Marjorie had drifted up behind me. “Nathan…excuse me. I wanted to say something.”
Barker and Melchen turned and looked at her wolfishly. They looked from her to me and back, and exchanged knowing glances.
Colonel Lindop said, “Please feel free to speak, Miss Bristol. We understand you were with Mr. Heller when he found the body.”
“I was. I didn’t mean to be eavesdroppin’…but I heard you say Arthur drowned. Well, Arthur, he was an experienced sponge fisherman. I don’t think it’s likely he’d drown in shallow water like this.”
“He might have hit his head, Miss Bristol,” Lindop said reasonably, “if he fell from the dock.”
“Does he have a bump on his head?” she asked.
“We haven’t turned it up yet, but the coroner will make an examination….”
“He was probably drunk,” Melchen said, and laughed.
“Is there any liquor on his breath?” she asked, standing right up to the squat detective.
Barker sighed dramatically, and said, “Colonel Lindop, we only came along because Heller told you this death related somehow to the Oakes case. It clearly doesn’t. Do we have to listen to both his cockeyed theories and this native girl’s?”
“Heller,” Melchen said, dragging it out into two molasses-soaked syllables, looking past her, “why don’t you gather your little nigger baby and go on home?”
I brushed past Lindop and looked right in the fat cop’s fat face. His smile was curdling by the time I said, “Apologize to the lady.”
“For what?”
“Apologize or I’ll feed you your fucking spleen.”
“You don’t scare me…”
“Then don’t apologize. Please don’t.”
He took a step back. In the moonlight his face looked flourwhite, but I had a hunch it would have looked white, anyway.
“Sorry, miss,” he said tightly, softly, without looking at her; without looking at anybody. “I was out of line.”
She nodded and walked back toward the car.
“Oops,” I said, and shoved Melchen.
His feet went out from under him and he landed, splat, in the water. Right next to Arthur.
“You son of a bitch!”
Barker took me by the shirt and said, “You think you’re so goddamn tough. War hero. Silver Star. Am I supposed to be impressed?”
I batted his hand away. “Say, Barker…where were you girls this evening?” I looked at Melchen, who was back on his feet, scowling as he brushed the soggy sand off his soggier suit. “You two got an alibi for Arthur’s murder?”
Both Barker and Melchen were looking at me with burning fury, their posture about to explode into an attack when Colonel Lindop stepped between us.
“Mr. Heller,” he said calmly, “before this gets further out of hand, perhaps you should go. We have a dead body to process.”
“Whatever you say, Colonel.”
“I’ll walk you to your car.”
He did. And as we walked, he said softly, “Mr. Heller, there is every likelihood that this death will be deemed accidental.”
“But…”
He stopped me with a raised hand. “But if you choose to investigate this man’s death-on the q.t., as they say-I want you to know that if you turn up any linkage between this and the de Marigny/Oakes case, I will be most interested.”
“Colonel-like I said before, you’re okay.”
“Mr. Heller, you won’t be ‘okay’ much longer if you continue to treat my American colleagues with such disrespect.”
“I’m just treating ’em the way they deserve.”
“I didn’t say they didn’t deserve it,” he said, smiled briefly, and saluted with a fingertip to his cap, turned and went.
I drove Marjorie back to her cottage in silence. I went in and sat with her, on the edge of her bed which she folded out from its little metal cabinet. I didn’t stay the night, and we certainly didn’t repeat our earlier carnal activities. I just held her in my arms and she shivered, though it wasn’t very cold at all.
Finally as I was about to leave, she said, “You know something, Nathan?”
“Yes?”
“Maybe they were shadowin’ us, last night, after all.”
She closed the door and I was out on the beach, alone.
16
Amidst tall exotic trees with whorls of feathery leaves, among colorful tropical gardens exuding a scent not unlike vanilla, stood the big pink stucco building that was the Porcupine Club. I’d been warned not to go inside the clubhouse of this exclusive facility, but instead to walk directly to the white beach beyond, where Nancy de Marigny would be waiting.
