A Deadly Dealer

by J. B. Stanley

  Pulling on a pair of jeans and her sweater set from last night, Molly finished off her outfit with a pair of flip-flops, which served as her slippers whenever she stayed at a hotel. “Just a drop of milk, right?” she asked Clara, seeking confirmation.

  “Yes, thank you, pancake. And try to get the biggest cups you can find for both of us. You’re not exactly a morning person, you know.” Molly had just opened the door when her mother added,

  “And stop by the front desk to complain about our coffeepot, too! Maybe we’ll get a few more drink tickets,” she called out hopefully.

  Exhaling loudly in annoyance, Molly would love to have slammed the door, but it eased gracefully closed on silent hinges and she had to settle for repeatedly poking the elevator’s down button in order to release some of her irritation at being sent for coffee when she should still be happily dreaming. When the elevator car arrived, it was empty.

  Molly descended to the lobby floor and was surprised at how quiet the enormous hotel seemed to be this morning.

  There were several groups of people already breakfasting at the Cascades, the restaurant overlooking the garden area not to be confused with the rotating lounge, and dozens of other guests bearing paper coffee cups were headed toward the lobby and afterward, the exit. Still, the majority of the Opryland’s guests seemed to be asleep or relaxing comfortably in their rooms.

  As Molly wandered over stucco bridges and followed a curving path adjacent to one of the gurgling streams, she completely forgot which direction would lead her to the Magnolia Lobby and the urns of free, fresh coffee. She noticed signs for the riverboat rides and realized that she had strayed out of the garden area and into the setting called the Delta. She was certain that she could find coffee for sale within the rows of shops but she hadn’t brought cash or her room’s key card with her, so she turned around and headed in a different direction, hoping to spy a sign that would direct her to either lobby. With almost 2,900 guest rooms, Opryland boasted two full-service lobbies, and Molly wished she could instantly materialize at the heart of one of them.

  Crossing from the Delta into the space known as the Garden Conservatory, Molly paused in wonder. Lush tropical plants covered every square inch of ground while giant palm trees grew toward the glass ceiling. Stooping to admire a cluster of birds-of-paradise, Molly walked toward the atrium, where she had a clear view of a half a dozen footpaths and the miniature waterfalls flowing over stepped rock faces. As she headed north, a large party including several members traveling via wheelchair blocked her forward progress, so she veered off to the left, believing herself to still be headed toward the Magnolia Lobby. Unbeknownst to her, the path she was on turned gently west and then plunged downward to where the narrow stream was almost completely obscured by vegetation. Coming to a halt before a single garden bench, Molly sat down heavily and groaned.

  She was lost.

  “I should have brought the map,” she chastised herself.

  “Ma is going to kill me when I finally do show up with her coffee.”

  Even though she should be feeling frantic over being lost when she needed to get a jump on the day, it was just too early in the morning to become seriously agitated. The quiet garden setting was so calming that Molly longed to linger, so she sat down on a wrought iron garden bench. She listened to the sounds of water splashing as it echoed softly around the rafters and watched in amazement as two birds darted above her head, pieces of dried grass held captive in their beaks. She wondered what the plant growing alongside a grouping of Christmas cacti was called. It had wide green leaves covered by brown patches resembling a tortoise’s shell and bore small white flowers on narrow stems.

  Molly got up from her seat and crossed to the far side of the path. She squatted in order to read the small plaque positioned at the base of the unique plant. The sign informed her that she was gazing at a Maranta (Leuconeura), whose common names were prayer plant and rabbit’s tracks. As Molly stood erect, she noticed sunlight winking off a piece of glass nestled in an empty space between two oversized ferns growing behind the Maranta.

  “That looks like a margarita glass,” Molly said aloud in disgust. “Who would litter in such a beautiful setting?” Stepping gingerly over the Christmas cactus with its crimson blooms, she moved several feet forward into the garden bed. Carefully, she picked her way among the ferns until she was within reach of the glass. Several yards beyond the ferns, the stream was mostly hidden by dwarf palms and a tall gathering of elephant’s ear, which was a unique shade of purplish black. Molly retrieved the glass and then looked about her with amazement. Standing in the small oasis, she felt transported to a miniature rainforest. As she slowly pivoted her body and took a few more careful strides deeper into the bed, she noticed that the streambed was wider in this part of the garden and that there were no paths between where she stood and the hotel’s interior walls.

