Murder in the Raw

by C. S. Challinor

  The limo picked them up at nine prompt.

  “I’ll be playing racquet ball with Duke in the morning,” Vernon informed Rex on the drive back to the resort. “You can come to my cabana then and poke around Sabine’s things to your heart’s content.”

  “Thanks. It’ll give me a better feel for her.”

  “I wish you could have met her.”

  “I do too. She sounds intriguing.”

  They bid each other a cordial goodnight outside the cabanas. When Rex opened his door, Brooklyn met him in the hallway and handed him a message from the front desk.

  “I just got back and found this on the door,” his roommate said. “I was about to go looking for you.”

  “I went to dinner in Grand Case.” Thinking the message might be from Thaddeus in London, Rex was eager to read it. “URGENT,” it said. “Call mother.”

  “Do you want to use my cell phone?” Brooklyn asked.

  Rex glanced at his watch, rubbing it absentmindedly with his thumb. “It’s past two in the morning in Scotland.”

  “But if it’s urgent …”

  “Aye. Thanks, I will borrow your phone if you dinna mind. I’m not getting service on mine out here.”

  “You’ll have to take it outside to get a signal,” Brooklyn said, handing him the Motorola. “Just don’t let anyone see you. They’re a bit uptight around here about finding their nude pictures on some sleazy website.”

  Rex privately considered most of them had nothing to worry about, unless they were concerned about being blackmailed.

  “Could be embarrassing, I guess,” Brooklyn said, voicing his thoughts. “Hope everything’s okay,” he added, discretely disappearing into his room.

  The message had been taken almost three hours ago, far past his mother’s bedtime. Anxiously, he dialed her number.

  “This is the Graves residence,” the housekeeper in Edinburgh intoned on the recording. “Please leave a message for Moira Ann Graves or Rex Graves, QC.”

  Rex started speaking in the hope his mother would pick up. If the news was that urgent, she would have waited up for his call—although she was getting on now and was prone to nodding off. “I’ll try you first thing in the morning my time, Mother,” he ended by saying into the machine.

  He wandered back in from the patio and knocked at Brooklyn’s door.

  “Couldn’t get through?” the American asked, tying the belt of his white bathrobe.

  “I got the answering machine.”

  “Keep the phone with you so you can try again later. Leave it on the kitchen counter when you’re done with it.”

  “I appreciate it. My mother will be up in three or four hours. She’s an early riser.”

  “Is she in good health?” Brooklyn asked.

  “Aye, fit as a fiddle, but she’s eighty-five. The message might be regarding my friend in Iraq. I haven’t heard from her in a while.”

  “Is she Iraqi?”

  “No, she went to Baghdad on a humanitarian mission. She disappeared from her hotel without leaving a forwarding address and I can’t get through to the relief office where she works.”

  “That’s tough,” Brooklyn said sympathetically. “Here, let me make you a pot of coffee. Looks like it’s going to be a long night.”

  Rex followed him into the living room. “You don’t need to go to the trouble.”

  “No trouble.” Brooklyn filled the machine with water and within minutes the kitchen was filled with an appetizing aroma of freshly ground French roast.

  “It’s just that with all the bombings over there, I don’t know what’s going on from one day to the next.”

  Brooklyn leaned against the counter. “Have you contacted your Embassy?”

  “Aye. She’s not on any casualty list. I suppose what concerns me most is the risk of kidnapping. Several hundred people of all nationalities, religions, and professions have been kidnapped since April of last year. Even the Red Cross and the UN are targets. And Moira goes into areas where there’s not always a military presence.”

  “Moira? Is that a Scottish name?”

  “Aye. It’s my mother’s name as well, which gets confusing.”

  Brooklyn pulled two mugs from an upper cabinet. “I heard you had a son in Florida …”

  “Campbell. He just finished his first year at Hilliard University in Jacksonville. Marine Science.”

  “Cool. Milk, sugar?”

  “Both, ta very much.” Rex sighed out of disillusionment. “I did rather hope he’d go into law.”

