Mara arrived at Tess's flat after dark with the whole gray folder and found the dining table cleared. Tess had moved June's case behind a cupboard door and set out two mugs with no tea in either. Mara knew her sister was making room for evidence, not company. She put the folder between them anyway.
“Nell Voss,” Tess said. “That was the name on the hotel room as an additional guest.”
Mara turned to the slip with Nora's name. “I never knew a Nell. Not that I remember.”
“You knew Nora. Do you know whether she was at the hotel?”
“No. I can't get from this paper to that woman.” Mara opened the folder. “These are the whole set I have. We can go through the names first, without reading each address aloud.”
Tess pulled out a chair. “Yesterday you said one errand.”
“I said I thought I met Nora on one errand.”
“And how many did you arrange with that phone number?”
Mara counted the slips she had marked during the afternoon: seven with the same last four digits in different months. Some courier boxes were blank. One had a name that might be Ruth, another a name June had abbreviated to N. Mara laid them down. “Seven in this folder. There may be other receipts at June's. The number could have been a shared phone.”
Tess looked at her across the pages. “You went from one ride to seven.”
“I went from the one I recognized to the ones I found.”
“You found them last night.”
Mara put both hands under the table. “I found the second one last night. I found the others today. I knew I had made more rides for Mum. I didn't say how many because you were holding a list with your name on it, and I wanted to bring you a useful fact first.”
“A useful fact for me, or one that made you look as if you had never been part of it?” Tess asked.
Mara had brought bread because Tess might not have eaten. She looked at it on the counter, still in its paper bag, and knew offering it now would sound like a way to end the question. “Both,” she said. “I wanted to be useful. I also wanted you to see the one ride I could explain before you saw the weeks when I did what June asked without knowing the rest.”
“You think I can't hold seven slips and my own name at the same time.”
“I wasn't thinking about what you could hold. I was trying to get through the door.”
Tess moved the folder to her side of the table, not as if she would keep it but to read the first page without Mara's hand over it. She checked the date, flipped it, and stopped at a host's number. “If I call this person, what do I tell her?”
“Nothing yet. That route doesn't touch the list as far as I know. She agreed to house someone for June, not to explain the whole network to us.”
“Then show me why it is here.”
“Because I promised you the whole folder. I won't use confidentiality to hide the fact I did more work than I said. We can cover the number while we sort the pattern.”
Tess found a clean sheet and laid it over the line.
“You wanted me to see the version where you did one favor and didn't know what June kept.”
“I didn't know what she kept. I did more than one favor.” Mara made herself leave the sentence unsoftened. “I drove women. I booked a room for one. I sent a driver to a clinic. I knew which door a host wanted us to use. I also knew when June told me not to ask a name, and I accepted that because the person got where she needed to go.”
Tess's gaze went to the locked case. “You let her decide what you could know.”
“I had the cars to find. Mum dealt with the rest. That's what I told myself.”
“That sounds like a sentence you have been waiting to say.”
“I thought it on the bus. It doesn't make it less true.”
Mara turned over the Alma slip. From her dispatch desk she'd told Nora which pharmacy-lot entrance the driver would use and asked her to bring groceries for Alma. Nora's voice had been sharp over the phone: “I know where to stand.” Later she called back to say Alma was inside with June's host. Mara had thanked her without seeing either woman. The voice told her nothing about who had used the other names.
“This one is Alma's,” she said. “Do you remember her from the funeral?”
“I remember Alma. Is this her current address?” Tess indicated the covered boxes.
“No. The final address wasn't on my copy. I want to know if you saw Nell at the funeral.”
Tess shook her head. “I saw strangers. One watched me load the case across the street. I couldn't describe her well enough to name her.”
Mara had been carrying chairs while Tess went out with the case. She tried to picture who had stood across the street and could not.
They spread the slips by month. Tess asked Mara to explain what each box meant. Mara knew the order because she had designed it: pickup, handoff, final host, fare, person who could be called if plans changed. A few entries had only a contact name and the time a driver was paid. Across June's folder, the fragments joined up.
“If you designed the boxes, why did June keep every copy?” Tess asked.
“I used them when a host said a car came late or a driver asked whether a fare had been paid. June said an old slip could settle a disagreement without phoning the person who had left.”
“Did it?”
“Sometimes. Once I proved a driver waited forty minutes and June paid him. Another time a slip showed we'd sent a woman to the wrong entrance and she had to walk around the block.” Mara turned the page so Tess could see the date, not the woman's name. “June kept a book of places she wasn't entitled to share.”
“A book you helped build.”
“Yes.” Mara had said June first from habit. She moved the next slip into the dated row.
“Were these ever at June's house while she was ill?” Tess asked.
“Yes. In the cupboard. I was there most days. Nell didn't come inside while I was tending her, if that's who this is.”
“You didn't tell me someone might be looking for them.”
“I didn't know anybody was. And I didn't know June had sent another packet out.” Mara touched the edge of the folder, away from the names. “I should have told you how much I did before you found out from the paper.”
Tess closed one mug between her hands. “The paper doesn't tell me whether you meant to hide seven rides or seven hundred.”
“Neither. I can count my work and give you my logs. I won't pretend this folder is all June had.”
Tess picked up the slip with the number ending in forty-two. “Tomorrow I want to see whether one of June's old hosts remembers the person who used it. We can ask about a single handoff.”
“I know someone who might.” Mara named a former host whose first name appeared on a spring slip. “I'll ask if she is willing to talk before we bring her into the middle of this.”
“Ask her to speak to both of us.”
Mara nodded. Tess let her keep the originals overnight only after photographing the relevant fronts and backs. Mara did not object. Tess brought out the sealed hotel packet and laid June's keys beside it.
“I said we could open it tonight,” Mara said.
“I know.” Tess looked at the key ring. “I want to ask your host first. Mum can't answer me. Someone who stood at the door can.”
“The pages won't be easier tomorrow.”
“No. After we speak to her, we open the case. Both of us. Don't let me put it off again.”
Mara nodded. On the way out, she saw the two unused mugs again. Tess had never filled them. Mara took hers to the sink and rinsed it before she went down the stairs.