Cobalt (9 page)

“Were you at the party last night?” Axel asked.

Beneath the table Clarisse nudged the toe of her shoe hard against Valentine's thigh. She exhaled a waft of swirling smoke, and said, “No, I had to do inventory last night. Did you enjoy it?”

Axel nodded, and flexed his triceps diligently before taking another swallow of Drambuie. “Who was your friend then, Daniel—the Empress Wu?”

“A friend from Boston. And it was a man under all that paint.”

Axel snorted approvingly. “Tell him he was pretty good. Fooled me. Is he…”

“Is he what?” prompted Clarisse when Axel didn't continue.

“Is he staying in town?”

“You want to get set up with a date?” asked Valentine.

“No. I was just wondering if he were still in town.”

“No,” said Valentine, not looking at Clarisse. “I put him on the commuter plane this morning. Still in drag.”

Axel nodded distractedly, but seemed relieved. “Listen,” he said, “you haven't seen Scott tonight, have you?”

Valentine shook his head. “Were you waiting for him out there?”

Axel nodded. “We had a fight—at the party, in fact—and he ran off. He took the car. I don't know where he went. We had reservations here tonight and I was hoping he'd show up. He didn't. I—”

Axel looked up at Clarisse and hesitated.

“You're not interrupting,” said Clarisse. “Val and I have already exchanged confidences for the evening. In fact, I'm going to leave you two alone.” When she stood, Axel started to rise, but she placed a hand on his shoulder. “No, please. Chivalry makes me break out in hives.”

He stood anyway, and apologized. “I'm driving you away.”

“No, no. I'm getting up at five in the morning, and still have to read the instructions that go with my alarm clock.” She winked at Valentine and left the room, then stopped just outside the door on pretext of smoothing her skirt, and with satisfaction noted that Axel had already begun to spill to Valentine. “I have
no
idea where he's gone,” she heard him say, “and I don't know what to do. I've—”

The rest was covered by Angel's yodel just outside the window.

As she stood outside the gate in darkened Kiley Court, Clarisse could hear laughter and splashing behind the high hedges. Evidently there was someone in the pool. She unlatched the gate and went inside. All three wings of the house were dark, and a few candles in amber glass provided the only illumination. The waning moon was hidden behind clouds. She got all the way to the edge of the pool before she saw Ann and Margaret swimming in the nude.

The two women swam over. Their bodies were sleek and well-toned. They rested their folded arms on the tiles, and their legs gently paddled the water behind them. They looked like waterlogged cherubs.

“Hello again,” said Ann with a smile. “Did you and Daniel have a nice dinner?”

“It was very pleasant,” replied Clarisse with a smile. She was glad to see that most of Ann's earlier drunkenness had passed, or more likely been absorbed by dinner. And whatever disagreement between the women had caused Ann's tears in the Throne and Scepter had evidently been smoothed over as well. “And you two?”

“We ate at a place called the Forward Pass,” said Margaret. “Did you know they have waiters dressed like cheerleaders?”

“I've heard.”

“And,” said Ann with emphasis, “they've got a great wine list.”

Clarisse glanced toward the darkened wing of the house at her right. “Are Noah and Victor home?” she asked.

“Haven't seen 'em,” said Margaret, wringing water from strands of her thick hennaed hair.

“Don't you want to swim?” asked Ann. “I love this pool, I love swimming in it at night. I love having it all to ourselves. I wish we could stay here the whole summer.”

“No thank you,” said Clarisse. “After the dessert I had tonight, I'd just sink. But I think I will sit out here for a few minutes, enjoy the night air, and try to think up a good excuse for not going to work tomorrow.” She drew a chair up close to the edge of the pool, seated herself, and indolently lighted a cigarette with one of the candles. Ann and Margaret swam away and then back again when she motioned that she wanted to continue the conversation.

“I had a good time at the party,” said Clarisse, looking down at the two women in the water.

“When my film comes back, I'll be sure to give you some prints of you and your friend.” Ann paused and added, “You really are a beautiful woman.” She reached for an opened bottle of wine that was beneath the table at Clarisse's side.

