A Matter of Time (25 page)

“There’s a third way,” Dupré murmured.

“What?”

“Never mind.” It was the first time he had not taken his partner into his confidence.

As they parted, neither man offered a hand in farewell.

30
  
  
saving plain jane

Maud and Margaret were on the little balcony of their room, watching the sun setting over the Atlantic, enjoying the sound
of the surf on the rocks below. The morning’s rain had passed quickly, leaving everything fresh and bright.

On the table between them were two glasses with ice and two tiny bottles of J&B.

“The person I’m most concerned about is Jane,” Maud announced, taking a drag on her slender cigar.

“Jane?”

“Our neighbor, remember?” She gestured in the general direction of the honeymoon suite. “Plain Jane MacLean. I like her!”
she exclaimed, blowing a smoke ring. “And I
don’t
like what’s being done to her.”

“We don’t know anything is being done to her! I mean, you thought you saw something Monday morning, during that awful time
on the beach. You just had a hunch, is all.”

“We’re
not
going through this again, are we, Mags? You know how right my hunches are.”

“But we don’t have anything else to go on.”

Maud tapped the ash off her cigar. “What about his afternoon jogs?”

“I don’t see what’s wrong with that.”

“Disappearing for two hours of prime time on his honeymoon?”

Margaret wasn’t buying it. “She said at breakfast that she doesn’t mind. Gives her a chance to take a nap.”

Maud scowled. “She’s putting up a brave front, poor thing.” All at once she set her glass down and stood up. “We’ve got to
help her!”

“Help her do what, for heaven’s sake?”

“She’s going to be badly hurt.”

“But we can’t help that.”

“Maybe we can,” her friend retorted, stubbing out her cigar.

Maud did not answer. She glared at the sun as if it were trying to stare her down.

“Maudie Brown! You swore to me, in the lobby of the Cairo Hilton, that you would never, never, never—”

Her friend waved a hand to stop the nevers. “This is different.”

“It is
not
different! The
only
difference is that here we might not be in danger of starting World War III!” She glowered at her friend. “But knowing you,
even
that
is not out of the question!”

Maud sighed. “Do you like Jane?”

“Of course I like her.”

“You want to see her hurt?”

“Of course not.”

“Then we’ve got to help her.”

Margaret’s voice was barely audible. “I don’t want to ask what you’ve got in mind.”

“Let’s just see if his afternoon jogs are as innocent as they’re meant to be.”

“How are we going to do that? It’s been years since I’ve done any running. And you—” she looked at her heavy friend and chuckled.

“I wasn’t thinking of joining him,” Maud snapped, not appreciating her cousin’s levity. “I was thinking of spying on him.”

“Oh, Lord!” moaned Margaret. “It’s happening again!”

Maud shook her head in disgust. “I don’t know why I drag you all over the world with me!”

“Because I’m the only one who’ll put up with your nonsense!” Margaret shot back. “And I’m not putting up with it any longer!”

“All right, all right,” said Maud, softening, “calm down.”

They sat in silence for a moment. Then in a more placating tone, Maud pleaded, “Do this one thing with me, Mags, and if it
turns out I’m wrong, we drop it.”

Margaret’s firm jaw remained set.

Her cousin upped the ante. “
And
—I promise to keep that promise I made in Cairo.”

Margaret’s eyes were cold. Her round steel-rimmed glasses seemed to underscore her steely resolve.

“
And
—we can go to Henley next spring for the Regatta.”

The prospect of watching some of the best crews in the world competing together was almost more than one of Wellesley’s great
former oars could resist. The manicured lawns by the river’s edge, the beautiful young men in their seersucker jackets and
straw boaters…. There was an infinitesimal softening at the corners of her mouth.

Maud saw it, and softly, enticingly started the Eton Boating Song,

“Jolly boating weather,

And a hay harvest breeze,

Blade on the feather,

Shade off the trees….”

Margaret, in spite of herself, began to smile. “That’s not fair!” she muttered, but by the time her cousin reached the refrain,
she had joined in,

“Swing, swing together,

With your bodies between your knees.”

“All right,” sighed Margaret with a shudder, “What exactly do you have in mind?”

“Well,” said Maud, rubbing her hands together and leaning forward, “he’s taken his scooter and gone over to the beach at the
Southampton Princess, to do his jogging there.”

“How on earth do you know that?”

“Because I eavesdropped. I overheard him telling Jane at lunch, in case she wanted to reach him by cell phone. He promised
he’d be back by six, to take her to II Palio for dinner.” She looked at her watch. “It’s almost five; if we catch a No. 8
bus, we can be there by 5:30.”

“But he’ll be almost ready to come back by then.”

“Exactly! They’ll be done jogging, and in the pleasant afterglow of all that exercise, they’ll be enjoying a beer—no, too
many carbos—a Pinot Grigio at the little bar by the beach.”

“What if we get there, and he’s not there?”

Maud shrugged. “Then we’ve wasted an hour and four bus tokens.”

“What if he’s there, but she isn’t?”

“Then—we’ll never, never, never do this again!”
Maud declared, mimicking her friend. “And either way, you get to feast your eyes on all those lovely boys at Henley. But
if
I’m
right, and he
is
there, you and I are going to the Masai Mara in January! For two weeks! And this time we’re going to do the hot-air balloon
ride!”

