Dead at Breakfast (6 page)

“Nobody thinks we had Jenny killed. It was all too clear that she was doing a fine job of that herself!”

“Stop being an asshole! Don't you see what it's going to be like? Tomorrow, or the next day, my children will be walking into some chapel at Forest Lawn, or wherever, with every fucking news truck in California filming, and if we aren't there with them . . .”

Alex slapped her, hard across the face. “You don't call me an asshole. Ever,” he said.

With a whap, she slapped him in return. “And you don't hit me! Ever!”

He started to laugh.

“Jesus, you are a sick bastard,” she yelled, starting to cry again. “We are going home. I'm going to take the car into town, where I can see the news and use my phone and then I'm going to charter a fucking plane, and we are going home.”

Alex took car keys from his pocket and tossed them to her. “Suit yourself,” he said, and sat down. “She was
my
daughter and I'm not going. Not just to put on a show. And I think your sister is enjoying her cooking course.”

Lisa had started away, but now she came back and stood over him. “Oh, is that your plan? You and Glory stay here and this will give you a chance to get into her pants again?”

Alex paid her no attention. He was concentrating on relighting his cigar.

“Sometimes I hate your fucking guts!” his wife yelled, and she stalked off in the direction of the parking lot.

Deputy Sheriff Babbin was lounging around, shooting the breeze with Janet, the Bergen town clerk, when the call came. It was a lady from OnStar. Janet handed Buster the receiver.

“We have a disabled vehicle on the Kingdom Road in Bergen,” said the OnStar operator. “GPS puts her about two-thirds of a mile out of town, right before the Dump Road turnoff.”

“Is the driver hurt? Called an ambulance?”

“Driver is conscious but confused. Air bags deployed.”

“Roger that. I'm on my way,” said Buster. “Better call the ambulance just to be safe. And get ahold of Pete at the Lakeview Garage. Send a truck.” He hitched his pants and put on his sheriff's hat. “Accident up the Kingdom Road,” he said briskly to Janet.

“Drive safe,” she said, knowing Buster liked nothing better than to turn on the siren and drive eight hundred miles an hour to answer a call about a cat in a tree. Even though it was the firefighters who got cats down.

When Buster reached the car, a huge Cadillac, he found the lady at the wheel still talking to her dashboard. She had been crying, and one side of her face was beginning to swell.

“I don't think it's broken,” she was saying as she rotated her wrist in the air, wincing. She was pretty in a sort of plastic way, like people on television. She had clearly taken a curve too fast. Her rear wheels had clipped the guardrail and started a spin, he guessed. The guardrail was torn out and the right front tire was hanging entirely in the air over the drop. The nose of the car was crumpled against a power pole, the hood accordioned, but the pole had saved her life.

“A policeman is here,” the lady said to the dashboard.

“That's good,” said the dashboard. “Do you want me to stay on the line?”

“Did you just tell me you called a tow truck?”

“I did, ma'am. It's on the way. And an ambulance.”

“Okay. Okay. Thank you.”

“You're welcome, ma'am. You have a nice day.”

The woman looked up at Buster. “I'm alive,” she said, as if really asking for confirmation.

“You are,” he said. “Do you think you can get out of the car?”

She considered. “I don't know. Do you think I should?”

“If you can. I think it'd be safer.”

She was talking as if she were translating each word he uttered from a foreign language. “Safer. Oh.”

“Have you tried opening the door?”

She shook her head no. She pushed a button to unlock the doors and the buttons popped. So the electricals were working. He wasn't sure that was a real good thing. If the gas tank was breached or the . . . well, he thought of sparks and he thought of gasoline and it seemed to him it might not be good. He tried the door. It was jammed, but not as badly as the door on the other side of the vehicle. He was weighing the possibility that really putting his weight into getting the door open might dislodge the car and send it farther over the edge, when Pete arrived in the tow truck.

The cooking class was eating a late lunch in the glassed-in porch looking out toward the mountains. Oliver was telling a story about catering a private fund-raiser in San Francisco for the president when Maggie said, “Isn't that a police car coming up the drive?”

