The Readaholics and the Poirot Puzzle (21 page)

“I've got a function,” I said.

“It doesn't matter,” Maud said. “I can fly solo.”

“You should have backup,” I said, chewing on my lip. “Maybe I can let Al—”

“Pish. I'm having a drink in a bar. Nothing safer,” Maud said.

“You can't do this by yourself,” I said firmly. I'd feel guilty if anything went wrong when I was the one who got her all revved up with my suspicions about Foster and Anita. “Wait until after I get the anniversary party going. I'll turn it over to Al and meet you somewhere. Say, eight o'clock?”

“Fine. Foster should be good and plowed by then,” Maud said cheerfully. “I'll go home and figure out which bars are closest to his place.” She strode off, a woman on a mission, gray-white hair swishing across her collar.

“You going to buy that?” A hopeful woman stood beside Kerry, pointing to the mushroom brush Kerry had been holding for several minutes.

“All yours,” Kerry said, handing it over. “I wish I could go with you tonight, but a mom's gotta seize the moment to spend time with a teenager, especially a boy. Amanda wasn't so bad, at least not until she got hot and heavy with Cormac. She used to talk to me about her classes, her friends. Not Roman, though. You'd think words cost ten dollars each, the way he doles them out, at least to me. One day, you, too, will be happy to watch a zombie movie if it means you might get three sentences out of your teenager.” She raised her voice. “C'mon, Roman.”

I laughed and called, “Enjoy the movie,” as she and Roman walked away.

A
s it turned out, the anniversary wife came down with a migraine midway through the party and it broke up early. Al and I finished supervising departures and cleanup a little before eight. On impulse, I invited him to join me and Maud on the Great Foster Stakeout, thinking that Foster would be less likely to notice me if I was with someone.

Al agreed to accompany me with a degree of enthusiasm that gave me pause, but I couldn't uninvite him. “We're just having a drink together, making sure Maud's okay,” I said. “No Rambo stuff.”

“Rambo?”

I tried to think of a more contemporary action hero. “No Iron Man heroics. Maud can handle herself.”

“I believe that,” Al said, clearly remembering some of his run-ins with Maud. “Are you wearing a disguise?”

“Sort of.” I had a floppy sunhat in the car that Mom had left there. I planned to stuff my hair under it, keep my sunglasses on, and hope the bar was dim enough Foster wouldn't notice me.

“That apartment complex is by the university,” Al said. “I'll bet he's at the Long Shot. The only other bar
that's walkable is Steve-O's, and no one over thirty goes there.”

I called Maud to give her that news and we agreed to meet at the Long Shot. Al was fairly bouncing in the passenger seat with excitement as we drove to the bar. “Chill,” I said when we arrived and got out in the parking lot. Neon lights advertising beer brands sputtered from the bar's windows, and lamps in the parking lot gave plenty of illumination. The sedans and SUVs in the lot said it wasn't a student hangout, and I began to hope we wouldn't have to troll through several bars to find Foster. Maud arrived a minute after we did, and dismounted from her Jeep. I almost didn't recognize her.

She wore a sharp gray suit with a skirt that skimmed her bare knees, and high-heeled pumps. She had smoothed her hair so it fell in an elegant swath against her jaw, and wore discreet but expertly applied makeup. I wouldn't have guessed that Maud even owned mascara. She moved with assurance, like a woman who wore heels every day and ground subordinates under them, and grinned when she saw my expression.

“Didn't know I cleaned up so well, did you?” she greeted me. “Hi, Frink.”

“You look like that actress in
The Devil Wears Prada
,” Al said, eyes round. “The old one.”

“Thanks,” Maud said drily.

“No one's going to believe anyone fired you when you look like that,” I said, trying to soften Al's “old” remark. “You reek of competence.”

“Don't you worry—I'll ‘loser' myself up a bit.” Maud grinned. “I'll go in and scout the place. If I'm not out in five minutes, assume I've acquired the target and come on in to enjoy the show.” Without waiting for us to agree, she strode across the parking lot, every line of her singing with power and confidence. I couldn't wait to hear more about Maud's pre-Heaven life.

Al started the timer on his watch, and I was relieved no one had said, “Synchronize your watches.” This whole thing was feeling too “James Bond meets the Three Stooges” for me already. A lone man and a pair of women in their fifties entered the bar while we waited, and then Al's alarm went
pip-pip-pip
and he said, “She must have found him. Let's move in.”