  “What the . . . ?” Molly suddenly stared at a gap between the elephant’s ear. Her eyes fixed upon what appeared to be a black shoe, but what her mind could not quite digest was the bit of leg covered by an argyle ankle sock peeking out from between the waxy leaves of a large tropic snow plant. She walked closer, peeling back the fans of palm fronds that partially blocked her view of the stream. Beyond the bristled surface of the palm’s trunk and the smooth boulder resting in its shade, Molly stopped short.

  There, on the ground, partially hidden by several other varieties of tropical plants, a man was spread eagle upon the ground. The right half of Tom Barnett’s body was submerged in the stream and the water lapped lazily over the brown chinos and green crewneck sweater that he had been wearing the night before. Tom’s face was turned away from Molly, and the gentle stream flowed like a caress over his motionless features.

  “Oh my god,” Molly breathed and rushed forward.

  Kneeling beside him, she knew that taking Tom’s carotid pulse was a useless gesture, for it was clear that his chest was no longer rising and falling, and that fresh, oxygen-rich blood hadn’t brought color to Tom’s cheeks for hours.

  Molly felt his cold neck and then backed away, grateful that the kind eyes of her mother’s friend were closed.

  Retreating from Tom’s splayed arms, his pallid skin, and his partially submerged face, Molly stumbled back toward the bench. A dark-haired woman wearing a Gaylord Opryland polo shirt was unreeling a thin hose in preparation for watering the bed from which Molly suddenly appeared. The woman exclaimed something in Spanish and then jabbed a finger at the ground where Molly was on the brink of trampling some blooming nettles.

  “Please,” Molly said, her voice barely audible. “There’s a body . . .”

  She brushed by the startled gardener, sank down onto the bench, and tried to control her breathing. “Hombre muerto,” Molly panted, utilizing two of the dozen Spanish words she knew. She pointed toward the stream as the gardener stared at her suspiciously. Molly realized that she was still clutching the margarita glass.

  “I’m not drunk!” she shouted breathlessly. “Dead man!

  ¡ Hombre muerto!” she repeated desperately, for the air around her had begun to feel stuffy and overheated and she could not seem to get enough of it into her lungs. The last thing she noticed was that the dark-haired woman removed the walkie-talkie from her belt and began speaking into it in rapid Spanish. Molly thought she recognized an accented version of the word cadaver before the green leaves around her knit together and began to spin faster and faster until they faded completely into black .

  Chapter 4

  “The canes carried by the executive branch of the law were more like weapons. Originally a type of spear, an actual or imitation halberd altered on a long stick. It was called a mediator, which in reality meant the following: If somebody could not be convinced with arguments, words, or orders, he was beaten with a cane.” Ulrich Klever, Walking Sticks

  When Molly came to she felt parched and more than a little embarrassed. She had only fainted twice in her life. The first time occurred during
her freshman year in college when one of the nurses working in the visiting blood mobile had found it necessary to stick Molly’s arm a dozen times in order to find a vein. Just as she was about to give up and walk out, the nurse struck a good vein but failed to hold the needle properly. It slipped from beneath Molly’s skin and for a few seconds, blood squirted freely out of her left arm. It only took a quick glance for Molly to promptly pass out, but it took thirty minutes, six Oreos, and a cup of cherry Kool-Aid before she felt normal again.

  The second time she fainted was during a recent assignment in Richmond, in which Molly had discovered the body of a murdered appraiser seated behind the wheel of his rental car. She had blamed that bout of swooning on the blazing summer sun, but this time she had to admit that it was more than humidity that had caused her to blackout.

