And what the hell was I supposed to do now? Call the police? Tell them a fifteen-year-old boy had copped a feel? Or talk to his parents? His father was in another world, another universe really, and his mother was actively denying any serious family problems. Would either of them even believe me? And what would they do to Paul if they did? Something that would help? Or something that would push him further into violence? My mind was whirling faster and faster. It ached from the activity.
I rose to my feet and straightened my posture. Decisions could be postponed. It was time to take care of myself. I took a deep breath and sank into the tai chi form once more.
Ten minutes later I had finished my tai chi for the day. And I had reached a conclusion. I would talk to Paul Beaumont myself. And I wouldn’t speak to the police or his parents, not unless his assault on me was related to Suzanne’s murder. I sighed. Some “unless.” Now, all I had to do was to figure out who had killed Suzanne. And why.
I searched my mind as I walked to my room. I just didn’t have enough information. But Felix Byrne might be able to get me some, I thought. I speeded up to a trot. Felix was my best friend Barbara’s boyfriend, but more important, he was a reporter. One who liked to dig. The things he could find out about people amazed me, even worried me at times. And he owed me. If it hadn’t been for me, he wouldn’t have met Barbara. And he wouldn’t have scooped the Marin murder story that landed him his job as western correspondent for the Philadelphia Globe.
I opened my door, shielded my eyes against the glare of the psychedelic wallpaper, and sat down to dial Felix. As the phone rang, I crossed my fingers and hoped he remembered he owed me. It seemed to me he had once mentioned that I owed him for all the information he had gathered for me in the past.
“You’re involved in another one?” was his only comment when I told him why I had called.
“Not me,” I said. “Craig. I was nowhere near the place when it happened.”
“Likely story,” he grumbled. “I suppose you want me to spend the day at the computer, running down all the suspects.”
“How’s Barbara?” I asked. A subtle reminder.
“Barbara is fine. She told me you’d be calling.” It made sense. Barbara was a practicing psychic. Between her and Felix, privacy didn’t stand a chance. “I get the story, whatever you find out?” he asked.
“Of course,” I assured him. I kept the hesitation out of my voice and told myself the murderer couldn’t be Craig.
“As soon as you find out?” he pressed.
“Right,” I said. Luckily he hadn’t been specific. As far as I was concerned, “as soon as” could mean that minute, that day or that century.
“Okay,” he said. His voice deepened with ghoulish anticipation. “Who are the suspects?”
By the time I put down the phone, I realized just how little I did know about the people at Spa Santé. With the exception of Craig and Don Logan, I didn’t even know where the guests lived when they weren’t on vacation, or where the Beaumonts or Avery Haskell had lived before the spa. I could almost hear Felix shaking his head in disgust when he had elicited the last of my meager information.
I lay back on my bed and wondered. Had one of these people crossed paths with Suzanne Sorenson before Spa Santé? And if so, where?
A sharp rap on my door brought me back up to a sitting position. And back to the fear I thought I had released. I was alone in this room. A room to which every member of the spa staff could probably find a key, including the youngest member of that staff, Paul Beaumont. A Technicolor image of the boy brandishing a knife burst into my mind. I shook the image away, rose to my feet and centered myself.
“Who is it?” I shouted.
SEVEN
“IT’S JACK THE RIPPER,” the voice announced.
I stared at the locked door until recognition penetrated my fear-soaked mind. The sound of the voice and the poor taste of the joke couldn’t belong to anyone else.
“Not funny!” I yelled and flung open the door.
Craig stood on my doorstep looking pale and sheepish.
“I didn’t think,” he mumbled, hanging his head.
“You didn’t think! There’s a murderer running around and your idea of a joke is to tell me you’re Jack the Ripper!”
“Kate—” he began.
“You scared the hell out of me,” I interrupted. I could feel angry blood rushing to my face. “And what if someone else heard you?”
“Kate—” he tried again.
“How do you think that would go down with Chief Orlandi? Do you suppose he would think it was funny?” I yelled. My head was buzzing with adrenalin. “And another thing—”
“All right,” Craig said, throwing his hands up in the air. “I’m a bozo, a diddle-brain, an asshole of the highest order. I admit it. I’m sorry.”
