“Candidate number three exists, for now, as pure phantasma. An amorphous fulfillment of fantasy… and ceaseless yearning….”
“Sounds as if I have my work cut out for me. How would you suggest I combat this amorphous fulfillment of fantasy?”
“That’s just it, you can’t. By keeping an oppressive watch you might keep the first two at bay, but you only increase the danger from her phantasma.”
“A sticky situation,” I agreed. “Maybe I should come up with my own phantom, to take on hers.”
“It’s amusing you think your imagination up to the task. But try if you like.”
She was right, of course. Any phantom I could conjure up wouldn’t stand a chance in a fair fight with hers. And I doubt hers would fight fair.
“Getting back to your secret identity, what if Ed sees you about? Both he and Annie have met you more than once.”
“The last time was two years ago. If you see me while with him, just pretend you don’t know me. Now I must attend to Mr. Mosher.”
When she’d gone, I buzzed down to the desk and had another blue pig sent up. If I was going to dine with Annie Ketchum, I wanted to be well fortified.
I arrived in the dining room at seven and, as I’d hoped, found Ed and Annie finishing their meal. If you only ever saw Annie, you might be sympathetic to Ed’s feelings toward her. She was an attractive woman, with high cheekbones, a perfectly shaped mouth, and raven-black hair. The intervening years and breeding may have added a few pounds, but there was nothing of the careworn mother about her.
“I told you 6:30, Harry.”
“Sorry, Ed. Couldn’t be helped. Hello, Annie.”
“Good evening, Harry. It’s so good of you to join us.”
When last I’d seen Annie, she’d transformed herself into a certified prig. Now she’d learned to augment the condescension with sarcasm. The waiter came by and I ordered another blue pig with my dinner.
“I hope you won’t be dragging Ed into any saloons on this trip, Harry.”
“He can’t here, Annie,” Ed reminded her. “It’s a dry state. Not a drop to be had.” He delivered this remark through a little grin. It was meant to be a wry smile, but it generally showed up when he was uncomfortable.
Ed was highly—if narrowly—intelligent. Get him on the subject of accelerants and spontaneous combustion and he could go on for hours. Ask him the day of the week and he’d have to consult his notebook. He was trim, with a full head of hair, and if I described his features in detail you’d take it he was a handsome fellow. And he was. But there was something in his mien that betrayed an inner imbecile.
“What’s that you’re drinking, Harry?”
“A local variation of iced tea. They call it a blue pig.”
When he ordered one for himself, I had a vague sense of foreboding. You see, Annie’s comment about dragging Ed into saloons wasn’t wholly off the mark. Our last case together involved visiting a good number of such establishments. I can’t remember the reasoning behind it, but I do remember becoming reacquainted with Ed’s inability to hold his liquor. It was common knowledge among the fraternity of insurance investigators that one should never let Ed have more than two beers if he’d be required to function normally.
What made Annie’s prudery so difficult to stomach was that Ed had met her in a bordello. And—though I never confirmed it—she seemed enthusiastic about the work. Who would expect that a wife found in a mill-town parlor house would evolve into a Xanthippe of the very worst sort?
“We need to hurry along, Ed,” she told him. “I don’t want to be late for Mr. Field’s reading.”
“It’s not until eight, Annie. We have plenty of time. Care to come along, Harry? Field is a poet Annie’s fond of. It’s just up the road at the casino.”
“No, thank you. I’ll be spending the evening writing the wife.”
Annie had already left the table when Ed’s drink arrived. He downed it in a gulp. “Very refreshing. I wish I had time for another. Say, Harry, they have a billiard room here. Maybe we can have a game later?”
“All right. Enjoy the reading.”
They went off and I ate my meal in peace.
6
It was a pleasant evening, with a refreshing breeze coming off the water. A walk seemed in order, so I left the hotel and went off along the same route Ed and I had taken earlier. A bevy of street cars passed, all full and all heading to Cape Cottage. Just before the turnoff, I came upon some fellows who’d pulled up a wagon. They were making a spectacle of smashing liquor bottles they pulled from crates. There was a little knot of onlookers, one of whom appeared to be an aboriginal hayseed. I queried him as to what was going on.
