Death in Paradise (36 page)

Ed went in the bedroom. I heard a click and then his slightly twangy voice on the line. "Detective? I am truly sorry about this. I can assure you, from the look on this little gal's face, that she had no idea."

"She didn't tell you?"

"No, sir, she did not. It looks like I just told her."

"But when you examined her—"

"Detective, I am feeling terribly guilty for speaking out of turn like I did, especially since I have no medical information on which to base my diagnosis. It is purely instinctive."

"No medical information," Andre said, "so you don't know for sure." He sounded terribly disappointed.

"I don't know from conclusive medical tests," Dr. Pryzinski said carefully, "but I know for sure. I hope this news is happily received by both of you. Your Thea is a great girl, and from all I can see, she loves you very much."

I put down my phone and went in the bedroom. "I'll take it from here," I said. "You go out and hang up the other phone."

"Guess I'm signing off now," Ed said. "Best of luck, Detective."

He left the room and a few seconds later I heard a click as the other phone was put back in its cradle. "So," I said, "that was a bolt from the blue. I don't know what to think, do you? We're not ready to be parents. We can't even decide where to live. Our lives are crazy. When would we see it? Where would we keep it? Who would take care of it? I don't think we could even agree on a name."

"If it's a boy, he's called Oliver, after my father, or Mason, after my uncle. If it's a girl, her name is Claudine."

I didn't know what to say. Weren't women the ones who kept lists of names for their future children? I didn't have any names on my list. I didn't even have a list, while Andre had it all worked out. "I can't even think," I said. "It's all too much for me. Let me get rid of all these people and I'll call you back."

"Thea..." He hesitated so long that I'd thought of five different, terrible things he might say before he spoke again. "If you don't like those names, we can think about others."

"Just as long as we don't call him Ollie. I love you," I said. "Good-bye."

"Stay safe," he said. "Be well. I'll talk to you soon. You can call me in the morning."

"Yours or mine?" I asked.

"Either one is fine. I love you," he said. "Good-bye."

I cradled the receiver and sat there, breathless, speechless, and utterly stunned. I had never been so surprised in my life. I went back to the sitting room and found Laura happily eating ice cream while Ed and Marie sat looking guilty and embarrassed.

"I can't believe he did that," Marie said. "Eddie isn't usually so tactless. Blunt and straightforward, but not utterly tactless. We're so sorry if we've caused problems for you, Thea."

I sat down and picked up my spoon. After a day with nothing but tea and toast and salad, suddenly I was ravenous. "Oh, well. I hope little Mason or Oliver likes chocolate." I raised a dripping, gooey spoonful to my mouth. "Unless it's Claudine."

Ed and Marie got up. "We'd better be going," Marie said, leaning down to give me a hug. "Seems like every time we try to do something for you, we mess things up worse than before. I can't remember a time when we've managed to do so much harm through good intentions. We're going to go back to our room and see if we can stay out of trouble."

I walked them to the door. Laura went on eating. Obviously, the subject of pregnancy was not one that interested her. She got enough of that at home, with her stepdad Howie dancing attendance on her polka-dotted mother. I sat down and picked up my spoon. "This was a good idea. Now, what was the second thing you were going to tell me?"

"Something I heard from the security guards." She grinned. "It pays to be a kid sometimes. I sit down and open my book and everyone thinks I've disappeared. But I'm still right there, listening. I heard these two guys talking about the couple that had the fight. The newlyweds who threw their luggage and stuff? Turns out that they left the next morning. Because they were so embarrassed, you'd think, right? Well, the hotel checks their registration information and guess what? Nobody by that name existed at that address. They were fakes. I guess the guy who was talking was the one who'd done the detective work. He was the blue-blazer type, not the work-shirt-with-security-patch type. Then the cops go through the hotel trash...." She gave me a curious look. "You're a detective, Thea. Did you know that they did that?"