“Stop with the spy lingo, okay? I feel silly enough as it is.” Twisting my hair up and cramming the hat onto my head, I put on my sunglasses, even though it was almost dark, and we headed into the Long Shot. Al held the door for me, and I entered a dreary space where the order of the day seemed to be serious drinking. Utilitarian tables and chairs occupied most of the space, and a bar with five stools ran along one wall. The guy manning it wore a white T-shirt, none too clean, and an apron, ditto. A two-day growth of beard speckled his jowls. The odor of cigarettes hung heavy in the air, even though smoking indoors was illegal and I didn't see anyone with a cigarette. I realized after a moment that it was leftover smoke, from decades back, soaked into the wooden floors, vinyl chairs, and wallboard. Major
eew
.

On a Saturday night, the place was not exactly
hopping, but it was decently busy. Four of the seats at the bar were taken, and several of the tables held men and women in various stages of inebriation. A small television high in one corner broadcast a college football game that a couple of people were watching, and a country lament thrummed from a jukebox. This place was no threat to Elysium Brewing, I decided.

I spotted Maud immediately, seated at the bar, shoulders slumped forward as she pounded back what looked like whiskey. One of her pumps was on the floor beneath the stool and the other dangled from her toes. Her hair was more disheveled than in the parking lot, her jacket hung off the back of the stool, and her posture made her the very picture of dejection.

“There's Ms. Bell,” Al whispered. “Is that the target next to her?”

“Shh.” I studied the back of the man seated beside Maud and decided it probably was Foster. Black hair, a little longer than I remembered, a checked shirt, khakis, and high-end trainers. As I watched, he turned his head a fraction and said something to Maud. I recognized his profile.

“Yes,” I said. “Let's snag that table over there.” I pointed to one that might be within hearing distance.

Al sprinted for it like he was trying to outrun Usain Bolt, and slid into one of the straight-backed chairs with black vinyl padding a second ahead of a man holding a beer in one hand and a bowl of popcorn in the other. I gave the man an apologetic smile and he glared before wandering to a booth closer to the television. “Way to be inconspicuous,” I muttered to Al.

“Sorry.” He looked abashed. “It's my first stakeout.”

I rolled my eyes but didn't say anything. Pulling out a ten, I gave it to Al and said, “Get us a couple of beers and some popcorn.”

He popped up eagerly and wedged himself between Foster and the man on his right to signal the bartender. He carefully avoided looking at Foster, but the way his head was cocked toward him, any moron could tell he was eavesdropping. Fortunately, Foster was snockered and more interested in Maud than in the skinny kid in the bow tie trying to get the bartender's attention. I strained to hear what Foster and Maud were saying.

“—with that effing company for twenty-eight years. Wouldn't you think that deserved some consideration, some loyalty on their part? Oh no. I'm out on my ear. Two weeks' severance. Have a nice life. One minute I'm an HR executive and vice president, looking forward to a comfortable retirement, maybe a condo in Florida, and two seconds later I'm on the unemployment line, hoping I don't lose my house. They had security escort me out, like I was embezzling or stealing company secrets. It was humiliating.”

Maud's voice blended bitterness and pathos very effectively. She swallowed the last of her drink in one extravagant gesture, and snapped the glass onto the bar. “I'm sorry. I shouldn't be bothering you with my
troubles. You can't understand unless you've been there.” She signaled for another drink. If she'd looked like Meryl Streep earlier, now she reminded me of Charlotte Rampling in that Paul Newman lawyer movie: sexy, disillusioned, angry.

“I've been there,” Foster said eagerly, almost slipping off the stool as he swiveled to face Maud. His eyes were bleary and his lips slack, but his diction was hyperprecise, not slurry. I'd bet he'd been here drinking since noon. “Laid off by a man not fit to shine my shoes. Fact. Not that they need shining.” He waggled one foot and the untied laces danced. “‘Laid off.' What does that even mean? Let's call it what it is, right? Fired. The other
F
word.” He laughed at his wit and insisted on adding Maud's drink to his tab.

“She should be an actress,” Al said, setting down two foaming mugs and a plastic bowl of popcorn. “I was right there by them, heard every word, and she should absolutely be in Hollywood.”

Having learned so many new things about Maud recently, I wouldn't have been surprised to learn that she
had
been a Hollywood actress.

Putting a finger to my lips to shush him, I leaned toward the bar as far as I dared, pretending to stretch and scooting my chair back several inches. My hat slipped over my eyes and I pushed it back a hair so I could see. Al had his eyes fixed on the pair like he was watching a movie, totally unsubtle. He shoveled a handful of popcorn into his mouth, reinforcing the movie idea.

