Death in Paradise (32 page)

He slammed on the brakes as a vivid orange Volkswagen beetle ducked out in front of us, and just like every parent since cars were invented, he threw out his arm to protect me. Marie laughed. "He's whacked more people in the chest that way. I'm beginning to wonder if it's really accidental."

"After that, Shirley avoided me. She just sort of drifted around at school, looking lost. One day she had a black eye and I asked her about it. Back then, we didn't know so much about battered women, either. She gave the standard reply, that she'd run into a door, and hurried away. The next week it was bruises on her arm. But she was still planning on college, as far as I knew. The school year ended and graduation came. No one was surprised that Shirley was valedictorian. No one was surprised that she declined the honor of making a speech. No one was surprised that she'd been accepted at a really good college and offered a generous scholarship."

"Hurry it up, honey," Marie said. "We're almost to the hotel."

"Two weeks before she was supposed to leave for college, Shirley disappeared. When the police went to talk to Joey, he told them that he and Shirley had been parking on one of the local lover's lanes, that they'd had a fight, and Shirley had gotten out of the car and walked away. They found what was left of her body two months later at the bottom of a ravine. The coroner determined her death was an accident."

He snapped on his turn signal. "It was no accident. When I was in medical school, I had a pathologist for a teacher who truly loved what he did. He used to say, 'They talk to me and I listen. The ones who have killed them think they're silenced forever, but I'm their translator. I'm their spokesman. I interpret for the dead and give them the voices that their killers have tried to steal away.' I listened to him and I thought, someone like that could have proved that Shirley's death was no accident. I decided to become a champion of people like Shirley."

"Isn't he wonderful?" Marie said. "Other people may make more money, but Eddie makes a difference."

They pulled up in front of the hotel. "Why don't you get out here," he said, "and then I'll go park the car." I got out of the car and stood for a moment, testing my shaky legs. "Can you manage?" he asked. "Marie could..."

I shook my head. "No, really. I'm fine." Damn! Now I was saying it, too. I wasn't fine. I just hated being fussed over.

After the cool austerity of the hospital and the soothing ride in the Pryzinski's air-conditioned car, entering the lobby was like walking into sensory overload. I stood in the entrance, gathering myself for the long hike to the elevators, assailed by the mingled scents of earthy, tropical vegetation, the faint salt tang of the ocean, and the perfume of flowers and scented women. Faint music, chattering voices, children splashing in the pool. Phones ringing. Welcome back to the world.

Jolene, done up in a long-sleeved shimmery blue dress, was arguing with someone at the desk. She abandoned the argument and came running up to me. "Thank goodness you're here," she said. "They won't let me into your room, dinner is in an hour, and I need that speech."

"Why didn't you get Billy to write you another one?"

"I would have, of course, but with your accident and the incident with Jeff this morning, and Martina... well, when I got back from the snorkel trip, Billy was working and couldn't be disturbed, and now I can't find him. I've asked everyone." She was moving rapidly toward the elevators as she spoke. I couldn't keep up. Normally, yes, but I was still a wee bit under the weather, if feeling like I probably wouldn't make across the lobby could be described that way.

"Slow down," I said.

"But we don't have time...."

Long-forgotten words came tumbling out. College Shakespeare. The most exciting teacher I'd ever had. Obviously, I'd carried the fear of drowning with me then, as well.

 

" 'Lord, Lord! methought, what pain it was to drown:

What dreadful noise of waters in mine ears!

What sights of ugly death within mine eyes!

Methoughts I saw a thousand fearful wracks;

A thousand men that fishes gnawed upon.' "

 

That stopped her. "What on earth is that?" she asked, turning to stare at me.

"Richard III, I think."

"Shakespeare? At a time like this?"

"Seemed to fit the moment." I didn't bother to tell her that it was always time for Shakespeare. Shakespeare and the Bible. That I still kept both within reach for ready reference, at work and at home. We made it to the elevators. Conference attendees were buzzing around the lobby, colorful as butterflies, talking and laughing. Despite our series of disasters, we hadn't managed to put a damper on everyone's good spirits. The elevator arrived. We got in. I leaned against the wall and closed my eyes.