Everyone stopped chewing and turned to look at the sedan, with its blue roof light revolving silently to announce the urgent business of the officer at the wheel. Buster parked directly at the front steps, beside the
NO PARKING
sign. As if he felt eyes or a camera on him, he left the car, hat firmly on his large round head, and marched importantly into the inn.

The table started to buzz with questions. Accident? Crime? Accident?

Cherry Weaver came to the door of the porch with Buster right behind her.

“That one,” Cherry said, pointing to Glory.

“Miss Poole?” said Buster, stepping forward.

Everyone looked at Glory, who had covered her mouth with her hands when Cherry spoke, and gone rigid. Her eyes filled with tears.

“Everything's all right, ma'am,” said Buster, sounding like a policeman on television.

“My sister?”

“She's going to be fine, ma'am.”

Glory sprang up and hurried to Buster just as Mr. Gurrell rushed up behind them. “You can use my office,” he said. “Come this way.”

When they had gone, the buzz of curiosity resumed. “Accident!” “Lisa?” “Hospital?” people asked each other.

“What was that sign you were making to Buster?” Maggie asked Hope.

“I was trying to tell him to take off his hat.”

“Who's Buster?” asked Nina.

“My son.”

“The sheriff is your son?”

“Deputy sheriff. And it's a long story,” said Hope.

No one knew what to do next. Dessert had not yet been served, and apparently no one was dead, except for Artemis. Yet to resume chattering about whether it made a difference to whip egg whites by hand or in a mixer seemed wrong.

Oliver said, “All right, troops. We need an organizing principle. Hope is the mother of the local sheriff. Now everyone tell something about themselves that the rest of us don't know.”

This was met with a murmur of relief. Oh good, parlor games. Oliver turned to Martin, who was on his right. “You're up.”

Martin's wife looked delighted. “This'll be good. There's nothing I don't know about you.”

Martin said, “I can play the tuba.”

“Shut
up,
” said Nina. “You can not.”

“I played tuba in my junior high school marching band,” he insisted.

“You are lying.”

“If I am, no one can prove it because no one ever has a tuba handy.”

Nina bopped him on the head with her napkin as she said, “In high school I was junior runner-up sewing champion of Indiana.”

No one doubted her and all were pleased. Teddy Bledsoe said he could do the tango. Margaux Kleinkramer was a level 90 orc shaman in World of Warcraft. “Whoa,” said Oliver, impressed.

Homer Kleinkramer had gone helicopter skiing in Alaska in a group that included the king of Spain. Bonnie McCue said that Billy Joel once kissed her on the lips. Albie Clark had been a nationally ranked squash player. Oliver was fluent in Japanese. Maggie said she had once expelled a boy from school whose mother then came into the building and tried to shoot her.

They all saw Buster's car pull off down the driveway. Mr. Gurrell came back to the door.

“Mrs. Antippas had an accident on the way down the mountain,” he said. “I knew you'd want to know. She's been taken to the hospital in Ainsley. The EMTs said she didn't appear to be badly injured but she's in shock, and she might have a concussion. She's asked for her sister to come and to bring her some things.”

“Does Glory need a car?” Martin asked, reaching for his keys.

“No, Mr. Rexroth will drive her. Miss Poole will be in touch with me as soon as she knows more, and I'll let you all know.”

As he left, a girl arrived with a tray of dessert soufflés, and Oliver said, “Hope, it's your turn.”

“I already went. My son is the deputy sheriff of Bergen,” she said, and chose a coffee soufflé.

He made a buzzer sound, like a wrong answer noise on a quiz show. “We all already know that.”

After a pause, she said, “You're cheating, but all right. I can read astrological charts.”

Maggie stared at Hope. Hope shrugged. “I used to be sent to my grandmother's in Maryland. There was nothing on earth to do there. Her Catalan cook had a little business going out the back door, doing readings. She didn't want me to tell, so she offered to teach me.”

“I think you're going to have to prove it,” said Teddy Bledsoe.

“Fine,” said Hope. “You're a Pisces.”

Teddy gave an appreciative hoot and slapped the table. “I am a
triple
Pisces!”

“I'm not a bit surprised,” said Hope.