I closed my mouth for a second. Then I opened it again, but without yelling. “I couldn’t have said it better,” I conceded. “You are a bozo.”
“Feel any better?” asked Craig quietly.
“Yeah,” I confessed, smiling with the realization that I did feel better. A lot better.
“Good,” he said, a grin spreading over his tired face. “Me too. Almost seems like old times again, with you yelling at me.”
I tensed, ready to object loudly. I hadn’t yelled at Craig that often when we were married. It was later, when we were separating, that I had done the yelling. Old times, indeed! Craig must have seen the objection forming in my face. He quickly changed the subject.
“Fran’s got the dinner buffet ready,” he said. “Are you hungry?”
What the hell. I was hungry and I told him so. Amazing what a few rounds of tai chi, an assault and some yelling can do for your appetite.
As we walked over to the dining hall, I asked if he knew where the various spa guests were from.
“Jack and Nikki are from Los Angeles,” he answered. “Hollywood, La-La Land. Cultural center of California according to them. San Francisco is dead. Long live Los Angeles.”
“What about Ruth Ziegler?” I asked.
“I think she’s from Northern California, the Bay Area,” he answered after a little thought. “I can’t tell you where I got that impression. She didn’t really say. Terry’s from the Bay Area, too, I think.” He paused. “I’m not sure, though. Why don’t you ask them?”
I nodded. We climbed the stairs of the main building. As we passed through the lobby to the dining hall, I thought how familiar this building had become to me in the five hours I had been here. Spa Santé was a second home to me now. The kind that can appear in nightmares for years.
I surveyed the dining hall, hoping to see Paul Beaumont. I wanted to get my woman-to-boy talk over with. But the boy was nowhere to be seen. Nikki and Jack were there, staring romantically into each other’s eyes over carrot juice, at one of the tables by the windows. Two couples and a family I hadn’t seen before had come in for the meal. Don Logan sat alone. And Ruth and Terry sat at the long communal table in the center of the dining room, engaged, as usual, in spirited conversation. Ruth broke off long enough to wave at me and then turned back to Terry.
But the surprise guest star was Bradley Beaumont, who stood behind the counter at the front of the dining room, doing host duty. He didn’t seem crazed any longer. I looked closer. His eyes weren’t glowing. That was the difference. Instead, his eyes held the still, empty look of the depressive cycle of manic-depression.
“The buffet tonight or just the salad bar?” he asked, his voice dull.
“The buffet,” Craig answered in an over-hearty voice. Was he trying to compensate for Bradley’s low spirits?
“The buffet for me too,” I said.
“All on Mr. Jasper’s bill, along with the rest?” Bradley asked, his eyes on the form in front of him.
“Right,” I said and walked to the buffet.
Craig followed me a for a few steps. Then he tugged at my elbow.
“All on my bill?” he asked, his eyes wide.
>
“I forgot to tell you,” I said, grinning. “You’re paying for my room and board while I’m here.”
“Me?” he asked plaintively.
“Yes, you,” I confirmed. He wasn’t getting any sympathy from me. He was the one that had asked me to come down here. And with the kind of money he made from his computer software company, he could easily pay the cost of my room at Spa Santé, or a suite at the Hyatt Regency for that matter, and write it off as a minor travel expense. “Any problem with that?” I asked him.
“No, no,” he agreed, slumping his shoulders. He sighed a martyred sigh.
“As long as you feel so bad, there’s also my airplane ticket,” I added. “And expenses—”
“Okay, okay,” he capitulated. “I won’t complain. I’m happy. See?” He bared his teeth in an attempt at a smile. He managed to looked like a mad dog. “Happy,” he reiterated through his teeth.
It was like old times, all right. Only I wasn’t feeling nostalgic.
The buffet looked good, though. Good in the sense of “good for you.” Great bowls of spinach and garden salad. Platters of raw vegetables. Cauliflower, broccoli, carrots, zucchini, jicama, celery, sprouts and bell pepper. Dips and dressings, with their healthful ingredients proudly posted. Meatless minestrone soup. Low-fat potato-corn chowder. Tubs of brown rice and cooked vegetables. Steaming polenta. Vegetable-nut loaf. Bread and fruit. Not a naughty bit in sight.