“Deputy Gaylord and Company found a cache of demon rum in some poor sap’s cellar. He brought it out here so the rubberneckers headed to the casino could see how diligent he is at protecting them from themselves.”
The two men in the wagon, bareheaded and in shirtsleeves, kept up a rigorous pace. The skinny young fellow would pull out a bottle and set it on an upturned crate, then the older, bigger fellow would destroy it with a sledgehammer.
“All these people are headed to a poetry reading?” I asked.
“Poetry reading? No, there’s a show at the theatre, The Belle of Richmond.”
“Worth seeing?”
“Depends what you’re in the mood for.”
“I’ll settle for any sort of comedy—as long as it’s simple-minded.”
“You think they could fill those cars if it wasn’t simple-minded?”
“And comical?”
“Parts. Just not the parts the author intended.” He paused long enough to let loose a shot of tobacco juice. “You have to be willing to take it as a subtle parody of middle-class morality.”
I decided to give the belle a miss. Theatre reviews that include the word ‘subtle’ usually spell trouble.
Continuing my walk, I passed the scene of the fire, then a farm on the opposite side. A half mile further on there was a golf course, and across from that, the site of the other new hotel. I kept walking until the road turned sharply inland and then retraced my steps. When I made it back to the turnoff for the casino, the wagon was gone and the road nearly empty. Just beyond it was a path I presumed led down to the ocean. I followed it, passing an old cottage and ultimately descending a set of wooden steps down to the beach.
There were a number of people about, so I walked to the far end of the cove and found a perch at the base of the cliff. Just as I sat down I heard voices—a man and a woman—from somewhere up behind me. Not wanting to intrude, I started to walk off. Then the woman said something about a crossbow. She was an English woman, and she and her partner chuckled over whatever it was she had said. I listened more intently now. The fellow’s tone changed.
“I think you’ve gone too far, May. Getting mixed up in all that.”
“I know what I’m about. Don’t you worry.”
“That fellow Noyes told me your lover was behind it.”
“He’s not my lover.”
“The proof is in the puddin’, May, an’ the puddin’s in the oven….” He laughed alone this time.
“You shut up, Jack. You know who set that puddin’. And it will be out soon enough.”
They stopped talking and I walked toward the water and looked back. I could see the whole of the cove now, but not the couple I’d overheard.
There was no way of knowing if they were speaking of the same crossbow that had sent an arrow whizzing past my face a scant few hours before. But barring an invasion of the Maine coast by Saxon yeomen, it seemed a likely bet. I walked back to share my findings with Emmie and discovered she was still out. When she hadn’t shown up a half hour later, I went down to the billiard room looking for Ed.
There were two things Ed knew well. How to start fires and how to play pool. His talent for the latter was due mainly to his orangutan-like arms, which made certain the cue ball was always in easy reach. I watched as, one by one, his adversari
es threw in the towel. Then while he racked up the balls, I ordered a couple blue pigs—just to even things up. Ed downed his in a gulp and I ordered another. When halfway through this, he had a revelation.
“You know, Harry, I think they may be slipping some bourbon in this tea of theirs.”
“Rye, I think. But not so much it matters.”
“No, I suppose not. But that first one with dinner sure made the poetry reading easier to take.”
“How was it?”
“Pretty weepy stuff. Hard to believe a man wrote it.”
“No ‘Charge of the Light Brigade’?”
“Not even a ‘Casey at the Bat.’ And his wife kept having to remind him of his own poems.”
“What’d you make of her?”
“Mrs. Field? An odd sort, wears men’s clothing, sports a derby. But friendly. Didn’t seem to mind Annie fawning over her husband.”
“Was Annie fawning?”
“Oh, you know how women are.”
“No, I’m still working on just the one. And I can’t say I ever saw her do any fawning. But I believe I met Mrs. Field earlier in the evening. In my room.”
“You met Mrs. Field in your room?”
