Fete Worse Than Death (9781101595138) (13 page)

Quill nodded. “That’s the one.”

Meg glanced at the brush in Quill’s hand. “Aha.”

“Whoa.” Dina shook her head. “Okay. So. I know I told you I was too busy with lab project to take on any fete duties, but I’ve changed my mind. Any committee this guy is on I want to be on.”

Meg rolled her eyes. “How good-looking is this guy, anyway?”

“Sort of Hugh Jackman–ish,” Dina said.

“More Robert Downey–ish,” Quill said. “Except he’s better built.”

Meg got up. “I’d better see this guy for myself.” She marched out the door, wheeled, marched back, grabbed Quill’s brush and ran it through her short dark hair, then wheeled out again.

“I thought you and Justin Alvarez were pretty tight!” Dina yelled after her.

Quill looked at her. “Well, you and Davy Kiddermeister are pretty tight.”

“And you’re married.”

Quill laughed. “True enough. I take it they had dinner in the dining room?”

“Steak frites, Pasta Quilliam, and Hammondsport trout amandine. A glass of wine each. They should be finishing up by now.”

“Good.” Quill yawned. “I’d like to get this meeting over with. It’s been a heck of a day. Is there anything else? Other than the gorgeous guy in the dining room?”

Dina clapped her hand over her mouth. “Oh, dear. Yes, there is. Nate needs you in the Tavern Lounge. You know that little old guy with the cane?”

“Mr. Swenson?” Immediately concerned, Quill got to her feet. “Is he okay? Do we need to call the paramedics?”

“
He’s
just peachy keen. We might need the paramedics for the guy he’s whacking around, though.”

Quill tugged at her hair, which made it fall halfway down her back. “Dina!”

“What? I was just kidding about the paramedics. Mr. Swenson’s ninety-eight years old, or so he keeps telling us, and he doesn’t pack that much of a wallop.” She
followed Quill down the short hallway that led to both the Tavern Lounge and the conference room. “I have to say I don’t much care for the guy he’s walloping, which is why this isn’t all
that
urgent.”

Quill paused at the doorway leading into the lounge, to assess the situation.

The room had that indefinable atmosphere of a room immediately after a disruption. The patrons seemed to be settling back down to their drinks.

The lounge itself was a well-designed place to have a glass of wine. Quill had round tables made from a reclaimed gym floor and spaced them widely enough so that guests were comfortable talking to each other but didn’t feel isolated. The long, highly polished mahogany bar was a relic of the Inn’s early days as a genuine tavern, as was the cobblestone fireplace. Over the years, Quill had changed her mind about the walls—initially a teal blue, now a creamy coffee. She’d gone through what she privately called her Georgia O’Keeffe period, and five of her flower studies hung near the French doors leading to the flagstone terrace outside.

This time of night, the lounge was about half full. A few people cast sideways glances at the table nearest the end of the bar, where Jeeter Swenson sat with a middle-aged man and woman at a table for four.

Dina gave her a little nudge. “That’s who Mr. Swenson was whacking. The guy in the blue blazer.”

Quill walked over and sat down in the fourth chair.

Jeeter was thin and wiry, with a head of bright white hair. Great age had been kind to him; his skin was mottled with age spots, his gray eyes were filmy, and his hands
were knobby with arthritis, but there was an alert, merry spitefulness to his expression and he greeted Quill with a wide smile. “The innkeeper,” he said with satisfaction. “Mrs. McHale to you, Portly. She’s come to throw your portly butt out of here. Didn’t you, Mrs. McHale?”

The man next to him nodded, and extended his hand. “Porter Swenson, Mrs. McHale. And this is my wife Melbourne.” Porter
was
portly, in a modest way, but he looked very like his father. Melbourne had the figure of a fiercely dedicated dieter. Her carefully applied makeup and unnaturally taut jaw didn’t do much to conceal her age, which Quill estimated to be in her mid-sixties.

“Please call me Quill. And no, I haven’t come to throw anyone out of anywhere. But I would like to offer assistance if you need it.”

Porter rose and put his hand under Quill’s elbow. “If you wouldn’t mind, could we step over here for a moment?”

Quill glanced at Jeeter, who winked at her. “Go on. Just remember that I’m footing the bill, here. Not him.”

Porter drew her to the end of the bar. “I hope you mean that offer of assistance.”

“Of course.”

He put his hand inside his blazer and pulled out a business card. He was a lawyer, with an office in Syracuse. “You can reach me here, or through Howie here in Hemlock Falls.”