I began heaping my plate. If the food I had gobbled up in Fran’s kitchen had been a fair sample, this food was going to taste as good as it looked. Craig loaded up, too. I was pleased by the return of his appetite. I gave myself a mental pat on the back. My harassment always did cheer him up. We sat down with Ruth and Terry.
“Thanks for the title,” said Ruth, turning her gypsy smile on me. “I have a feeling Healing the Broken Heart will sell like…” She paused. “Like oat-bran hotcakes.”
“Of course it will sell,” groused Terry. “More self-indulgent, psychoanalytic bullshit. The newest opiate for the masses.”
I flinched, shocked by his blunt appraisal. But it didn’t bother Ruth. She laughed.
“Did it ever occur to you that the good fight for social justice is, itself, an opiate for the masses?” she asked, her black button-eyes gleaming mischievously. “Or perhaps an opiate for the elite?”
“Not that old argument,” snarled Terry, glaring fiercely through his wire-rimmed glasses. “Who cares whether political activists are unconsciously working out Oedipal complexes? The struggle against poverty, injustice and racism is what matters. Are you going to look for a warp in Martin Luther King’s upbringing, or respect what he accomplished? You want to talk about what causes unhappiness? Look at social injustice, not psychology.”
“I’m not saying injustice doesn’t cause misery,” Ruth argued. “It does. But even if all injustice was eradicated, there would still be a lot of unhappy people around. Look at Suzanne. Beautiful, privileged and successful. But happy? What do you think, Craig?” she asked suddenly, turning her eyes on him. “Was she happy?”
Craig dropped the forkful of salad he had aimed at his mouth. His face paled. “No, she wasn’t happy,” he mumbled.
So much for cheering him up. I just hoped Ruth knew what she was doing.
“Because she couldn’t let go,” Ruth said softly. “She had to be the best. But she could never believe she was good enough. Who was she trying to impress? Someone from her past, I’d bet.”
Craig nodded, his eyes held by Ruth’s. The gypsy fortune-teller had him now. “And no one else could ever be good enough. Others were always to blame. But, you know what? There was nothing anyone else could have done for her. She had to come to terms with her life on her own. You couldn’t have helped her.”
“I couldn’t?” asked Craig softly.
“No,” said Ruth authoritatively. “Let go of it. It wasn’t your fault.”
Craig stared at Ruth for a while, then smiled weakly. “Well, I’m certainly glad that’s settled, Ollie,” he said in a fair Stan Laurel imitation.
Ruth smiled back. “Go ahead, joke,” she said. “But think about it.”
“Okay, I’ll try,” promised Craig. Then he pointedly broke eye contact and plunged his fork into his salad once more.
I followed suit and took a bite of polenta.
“Just what does all this have to do with political activism?” Terry asked, his weasel face pinched with irritation.
“Nothing,” said Ruth seriously. “Just that. Nothing. Sometimes there’s nothing anyone can do.” She lowered her eyes. Without the life in those eyes lighting up her face she looked elderly. “My oldest son had everything society could promise, and he died. Killed by accident in a fraternity prank. I could blame myself or blame others. I could hate forever. Or I can let it go and move on with my life. Allow closure. Allow my broken heart to heal.”
That was a real conversation stopper. Not to mention an appetite killer. I swallowed hard on my mouthful of bread. But Terry wasn’t deterred.
“You could commit yourself to work for legislation to ban fraternities,” he pointed out.
Ruth brought her eyes back up. She patted Terry’s hand. “If anyone can change the world, you can,” she said affectionately. “You’re persistent enough.”
I went back to my meal with a sigh of relief as Terry and Ruth continued to argue.
The meal was good. But Ruth and Terry’s sparring got old fast. I waited until Terry paused for air and asked him where he was from.
“Ah, the private Gestapo begins interrogation,” he drawled. His eyes filled with disgust behind his wire rims. I jerked up in my chair, feeling propelled by that disgust.