"Now that you're here, maybe you could still do the—"

Without opening my eyes, I said, " 'Full fathom five thy father lies; Of his bones are coral made: Those are pearls that were his eyes: Nothing of him that doth fade, But doth suffer a sea-change into something rich and strange.' "

"The Tempest
," she said. "Have you gone mad?"

"Suffered a sea-change. No. I'm
not
giving the speech. Two hours ago I couldn't speak at all. Now I can speak but I can barely stand. I'm not pushing my luck. You wouldn't want me to. It would do the conference no good if I collapsed into my dinner plate before I got our speaker introduced. We've had quite enough drama for one weekend."

"You're right," she said. "I'm sorry. I'm afraid I'm letting all this chaos get to me. I should know better. The headmistress's life is pretty much constant chaos, at least at my school, hard as I've worked to change it. I don't know why I think this should be different. Or why I'm not coping."

"You'll do fine."

The door opened and we got out. Two women were waiting to get on. Women in identical blue dresses. Of course. The Elliot sisters. They smiled and waved and didn't even stop to ask questions. The open bar only lasted for the first half hour of the cocktail party. When the door had closed behind them, I said, "I saw Rory at the hospital. I thought I should."

"And?"

"She says she wants to die. I can't tell whether it is just hysteria and late-adolescent angst or whether she had something to do with Martina's death and now she can't handle the guilt. She dropped these dark hints but she wouldn't say anything. If she hadn't been so helpless I might have whacked her. But it worries me. The whole situation. A kid, alone in a hospital in a strange place..."

I was hoping Jolene would pick up the ball and put herself or someone else in charge of Rory's welfare, but all she said was, "Guess we'll have to put off telling her that she's fired, won't we?"

"I guess." I stuck the key in the door and opened it. The room seemed very dark and I was sure I'd left the curtains open. I snapped on the light and stared. It looked like a tornado had hit.

My clothes and papers were flung helter-skelter all over the place, mixed with crumpled bedding and pulled-out drawers. The coup de grace was my laptop, which I had left on the desk. It had been dismembered and the pieces were scattered everywhere. My recovery suffered an immediate and serious setback. I sat down in a chair, gasping. I had once again lost my powers of speech.

As if they'd been summoned by my telekinetic powers, Bernstein and Nihilani arrived at the door, invited themselves in, and surveyed the damage. Out popped a radio and technicians were called. Dr. Pryzinski and Marie arrived and wanted to carry me off to their room. Bernstein and Nihilani didn't think so. Jolene looked like she was about to decompensate.

I have been Thea the fixer for too long. Despite the shock, despite my anguish at losing my computer, I summoned back my powers of speech, begged for ten minutes grace from the midnight twins, and went to her room with Jolene to compose a speech. I felt dissociated from myself, as though one Thea, the battered, confused, exhausted one, was watching another composed and coherent Thea perform. Luckily, I had invited the speaker. I had collected background materials and written the speech for Martina. I had written it again for myself. By this time, I could practically recite it from memory. I talked. She wrote. My voice held; her fingers flew. At last, I said, "Therefore, it is my great pleasure to introduce Dr. Noreen Van Norden, whose courage in pioneering single-sex math classes in the public-school setting, and the positive results of that experiment, has, and will continue to have, lasting importance for the lives of young girls everywhere. Dr. Van Norden."

She put down her pen. "You're amazing, you know that?"

I didn't feel like being complimented. I was on the verge of complete collapse, visions of warm blankets and soft pillows dancing before my eyes. "I only wish I could hear her speak. She's going to be wonderful."

"So come. It's not too late."

"I'm tired, Joly. I'm beyond tired. And I've still got the mess that was my room to deal with. I don't even have a place to lie down." I picked up her phone and called the desk, explained what had happened, and asked for another room. All they had left, he said, was a suite. I said a suite would be just dandy. He hesitated and then informed me that it was next door to the, um, room where a woman, um, had, um, been, um. I thought that if he said "um" one more time that I would crawl down to the lobby and strangle him. It seemed like justice to me. I asked if he could send someone up with the key. At that he hemmed and hawed and hesitated.

"Look," I said, "here in your hotel, while I was at the local hospital being revived after nearly drowning, someone broke into my room, trashed it, and destroyed a very expensive computer. In case you have missed the irritation in my voice, let me point it out to you. I'm very tired, physically unwell, and extremely upset. Send someone up with the key." I banged down the phone and leaned back in the chair, exhausted. My eyelids felt like there were little lead weights on them.