“—out on my ass—just like that.” Foster tried to
snap his fingers. “But that bastard got his.” He nodded slyly.

“How so?” Maud asked, keeping her voice casual.

“Got what he deserved,” Foster said, nodding like a bobblehead. “Arrogant bastard.”

Maud tried again. “What did he get?”

“Dead.”

Maud leaned her upper body toward Foster, ready to receive his confidence. “You killed him?” she whispered, her look suggesting he deserved a prize, if so. I didn't hear the words so much as read her lips.

Al started, his knee bumping the rickety table, and his mug toppled. Pale golden beer spilled across the table, dribbling to the floor and into my lap. The cold liquid immediately saturated my slacks. Al flushed beet red, stuttered, “I'm so sorry,” and tried to sop up the mess with his four-inch-square bar napkin, which dissolved on contact with the beer.

Maud and Foster, along with half the other patrons, looked at us. I kept my head bowed, dabbing ineffectually at my slacks with my napkin, hoping Foster wouldn't recognize me.

“Use this,” the bartender said, slinging a damp cloth toward Al. He caught it and stood to make a better job of blotting up the beer.

“Hey, I know you,” Foster said.

I peeped through my lashes to see him staring at me.

“You're her.” He seemed to struggle for my name or a descriptor that didn't cover half the population. He failed. “That one. Her.”

“I'm going to clean up in the restroom,” I announced.
Trying to keep my back to Foster, I rose and started to squelch toward a dark hall where I hoped to find the facilities.

“You were telling me what you did to get back at the jerk who laid you off,” Maud said.

Her attempt at distraction didn't work. “You're her. From that other bar where Marsh got killed.”

That stopped conversation bar-wide. Only the announcer's voice from the football game, lamenting a fumble, and Carrie Underwood singing about a wife and mistress killing the man who done them wrong kept the room from total silence.

Why did Hercule Poirot not have moments like this? No one ever soaked his pants so it looked as if he'd peed himself. No one ever caught on to his game when he was staking them out or leading them into a clever interview trap. Should I hide in the restroom or confront Foster? “I don't think we've met,” I mumbled, continuing toward the ladies' room. I tried the door. It was locked.

“Just a minute,” a voice called from inside.

I heard the thud as Foster slid off the stool and his feet hit the floor. “Are you following me?” he asked. “Spying on me?”

I half turned. “No, of course not! I—”

“'Cause you're not the kinda woman hangs out in a dive like this. You must be—”

“Hey,” the bartender (and owner?) said in a wounded voice. “If the Long Shot ain't good enough for you, Foster, you can haul your heinie out of here. In
fact, I'm gonna call your wife.” He pulled a cell phone out of his apron pocket and dialed from memory. It obviously wasn't the first time he'd had to call Anita Quinlan to haul her husband home.

That got a few titters from onlookers, who went back to their drinking, game watching, and conversations. The woman in the restroom came out and I ducked inside. It was small but surprisingly clean. I used paper towels to try to rinse some of the beer out of my slacks and then splashed water on my flushed cheeks. When I emerged, Al was sitting beside Maud at the bar, and Foster was nowhere in sight.

“Where's Foster?” I asked when I reached them.

“Waiting for his ride outside,” Maud said. “He tried to follow you into the restroom, so Mel here”—she nodded toward the bartender—“suggested he get some fresh air.”

“I'm so incredibly sorry,” Al said, looking downcast. “I ruined our operation, alerted our target to our presence, and just totally tubed it.”

Maud said, “I guess we need to pull your double-oh rating.” She grinned. “Really, Frink, it's no big deal.”

“But he was right on the verge of saying he killed Gordon,” Al said.

“Maybe yes, maybe no,” I said. “Did you hear how he said ‘that bar where Marsh got killed,' or something like that? He didn't say ‘that bar where I killed Marsh,' or ‘that pub where I tossed Marsh off the roof.' He's three sheets to the wind, so he probably isn't thinking too quickly, and yet he didn't say anything
incriminating in the heat of the moment.” I shrugged. “I'm just not sure he did it anymore.”

“Let's go out there and ask him,” Maud said, sliding off the stool in one graceful move. She searched for her pumps with her toes and slid them on. “I'd forgotten how these suckers pinch. Stilettos are proof of the fashion industry's conspiracy to keep women subordinate to men. I need to write a blog post about that.” She marched toward the door.

Al and I exchanged a look and hurried after her. We opened the door onto a parking lot devoid of people. Brake lights flared at the turn-in, and a car slid into the street and purred away.

“You win some, you lose some,” Maud said.