I nodded. Skipped reminding her that I wasn't a detective. The one time I was following advice and not getting involved, and no one around here believed me. "I've heard. I wouldn't want that job, would you? Especially not with a place as big as this. That's a lot of trash. And?"

"And they found two discarded boarding passes, Honolulu to Maui, for people not registered at the hotel. So guess what? This guy tracks them down and it turns out they were an actor and actress from Honolulu who were hired to came here and have that fight. But the security guy says they don't know who hired them because it was all done by phone and letter. All they can say is that it was a woman who told them to show up at the hotel and gave them false names to use. Why would you hire someone to go to a hotel and have a fight? Isn't that the strangest thing you've ever heard?"

I'd heard an awful lot of strange things in my life. People's reasons for abandoning morality. People's excuses for inhuman behavior. People's justifications for discarding other people's lives. Compared with that, this didn't seem strange at all. Obviously the couple had been brought in to create a disturbance to divert any attention from Martina's killers. What I found strange, and disturbing, was how carefully planned and orchestrated her killing had been. This was no spur-of-the-moment crime of passion, though that's how it was supposed to look.

"Thea? Thea! Are you awake?" Laura was staring at me nervously. "Is something wrong? Are you getting sick again? Maybe I should call that nice doctor back?"

I had retreated so far into my mind that I'd frozen in mid-bite. The spoon hung in midair between the dish and my mouth, dripping hot fudge sauce onto my ugly green dress. I stuck the spoon in my mouth. What had been delicious a minute ago no longer seemed appealing. Too many shocks. Too much to think about. When I get distracted, I lose my appetite. Maybe that's why I'm not fat. Maybe it isn't exercise and hard work. Maybe it's all the meals I skip, all the food I don't get around to eating.

"I'm fine, Laura. I was just thinking about what you said. And about what people do to each other. Ugly thoughts." I stood up and reached for the new dress. "Maybe I'll go put this on. I seem to have ruined the other one."

"Oh, it will wash," she said seriously. "I'm a spiller myself. I know."

I didn't know about this baby, if there even was a baby, but if someone had told me I could have Laura Mitchell, half-formed and delightful at age eleven, I would have taken her in a second. It seemed odd that tomorrow night I was flying back to Boston, and soon Laura would go back to Iowa and I would never see her again. I went in the bathroom, stripped off the green dress, took Bernstein's card out of the pocket, and dumped the dress in the sink to soak. I picked up the clean dress, then set it down again and stood in front of the mirror, staring at my body. It looked just the same to me. Was it really possible that there was another life lurking inside me?

I clasped my hands over my belly. Did it seem rounder? I turned sideways and dropped my hands. Nothing looked any different. What was it that Ed Pryzinski was reading in my face and body that had led him to his shattering declaration. I wasn't ready for motherhood. It was something I wanted to plan. Something I wanted to anticipate. I wanted to affirmatively discard birth control and sleep with Andre, full of the delicious knowledge that what we were doing might lead to the creation of life. I didn't want to have a baby thrust upon me like this, without any say in the matter. And the cool, logical part of me couldn't help wondering why this was such a surprise. As Dr. Pryzinski had said, I was supposed to know about sex and reproduction. Yet I hadn't even suspected. Had I completely overlooked a missed period? Was this denial? Repression? Or just the quirks of a busy life?

A lost and bewildered-looking woman in a flowered bikini stared at me from the mirror. A pale, unhealthy-looking woman with intense green eyes and a wide, chapped mouth. Shaking my head, I turned away and picked up the dress. I'd had some days that I thought were record setters for the amount of emotion and the number of shocks my system had been exposed to. The most terrible had been waking up to learn, from the television news, that Andre was being held in a hostage situation and that probably he was seriously wounded. That day, it felt like I held my breath for twelve hours. And did some heroically stupid things. Today might be a close second. I felt like I could run a mental tongue over the jagged edges of my emotions and come away with the taste of blood.

Laura banged on the door. "Thea! Are you all right? Are you ever coming out?"