Jolene was hovering by the door. "I'd better get downstairs with this. Do you mind? You're okay... I mean..."

"Go," I said. "Go ahead. I've got to get back there and see what I can rescue anyway. I'm not spending any more time than I have to in this." I plucked at the shapeless green sack I was wearing. Ed Pryzinski was a wonderful, generous man but he had no fashion sense. As she reached for the doorknob, the sleeve of Jolene's dress pulled up and I saw a Band-Aid on her wrist. "What happened to your wrist?"

"Coral," she said. "Or lava. You know how things are closer than they look in the water, kind of like side-view mirrors? I reached out and bingo. Big scrape and blood pouring everywhere. I headed for the boat so fast I practically walked on water. Ran on water. All I could think of was sharks." She opened the door. "See you in the morning. We'll miss you."

I trudged back to my room. The destruction was being photographed like a serious crime scene, instead of merely nasty vandalism. This time I noticed, as I hadn't before, that my birthday roses had been shredded. That hurt. I sat in a chair and put my head in my hands. It never stopped, did it? "They're giving me another room," I said. "Could I get some of my clothes and stuff and go up there?" I only asked permission because I was too tired to argue.

The midnight twins exchanged glances. "Sure," Nihilani said. "Long as we know where to find you."

"Someone's coming up in a minute with the key." I knelt by the pile, picking through it, brushing aside the petals of my brutalized flowers. Found some clean underwear. A nightgown. A skirt. A T-shirt. Some shoes. The sandals I was wearing hurt my feet. I decided to switch to the shoes. When I stuck my foot in, a piece of paper rustled under my toe. I pulled the shoe off, took the paper out, unfolded it. A cash receipt for the purchase of lingerie. The top, which would have listed information about the store and purchase date, had been torn off. It made no sense, but so little of what was happening did. I handed it to Bernstein, my extended arm shaking with the effort of holding it out. "Here," I said. "It was in my shoe but it's not mine. I wore these shoes on Friday."

Bernstein took it, looked at it, and handed it to Nihilani. Nihilani frowned and pointed at the door. Then the two of them went out into the hall. At this point, I didn't even care if they arrested me. There were beds in jail. There might even be hot showers or cups of tea. Right now I had no amenities. I took advantage of their absence to go into the bathroom. For some reason, the vandals had neglected to do their work here. I collected my cosmetics bag and vital stuff like toothbrush and hairbrush. Then I checked the stack of towels to see if Rory's laptop was still there. It was. I wrapped it up in the bundle of my clothes and stuck everything into the tote bag I'd been carrying.

A bellboy came hurrying in and stopped in shock when he saw the mess. He held out an envelope. "Ms. Kozak?" he asked. In his voice were the words "What the hell happened here?"

I opened the envelope and read the room number. "Thanks," I said.

"I'm supposed to ask if you need any help with your, um, things," he said.

Maybe "um" was a part of the Hawaiian language, but I doubted it. "I'm beyond help," I said. "Maybe tomorrow." He left.

I followed him out, gave the number of my new digs to the midnight twins, and took the elevator up to seventeen. Maybe, if I was really lucky, I'd get a fruit basket. What I wanted to do was to drink the entire minibar and fall into a mindless stupor. But my stomach was in no state for such indulgence. What I wanted to do was call Andre, cry on his shoulder, and ask for advice. But I didn't know how soon the twins would arrive and I didn't want to be interrupted in midcry. When I finally got around to crying about this, I wanted to give it my all.

I called room service and ordered tea and soup and toast. Then I wrapped myself in a blanket, lay down on the couch, and let myself drift into a senseless doze. Eventually they came. Pulling up their chairs, taking out their notebooks, and clicking their pens. "Mind if we call room service?" Bernstein asked. "We didn't have time for dinner."

I waved in the general direction of the phone. "Be my guest." What the heck. The bills were already so insane what difference did a little bit more make? My regret was not that I had to feed them again—I like feeding people, especially, sexist as it is, hungry men—but it meant they'd be staying awhile. Visions of bubble bath danced in my brain. I'd spotted some in the bathroom.