by Anne George
“They’re the ones with the teenage daughter?”
“Uh huh. Jack and Tammy Berliner. Their daughter’s name is Sophie.”
“And they fly out of Atlanta? That’s not exactly commuting distance.”
“They’ve got a Cessna, I understand. And they don’t work every day. They’ll make a flight and then be off for a couple of days. It seems to be working out okay. Millicent says the move was mainly for Sophie and she thinks it’s done her good. She’s not quite as weird.” Sister stopped walking. “Oh, my. Poor Millicent.”
We stood at the edge of the water. Beyond us, some flounder fishermen were shining their lanterns into the water. Above us, the stars wheeled hazily.
“I hope he was good,” Sister said.
“Who?”
“The man Millicent was with last night.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake. Maybe she just went to sleep like she said she did.”
“I hope not. I hope she was with some strong, virile man who made love to her all night.”
I was getting caught up in this. “A sweet and gentle man.”
“I got a big one!” one of the flounderers shouted.
“To each his own,” Sister said.
The next morning, it was about nine o’clock when I woke up. Haley’s bed was empty. I put on my robe and went to see what was going on. Haley and Frances were sitting on the balcony drinking coffee and passing a pair of binoculars back and forth.
“Good morning,” I said. “What are y’all looking at?”
“Porpoises,” Haley looked up. “There’s a whole bunch of them out there. How’s your tailbone?”
“Not as bad as I thought it was going to be. Did your Aunt Sister get off to her writers’ conference?”
“Bright eyed and bushy tailed. She’s been gone a long time,” Frances said. “She left you a Post-it on the refrigerator.”
I headed into the kitchen, bleary eyed, amazed as always at my sister’s energy. She couldn’t have had more than three or four hours’ sleep and she was bright eyed and bushy tailed? I took the Post-it from the refrigerator. It said, “Patricia Anne, please take care of Fairchild.”
Take care of Fairchild? What was I supposed to do to take care of Fairchild? I poured a cup of coffee and went back to the balcony.
“She wants me to take care of Fairchild,” I said.
“I know. I saw the note.” Haley handed Frances the binoculars. “Look, Frances, right to the left of that bait boat. See the fin? Reckon that could be a shark?”
“Could be. I swear I haven’t been more than ankle deep in the ocean since I saw Jaws. Frances trained the binoculars in the direction Haley was pointing.
“I guess I’d better get dressed and go see about him,” I said. “See how he fared last night.”
“Mary Alice checked before she left. She said he’s doing pretty good. Still wrought up, of course, but who wouldn’t be?” Frances handed the binoculars back to Haley. “It’s a porpoise.”
“You’re probably right.” Haley put the binoculars on the table. “If he’s real wrought up, Mama, maybe that doctor that lives downstairs needs to check him out again.”
“I’m still pretty wrought up, myself, from finding the body yesterday,” Frances said. “I sure didn’t sleep much last night.”
“You could have gone for a walk on the beach with Mary Alice,” I grumbled. I went to get a shower and get dressed. Fairchild was one of my favorite people. I didn’t need a reminder from Sister or a description of him as “real wrought up,” whatever that meant, to go see about him.
Fifteen minutes later, as I stepped into the corridor, I almost bumped into a beautiful blonde woman who was carrying a covered dish toward Fairchild’s door. A quick dodge and some juggling saved the contents.
“I’m so sorry!” I said.
“It’s okay.” She smiled at me. “We almost had breakfast pizza all over us, didn’t we?”
“I should have been more careful.”
“No harm done.” She smiled again. “I’m Tammy Berliner. I live down the hall.”
“It’s nice meeting you, Tammy. I’m Patricia Anne Hollowell, Mary Alice Crane’s sister.”
“It’s nice meeting you, Mrs. Hollowell. I’ve heard her talk of you.”
“Don’t believe a word. And call me Patricia Anne, please.” I motioned to the pizza. “You on your way next door?”
She nodded. “I can’t believe this has happened. Can you?”
“No,” I said. “I can’t. We’ve known Millicent for twenty years, the nicest person you’d ever meet. Fairchild, too.”
