerful clown with a ski report.

Eleven-forty-two, according to the clock screwed to the table beside the bed, when the phone rang. Dortmunder answered, and Kelp’s voice said, “I gotta admit, it was kind of fun.”

“Slowed you down a little.”

“You should see the other guys.”

“You all set now?”

“Sure. When you go out, go way down to the end, away from the office here. I’ll head back down there now.”

“Right.”

The idea was, Kelp and Murch couldn’t exactly check in at this motel because they didn’t have a vehicle they could mention on the register card, and if they didn’t have a vehicle, how did they get here? So Kelp had merely walked into the lobby to use the house phone, and now they’d all meet outside. And later, when they were done, Kelp would illegally share Dortmunder’s room and Murch would illegally share Tiny’s room.

Kelp said, “Bring along the WD-40, we got a squeaky door in the back.”

“Right.”

“And don’t forget the tin snips.”

For cutting the electric and phone wires, of course. Dortmunder said, “Don’t need them.”

“But we gotta cut off the, you know.”

“It was on the news half an hour ago,” Dortmunder told him. “That part of the country down there, they’re already out, electric and phone both. The storm did the job for us.”