“Yes, he took me to his room and had his way….” It was the lady herself. She’d come up behind me, laced her arm in mine, and leaned into me. “I hope you don’t mind my intruding, but I heard my name mentioned. I’m afraid you were so occupied during our previous meeting, you never bothered to introduce yourself.”
Living with Emmie, I’d grown accustomed to being caught unawares. My usual state being something between dumbfounded and nonplussed. Still, the lady had knocked me off my pins.
“This is Harry Reese, Mrs. Field,” Ed told her. “An associate of mine.”
“And how do you find him?”
“Well, he’s always been square with me.”
“Sounds painful. The round hole has little use for the square peg. Can you at least vouch for his probity?”
“Harry’s as upright as they come.”
“Sounds more promising, but a man esteemed by his comrades as a true and genuine cove may play a different game when he has some poor giglet between the sheets, where honest pursuits often wither.”
“Giglet?” Ed asked.
She uncoupled herself and her withdrawal left me in a state of psychic confusion. Spiritually, I felt an immediate relief. But the physiological side took some convincing.
She sauntered over to Ed. “Yes, it’s her commodity he’s after, and it’s her commodity he will have, by hook or by crook.” By now she’d entwined herself with him. “And speaking of staffs, I’ve wanted to ask, Mr. Ketchum, is everything in proportion?”
“Pardon?”
“Your enormous size… for instance….” She pressed a finger to his chest and ran it downward.
“Oh, I see. Well, I wear a size 13 shoe.”
“Hmm. Interesting, but not what I’m getting at. Might I see your thumbs?”
“My thumbs? Sure….”
“Oh, excellent. Well, if this is any evidence, I don’t understand why your wife must spend her time dogging my husband.”
“Oh, I don’t think she’s dogging him….”
“She is. I left her slobbering over him scarcely an hour ago. I believe she lacks a certain… fulfillment. Do you allow her to play the dragon astride your St. George?”
“Dragon?”
“Do you tip the velvet, Mr. Ketchum?”
“Oh, play pool, you mean?”
“Playing pool, you call it?”
“Billiards to you, I suppose. But it’s not velvet.” He ran his hand across the table. “Green baize.”
“I prefer the velvet.” She licked her lips with a good deal of feeling.
“Oh, that wouldn’t work. With velvet the balls would hardly run at all. It would be a mighty slow game.” He gave her his wry smile.
“Some prefer the game to run slow, Mr. Ketchum, and have no need for balls at all.”
“Oh, that’s just silly. Here, let me show you.”
Ed proceeded to teach the lady how to play pool, with her making sure it involved a healthy amount of contact. I can’t say I followed all her allusions, but to Ed they were opaque. He was both too naïve and too literal-minded for innuendos. This can best be illustrated by explaining how he and Annie met. Ed had traveled to Glens Falls to investigate a fire that destroyed one of the few hotels in town. It also happened to be the week some popular horse races were running. Rooms being difficult to find, Ed ended up at what purported to be a boarding house, but was, in fact, a brothel. It wasn’t until I pointed it out to him that he realized the girls living there didn’t work in a shirt factory. You can imagine what a plum he looked like to Annie.
Just after midnight, she herself appeared in the doorway of the billiard room.
“Ed!”
Ed was leaning over his pupil as she sprawled forward over a shot. On Annie’s arrival, Mrs. Field turned around and faced him. “Oh, you rogue!” she cried. Then slapped him.
Ed rose, disoriented.
“Ed!” Annie commanded again. Ed followed her out, rubbing his cheek in amazement.
“Poor Ed,” I said to Mrs. Field, still lying across the table, but now braced on her elbows.
“Poor Ed? It’s his wife I feel for.”
“That nag?”
“Oh, she just nags from frustration. She’d be a right short-heeled minx given the proper inducement….” She extended an arm toward me and I helped her to right herself.
“Short-heeled minx?”
“Prone to falling on her back.”
Still holding my arm, she pulled me toward her, brushed her face against mine, and then pushed me away just as quickly. A half second later she was gone and I stood staring at her absence.