“My name is Terrance Douglas McPhail,” he rattled off, name, rank and serial-number style. “I live in Berkeley, California, where I own and operate Radical Tees.” He reached in his pocket and pulled out his wallet. “Here’s my driver’s license and my social security card. Anything else?”
I stared at the glowering face on Terry’s license photo. Here was my opportunity for information-gathering. But his rapid-fire hostility had stunned me into blankness.
“And I didn’t kill Suzanne Sorenson,” he added truculently.
“What’s Radical Tees?” asked Ruth in an easy voice. I shot her a grateful look.
“A screen-printing shop,” Terry answered. He reached in his wallet again, this time for a business card. “T-shirts, bumper stickers, posters, caps, jackets, sweats. You’ve got a message, I’ll print it for you.” He handed Ruth the card.
I pointed at his “CIA Out of Central America” T-shirt. “Yours?” I asked.
“Guilty as charged,” he said, but he was smiling now, the disgust gone from his eyes. “This too,” he added pointing proudly at his “Food Not Bombs” cap. “T-shirts, caps and bumper stickers. The literature of the nineties. People don’t read pamphlets anymore, much less books—” He broke off and frowned again. “But, that’s enough about me. Don’t you want to interrogate Ruth?”
I looked over at Ruth nervously. She beamed her gypsy smile at me. “Go ahead, honey,” she said encouragingly.
How do you interrogate a woman who calls you “honey”?
“All right, where are you from?” I asked, forcing a “just joking” note into my voice to take away the sting.
“San Anselmo,” she replied. Bingo! San Anselmo was in Marin County, my home county. And, more importantly, Suzanne’s. Ruth must have seen my eyes light up. “I’m a therapist and a writer,” she said gently. “Not a murderer.”
If I was polite, I would quit here, I thought as I wriggled uncomfortably in my chair. But I just couldn’t. “Did you know Suzanne before you met her here?” I asked.
“No,” she answered brusquely. That was an awfully short reply for Ruth. It seemed that I was getting close to the limit of her immense supply of good humor. I looked into her eyes. They weren’t beaming anymore. Maybe I had gone beyond close and hit that limit.
“Thanks,” I said
, keeping my voice cheerfully nonchalant. “Interrogation over.”
I could feel the tension lift. Ruth smiled once more. Terry relaxed in his chair. And Craig breathed an audible sigh of relief.
Terry began a new diatribe against police practices, and I sank gratefully back in my own chair. I looked around the dining hall. Avery Haskell had joined Don Logan at his table, but there was still no sign of Paul Beaumont. Was the kid hiding out? Or helping Fran in the kitchen?
I watched Haskell bow his head before eating. “Thank you, Jesus,” he said.
“Anyone want something from the kitchen?” I asked.
“No thank you, Jesus,” replied Craig loudly.
Haskell’s head jerked up. He scowled in Craig’s direction. No wonder he wasn’t a member of the Craig Jasper fan club.
I glared my own disapproval at Craig. When was he going to learn? He deflated and mumbled, “Jeez, I was just kidding.”
“You might feel better if you apologized to Avery,” Ruth suggested in a whisper. She sounded just like my second-grade teacher, Miss Johnson.
Suddenly, it was all too much for me. The omniscient Miss Johnson had always made me nervous. And I was tired of Craig’s antics. I got up, walked to the kitchen and peered in over the swinging doors. But the kitchen was empty. Not even Fran was there.
“Looking for me?” came her musical voice from behind me. I swung around to face her. Her delicate face was shining with sweat. “I’ve been setting up our video for the evening, Solar Cooking for Vegetarians, in the old theatre. I ran all the way back in case anyone needed anything,” she explained.
I surveyed the hall. Bradley had disappeared from his station at the front counter. Paul was still nowhere to be seen. Avery Haskell sat eating quietly, the only other representative of Spa Santé.
“Is your son around?” I asked.
Fran blinked, but answered without asking me why I wanted to know. “I think he’s doing homework. But he should be there at the video.”
That’s how I ended up spending my first evening at Spa Santé watching a video about cooking vegetables and grains with sunshine. A method I hope I will never have to use. Or hear about again. And Paul Beaumont never did show up.
The Last Resort (A Kate Jasper Mystery) Page 7