“What does that even
mean
?” asked Maggie.

“And you,” said Hope to Nina, “are a Sagittarian.”

“I'm a what?”

“When's your birthday?”

“December first.”

“I rest my case,” said Hope.

The head of housekeeping was in Mr. Gurrell's office. Mrs. Antippas's dog had been in room 6G yowling, since midmorning. When the girl went in to clean, it snarled at her, and then went to the bathroom on the carpet. She had just gone to ask Mr. Antippas to take the dog, so the room could be ready for when the sisters came back, but he had his
DO NOT DISTURB
sign out, apparently taking a nap after lunch. His room reeked of cigar smoke, by the way. She'd found a cigar butt floating in his toilet yesterday, disgusting, like he forgot to flush. Someone had to get the dog out of the room, and
she
wasn't going to do it, she drew the line, he knew when he hired her that she wouldn't deal with animals . . .

Gabriel Gurrell was pinching his knees under the desk to distract himself so he wouldn't shout at her. She was a very good housekeeper, but high-strung, and once she got going like this you practically had to tackle her to get her to stop.

“I'll take care of . . . Mrs. Eaton, I'll . . . Mrs. Eaton!” he finally raised his voice. Then he added, “I'm sorry. I know it's been difficult. I will have Cherry take the dog for a walk, and please apologize to the staff for me. There was an accident this morning, you know, and we're all upset.”

Mrs. Eaton knew all about the accident. Everyone in the house did. They all knew about the girl's death in California too, the singer, and they thought Mr. Antippas was a . . .

“Thank you, Mrs. Eaton,” Gabriel said. “Everyone is under strain.”

“They are. Chef is very upset. Earl is upset.”

“I'll take care of it. Thank you for coming to me.” He was on his feet, guiding her to the door. When she had disappeared up the stairs he went down to find Cherry.

Cherry was lounging behind the reception desk, reading a magazine and chewing gum. She jumped up when she saw him coming, stowed the magazine, and spit the gum into her hand and hid it behind her back.

“Cherry,” he said.

“What?” No more ‘Yes, Mr. Gurrell?' Now that she knew she wasn't staying on she'd reverted to the sullen manners that were apparently her default mode.

“A couple of things. When the deputy arrived this morning, you should have called me rather than dealing with it yourself.”

“You said I was to take initiative.”

“But this was rather a special case, don't you think?”

“Yes I do. I did. Buster said he needed to see Mrs. Antippas's sister right away and I knew where she was so I took him. Anyway it wasn't morning.”

Now she was just being rude. She was really a very hostile little item, Gabriel thought. He sighed impatiently and hitched his
shoulders back. Stand straight. Maintain your dignity. You're the one who always has to eat the crow if you're in the hospitality business. Clearly the Cherry situation was deteriorating fast, but at this minute, he needed her, if he didn't want a domino effect cascading through the staff.

“Afternoon then. You're right about that.”

“I know.”

“I've come to you about something else though. With Mrs. Antippas in the hospital, and her sister gone, I need someone to walk the little dog. The maid hasn't been able to clean the room and—”

“You know what, I quit. I quit right now. I know you already fired me but I still quit, I am not a fucking dog walker. I don't even like dogs.”

“Cherry! Remember where you are!” Gabe was trying to whisper.

“That slobbering horse you made me walk last time dragged me halfway around the lake, I've still got blisters on my feet, you try it in fucking high heels!”

“That was unavoidable and I told you how much I—”

“Oh shut up. I know you think I'm stupid, you blame me for everything. Walk the damn dog yourself.” Suddenly she started to cry and began to unbutton her Oquossoc Mountain Inn jacket.

“Cherry! Please!”

Furiously, Cherry threw the jacket onto the reception desk. There was a gob of chewing gum stuck to it. She began unzipping her skirt. Gabriel was horrified.

“Cherry!” Gabriel cried helplessly. “You're in a public space!”

She took off the skirt and threw that on the desk. Then she took off one tan faux patent leather pump and threw it at him, and found it so satisfying that she did the same with the other one. Then she stalked off in her blouse and ragged slip, through which you could see her magenta thong underpants.