This was Hog Island, much of which was owned by the black-listed billionaire Axel Wenner-Gren. I’d taken a launch over to the nearby public beach-a five-minute ride-and now was at the private beach next door, winding through striped beach umbrellas and wooden deck chairs, looking for my client among various rich folks, mostly women of various ages, who were soaking up the midmorning sun under a clear blue sky that they probably thought belonged to them. Or anyway should.
She was at a round metal table under a large green umbrella with a leaf design that made it look like a big cloth plant; she sat back in her deck chair, looking tan and lovely, ankles crossed over red-and-blue-and-yellow-and-green leather open-toed sandals, her face further shaded by a colorfully banded straw hat that tied with a yellow sash under her strong jaw, her eyes hidden behind sunglasses. Her slender body was wrapped in a short terry-cloth robe, under which was a glimpse of lime-green swimsuit. Her fingernails were painted candy-apple red, and so were her toenails.
There was a little-girl-playing-dress-up quality about her that didn’t diminish her allure-nor did the bottle of Coca-Cola she was sipping through a straw, which made a kiss of her full red-painted lips.
“Mr. Heller,” she said, and smiled, sitting up. “Please sit down.”
She gestured to a straight-backed wooden chair at the table; there were two of them, as if another guest were expected.
I sat. “I have a hunch you should keep your voice down, when you’re using my name.”
She cocked her head. “Why’s that?”
“This place is restricted, isn’t it? Isn’t that why you had me avoid the clubhouse?”
She removed her sunglasses; the big brown eyes were earnest and her expression was almost contrite. “It is. I’m sorry. You must think I’m awful, even belonging to a place like this.”
I shrugged. “A lot of people belong to places like this.”
She shook her head. “You’d think people would change their attitudes…because of this terrible war-the way the Jewish are being mistreated by those horrible people.”
“I appreciate the sentiment, but that’s not exactly your fault. You know, frankly, Nancy, I never felt very Jewish before this war came along. Back on Maxwell Street, I was a shabbes goy.”
Her pretty face crinkled. “Shabbes goy?”
“Yeah. My mother was Catholic and died when I was little, and my father was an old union guy who didn’t believe in anybody’s God. I wasn’t raised in either faith. Anyway, on Friday nights, the Jewish families needed some non-Jew to do their chores after sundown.”
Her smile was sad. “So to the Jews you’re a ‘goy.’”
“And to the Irish Catholics, I’m just another heathen.”
Now there was embarrassment in her smile, and lipstick on her soda straw. “I feel like the heathen, inviting you here….”
I shrugged again. “Hey, obviously, a private club like this is a good place for you to get away from the reporters and other pests.”
“It is. Do I seem simply ghastly, sitting in the sun, sipping a Coke, when my husband is rotting away in a filthy cell?”
“No. You’re under a lot of pressure, and I don’t blame you for relaxing a little. On the other hand, you’re paying me three hundred dollars a day, so I’m inclined to cut you a little slack.”
Her smile was so genu
ine, it underscored the phoniness of the heavy lipstick. “I like you, Nate. And I think Freddie likes you, too.”
“It’s not important he likes me. What’s important is we get him sprung. Which is why I wanted to see you today….”
Two days had passed since Arthur’s murder, and in those two days I’d run up against a stone wall. A number of stone walls.
“There are people I need to talk to who are simply unapproachable,” I said, then laughed, once. “They’re probably all members of the Porcupine Club.”
Her brow was knit. “Such as?”
“Well, the Duke of Damn Windsor, for starters. I actually went up to Governor’s House and managed to talk to the Duke’s majordomo…”
“Leslie Heape?”
“That’s the one. He said that under no circumstances would the Royal Governor see me or speak to me. The reason he gave was that the Duke was keeping his distance from the case.”
Her big eyes got bigger. “Keeping his distance! Why, he’s the one who brought in those two Miami detectives!”
“I know. And when I pointed that out to Heape, I got shown the door in a hurry.”
She placed her Coke on the table. “Who else is giving you a hard time?”