"Be right there." I dropped the new dress over my head. It was perfect. That was one positive thing about people who liked to shop. Often they were good at it, too. The shrimp color suited me. I looked like someone had turned on a light beneath my skin. I brushed my hair and twirled like the woman on the box. For the first time since we'd found Martina's body, I didn't look like death warmed over.
A lot you know,
I told the mirror.
Appearances can be deceiving.
I opened the door and stepped out.

Laura was standing there in the gloomy dressing area, waiting for me. She followed me into the living room. "Oh," she said, "you look wonderful. But you need to finish opening your present."

"There's more?"

She nodded. "This stuff, I picked out, so maybe you won't like it as much."

"Never apologize in advance for a present you're about to give," I said, reaching into the box and fishing around in the purple paper. I pulled out two small packages. Inside the first was a pair of earrings that were carved wooden fish painted in gaudy tropical colors. In the second, a matching necklace. I put them on. "At least I can look at these fish without worrying," I said.

"Funny. That's just what I thought," she said. "I wanted you to have something good to help you remember the trip. And the fish were great, weren't they?" She studied me carefully, in that unselfconscious way children have before they've learned to stare covertly. "Come here," she said, getting up and taking my hand. She led me back into the dressing room and turned on the lights. "Look. You're beautiful. No wonder that man was watching you on Friday night. Though he didn't look like he was happy to see you."

Little warning flags dropped all over the playing field. "What man?"

"The old man in the bar. The one I saw heading for the elevator after that couple had their fight. I told you. He saw me and he said 'Too slow' and went down the stairs."

I didn't remember an old man in the bar. Maybe, if I got a better description, someone else in the group might. And, of course, old to Laura might not be old at all. I didn't even remember Laura in the bar. "I didn't see you in the bar on Friday."

"Nope. I was outside the windows, trying to catch a frog. But I was looking. I like to watch people. Especially when they don't know they're being watched."

"How old?" I asked. "And what did he look like?"

"As old as Howie," she said. "He's fifty-four. But grayer. Not as fat, though. Kind of tall. He had a mustache. And he was sitting with a tall, skinny woman with long dark hair and the weirdest glasses you've ever seen. The ones shaped like cat's eyes with sequins on the corners. They were way back in a corner where it was dark, like they didn't want to be seen. But the spy sees all."

I put my arm around Laura's shoulders. "I think it's time for us gal detectives to go to work. I know you've already been in the bar once tonight, but could I interest you in another drink?"

"You can't have alcohol," she said disapprovingly.

"Neither can you. We'll get us some Shirley Temples and do a bit of sleuthing. What do you say?"

"Christy and Company," she said, raising her hand.

"Nancy Drew," I said, slapping her palm.

I tucked Rory's laptop in my bag—no way I was trusting it to hotel security—and arm in arm we headed out, two tough dames on the job.

 

 

 

Chapter 25

 

The bar was nice and quiet but that wouldn't last. If there was one fundamental thing to be counted on at conferences, it was that sooner or later, everyone would end up in the bar. Bars are where most of the actual conference business takes place. We got a good table where we could spy on the whole room and settled in for a spot of girlish detection. Despite the enormous ice cream she had consumed, Laura decided that she was hungry and we asked our waitress for some menus. Meanwhile, she ordered a strawberry daiquiri and I got a pina colada. Nonalcoholic for both of us.

Looking at the menu stirred a primitive craving for meat that could only be satisfied by an enormous hamburger. I took it as a sign that I was feeling better, unless it was a sign that Oliver or Claudine was a carnivore. Laura was more restrained. She went for the grilled chicken sandwich. It was clear which of us would live forever. Of course, my earlier adventures couldn't be discounted, either. I'd already had an encounter with Mr. Death, while Laura had only met an eel. Through some strange correspondence in my brain, the thought called forth another bit of Shakespeare. "Thou mettest with things dying, I with things newborn."
A Winter's Tale.
Yet both were met in me.