Rachel Alexander 05 - The Wrong Dog

she did, watched her ring the bell at the house behind Sophie’s, and waited as the door opened and she disappeared inside. Then I waited another five minutes before crossing the street again, going up the same stoop she had and checking the name on the bell. This time there was one. Charles Madison. Why wasn’t I surprised?
    I leaned hard on the bell, heard a dog bark, and quickly went back to where I’d been, crouching behind a green Toyota that had a little handwritten sign in the window saying No Radio, the window next to it broken, the ground covered with tiny shards of green glass, as pale and shiny as jellyfish.
    The door opened and there was Joe again, a white bull terrier at his side, her nose tilted high, her nostrils moving.
    He hadn’t shaved, poor thing. He looked a mess. It must be very stressful, killing the wrong person.
    He looked left and right, then pulled the dog back inside and closed the door. I walked to the comer, checked out the drug dealers lined across all the paths in Washington Square Park, then headed around the block.
    There were no cops standing around outside the building where Sophie had lived. The little brass plaque with the name and address of the building manager was tucked under the bells. I had to crouch to read it: WAM Realty. Three initials again. Or perhaps it was a name this time. I remembered seeing it on Sophie’s rent check, wondering if it was Chinese, elevating my arm for five minutes so that I could tell my Chinese doctor I’d followed his instructions.
    I unlocked the outside door. There were no cops inside either. The yellow tape made a big X over Sophie’s door, but that didn’t present a moral issue for me since that’s not where I was headed.
    I took the stairs, climbing slowly. I didn’t expect to meet anyone, or find anyone when I got to where I was going. I didn’t think anyone had followed me from Charles Madison’s house. There was no reason to rush.
    I could hear television sets playing and snippets of conversation as I approached each floor. When I got to the top, I pushed on the bar that opened the door, carefully letting it close on the Schweppes ginger ale can, and stepped out onto the tar-covered roof. For a moment, I stood still, my eyes adjusting to the light, listening to the sounds, smelling the honeysuckle that climbed a trellis on one of the back balconies of the building next door. Then I walked toward the edge, crouching when I neared the parapet and looking over at what was below. Looking straight down, which I did first, made my knees feel as if they’d turned to liquid. There was no light on in Sophie’s garden, nor in the little cottage that backed up to it. The town house behind it, the one where Joe was, and Elizabeth Madison, was all lit up. No one had bothered to close the curtains either, and lucky me, I had my binoculars hanging around my neck under my jacket. I unzipped and held them up to my eyes.
    I could see into the living room, an open loftlike space that ran undivided through to Fourth Street. The grand piano was near one of the garden windows, on the side opposite the tall, glass French doors. Beyond that, huddled together at a round table, were Joe, Elizabeth Madison, and Charles Madison, sitting with his back to me. Still, he looked familiar.
    I backed up and looked around the roof for a rock, but found only tiny pebbles. I scooped up as many as I could hold and, keeping my foot in the doorway, filled the soda can with them. Then I slipped off my shoe, left it in the doorway, and went back to the edge of the roof. Standing, but not looking down, I hurled the can as far as I could. I heard barking, then I saw them, two white bull terriers, as game as they were meant to be, barking at the back door.
    Madison got up and let them out. For a moment, he stood in the doorway. I peered through the binoculars trying to figure out where I knew him from. Then he turned and went back to the table, hunching over and leaning forward, Joe and Elizabeth leaning closer, whatever they were saying, neither of them wanting to miss a word.
    I watched the bullies in the garden. They’d found the can. At first, they tried to play tug of war with it, pulling it in pieces, the pebbles spilling onto the flagstone walk. Then one, followed by the other, carried the treasure to the back door, put paws up, and pushed the doors in and open, vying to see who could get to the table first and drop the half can at Madison’s feet.
    He looked