  “Follow in his father’s footsteps, huh?” Brooklyn set a mug of steaming coffee on the counter beside Rex and poured one for himself. “My one regret is not having kids,” he said. “Once I meet the right woman, I will though.”

  “Did no one ever fit that description?” Rex did not wish to seem indelicate in light of what Brooklyn had told him about his feelings for Sabine, but the companionship fostered by the urgent message from his mother, the time of night, and the two of them sharing a place in the French West Indies made him forego his usual reserve and sense of propriety.

  “Oh, if you’re referring to Sabine,” Brooklyn said candidly, “there was never any question of kids. She always said she wasn’t built for it. Well, you saw in the picture how skinny she was.”

  “Many a brawny bairn was born of a slender lass,” Rex countered. “When Fiona, my late wife, was carrying Campbell, the doctor warned she might have to have a caesarian due to her narrow hips. But she was delivered of a healthy nine-pound boy after less than three hours in labour, without the necessity of surgical intervention.”

  She had failed to win the battle against breast cancer, however. Rex gulped his coffee to force down the bitter lump rising in his throat.

  “I think it was probably vanity on Sabine’s part,” Brooklyn concluded. “In any case, kids would have gotten in the way of her career.”

  “What’s the name of that American actress who adopted children from third-world countries?”

  “Angelina Jolie?”

  “Aye. Very admirable. Moira has often talked about adopting a child. She said not to be surprised if she brought one back from Iraq.”

  “How would you feel about that?”

  “That would be just grand.” Rex swirled the dregs at the bottom of his mug. What he said was true enough, but he wondered if raising an orphan would in fact ultimately fulfill Moira’s indefatigable capacity for self-sacrifice. There had been times when he felt unable to keep up.

  “Vernon would have liked kids, I think,” Brooklyn said, pouring the remains of his coffee down the sink. “Have you had a chance to interview him yet?”

  “We spoke over dinner. He’s an astute man.”

  “Yeah, not so easy to manipulate.”

  “What d’you mean by that?”

  “Sabine couldn’t exactly twist him around her little finger the way she could with other men.”

  Yawning uncontrollably, Rex took another look at his watch. “I’ll try to grab a couple of hours’ sleep and then call my mother again. Thanks for the loan of your phone.”

  “Hey, don’t sweat it. Wake me if you need to talk.”

  Rex thanked him and went to prepare for bed. It was a horrible feeling to crave sleep and know you would be unable to succumb to its blissful release. He switched on the ceiling fan, lay down on his bed half-dressed, and turned off the light, letting his mind dance to any tune his thoughts struck up, mostly morbid ones where a blindfolded Moira was being forced at gunpoint to plead for her life and denounce her country’s support for the war. Or on another ominous note, his mother had just been diagnosed with a terminal illness—or perhaps Miss Bird, their devoted housekeeper, had taken a fall down the stairs.

  Rex rolled over on his side. He could just make out the outline of Helen’s postcard on the nightstand. A soothing melody calmed his nerves as he recalled her words.

  “… went ahead and booked my passage on the Sun-Fun Cruise Line. Will dock at St. Martin on July 23rd.
Meet me off the Olympia …”

  He fell asleep at that point, but tossed fretfully for the next couple of hours, the import of the late-night call from his mother running like a dark thread through his troubled dreams.

  At five-thirty Rex awoke with a start. Jumping off the bed, he stumbled onto the back patio and dialed his mother’s number in Edinburgh. It was so quiet outside he could hear the lapping of waves on the powdered sand beyond the grayed-down colors of the predawn.

  “Mother!” he almost shouted when her voice answered. “I got your message to call. I tried late last night.”

  “How are ye, Son? You sound croaky. Are ye coming down wi’ something?”

  “I just got up. I’ve been worried sick—”

  “Nay, lad, it isna bad, I dinna think.”

  “What isn’t?” Rex asked, experiencing a meteoric rise in his blood pressure.

  “It’s about Moira—”

  “You heard from her!”

  “A letter arrived.”

  “What does it say?”

  “Well, I didna open it! It’s addressed to you.”