“Thank you,” said Clarisse, smiling. She watched with interest as Ann poured out a full glass, spilling a little on the tiles.

“Are you living with Daniel or just staying with him?” Ann continued after Margaret pushed gently away to glide through the water.

“Valentine is…gay,” Clarisse said, hesitantly. The candlelight provided not much illumination, but enough to show Clarisse what was in Ann's eyes. “But we, ah—”

“She's straight,” shouted Margaret from the other end of the pool.

“
That's
what I meant to say,” said Clarisse.

Ann sighed. “Who can be sure anymore? I mean, after Eleanor Roosevelt…” She shrugged. “Must be difficult for you in this town.”

“Life is a trial,” Clarisse admitted, then changed the subject: “Did you take a lot of pictures of costumes last night?”

Ann nodded. “Everybody was very nice about it.”

“Did you get one of Cain?”

“Cain? Which one was he?” She swallowed off the glass of wine.

“The one with the
X
on his forehead, wearing a chiton.”

“Is that like a tiara?” asked Margaret.

“No,” said Ann quickly, “I didn't get his picture, and I'm glad too.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Didn't you hear? Somebody killed him.”

Clarisse made no reply.

Margaret swam up. “Yesterday morning,” she said. “The tide was licking his heels.”

“I know,” Clarisse said at last. “I was the one who found him.”

“Oh, that's terrible. Were you looking for him?” asked Margaret.

“It was terrible. Why should I be looking for him?”

“Well,” said Margaret, “you know, we were all on the ferry together yesterday, and Ann and I saw you walking down the pier with him.”

“That's right,” said Clarisse. “He was trying to hustle a place to crash.”

Ann threw one dark leg over the edge of the pool and hoisted herself out of the water, sitting sideways on the edge. Water splashed onto Clarisse's white shoes, and Margaret reached out of the pool to wipe them off with a towel. “Do you want a joint?” Ann asked. She took one from the pocket of her folded shirt and Clarisse leaned forward with the candle. Margaret, still in the pool, held on to Ann's feet under the water. She shook her head when Ann motioned toward her with the joint.

“It's not treated,” Ann assured her, but Margaret still waved it away.

“Did
you
talk to him?” asked Clarisse.

Both women nodded. “But not on the boat,” said Margaret. “Here.”

“Here!” cried Clarisse.

“We got here about one-thirty yesterday afternoon. And after we had unpacked”—here Ann interrupted with a prolonged giggle that Clarisse had no difficulty interpreting—“we put on our suits and came out here. Shortly after that he came through the gate with his bag and said he was looking for his lover.”

“His lover?” Clarisse repeated with astonishment.

“Well,” said Ann, “I told him that we had just arrived, and didn't know who else was staying here, but that there wasn't anybody at home right then. So then he sat down and waited.”

“But who could his
lover
be?” demanded Clarisse. “I know it's not Valentine. Maybe it was the man who was staying here last week.”

“No,” said Ann definitely to this last. “Terry O'Sullivan is my boss. I'd know if he had a lover—and he doesn't.”

“He came to see Mr. Lovelace,” said Margaret.

“Noah!”

“Jeff King sat right there where you're sitting now,” said Margaret, “and just waited for about ten minutes. Then Mr. Lovelace came back. He was very surprised to see Jeff here, but he took him inside. They were in the house for about five minutes and then Jeff came back out.”

“He was mad, too,” added Ann with a gasp, after she had sustained a lengthy inhalation of smoke.

Clarisse sat puzzled and consternated for several moments. “I don't understand any of this.”

“It's simple,” said Margaret. “Jeff King had probably tricked with Mr. Lovelace a couple of times, and then blew that up into ‘my lover.' Then he shows up on the doorstep expecting a place to stay, and Mr. Lovelace says he's all full up. So Jeff King goes away mad. That's bound to be what happened.”

“Maybe,” said Clarisse doubtfully. “Did you tell this to the police?”

