by Alan Russell
“This whole thing reminds me of your saint,” Sharon said.
“What saint?”
“Julian. Remember how you said he came home and thought he'd found his wife with another man, and he killed the couple?”
Am nodded.
“There's something baroque about all this. Why would the murderer clean? And why did the murderer kill?”
“Few murderers are saints,” Am reminded her.
Then he recalled something that Mark Twain had once written and repeated it aloud:” 'All saints can do miracles,'” he said,” 'but few of them can keep a hotel.'”
XXXII
Sainthood was not on Carlton’s mind.
It usually isn’t on first dates. Carlton and Bobbi had decided that the fraternity of the Bob Johnsons was not as important as their time together. They talked over drinks in the Sandcomber Lounge, a bar whose tropical island motif looked as if it had been inspired by Disney. There were ersatz palm trees that had wind birds perched on limbs. Given a breeze, or even overactive air-conditioning, the birds let out electronic warbles. The sounds delighted visiting tourists, but one bartender had quit and filed a workers compensation claim, stating that the noise was akin to eight hours of hearing fingernails on a chalkboard.
The wall ornaments were consistent with the kind of flotsam designers would want to find on beaches, colorful worn glass, sand dollars, shells, and multihued fish netting. There was no sewage, tar, dead fish, or syringes on display. Most of the drinks were served in coconuts or pineapples. A barnacled dinghy in the corner was home to some musical instruments and presumably a band that had not yet arrived. Each of the tabletops was adorned with sand and driftwood. Bobbi touched her fingertips along the sand and declared that the designer who had thought up the effect was a genius. Those who had to clean the fallen granules, which were supposed to be corraled inside an upraised lip but regularly found their way to the floor, would have disagreed. Little indentations were left in the wake of Bobbi’s fingers.
“Footprints in the sands of time,” she said.
“That’s beautiful,” said Carlton.
“Some poet wrote that,” she said. “I write poetry, too.”
“And I’ll bet it’s pretty, but it couldn’t be as pretty as you.”
Her fingers stopped dancing in the sand and reached for his. Their digits twined.
Carlton spoke from his heart: “I wish this was a deserted island, and only the two of us were on it. Like Robinson Crusoe.”
“Which would make me what? Friday?”
“Monday through Friday. And the weekends, too.”
She giggled at that one. Her Bobby had quite the silver tongue. “I feel like I’m dreaming,” she said.
“Me too.”
“Oh, look. The sun’s about to set. Let’s watch.”
Hand in hand, they observed the sun being swallowed from their own tropical island. In its wake they were bathed in a red glow.
“Red sky at night, sailor’s delight.”
“You are a poet,” he said.
“Borrowed again,” she said. “But I’m going to write a poem about all of this.”
“Am I going to be in it?”
She tried to hide her big face behind her big hands, a move that beguiled Carlton, and said, “I’m thinking of slipping you in.”
No one had ever included him in a poem before, of that Carlton was sure. He felt reborn, like one of those plants that against all odds emerge out of rock or asphalt, and he tried to express that thought to Bobbi.
“That's beautiful,” she said.
“Another?”
Intruding on their red glow, and their mutual admiration society, was a cocktail waitress. She was dressed in a sarong of tropical colors. Her rainbow piscine name tag said Rhonda and identified her hometown as Bayonne, New Jersey.
“Let's walk on the beach instead,” said Bobbi.
Am signed off on yet another form. Who guards the guards from bureaucracy? he wondered. As interim security director, he had found himself vouching for just about everything.
Lost and found duty was one of his new responsibilities. He had charge over inventorying and locking up all unclaimed items. While most guests were just negligent or absentminded, he knew some deliberately left behind certain articles. The Hotel now sent sealed generic letters to guests, advising them that an item(s) had been left behind in their room and that they should contact the director of security for further information. The lack of specifics was an improvement over the Hotel's previous method of sending out postcards describing what was being held. One man had been advised that a pink nightie was left in his room, but not before his wife, family, the postman, and half the people in his town had been informed of the same thing. The man's wife had threatened to sue him for divorce, and he had threatened to sue the Hotel for breach of privacy. The pink nightie was never claimed.
The pickings for that day weren't as salacious. A dozen rooms had left behind books that Am logged dutifully, though he knew that most guests never wanted them back. In six months they'd either find their way to the Hotel library or to interested employees. One man had forgotten his swimming trunks and another his two ties (though he wasn't fond of neckwear, Am had one of the largest tie collections in the Western world, courtesy of guest largesse). From three other rooms had come an electric razor, a camera, and a wind-up alarm clock. Am was glad that nothing too exotic had been left behind. He'd heard about guests who'd forgotten their pornographic tapes, bondage material, and sexual paraphernalia. Most, but not all, were embarrassed when claiming their losses.
