The Other Woman

by Joy Fielding

  "She called and asked if I could meet her for a cup of coffee," Jill said simply. “I was preparing dinner so I had to say no”

  "She wanted to meet you immediately?"

  "Yes." Jill took a minute to review the conversation in her own mind. "She sounded very strange," Jill continued, remembering now all the details she had somehow managed to avoid the night before. "In fact, I didn't recognize her voice right away. She sounded—scared," Jill said, putting a word to what she had heard in Beth's voice but ignored because she was too busy to want to recognize it. Oh my God, she thought, had the killer been there when Beth had phoned? No, she decided. Beth had wanted to meet her right away. Surely the killer wouldn't have let her walk out to meet a friend for coffee.

  "Did she say she was frightened?" Captain Keller asked.

  "No. She just asked if we could meet for coffee. I asked her if something was wrong and she said no, just that Al was going to be late—he was tied up in a meeting—and she thought it would be a good time to get together. She sounded fine then. It was only at the beginning of the conversation that she sounded funny."

  "She said her husband would be tied up late in a meeting?"

  "Yes. We made arrangements to meet on Wednesday night instead."

  "Anything else?"

  "Nothing."

  "Is Beth Weatherby a close friend of yours, Mrs. Plumley?"

  "We're friends," Jill answered. "We play bridge together a bit and we take an exercise class together. I like her a lot." She tried to read some information from his expression but she got nothing. "Is she going to be all right?"

  "Thank you, Mrs. Plumley," Captain Keller said. "We may want to speak to you again." He left the room.

  "What was all that about?" Jill asked, turning to David.

  He shook his head. "Why didn't you tell me Beth sounded frightened when you spoke to her?"

  "I just didn't think about it. Do you think there's any connection?" she asked incredulously.

  "It seems more than a bit coincidental," he answered, a touch of sarcasm creeping into his voice.

  "But how?"

  "David." The voice was soft but no less husky than it had sounded the night before. Jill turned toward it in time to watch Nicole dissolve into tears in David's arms. She couldn't believe what she was watching. In front of all these people, her husband was openly embracing another woman. Of course, no one else present was aware of all the implications—what they saw was an emotional young woman, not to mention a brilliant legal mind, who was all broken up at the death of a man everyone had loved, and was turning for comfort to the man so many of them had similarly embraced. Jill felt embarrassed. How could she be so petty as to be jealous at a time like this? Her husband's close associate and friend had been brutally bludgeoned to death and his wife was who-knew-how-seriously injured, and all she was worrying about was the stiffness of her husband's cock against Nicole Clark's tight-fitting jeans.

  David backed away from the other woman's embrace gently. "Jill, do you have any Kleenex?" he asked.

  Jill reached in her purse and pulled out several crumpled tissues. "I hope they're not used," she said, handing them over, then watching in stunned surprise as David wiped the tears from under Nicole Clark's eyes. I hope it is used, she cursed silently. Did he have to make such a display of everything? She didn't remember him wiping the tears away from under her eyes. Then she remembered she hadn't shed any. She'd been too stunned to cry.

  Jill began to feel awkward watching them, as if she were an intruder in a sacred and beautiful scene. Somehow, she found it harder to watch her husband touching Nicole than she had sighting her camera lens on the carnage and severed limbs of Vietnam. She turned away, aware now of their voices beside her, Nicole questioning, David having all the answers. A policeman approached and asked the newcomer's name. She heard him leave again, heard Nicole's whispers and her husband's soft assurances. Why had they come here? What possible good were they accomplishing?

  "Davey! Nicki! How are you?"

  Jill turned to watch Don Eliot approach her husband and Nicole. Tragedy had not altered his unorthodox style of dressing: He wore tight jeans and sandals along with a white shirt and green tie. He conferred for several minutes with David and Nicole before he even took note that Jill was there. "Hi, Jilly," he said, grabbing her hand and shaking it.

  Hi, Donny, she wanted to respond. "Hello, Don," she smiled. "Have you heard anything more?"