They caught the No. 8 and arrived at Southampton Beach on schedule. It was a long walk down to the beach, and Maud was having
a hard time. “Now I see why they have those nice blue trolleys for the hotel’s guests,” she gasped, as one passed them. “If
I’m having this much trouble coming down, I’m never going to make it back up.”

“It’s all right, dear,” said her cousin. “I’ve already decided we can splurge and take a cab home.”

They reached the Cabana bar and restaurant facility, and Margaret was about to go in, when Maud grabbed her. “You can’t just
walk in there!” she hissed under her breath. “He’ll see you!”

“
If
he’s there,” said Margaret, refusing to concede the point or lower her voice.

“Come on!” said her friend in her most urgent, conspiratorial whisper, and she went into the women’s changing room. Margaret
followed. “Now,” continued Maud, “we’re going to go out on the beach, and then come up to the bar from there, only we won’t
go in.” She opened the door to the beach. See those bushes? We’ll use them as cover, to check out the lay of the land, as
it were.” She paused. “If she’s here, of course.”

“Don’t be crude, Maudie; it doesn’t become you.”

Once the two of them were behind the bushes, Maud peered out—and after a moment murmured, “Hah! Got you, you miserable, blow-dried
creep!”

“Where?” whispered Margaret, tugging on her friend’s arm. “Let me see!”

Reluctantly, Maud yielded the optimum vantage point.

“You’re right!” Margaret whispered. “Again!” She watched Buff and the woman from the Red Lion pleasantly glowing, heads close
together, sipping on straws in tall, reddish-brown drinks. “I think they’re having Planter’s Punch.”

She turned to her cousin. “
Now
what do we do?”

“We don’t
do
anything. We just watch.”

They watched.

“This is so—
weird
,” whispered Margaret, enthralled. “I’ve never done this before.”

“What, spied on people? Why is it any different than what we do in restaurants? We eavesdrop like mad, even make up fantasy
backgrounds for the people we’re listening in on. Just think of this as
eaves-seeing
!”

After a while, Margaret whispered, “I’m beginning to see how this is such a turn-on for stalkers. It’s kind of—
empowering
! We’re seeing everything, and they don’t even know they’re being observed!”

“My turn,” announced Maud, assuming the observation post. “Hmm, I think she just stopped glowing…. Uh-huh, if a person can
un
-glow, that’s what just happened…. Oh, my stars and garters! Is she
ticked
!… She’s standing up…. She’s leaving… coming this way… we’ll have to duck out of here in a moment.”

Maud turned and was about to leave, but couldn’t resist one more look. “Wait! He’s coming after her… he’s got her by the arm…
she pulls free and…
Whoa
!” Maud winced and recoiled.

“
What?
” hissed Margaret. “
What is it?
”

“She slapped him!
Hard!
”

“Let me see!”

“Not yet.” Maud held her away, without taking her eyes off the drama. “He’s coming back for more! He’s gotten around in front
of her, to cut her off…. Oh, good for you, girl!”

“Tell me!”

“She just hauled off and belted him! And does she pack a wallop! Must work out on the heavy bag when she’s not spinning! Now
she’s—that’s telling him! Whoops, duck! Here she comes!”

The two cousins whirled away and bent over, apparently fascinated by a seashell—that looked exactly like all the others in
its immediate vicinity.

The young woman passed by without noticing them. Rubbing the side of his face, Buff went away in the opposite direction.

In the cab on the way back to Sandys House, Margaret asked, “Just before we ducked, you said, “That’s telling him!’—What did
she tell him?”

“Oh, just something crude that did not become her.” Maud smiled at the memory. “But it was right on!”

That evening the two cousins were watching television in the TV room off the main lobby. There were no TV sets in the rooms,
as St. John Cooper-Smith felt that if his guests came to Bermuda on holiday, they might appreciate a vacation from mindless,
pre-digested entertainment. To first-timers complaining about no TV in their rooms, he would suggest “a little television
of the mind” and would lead them to a library of well-thumbed mysteries.

Some discovered that they liked reading, even regarding
it as a lost pleasure. It made for lively and enthusiastic breakfast conversation, over which St. John presided at the head
of the long table, dispensing coffee from a huge silver samovar. Those already into reading, or back into it, would compare
favorite writers and plot twists. Then the readers would encourage the nonreaders to give it a try. The occasional rainy afternoon
produced an abundance of animated conversation, and people began congratulating St. John on inspiring a mini-renaissance for
the literary-minded.

But he did realize that for some, giving up their daily tube fix, cold turkey, was asking a bit much. So he put in a TV room
and let the addicts discover for themselves that, while they might have access to twenty or thirty channels at home, in Bermuda
there were only three. Of which two often played the same program at the same time. While the third carried a cricket match
so uneventful that even Bermudians sometimes thought of going out to the kitchen to watch the bananas ripen.

This night Maud and Margaret were watching Oprah. They were surprised to find her show on in evening prime time—until they
realized how many islanders might prefer it to anything else they could get from the States.

Oprah was just plugging her latest book discovery, a Cape Cod mystery writer, when Jane and Buff came in from dinner. Glancing
in the TV room, Jane saw them and smiled. When the cousins smiled back, she came in. Buff followed, not smiling.

“We had the best time!” Jane exclaimed. “That is the nicest restaurant! Great Italian food and an easy walk from here. You’ll
have to try it!”

“That’s wonderful, dear!” said Maud. “We’ll go tomorrow.”