“I know. Can you knock on the door for me?”
I did, and Laura Stamps answered. My first thought, as usual when I see Laura, and which I had the decency to feel guilty about, was that it was a shame they hadn’t invented sunscreen years ago. Laura’s tanned, leathery skin looked like a mask this morning. With cracks in it.
“Come in,” she said, taking the dish from Tammy and nodding toward the living room. “Fairchild’s in there.”
“How is he?” I asked.
“More hungover from what that fool doctor gave him last night than anything else.” Laura disappeared into the kitchen.
“That’s breakfast pizza, Laura,” Tammy called. “It’s for eating right now if anybody wants some.”
It sounded good to me. I hadn’t had anything but a cup of coffee but didn’t feel comfortable diving into his food without speaking to Fairchild first. So I stepped into his living room where women were perched everywhere, on the arms of the sofa, on the footstool; those young and thin enough were sitting on the floor. Fairchild sat in his recliner, looking dazed. Or panicked.
“Hey, Fairchild,” I said, stepping over several women to kiss him on the cheek. Mary Alice’s cryptic message had suddenly become clear. “I came to get you. There’s a policeman next door who wants to talk to you.”
He looked up in surprise. “Now?”
“He can wait if you can’t come now.” I looked straight at him and saw him catch on.
“I’ll come.” He came up out of the recliner with an agility that was amazing in a man his age. “Right now.”
“Good,” I said. Nobody seemed to think it strange that a policeman would be next door to question Fairchild, and no one saw me grab the breakfast pizza on our way out.
“Thanks, Patricia Anne,” he said as I opened Sister’s door.
“You’re welcome. You want anything to eat?”
“I just want to go to the bathroom and rest a while.”
“Well, we can arrange that. There’s the bathroom and you can take a nap on Mary Alice’s bed.” He seemed to brighten a little at that idea.
Haley and Frances had disappeared, probably had gone to the beach. While Fairchild was in the bathroom, I made up Sister’s bed, got a pillow from the linen closet, put a fresh pillowcase on it, and located a light cotton blanket.
“Oh, my,” Fairchild said, stretching out. I think he was asleep by the time I left the room.
I headed for the breakfast pizza which was nothing but mega fat grams and cholesterol: ham, cheese, bacon, eggs. Delicious. Haley and Frances showed up in time to help me finish it, Haley saying at least ten times between bites that our arteries would never be the same.
“Y’all be quiet,” I cautioned them when they came in. I told them what had happened in Fairchild’s apartment and that he was napping on Sister’s bed.
“All those women in there consoling him? You sure you didn’t pull him out of the briar patch?” Frances asked.
“I’m sure. The ladies of Gulf Towers are formidable consolers.”
Haley took another piece of pizza. “Good cooks, though.”
“This came from the lady at the end of the hall, the one who moved in this spring, Tammy Berliner. She’s a beautiful blonde, probably just a little older than you, Haley. She’s a flight attendant for Delta.”
“She commutes to Atlanta?” Frances asked.
“She and her h
usband both. He’s a pilot. Or else she’s the pilot and he’s the flight attendant. One or the other. Sister says they have a teenager named Sophie. I love that name, don’t you? Sophie Berliner. And I’ll bet she hates it. Probably wishes she had her mama’s name.”
“Everybody hates their name,” Frances said. “It’s a given.”
“I hate mine,” Haley said cheerfully, her mouth full of cholesterol.
I took the last piece of pizza. “Sorry. We should have gone with Letitia Maude, your papa’s first choice.”
“Letitia Maude Hollowell,” Haley mused. “I’d have been a completely different person.”
“You would have been a perfectionist,” Frances said. “A Letitia Maude would do everything just so.”
“Like dresser drawers. All my dresser drawers would be straight. And my closets. A place for everything.” Haley dribbled water down her shirt from a glass that had condensation on it.
“Letitia Maude wouldn’t have done that,” Frances said.