  "Well, I saw Beth last night, of course, after they brought her in, but she was in a state of shock and couldn't say anything. I talked to the police, but it was too early to get much out of them. I just spoke to the doctors and to the officer in charge. Apparently, Beth is awake now and they're going to try and talk to her."

  "Are her kids here?"

  "The daughter's on her way in from Los Angeles. Her oldest son flew in from New York last night. He's with her now. The youngest son they haven't been able to locate yet."

  "You don't think he did it, do you?" She thought of the recent tension between father and son since the boy had dropped out of school to don flowing robes and shave his head.

  Don Eliot's face grew grim. "It's a thought," he said.

  "Oh, God."

  The room filled with the sound of fresh rumors. More people crowded into the already overcrowded area. Another policeman returned to recheck Jill’s account of her phone conversation with Beth Weatherby. Don Eliot made frequent forays into the hall, conversing with several different officers. David had left Nicole's side and was now giving comfort to one of the other wives. Jill felt vaguely about her earlier feelings and looked away. Nicole Clark was staring at her from across the room. She looked more like a frightened and confused little girl than a femme fatale, Jill thought, before reminding herself that frightened and confused little girls had a way of being dangerously attractive to other women's husbands.

  She turned away, her thoughts suddenly on Beth Weatherby. Yesterday, Beth had had everything. A successful marriage, a wonderful husband, a charmed existence. Today all that was gone. Shattered by several strong blows to the skull. Wasn't it remarkable how everything could change so completely in the space of a single night, and wasn't it strange, she thought, her mind echoing a phrase Beth herself had once uttered, how nothing ever worked out quite the way you thought it would.

  "Why won't they let us see her?" Jill was asking angrily. ''What are they doing for so long in there? Won't they even tell us how she is?"

  No one answered her. Only a handful of people remained, including Nicole Clark, who had gone to bring everyone a cup of coffee and had returned with one cup too few. Jill had declined the girl's offer to make a second trip, claiming she drank too much coffee anyway (although she dearly would have liked a cup), and so she had to content herself with pacing the room and addressing herself to the walls like someone half-crazed and all alone. Of course I'm not alone, she told herself. My husband and his future wife are with me.

  "I don't understand what's going on," Jill continued. "Why won't they tell us anything?"

  "I'm sure they will as soon as they can," Nicole answered, her voice sweet and soft.

  If she doesn't stop being so bloody sweet to me, Jill thought, I'm going to break her bloody sweet little neck.

  As if on cue, Don Ehot appeared in the doorway. “Jilly, I'm glad you stayed. We're not getting anywhere. She won't say a thing. She just lies there—"

  "Well, she's in shock," Jill protested. "Some lunatic beats her up and murders her husband—"

  "She called you last night, is that right?" Don Eliot asked. "Tell me exactly, word for word, what she said."

  Jill repeated the conversation to the best of her ability. "Well, she obviously wanted to tell you something," Don Eliot concluded. "It's too bad you couldn't go." He paused long enough to inspire the appropriate guilt. "Look, Jilly, maybe she'll talk to you now. I think I can talk the doctors into giving us a few more minutes. Are you game?"

  "Sure," Jill said numbly. "If you thin
k it'll help."

  She knew the words out of his mouth before he said them. "It can't hurt," he said, and she walked down the corridor beside him, leaving her husband standing in the doorway beside Nicole Clark.

  The woman sitting in the hospital bed had two black and swollen eyes, her skin was severely discolored, and large blotches of maroon, like misplaced rouge, stained her cheeks and chin. There were bandages across her nose and cheek, and one disappeared just inside her hairline. Her lips were cut and twice their normal size, her ears scratched and caked with dried blood. Still, there was something as peaceful about Beth Weatherby as she sat in her hospital bed, the blankets pulled high around her, hiding her other injuries from Jill’s sight that Jill feared in that initial instant that the woman had stopped breathing altogether, that she was being led forward to converse with a corpse.