  Molly sat up slowly, keeping her eyes lowered, and accepted a damp towel from the female gardener. She pressed the cloth against her clammy forehead and instantly felt better. Still partially hunched over, she noticed that there was a man in an impeccable blue suit with shiny black loafers sitting beside her. He leaned forward so that he could peer into her face with a look of utmost concern. She caught a pleasant hint of aftershave, which seemed to aid in clearing her muddled brain.

  “Are you all right, miss?” he asked, brushing a tiny white flower petal from the tip of his shoe.

  Molly nodded. “I will be. I just need a second,” she answered slowly, as if testing her ability to speak.

  “Can I get you anything? Perhaps some orange juice? I think it’s best if you remain still for the moment.” He cleared his throat as if what he was about to say was difficult for him. “I’ve notified the authorities and I’m certain they’ll want to speak to you. I am terribly sorry that you had to be the one to discover the . . . ah . . .” He trailed off, clearly at a loss for words.

  Molly examined the man’s brass pin listing his name and title in black script. “Thank you, Mr. Fallon. I think some juice would be great, and if you would, could you call my mother? She’s waiting for me in our room.” The manager hesitated, undoubtedly wanting the shocking presence in the stream to become known to as few of his guests as possible. As Molly carefully sat upright, she noticed that both ends of the path had been roped off with maintenance tape backed by a row of yellow signs on stands reading caution. wet floor.

  Sensing his reluctance to involve her mother, Molly added, “I think the police will want to see her, too. She knew the man in there.” She pointed toward the stream and gave the manager their room number, leaving him no opportunity to argue. He got up and hurried away and Molly settled herself back on the garden bench.

  Within five minutes, Fallon returned bearing a small tray with a glass of fresh orange juice and a buttered biscuit. He set the tray down beside Molly and then began to pace back and forth as he talked with quiet urgency into his cell phone. Molly had polished off both the juice and the delicious biscuit by the time her mother appeared, led by the same dark-haired gardener who had revived Molly after her faint.

  Clara turned a pair of stormy eyes to her daughter. “What on earth is going on?” she demanded and then swung around to face Fallon. Assuming that he was a maitre d’ or something of the sort, she said, “I sent my only child out for coffee forty minutes ago as the coffee machine in our room is broken. And she never came back! Do you think we could get a whole pot with some milk on the side?” She looked around in confusion until her gaze fell on Molly’s crumb-laden tray. Clara beamed at the befuddled manager. “Oh!

  Can we order breakfast, too? My, this is some service you’ve got here.”

  “Umm . . .” the manager squirmed beneath Clara’s penetrating stare.

  “It would be so nice of you to arrange for coffee.” Molly smiled sweetly at the agitated manager. “And then I can quietly explain to my mother what’s happened.” She lowered her voice to a whisper and leaned toward him. “The police will no doubt appreciate coffee as well.” She added conspiratorially, “It doesn’t hurt to start off on the right foot with them.”

  Fallon gave a dull nod and hustled off, issuing a few directives in Spanish to the gardener, who had remained amazingly nonplussed since Molly’s discovery of the body.

  “Did you say something about police?” Clara frowned, still looking around their setting in bewilderment.

  Molly removed the empty tray from beside her and placed it on the ground. Patting the empty seat she said,

  “You’d better sit down, Ma.”

  Clara obeyed, examining her daughter’s face carefully.

  “You look rather puny, as your grandmother used to say when I was coming down with something. What’s going on?”

  “Well, for starters, I got lost trying to find the lobby and I ended up here.” Molly gestured toward the margarita glass sitting on the ground by the foot of the bench. “Then I saw that glass in the bushes and I went to pick it up—”

  “What does that glass have to do with getting me my coffee?” Clara cut in before Molly could continue.

  “There’s a man back in those bushes, Ma,” Molly plunged on, irritated with her mother’s fixation on being denied her coffee. “He’s dead. I saw his body when I went to get the margarita glass.”

  Clara took her daughter’s hand in her own. “Oh, honey.

  How awful! No wonder you look so pale.” She paused.

  “Was he old? Do you think he had a heart attack or something?” Without waiting for an answer, she continued.

  “Poor thing. Still,” she looked around and smiled, “it’s quite a tranquil place to die. Not a bad view if it’s the last one you’re going to see. Just look at those orchids over there.