Upstairs, I opened a bottle of wine I’d had sent up and waited for Emmie. It was after one when I heard her enter her room. I knocked on the door from the bath, and after a good long while, she opened it.
“I’ve poured you a glass of wine.”
“No, thank you.” She walked past me into the bath. “I’ve just been sharing some of your wine with Miss Macleod.”
“Miss Macleod?”
“Fiona Macleod. The Scottish poet. Harry, you really are devoid of any culture. Mr. Mosher is publishing a new volume of her work and asked me to deliver the proofs to her.”
“Why didn’t he take them to her?”
“I’ve instructed him not to leave his room until morning. Does it bother you I spent the evening with another writer, Harry?”
“Another?”
Well, I’d just dug my hole a little deeper. Why it wasn’t obvious the other writer she was referring to was herself, I can’t say. She insisted I go into my room and then closed the door between it and the bath, making a loud point of latching it.
“I’m sorry, Emmie. I suppose this means you don’t want to hear about Ed’s pool game with Mrs. Field.” She didn’t respond. “Or what May said about the crossbow….”
About half a minute elapsed before I heard the latch snap open.
“Who’s May?”
“An unseen voice on the beach.”
“What did she say about the crossbow?”
“Can’t say, but her companion thought it amusing.”
Emmie took the offered glass and listened intently while I recounted all I’d heard between May and her companion.
“And she was English, you say?”
“Sure sounded like it. But not in the same way as Mrs. Field.”
“Who is this Mrs. Field?”
“The other English poet’s wife.”
“What other English poet?”
“Michael Field. I guess I’m not the only one who’s culturally deficient.”
“The wife of the English poet Michael Field? How curious.”
“Wait until you meet her, then you’ll know the meaning of curious.”
It took three more glasses of wine before I was p
artially absolved. But as soon as her head hit the pillow, she was fast asleep. Or pretending to be. She turned, and I saw she had her wedding band on a string around her neck. I took some comfort from that and crawled in beside her.
I woke the next morning in Emmie’s room, alone. When I’d dressed and she hadn’t returned I went on down for breakfast.
I was enjoying my solitary repast on the porch when Ed and Annie approached. They were upon me before I had any chance to escape, so I invited them to sit down. Ed was exhibiting the effects of three blue pigs and a black-crowned termagant. The latter bid me good morning.
“Good morning, Annie. Sleep well?”
“The guiltless always sleep well.”
“The shameless, too.”
She smiled at that. I’d always suspected there was a little more to Annie than sheer hypocrisy, that perhaps the whole act was her own subtle parody of the middle-class morality she’d felt stigmatized by in her earlier life. But her protracted critique of Ed’s handling of his bacon argued against it.
There was a fortuitous commotion in the lobby and I took the opportunity to leave the table. I walked off alone, but the sighs and “Oh, dears” emanating from the gathered throng were irresistible and Ed and his wife soon followed. A body was being carried downstairs on a stretcher.
7
“Who is it?” the crowd queried.
“Young girl…,” one privy to hotel gossip responded.
The crowd proclaimed its cosmetic compassion with a diminuendo “Ooohhh.”
“…died in the Fields’ suite,” the rumor-monger added.
This elicited an encore “Ooohhh,” but sung crescendo, through involuntary half-smiles of delight.
“Michael!” Annie yelped as she rushed upstairs.
After a moment’s hesitation, Ed hurtled after her, having an even more difficult time than normal keeping his outsized limbs in alignment.
I suppose I could claim my decision to follow was born of concern for my friend, but that wouldn’t be altogether true. In fact, it wouldn’t be true at all. I went for the same prurient reason the crowd had taken such delight.
First Annie and then Ed disappeared into a room at the end of the hall. I ambled down and stood in the doorway. It was a sitting room. Mrs. Field—who, in spite of the circumstances, or perhaps because of them, seemed to be in good humor—bade us a warm welcome. She came and put her arm in mine and drew me inside.
Fair Play’s a Jewel (Harry Reese Mysteries Book 5) Page 5