I dipped into the jacket of my white linen suit for my little black notebook; I thumbed to a specific page. “On the night of his murder, your father dined at Westbourne not only with Harold Christie, but also a Charles Hubbard, as well as a Dulcibel Henneage.”
She was nodding. “I don’t know Mr. Hubbard very well-he was just an acquaintance, and neighbor, of Daddy’s.”
“He lives near Westbourne?”
“Oh yes. Those Hubbard’s Cottages where those two women Freddie dropped off live? He owns those, and lives there himself, but not in a cottage. I believe he’s from London-Daddy said Mr. Hubbard made his money in ‘dimestores.’”
I sighed. “Well, he’s not responding to messages I left at his Bay Street office, or with his housekeeper. This Mrs. Henneage I’ve left messages for, also-with her housekeeper, and with one of her kids, apparently. She doesn’t respond, either.”
She made a tch-tch sound. “I see.”
“I thought, before I went around banging on doors, showing up uninvited on rich people’s doorsteps, I should see if you could pave the way, at all….”
“Mr. Hubbard shouldn’t be a problem,” she said, frowning. “But I’ve got a feeling Effie will be another matter entirely….”
“Effie?”
“Mrs. Henneage. That’s her nickname-Effie. You see, Nate, Effie is a married woman.”
“Well, I gathered that from the ‘Mrs.’”
“I mean, she’s not a widow or anything.”
“I’m not following you, Nancy.”
She spoke slowly, patiently, as if to a child; a backward child. “She’s married to an officer stationed in England; she has two children here with her, and a nurse, who’s probably the one you spoke to on the phone.”
“So?”
“So-Effie is widely rumored to be…friendly with a certain unmarried man of some local prominence.”
“Hubbard, you mean?”
“No! Christie. Harold Christie. Oh! Look who’s here! You’re late-I was starting to worry!”
My mouth had dropped open like a trapdoor at this latest Harold Christie revelation, but it would’ve been that way anyway, because the party approaching our table was one of the most stunning examples of womanhood this ex-Marine ever had the privilege of feasting his lecherous eyes upon.
She looked a little like Lana Turner, facially, and had other things in common with that famous sweater girl, including ice-blond hair that cascaded to soft, smooth shoulders; but unlike Miss Turner, this lady was a tall one, taller even than Nancy de Marigny. I would say five ten, easy, and lanky, slim-hipped, almost too bosomy for her frame, but as faults go, that was easily overlooked. So to speak.
Her skin was pale, improbably pale for the tropics, and the effect of her white one-piece bathing suit, white open-toed sandals, was that she looked like a seductive ghost. The only hint of something darker was the shadow of her pubic triangle beneath the suit. Her eyes were almost exactly the light blue of the Bahamian sky, rather small but seeming larger thanks to the framing of thick brown eyebrows and long, apparently authentic lashes. Her lips had a puffy, bruised look, and were painted blood-red, under a tip-tilting nose; apple-cheeked, but not at all wholesome-looking, she had a white terry robe like Nancy’s over one arm and white-framed sunglasses in the opposite hand.
You had to look close to tell, but she was not the twenty-some-year-old she seemed at first glance; gentle crow’s-feet, extra smile lines, the way her eyes sat deep in their sockets…I put her at thirty-five.
“I simply must get out of this sun,” she said. Her voice was thin but not unattractive, a brittle, British wind chime of a voice.
Nancy was beaming, half-standing. “Di! You look fabulous in that new suit. Schiaparelli?”
“Travella.” Her smile was surprisingly wide, her teeth the dazzling white Pepsodent promised, but rarely delivered.
And now she had turned that smile on me. “You must be Nancy’s charming private eye.”
I was standing, straw fedora in hand. “Nathan Heller,” I said.
She arched an eyebrow. “You must be good at what you do.”
“Why’s that?”
“To sneak in here with a name like that.”
I didn’t know whether to laugh politely or slap her.
“You’re outrageous, Di,” Nancy said, almost giggling. “Don’t mind her, Nate. Di’s the least prejudiced person I know.”
“But then most of your pals belong to the Porcupine Club,” I reminded her.