“You’re right,” Haley giggled, wiping her shirt with the back of her arm. “And you know what? In Letitia Maude’s kitchen, even the roach motels would be lined up perfectly.”
Frances giggled, too.
I didn’t feel like playing along with them. My eyes were still puffy from lack of sleep, I had a slight tail-ache, and I was worried about the nice man asleep on Sister’s bed who had just lost his wife so violently. I got up, went into the kitchen, and was putting on another pot of coffee when someone knocked on the door. Expecting Laura Stamps, who would be wondering where Fairchild was, I was startled to see the small, black-clad figure that looked up as I opened the door.
“Is my mother here?” she asked. “Tammy Berliner? She’s not next door.”
“No,” I said. “You’re Sophie?” The question wasn’t a rhetorical one; I truly wasn’t sure. That the blond, golden-skinned Tammy could have given birth to this child was indeed questionable. Standing before me was one of those big-eyed, waifish children you see on velvet paintings. Long black hair hung limply against the palest skin I’d ever seen. And the outfit she had on was a loose robe that reached the floor and seemed to be made of black gauze.
“I’m Sophie,” she said. “I’m sorry to have bothered you.”
“No problem.” Who was it who had told me Sophie was less weird since they had moved to Destin? “I’m Mrs. Hollowell, Mrs. Crane’s sister. Would you like to come in and have something to drink?”
Sophie scowled, and I realized that part of the wide-eyed look was caused by a liberal application of eye liner, deep purple shadow, and what couldn’t possibly be real black eyelashes.
“I’m looking for my mother,” she said. She turned and wafted toward their apartment at the end of the corridor.
“Nice meeting you, too,” I mumbled to myself.
“Who was that?” Haley asked as I walked back into the kitchen.
“One of the Addams family children.”
“Which apartment do they live in?”
I leaned across the kitchen counter. “It was Sophie Berliner.” I described her to Haley and Frances.
“Rebelling,” Frances said, forever the guidance counselor.
“How old did you say she is?” Haley asked.
“Thirteen or fourteen, I’d guess. Y’all want some more coffee?”
Frances got up and handed me her cup. “Neither fish nor fowl at that age. I wonder how close she was to Millicent. The black could be her way of showing mourning.”
Shit, I thought. The kid’s just screwed up. But I didn’t say it. Instead, I took my coffee into the bedroom, lay down on my bed, and opened my book. Lack of sleep and the breakfast pizza immediately took their toll. I was so sound asleep, the pounding on the door an hour later was incorporated into my dream as Fred hanging a picture on the wall. The sound of voices brought me awake, though. I peeked into the living room and saw Fairchild and a couple of Florida Marine Patrol officers. I ran a comb through my hair, brushed my teeth (on the mirror was a Post-it that Haley and Frances had gone to the outlet mall), and went to see what was going on.
The two Marine Patrol officers jumped up as I came in. One was a pretty young woman with curly brown hair, the kind of hair that I was sure drove her crazy frizzing in the high humidity of the beach. I knew, because mine did the same thing. The other officer was a man close to retirement age who had the opposite problem. You could have counted the hairs on his head.
“Patricia Anne,” Fairchild said, “this is Elaine Gregory and Tim Blankenship. They’re here to ask me some questions about Millicent.”
I shook both the officers’ hands and asked if they wanted to talk to Fairchild alone.
“Stay, by all means, Mrs. Hollowell,” Elaine Gregory said. “I understand you found Mrs. Weatherby’s body.”
“I didn’t look at her,” I admitted. “My sister did, sort of accidentally. And my daughter.” I sat on the sofa beside Fairchild. “You feeling better?” I asked him.
“Yes. Thanks.” But he was still very pale and the hands he kept running along the crease in his pants were shaking. Pants that Millicent had ironed. I looked away toward the water.
“We just need to ask you a few questions, Mr. Weatherby,” Tim Blankenship said.
“All right.”
Too placid. “He’s on medication,” I told the officers. And, patting Fairchild’s arm, “You don’t have to answer anything now, Fairchild.”
“It’s okay, Patricia Anne.”