Ann laughed. “Why? He wasn't killed here, after all.” Then she added indignantly, “I'm not going to spend the last week of my vacation filling out police reports. Margaret and I have better things to do.”

Now Margaret giggled.

Clarisse said nothing, but just sat staring across the dark courtyard toward her uncle's unlighted windows.

C
LARISSE WAS READING Monday's edition of the local newspaper at breakfast when Valentine staggered in from his bedroom. He was wearing a pair of frayed gym shorts at least fifteen years old, and she was already dressed for work. While she poured him coffee and brought out doughnuts, he stared at the front page of the paper. The banner headline told of a rare species of whale found beached in Herring Cove; a minor drug bust was noted in the lower left-hand corner; a large center-page photograph showed a child sitting atop a pier fishing with a sunset shimmering behind her.

“The notice is on page six,” said Clarisse. “Jeffrey Martin King, age twenty-eight, resident of Boston, leaving a mother and two sisters to grieve.”

“And that's all?” asked Valentine, sipping his coffee.

“That's it. Mr. and Mrs. We're-on-Holiday-and-Don't-Want-to-Think-about-Anything-Nasty wouldn't want to hear about the thumb marks on his throat, and wouldn't want to know exactly where on the beach the body was found,” said Clarisse sourly.

“I told you so,” said Valentine, and pushed the newspaper aside, without bothering to turn to page six.

“I can't believe they'd ignore a
murder
. I've been through that paper three times, thinking I'd overlooked the article, but it's not there. I have a good mind—”

“Don't get started,” warned Valentine. “There's nothing you can do.”

They were silent for several moments. Clarisse sat across from Valentine and methodically tore the paper, page by page, into small scraps.

“So,” she said at last, “you persuaded someone home last night.”

Valentine nodded. “You heard us?”

“Not the part where you turned down the sheets, but everything else.”

“It was Axel. We went to Back Street. I bought him a drink and he spilled his guts. Then I brought him back here and comforted him for about two and a half hours. Then we ran out of poppers.”

Clarisse nodded toward the bedrooms. “He still asleep back there?”

“Left with the dawn. He started to get worried that Scott would come back and not find him home. Listen, why didn't you want Axel to know that was you in Oriental drag?”

“I didn't want to embarrass him. I saw him have that fight on the deck, remember? You didn't tell him, did you?”

“I didn't need to. He knew it was you.”

“Why didn't he say anything?” asked Clarisse.

“He didn't want to embarrass you by catching you in an outright lie.”

“Oh, well,” she sighed. “Go back to the spilled guts.”

Valentine took a sip of his coffee, thought for a moment, and then began to speak, in a sincere and deep-throated voice: “Dear Ann Landers:

“I am a thirty-seven-year-old swimming coach, moderately successful. I have seventeen trophies, a gold American Express card, a picture of me shaking hands with Lyndon Johnson, and a lover who is fifteen years younger than I am. I'll call him Scott DeVoto. Scott is jealous, insecure, and out of work. He doesn't understand me, he doesn't understand that just because I hop into bed with every man who winks at me that I still love him more than anything else in the world. I met him in the bliss of a coach-student fantasy. The fantasy faded, but Scott hung around. Which is fine, except that he's always afraid that I'll dump him for somebody who's got a better time on the hundred-meter freestyle.

“Three months ago I met a young man I'll call Jeff King. I saw him twice—it wasn't any big deal, except that Jeff King gave me the clap, herpes, and crabs. Then Scott (my lover) accused Jeff (my trick) of stealing some clothes out of his closet. Ann, we nearly went to divorce court after that one. We had this huge fight in the VD clinic and it was terrible. It wasn't the first fight and it wasn't the last one, either. And the thing of it is, I still love him! Scott, that is, I still love him like I loved him on the day we first stared at each other in the showers. Am I afraid of growing old alone? Will I ever stop screwing around? Do I really enjoy public battles?” Valentine took a breath, adding at the last, “Signed, Anxious Axel.”