  Gorgeous little things, aren’t they? And do you smell that mint? It’s so—”

  “Ma!” Molly was exasperated. Shaking Clara’s hand away, she pointed in the direction of the body. “You knew the dead man!”

  Clara’s gaze slid away from the orchids and fixed upon the verdant area Molly indicated with a shaky finger. “Oh,” she said softly and then, “Who is it?”

  “You can’t see him from here,” Molly assured her gently. “But it’s Tom Barnett.” The medical examiner was first to arrive on the scene. He was a stocky man with a square jaw and unruly ash blond hair. He introduced himself to the manager as Berkley Butler, politely declined Mr. Fallon’s offer of coffee, and asked to be shown the body. The gardener mutely beckoned for him to follow her but Berkley began to speak in Spanish and the two exchanged words until they passed out of sight to the place where Tom lay.

  Ten minutes later, a carbon copy of Berkley arrived and introduced himself to the slack-jawed Mr. Fallon as Detective Reginald Butler. The only dissimilarity between the twin brothers was the detective’s military-style buzz and the intensity of his gaze. After disappearing in the direction Berkley had taken, Detective Butler reemerged moments later and headed directly toward Molly.

  “Good morning, ma’am.” He shook hands with surprising gentleness. After waiting for Clara to introduce herself he handed Molly a business card. “I’m Detective Butler of Nashville P.D. I understand you were the one to find the deceased. Is that correct?”

  “Yes,” Molly answered. “At about twenty after seven.” The detective stared at her unblinkingly. “And how did you come to be so far off the beaten path at such an early time in the morning, if I may use a cliché?” After offering the details of their broken coffeemaker and her sojourn for free coffee, Molly gestured at the margarita glass and explained how she had sought to retrieve it.

  “Has anyone else handled the glass?” the detective asked. “After you picked it up?”

  “No.”

  Butler drew a small notebook out of his jacket pocket.

  “And I understand you were able to identify the deceased.

  Could you tell me the nature of your relationship?” Molly paused, trying to figure out how to verbalize her recent acquaintance with Tom Barnett. Clara filled the momentary silence by explaining how she had know
n Tom.

  “So he’s an antique dealer.” Butler scribbled in his pad.

  “Here for the Heart of Dixie Show?”

  “That’s right,” Clara replied.

  Butler sighed. “This is my uncle Geordie’s biggest event. He’s not going to be pleased with any hitches this weekend.” He rubbed the stubble on his chin thoughtfully.

  “What else can you two tell me about Tom’s behavior last night? Did anything strike you as unusual?” Clara and Molly exchanged quick glances.

  “Lots!” Clara said dramatically. “But why are you asking about his behavior? Doesn’t the man in the bushes—

  the one who looks just like you—know how Tom died?” Detective Butler scowled. “It’s for me to ask you the questions, ma’am, and these questions are strictly routine.” He gesticulated with impatience toward the garden bed, where his twin worked. “Don’t be concerned about my brother, Berkley. He’s the finest medical examiner in all of Tennessee. He’ll find out exactly how your friend died in a compassionate and expedient manner, but sometimes he can’t tell simply by looking at a person. This is one of those times.” His tone invited no argument or additional questions.

  “I’ll go over last night’s events, Ma,” Molly jumped in quickly before her mother could ruffle the detective’s feathers any further. “You just chime in if I miss anything important.”

  “Hrrmph.” Clara began to sulk and then immediately perked up at the sight of Fallon collecting a tray from a waiter who stood like an obedient dog on the far side of the maintenance tape. The tray bore a pot of coffee, three mugs, cream, and a plate of assorted rolls and Danishes along with butter and a jar of blackberry jam.

  Clara poured coffee for all three of them and then buttered a croissant baked to a golden brown. Molly began her narrative of the previous night’s events while eating small bites of an apple turnover. Detective Butler sipped his coffee and took notes in his pad. Two cups of coffee later, Molly had reached the part in the account when she and Clara had visited Tom Barnett’s booth toward the end of the evening.