“Howie Murchison?”

“Classmate of mine from Cornell. He understands the situation. You can see how it is.”

Quill glanced back at Jeeter, who was playfully poking
Melbourne with the tip of his cane. There was a smile on her face, but her eyes glittered in a way that only could be described as homicidal.

“My father’s ninety-eight. He is clearly suffering from dementia. I’m going to need your help to get him out of here and into a safer place.”

“A safer place? You mean a nursing home or something like that?”

“Something like that.”

Melbourne shrieked, grabbed the cane, and threw it on the floor. She took a deep breath, and then called to her husband. “I’m going to sit in the car, Porter. Can you wrap it up, please? I’d like to get back to Syracuse before the damn sun comes up.” Then, between gritted teeth, she said, “Good-bye, Dad. You stay well, now.”

“Never been better,” Jeeter cackled. He bent over and picked up his cane with an effort. He waved it at Melbourne. “Scoot!”

Melbourne scooted.

Jeeter chuckled to himself, and then raised a finger in Nate’s direction. “Cup of coffee here, Nate, if you please. Just black.”

Porter shook his head in spurious sorrow. “You can see for yourself what we’re dealing with here.”

What Quill saw was a guy who was taking full advantage of his age to torment a daughter-in-law he didn’t like very much. But she said, “He’s been seen by a doctor? Your father, I mean?”

Porter’s gaze shifted sideways. “Well, the thing is, he’s very clever with it. The dementia, I mean. To talk to him, in a clinical setting, you’d never guess that the
chandelier’s shy a few lightbulbs. And the damn doctors buy it. He’s clever, Dad is. Always has been.” Porter widened his lips in a grin. His teeth were too white. He smelled like wine and sweat. “Look. It’s important, for his sake, that we get him to a…a safer environment. And to do that, we’re going to need outside verification of what Melbourne and I have seen all along.”

Quill raised her eyebrows politely.

“Aggression. Inappropriate behavior in public.” Porter rubbed his elbow reflectively. “Assault.”

“You think he has dementia because he pokes people with his cane?”

“That’s it,” he said eagerly. “That’s it in a nutshell. Now, if you could just talk to your maids, and the waitstaff, and keep an eye out yourself and report on his behaviors, we will be very, very grateful. We will be happy to reimburse everyone for their time, of course. Handsomely.”

Quill stared at him for a long moment. Then she said, “Mr. Swenson checked in a week ago, and we haven’t seen any evidence that he’s…umm…demented. Quite the reverse, as a matter of fact. He’s made some friends here, including my son and his grandmother—well, his honorary grandmother—and our receptionist Dina Muir.”

Porter dropped the smile and stepped in close to her. “So it’s going to be like that, is it? You figure the money you’re getting for the next three months is more important than my father’s health?”

Bullies made Quill lose her temper. Pious bullies were even worse. “It’s not like anything, Mr. Swenson. If there’s nothing else, I have a meeting to get to.”

“I warn you, Mrs. McHale, that if anything happens to my father while he is under your care here at the Inn, you are leaving yourself wide open to legal action. You might think about booking that suite he’s in to someone else. The sooner the better.”

Quill was standing with her back to the fireplace, facing the door to the Inn proper. She saw with relief that Linda Connelly, Dina, Marge, and Linda’s two assistants had come into the lounge. Nate waved them to a table for six by the French doors. She slipped past Porter, with a murmured “You’ll excuse me, please,” and went to join them.

“What’s put your knickers in a twist?” Marge demanded.

“Nothing.” Quill scowled at Porter, who’d gone back to his father and was leaning over him. Jeeter glared back up at him, poked him a good one in the shins with his cane, and hobbled out of the lounge. Porter stared after him, and then slammed out of the French doors into the night.

“What was
that
little drama all about?” Linda asked.

“That’s Jeeter Swenson,” Dina said. “The sweet old guy, that is. The creep is his son, who’s a lawyer from Syracuse, and who wants to get his hot little hands on Jeeter’s lakeside mansion. It’s a gorgeous place, right smack on Seneca Lake and he’s trying to get Jeeter into some nursing home and Jeeter doesn’t want to go. So Jeeter came here, to get away from them and guess what, they tracked him down and showed up here about an hour ago. It’s awful.”

“Now’s not the time, Dina,” Quill said firmly. “We’ll discuss this later.”

“But it’s not right!”

