Convicted by Jan Burke

she would ask of him—just to look at it.
    At one of these turnouts, she kicked off her shoes and rolled down a window, resting her bare feet on the sill. She drove barefooted the rest of the night.
    She asked him questions. He talked more that night than he had ever talked in his life. About his writing, his family, his childhood, his love of Woolrich stories and Hitchcock films and chocolate and on and on, even describing the furniture in his apartment.
    â€œAnd you?” he asked. “Where do you live?”
    â€œSomewhere in these hills. Perhaps I’ll take you there someday.”
    As many questions as she asked, and as few as she answered, somehow she still managed to make him feel that he was of vital interest to her, not in the way some questioners might—as scientist studying an insect—but as if she cared about him from before the time she had met him. He was wondering at the trust he had placed in this stranger just as the sun was coming up over the hills. She had parked the car on a ridge. Harry was snoring softly.
    â€œI’ll take you home,” she said.
    â€œI’m not sure I want to go home,” Bill answered, then quickly added, “Sorry, I don’t mean to be pushy. You’ve been a great listener. You’re probably tired and—”
    She reached over then, and laid a finger to his lips. She shook her head, and he stopped talking, unsure of what she was saying no to.
----
    SHE TOOK HIM BACK TO his apartment, leaving Harry asleep in the car.
    â€œDo you want to come in?” he asked on his doorstep.
    She shook her head, an impish smile on her lips. “I know exactly what it looks like—I’m sure you’ve described it perfectly. Besides, you’re very busy. You’ve got to get a little sleep, and then you’ll wake up and write your book. It’s going to be terrific, but no one will ever find that out until you write it.”
    She turned and skipped back to the car.
    â€œWill I see you again?” he called out.
    â€œStop worrying,” she called back. “Write!”
    And he had. He slept about three hours, woke up feeling as if he had slept ten, and wondering if he had dreamed the woman in the Rolls-Royce. But dream or no dream, he suddenly knew how to get around that problem in his story, and went to work.
    Harry appeared a few hours later, a picnic basket in hand. “Miss Eleanor sends her regards, and provisions so that you need not interrupt your work.”
    â€œYou can talk!” Bill exclaimed.
    â€œWhen necessary,” Harry said, and left.
----
    BILL SEARCHED THROUGH THE BASKET, and found an assortment of small sandwiches, a salad, a slice of chocolate cake and several choices of beverages. He also found an old-fashioned calling card:
    Miss Eleanor Wingate
    On the back she had inscribed her phone number. “Delicious,” Bill said, holding it carefully, as if it might skip away, disappear as quickly as she had.
----
    AND SO HE WENT BACK to writing. Bill saw little of Ellie during the first few weeks which followed their ride through the hills, but he called her often. If he found himself staring uselessly at the place where the wall behind his computer screen met the ceiling, unsure of how to proceed, a brief chat with Ellie inspired him. They played a game with Hitchcock films and Woolrich stories.
    â€œA jaguar,” he would say.
    â€œBlack Alibi,” she would answer. “A name scrawled on a window.”
    â€œEasy— The Lady Vanishes.”
    And his writer’s block would vanish as well.
----
    WHEN BILL COMPLETED HIS MANUSCRIPT, Harry brought him and the manuscript to her home for the first time. Bill, trying (and failing) not to be overawed by the elegance which surrounded him, handed her the box of pages. She caressed the corners of the box, looking for a moment as if she might cry. But she said nothing, and set it gently aside without opening it. She held out her hand,