  "My God, Beth," Jill whispered, moving toward her. "Who did this to you?"

  Beth Weatherby's eyes remained closed. Jill walked slowly to the woman's side, bent down and kissed her very gently on the forehead, on the only patch of skin which seemed untouched, her tears falling down involuntarily and wetting Beth's skin. "Oh, Tm so sorry," she cried. "I’m so sorry about what's happened." Beth's eyes flickered but stayed shut. Jill realized that perhaps the woman didn't recognize her voice. "It's Jill, Beth. I'm so sorry I couldn't meet you last night." She sniffed loudly, tying to stop the tears. "It's going to be all right, Beth," she continued lamely. "They'll find whoever did this and then this whole nightmare will be over. That's the good thing about nightmares, you know. You get to wake up."

  Beth's eyes opened suddenly and focused on Jill. But they did more than stare, Jill realized, careful not to avert her own. They were searching. For what? Jill wondered. For answers? I don't know the question, she admitted silently. For reassurance? All I have are platitudes and empty promises. For support? You have it, Jill tried to communicate. All I have.

  "I'm so tired," Beth muttered, barely audible behind her swollen lips.

  "I know," Jill said, feeling dumb and inadequate. Just what was it she claimed to know?

  "They hurt me," she said, her words slurred.

  "They?" Jill asked quickly.

  "When they changed the bandages," came the slow reply. "I know they didn't mean to." Her eyes closed briefly, then opened again. "Oh, Jill, I hurt so badly."

  Jill tried to speak but couldn't. The words caught in her throat and were lost before they could find her tongue.

  "Brian is here," Beth said suddenly.

  "Brian”

  Beth smiled, or tried to. "My son, the doctor," she said, and Jill almost smiled in return. "I know he was here before when they were talking to me." She raised her head and began searching the room, a look of mounting panic filling her eyes.

  "Your son went out for a cup of coffee," Don Eliot said from his position near the door. "Do you want him?"

  Beth lowered her head back to the pillow. "They told me Lisa is on her way in from Los Angeles." She looked toward the window. "They haven't been able to find Michael yet. I think that's what they said. Tm not sure." Her voice was trailing off into a soft whine. "So many people," she said. "So many questions. Something to do with Al." She looked back at Jill. "They keep repeating his name as if they expect more than just its sound in return." She looked puzzled. "Poor Brian. He looks so tired and worried. I know I'm the cause. What did that policeman say to me before?" Jill could see Beth's mind racing to catch up to the scattered debris of her thoughts.

  "Why don't you try and sleep, Beth," Jill offered. "We'll talk later."

  "Something about Al. He was trying to tell me something about Al. He talked exactly the way they do on television. I didn't say anything. I don't know what he wanted me to say. My God, Jill," she said suddenly. "Al is dead!"

  "I know," Jill said, a tear running down her cheek.

  "Al's dead," the woman repeated.

  "Please try not to worry," Jill pleaded, patting Beth's hand as it rested beneath the covers. "They'll find whoever killed Al. And they'll put him away. He won't be able to hurt you anymore."

  "No, he won't," Beth said, her voice suddenly calm, her eyes closing once again, her breath becoming less forced and more even, as she succumbed to sleep.

  Jill leaned forward and once again kissed her friend's forehead. "Sleep," she whispered, her eyes staring straight ahead at the white of the hospital pillowcase. Slowly, she allowed her spine to straighten and her shoulders to pull back. Then she turned and walked directly to the door.

  "I’m afraid I wasn't much help," she said as she reached Don Eliot.

  "You never know," he answered. "She said more to you than she has to anyone. That's a start, anyway."

  "The start of what, I wonder," Jill said numbly, then opened the door to the hallway and quickly left the room.

  Chapter 14

  If and when she ever dropped dead, Jill decided, it would definitely not be in the middle of a heat wave. It just wasn't fair to expect people to crowd into an un-air-conditioned church to mourn your demise when the temperature outside was over 90 degrees and rising. God only knew what heights the thermometer would reach inside the church itself once they were all crowded together inside.