“All he has to do is refuse to go,” Linda said, with a clear lack of interest.

“If they get him declared demented, he can refuse all he wants and they’ll haul him off like a forgotten teddy bear,” Dina said emotionally. “It’s all because of what he saw in the lake.”

Quill was pretty sure she was going to regret the answer, but she asked, “What did he see in the lake?”

“The Loch Ness Monster,” Dina said. “Or more accurately, the Seneca Lake Monster. Of course it’s unlikely that there are monsters in Seneca or any other lake, and if anyone knows that, it’s me, and I told Jeeter that, but he’s got a what d’ycall it. An idée fixe. A harmless one. He is
not
demented.” She pushed her spectacles up her nose and added thoughtfully. “Of course, there’s more things under heaven and in earth, Horatio and all that, and I’ve always had my suspicions that there really is a relic of aquatic dinosaurs in Loch Ness, so why not Seneca, too?”

Linda blinked at her. “What?”

“Dina’s a graduate student in limnology,” Marge said. “That’s freshwater pond ecology. I suppose she’s more likely to know about aquatic dinosaurs than anyone else around here.”

Linda shrugged. “Freshwater pond ecology. Aquatic dinosaurs. Interesting, I guess. I can’t see it affecting the fete, however. Let’s move on. I’m sure we’re all tired after what’s been a very long day.”

“Sure,” Dina muttered, “of course. Sorry.”

“Good. So let’s get the ball rolling here, shall we?” She swung her briefcase up on the tabletop and opened it up. “I’ve learned something that distresses me a little, and before we get any further down the road with this project, I’d like to talk it over. It may be that Presentations can’t tackle this for you after all.” She looked at Quill, Marge, and Dina in turn. “Do any of you know a Carol Ann Spinoza?”

~

“Linda Connelly’s going to be very effective, if she doesn’t up and quit because she thinks we’re all crazy or crooked or both,” Quill said to Myles’s computer image some hours later. “Between Dina’s lake monster and the Citizens for Justice she must think she’s fallen in with crazies. What’s more important is that Elmer didn’t tell her why Adela had to withdraw from the fete when he recruited Presentations. Linda didn’t have a clue about the missing money until Carol Ann tracked her down. She’s concerned about her company’s reputation. She doesn’t want to be in the middle of what might turn out to be a case of fraud or theft or whatever.”

“Embezzlement,” Myles said.

“Right. Embezzlement. Anyhow, Marge and I convinced her that it’s all under control, but she’s skeptical. She’s going to go to another one of those dratted meetings at Brady’s to get some idea of what we’re up against. I can’t blame her, really. No one wants to be associated with a public relations disaster. She wants to talk to Adela, too, of course, even though Elmer’s turned over all her fete
files, which is going to upset Adela to no end. Anyhow. I’ll tackle all that tomorrow…” Quill yawned. “What else? Oh! And what shall I do about that horrible Porter Swenson? I mean, I ask you! Isn’t there some law against attempting bribery of an innkeeper? Aren’t there laws against tormenting the elderly? Although, I suppose to be fair, Jeeter was doing most of the tormenting.”

“I don’t think I’d be looking on the Internet for a Taser cane to give him, no.”

“It’d be great if there were such a cane. I’d Taser that Porter within an inch of his life. I’ll talk to Howie tomorrow, too. I can’t imagine that he and Porter are buddies, but you never know.” Quill yawned again. “Oh, dear. I’m sorry. I think the day is catching up with me. Maybe I’m just getting old, Myles. I used to be able to handle this stuff with one hand tied behind my back.”

“Thirty-nine. A dangerous age. I’m sure that’s the reason.”

Quill bent closer to the screen. “You’re not laughing at me, are you?”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

“It was,” she admitted, “an unusually odd series of events all in one day.”

“Not for Hemlock Falls,” Myles murmured.

“What?”

“Get to sleep, dear heart. It will all look better in the morning.”

“I doubt it,” she said. “But I can always hope.”

She told him she loved him. She didn’t tell him she missed him. They had an agreement about that. Then she signed off and went to check on Jack.

Quill cracked the door to Jack’s bedroom and looked in on her sleeping son. The light fell across his bed. Max the dog lay curled at the foot of the bed, and Jack lay curled on top of Max. Gently, she lifted Jack’s solid little body and tucked him properly into bed. Max yawned, scrabbled to his feet, and slouched into the living room to her front door. He cocked one lopsided ear at her.

“You want to go out?”