  “Oh, fer goodness’ sake, open it, will ye?” Rex said, emotion thickening his Scots accent. His hand on the cell phone started shaking. He gripped it more tightly.

  “Are ye sure?”

  “Mother,” he said in a stern voice. He heard the tearing of paper at the other end of the connection and then a lengthy pause. “Is it a long letter?” he asked.

  “Noo, it’s just that …”

  “What?” His mother’s reticence alarmed him. Perhaps Moira had uncharacteristically added some intimate language to her missive, and his mother was standing by the phone in the hall, stricken with shock. Sex was never a topic of conversation in the house.

  “She’s run off!” his mother finally said in disbelief.

  “Run off where?” Moira was already in Iraq. How much farther could she run?

  “Run off wi’ another man!”

  “Who?”

  “His name’s Dillon. He works for a paper in Sydney.”

  “Mother, read me the letter.”

  “Well, I shall, but it’s shameful. She writes, ‘Dearest Rex, please forgive me for not writing before. I tried so many times, but it was not easy to say what I had to, and the pressure of work here is enormous, as you know. More on that later. I’ve met someone. We didn’t mean for it to happen, but it’s God’s will. He pulled me out from under a pile of rubble. Through the smoke I saw a pair of blue eyes peering at me with concern and—’”

  “That’s enough. I get the picture.”

  “Aye, it reads like a Barbara Taylor Bradford novel. There’s no even a return address. So, anyway, what’s it like out there in the French West Indies?” his mother asked, attempting to distract him from the bad news.

  Rex got a hold of himself. “There are bays and inlets with white sand beaches and palm trees,” he replied without enthusiasm, averting his eyes from the blaze of yellow just now breaking through the amber sky. “It’s straight out of Treasure Island. The food is mostly spicy or French, sometimes a mixture of both.”

  “It sounds so exotic. What about the people?” His mother always wanted to know about people.

  “The islanders have gentle features and happy dispositions.”

  “I canna be surprised they’d be happy the way you describe the place. What is there to do?”

  “Just about any water sport, horseback riding, shopping.” Rex thought it best not to mention the naturist attractions and risk getting a sermon.

  “I am sorry about Moira.”

  “Aye, but I knew it couldna be good news after so long. It’s still better than finding out she got kidnapped or blown up.” Just barely.

  “What about that nice woman who called from Derby? The one you met at Christmas at Swanmere Manor? She sounded so pleasant on the phone.”

  “Helen d’Arcy. She sent me a postcard saying she’d be stopping on St. Martin next week for the day. She’s on a Caribbean cruise.”

  “Well, I’m glad aboot that. I have to say I’m verra disappointed in Moira Wilcox. Running off wi’ a photographer! The ones on TV look so scruffy. And she’s so straight-laced. I just canna credit it.”

  “It’s different out there, Mother. There’s a war going on.”

  “I suppose you’re right. And I’m glad you’re taking it well. When are ye going to bring Helen to tea?”

  “I’ll have to see how things go when I see her.”

  “It may all turn out for the best,” his mother said cheerfully. “Have you been in touch wi’ Campbell?”

  “We spoke yesterday. He sends his love.”

  “I wish the lad would write more.”

  “He probably would if he could e-mail you.”

  “E-mail! At my age.”

  His mother could not even fathom the television remote, and so Rex refrained from extolling the convenience of computer technology. Imagining her in front of a laptop was as incongruous as picturing a robot taking tea at a table set with his mother’s lace doilies.

  “Reginald?”

  “Mother?”

  “Reread the Gospel according to Matthew, chapter eleven, verses 28 through 30. It will make your suffering easier to bear.”

  “Aye, Mother.”

  However, in the event, he did not resort to the scriptures. Leaving Brooklyn’s phone on the counter, he strode back through the sliding glass doors in a frigid blue fury. The sand felt hard and cool beneath his pounding feet. He barely noticed when he stood on a burr. The beach, deserted and devoid of the vibrant color of later morning, looked unwelcoming, but the water was just beginning to glimmer with promise. He ripped off his briefs, abandoning them on the shore, and splashed into the sea as fast as the resistance of the water permitted.