  Jill wondered if Beth would be present. She had been released from the hospital just yesterday, out of danger yet still strangely silent. In the week since AFs murder, Beth had surrounded herself with silence, speaking to no one, sleeping long hours and allowing only her daughter and sons (the youngest had finally been located) to minister to her needs. According to Don Eliot, she was almost a zombie. He could get no information out of her at all, and the doctors feared the shock might take months, possibly years, to abate. Without Beth, there was little to go on.

  The police still hadn't located the murder weapon, and there were no signs of forced entry into the Weatherby home, leading the police to suspect that the killer had been known to his victims. Possibly even related. Jill thought of Michael. It would certainly go a long way toward explaining Beth's silence. The shock of watching your own son destroy his father, then turn his rage on you—

  Jill felt her breath becoming short and looked down at what she was wearing. David had insisted she wear a black wool turtleneck dress. It was the only black dress she had, and despite her argument that you showed respect at a funeral by your presence and not by what you wore, David had been adamant that she wear black. And so, here she was in the blistering late summer heat wearing a dress she usually saved for only the coldest days of a Chicago winter.

  They hadn't even been able to get away over the long Labor Day weekend, the way they always had. Jill fretted, picturing the refreshing lake waters that framed the shore of the Deerhurst Inn, a quaint old country retreat they had stumbled across when their romance was in its infancy. She felt the loss of that weekend hideaway as acutely as a pilgrim denied his annual ablutions at Lourdes. But David had had to work all weekend, Weatherby, Ross having been thrown into an understandable state of chaos. Everyone was waiting anxiously for the police to release Al’s body for burial, and the endless tests they were conducting only intensified the outrage, grief and scandal that threatened to swallow up everybody connected with the large firm.

  The next few weeks could only bring with them more of the same, although possibly the smothering cloak of heat which seemed to have been thrown across the city in the week since AVs death might lift. Jill tugged at the black wool which was sitting at her neck like a sleeping boa constrictor. Someone save me from this heat, she prayed silently, feeling guilty for the overwhelming triviality of her concerns in the face of what she knew Beth must be going through.

  She had tried to reach Beth several times during the past week, and had met with polite but insistent refusals from her children. Their mother wasn't speaking to anyone, she was told, a fact with which Don Eliot immediately concurred. Jill repeated to all parties that she was readily available whenever she might be needed, but no one had called. Perhaps today, when she saw Beth�
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  The sideshow began at the front door with at least ten Hare Krishna’s chanting in cacophonous unison and handing out pamphlets to the stunned mourners. Apparently, Beth had given instructions that they were not to be disturbed, this being her younger son's way of dealing with his grief. Jill and David refused the proffered pamphlets—David muttering something about shooting Jason should he ever don flowing robes—and pushed past the chanters into the interior of the church.

  It was even hotter than Jill had been prepared for. The circus at the door had at least provided something of a distraction, but now the body heat of some several hundred mourners, combined with the natural temperature of the outside air, made Jill gasp for breath. For a fleeting second, she thought of the movie Land of the Pharaohs with Jack Hawkins and a super-sultry Joan Collins. Joan, having plotted long and laboriously to kill all those who came between her and the throne of Egypt, including her husband, the current monarch, found herself in the great tomb along with the dead Pharaoh and all his favorite slaves, concubines and horses, about to be buried alive. Such were the Pharaoh's wishes.

  Jill hastily surveyed the large room which was in the process of filling to capacity. Was this Al Weatherby's plan as well? Had he posthumously gathered together the modem-day equivalent of his favorite slaves, concubines and horses? Was he planning on taking them all along? Into which category did she fit? Undoubtedly one of the horses, she decided, as David pushed her toward an aisle where she was forced to climb past several sets of kneecaps, all of which seemed to have been nailed into the floor.

  She felt her hair curling into tight little balls around her face—she didn't remember Joan Collins sweating—and wished now that they had accepted one of the pamphlets they had spumed at the door. It would have made a good fan.