“Touche,” Di said. She took a seat, got herself in the shade to protect that Aryan skin of hers. “We’re not going to be enemies, are we?”
“You tell me,” I said.
“Nate, this is Lady Diane Medcalf.”
Lady Diane extended her pale white hand to me and I said, “Do I kiss that or shake it?”
“Handshake will be fine,” she replied. Then her smile settled wickedly in one dimple. “We’ll save the kiss for later…perhaps.”
Nancy turned earnestly to me. “Di is my best friend. She’s a fabulous person, you’re just going to love her.”
“I already love her swim suit,” I said. “Travella, huh? I was going to say Macy’s.”
To her credit, she chuckled and said, “You are bad. I understand you’re going to clear Freddie of this ridiculous charge.”
“Fred’s got the deck stacked against him,” I said. “I was just explaining to Nancy how some of Nassau’s social lions are ducking my inquiries.
“Really,” Lady Diane said, and her brow creased and she seemed honestly troubled. “We can’t have that, can we? Why don’t I arrange a little soiree out at Shangri La?”
“Pardon?”
Nancy said, “Shangri La is Axel Wenner-Gren’s estate…it’s over there…fabulous place.”
“And Axel won’t mind?” I asked dryly. “Being as he’s in Mexico and all?”
Lady Diane’s laugh was brittle, too, but it had a certain musicality. “I’m sure Axel won’t mind. Who does a girl have to fuck around here to get a drink?”
“Oh, Di,” Nancy said, giggling, a little embarrassed, “you’re awful.”
“I’ll get you a drink,” I said. “You can pay up later.”
“You are b-a-d, Heller,” Lady Diane said. “Gin and tonic, darling.”
I went over to the portable bar, where a white guy in a tuxedo was bartending under the hot sun, and bought her a drink and myself a rum and Coke; it only cost me about half what a week’s rent did back home at the Morrison Hotel. This rich bitch appealed to me, for some strange masochistic reason. If my heart didn’t belong to a dusky native girl, I might have done something about it.
I took my seat again, but Lady Diane was gone.
“She went in for a dip,” Nancy sa
id. “To cool off.”
“With that mouth of hers,” I said, “it’s no wonder.”
“Isn’t she fabulous?”
“Fabulous is the word. Who the hell is she? How do you get to be a ‘lady,’ anyway?”
“In Di’s case, by marrying a lord. She’s the widow of one of the Duke of Windsor’s closest friends…his equerry.”
“The Duke always did strike me as a little effeminate.”
She made a face; a pretty one. “Nate, an equerry is in charge of horses.”
“I know. It was a joke.”
She smirked. “You are…”
“Please don’t tell me I’m bad. Tell me more about Di before she gets back.”
Nancy shrugged, raised her patrician chin. “She’s only one of the most important women in the Bahamas…possibly second only to Wallis Simpson. She’s a professional woman, Nate, which is something of a rarity around here. She’s been Axel Wenner-Gren’s executive secretary for almost a decade.”
“Who pulled the strings to get her a job like that? The Duke?”
“Actually, yes. He and Axel are extremely close friends. Now that Axel’s been blacklisted, so very unfairly I might add, Di is managing the Wenner-Gren assets for the duration.”
“And she’s bunking in at Shangri La?”
Nancy arched an eyebrow. “More than that-she’s running it, maintaining it, with something of a skeleton crew. It’s like nothing you’ve ever seen. I can’t tell you what it means to have her offer to throw a party for our benefit…no one will decline an invitation from Lady Diane.”
She came running up, as if fleeing from the sun, pulling a white rubber cap off her mane of blond hair, which sprang free, glimmeringly, the supple muscles of her long legs grabbing as her feet caught the sand.
For a moment she stood there before me, though she must have known that brown pubic patch was showing right through; so were small erect nipples on the oversize breasts. She picked up the drink I’d brought her, guzzled it greedily, set down the empty glass and grinned at me. There was something savage about that grin; the look in her eyes was gleeful.
Then she threw the robe around herself, tossed back her hair. With the rouge washed away from the pouty lips, she looked even better. Naturally pretty, instead of calculatedly beautiful.
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