  We didn’t mean for it to happen, but it’s God’s will.

  Moira’s echoing words infuriated him. How many times had he heard “God made me do it” as an excuse in court? God must be incensed by all the stupid feeble excuses dumped at his feet. Rex swam parallel to the beach, his strong strokes tugging the sea out of the way as he furiously blinked the salt from his eyes. When he reached the promontory, he U-turned under the water and returned the way he had come, using his cabana as a landmark, the vigorous exercise gradually driving all meaningful thought from his brain.

  Och, that’s better, he thought, flinging his upright legs through the shallows to where his cotton briefs lay unceremoniously tossed on the sand. Realizing he had forgotten his towel, he used them to brush off the excess moisture from his body. He spotted Paul and Elizabeth on their patio at the third cabana and gave a peremptory wave before hurrying back to his place, loosely holding the underwear in front of his privates.

  After rinsing off under the outdoor shower, he went inside to shave, and then lingered over a Sudoku puzzle while drinking his coffee. The puzzle took longer than usual since his mind kept wandering back to Moira. He still had trouble believing the news.

  Brooklyn wandered onto the patio in his bathrobe, yawning and stretching. He looked even better with dark stubble, Rex noticed with envy. His own chin sprouted ginger hairs and he had bedhead first thing in the morning.

  “There’s coffee in the pot,” he informed Brooklyn.

  “Thanks. Did you get your news?”

  “Aye, nobody died but me. My girlfriend left me for another man—a photographer from Down Under.” Rex reported the facts and even managed to make them sound humorous.

  “Good on ya, mate,” Brooklyn commiserated in an Australian accent. “Plenty more fish in the sea.”

  When nine o’ clock rolled around, Rex went next door and, poking his head into Vernon’s hallway, called out “Hello!” to see if the lawyer had left for his game of racquet ball.

  Hearing no response, he penetrated the cabana and glanced around the living room, which contained little in the way of personal effects other than a stack of CDs and a pile of American entertainment magazines. He opened the door to
one of the two bedrooms, to all appearances uninhabited and with the bed made, but when he looked in the wall-to-wall closet, he found a rack full of clothes. For a moment, he doubted these could belong to Sabine. Though stylish enough, most of the dresses did not entirely live up to what he pictured a glamorous young actress would wear.

  He read a label, not recognizing the designer’s name—not that he was an expert on women’s clothes, but he was familiar with Versace and von Furstenberg, and he even remembered Emanuel, the husband and wife team that had made Princess Diana’s wedding dress. Clearly none of these clothes was of that caliber. The size of one dress caught his eye: a six? Surely that was too big for a willowy lass. The bulk of them, he discovered, were twos. Perhaps she had put on weight since the riding photo.

  Or perhaps she was expecting to. What if the chiropractor she was seeing was another sort of doctor? Whatever was going on, Vernon seemed unaware of it. Rex decided to leave the questions for now and continue his search.

  The built-in safe in the closet was unlocked. Rex rummaged through the jewelry, none of it worth as much as he would have expected. A frugal lass, he approved. His son’s Cuban girlfriend could take a leaf out of Sabine’s book. All the same, he felt something was wrong. The items did not match his impressions of their owner.

  Next he searched the bathroom, finding nothing of note, but appreciative of the fragrance of the lemon sherbet bar soap by the sink, provided courtesy of the resort.

  The suite across the hall accommodated only Vernon’s belongings. Little the wiser, Rex headed toward the front door. As he was leaving, the maid, a statuesque woman in her forties with handsome ebony features, approached, rolling her cleaning cart along the path.

  “Okay to go in?” she asked.

  Rex held the door open. “Aye, no one’s home.”

  Afraid she might think he’d been snooping, which in effect he had, he was about to explain his presence.

  “Is maid service to Monsieur’s satisfaction?” she asked.

  “Oh, aye. The cabanas are spotless.”

  Outside, he caught sight of a guard patrolling the far perimeter of the resort. Deciding to keep busy so he wouldn’t think of Moira, Rex crossed the grounds.