Officer Blankenship cleared his throat and looked at his partner. She nodded. “Mrs. Weatherby didn’t come home night before last?” he asked.
“I’ve already told the Major Lieutenant about that. She had drinks at the Redneck Riviera with some friends and had a little too much. She went to sleep in the car in the parking lot.”
“Do you know who the friends were?”
“Some people from Blue Bay Ranch, I think.” Fairchild’s fingers quit creasing his pants. “I’m not sure.”
“We’ll check,” Elaine Gregory said.
“She’s never done anything like that before,” Fairchild looked at me. “Tell them, Patricia Anne.”
“She’s never done anything like that before,” I said, hoping I wasn’t lying through my teeth.
Elaine Gregory ran her fingers through her hair, making it spring out even more. “What time did she come in?”
“Look,” Fairchild said. “I’m trying to cooperate, but where’s that other fellow, that colonel what’s his name. I’ve already told him all this.”
“Lieutenant Bissell is taking a personal leave day,” Officer Gregory said.
“He’s at the writers’ conference,” I explained.
“Well, damn!” Fairchild’s face was no longer pale. He leaned forward. “Look here,” he told the two officers, “you find out what happened to my wife and you tell me when you are going to release her body. She’s got a sick sister in De Funiak Springs and this whole thing is going to kill her. I’ve got to at least tell her and her brother when we can plan a funeral. You hear me? And I’m damned if you’re going to keep asking me the same questions you’ve got the answers to there in those damn notebooks.”
This was the man who had just said he would answer anything they asked? I reached over and patted his arm again.
The two officers didn’t seem at all surprised by Fairchild’s outburst. “Okay, Mr. Weatherby,” Elaine Gregory said. “I’ll read you what we have in our notes and you can tell us if we’re right. Okay?”
“I guess so.” Fairchild folded his arms and waited.
Elaine Gregory consulted her notebook. “Mrs. Weatherby got home between six and six-thirty yesterday morning.” She looked at Fairchild and he nodded. “She said she had been sleeping in her car at the Redneck Riviera because she had had too much to drink.”
“She only had a couple of drinks,” Fairchild said. “But she wasn’t much of a drinker.”
“She was with some people from Blue Bay, you think, either
the staff or prospective clients.”
“That’s what she said.”
“Which? Staff?”
“I’m not sure,” Fairchild admitted. “I was angry and relieved at the same time, so I don’t remember what she said about who she was with.”
Elaine nodded and continued. “You had a few cross words, and then Mrs. Weatherby came over here to tell Mrs. Hollowell she was all right.”
“She did,” I agreed.
“And then she went back to your apartment, Mr. Weatherby, discovered you were out of tomato juice and said she was going to run over to Delchamps Super Market to get some.”
“Their Food Club tomato juice is delicious,” I said. “The store brand? It’s not as tart as some of the others. About twenty cents cheaper, too.”
Officer Gregory cut her eyes at me. “Well, it’s the truth,” I said.
“And she never came home.” Tim Blankenship spoke up.
“No,” Fairchild said. “And if you’ll consult your notes, you’ll see I thought she had decided to go on to work.”
“Not in the clothes she had slept in, Fairchild,” I interrupted. “Millicent wouldn’t be caught dead not looking neat as a pin.”
But she had been. Shut up, Patricia Anne. I bit my lip and looked out at the Gulf again.
“Thank you, Mr. Weatherby.” Elaine Gregory put her notebook back in her pocket. “We’re just doing our job, trying to find out what happened to your wife.”
“I know,” Fairchild said. “And I’m sorry I flared up. It just seems so unnecessary to go over the same things again and again.”
“We understand. We’ll try not to do that.” Elaine Gregory nodded toward Tim Blankenship. “You ready?”
They started out and I followed, being polite, seeing them out of the door. I was so close that when Elaine Gregory turned suddenly, I jumped backwards.
“Oh, Mr. Weatherby, there is one new thing we need to ask you about, the insurance policy.”
Fairchild was standing in the middle of the living room. “What policy?” he asked, though I could tell he knew exactly what she was talking about.