The only lost item not quite run-of-the-mill was a man's wedding ring, which had been left in the Bob Johnson hospitality room. Even that wasn't too unusual, except that most of the time wedding rings were found next to room sinks or in one of the lounges. There wasn't anything distinguishing about the gold band, no inscription or initials. Am supposed that “To Bob” wouldn't have helped him much anyway.
There were numerous reports to write, the usual closing of the barn doors after all the animals had escaped. The keystone report was purportedly for Kendrick, but Am knew it would be copied and forwarded to the owners, as well as to Hotel legal counsel. In it, Am carefully detailed what had occurred. When the Hotel was sued (these days it was never a question of “if”), the report would certainly be subpoenaed. Putting a positive light on murder wasn't easy. Am noted that there was no sign of forced entry and documented that there were no outstanding keys to the room. He included a copy of the Detex rounds, which showed how the guards had conducted a pass of the floor every three hours, a progress recorded by key punches. Unmentioned was how most guards considered patrolling another form of sleepwalking, and that they remembered to open their eyes only when clocking in, if then.
Am documented that there had been no reports of noise from other rooms and nothing untoward seen by staff. He didn’t speculate, just included everything that was known about the deaths that didn’t put the Hotel in a bad light. Brevity ruled.
There were several supplemental reports. Am wrote of the response teams that had been formed, his conversation with McHugh, and the efforts to ameliorate the situation. He concluded with a brief write-up on the Bob Johnson Society and the goings-on of Murder Mayhem Weekend. For once, the show had lived up to its billing.
Am wasn’t yet ready to relax. As he finished up the reports, he tried to make them look all the more official with appropriate titles. He quickly put a heading to all of the accounts, save for the Kendrick summary. Am didn’t want to use “murdered” in the title, and he thought “incident” too trifling. Already punchy, he remembered what Sharon had said about St. Julian. He tapped out, “A Visit from St. Julian,” and contemplated the heading for a few moments of perverse pleasure before deleting the entry and entering, “The Unfortunate Deaths in Room 605.”
Before turning off the computer, Am called up that room number. Looking up the charges of the dead was getting to be a habit of his. The first thing
he noticed was the privacy notation. David Stern had requested that he not be bothered with any telephone calls and had asked the Hotel not to acknowledge his presence on the property.
There wasn’t much to his bill, except the excessive eating in. Judging by the expensive room service charges, he and his lady friend had dined well. The last charge had been recorded a little before five the previous day. If McHugh was right about the time of their deaths, they wouldn’t have had long to digest their last meal.
Curious, Am scratched out a note to accounting. He wanted to take a look at 605’s charges. On the signed room service tabs would be a notation of who had done the serving; maybe the waiters had noticed something out of the ordinary.
Am reached out to turn off the computer but at the last moment found himself tapping into room 711. Tim Kelly’s death now seemed like a distant memory. Was it only a dozen hours earlier that he had first scanned Kelly’s charges and come away with a head of steam? That steam had certainly dissipated. He and Sharon had combined for some beautiful theories that had been belied by harsh facts. He should have remembered one philosophy professor’s favorite quotation: “There is nothing uglier than reason when it is not on your side.” Kelly hadn’t had sex or drugs, and his only rock and roll had happened when his body hit the sand.
For a few moments Am remembered the thrill of the hunt that he and Sharon had experienced and the sense of intimacy that had grown between them. The blood sport had been exciting. He had been forced to reassess his initial impression that she was some stuck-up easterner weaned on private schools. There was still her reserve, though. She was good at reining herself in. He wondered why she felt that need.
Computer screens are this century’s gift to daydreaming, but even in his fog Am recognized something was wrong. There was something disconcerting, something…
Tim Kelly’s bill. The man had died early that morning, so how was it that he had already been charged room and tax for the night?
Looking for answers, Am found that Casper was still on the job, miracle of miracles. “Roger,” said Am, handing him a printout of Tim Kelly’s bill, “what’s this?”
The front office manager looked over the bill and its charges and could apparently find nothing wrong. “What do you mean, Am?”
“Kelly died at two A.M. How can we be charging him for tonight?”
“Oh, that,” he said. “I talked with Mr. Kendrick before he left this morning, and I mentioned that the room might have to be out of service for tonight. He said if that was the case, we should add on the room charge.”
And since all the Contractors Association rooms were being charged to the master account, the additional room night would probably never be questioned. And even if it was, the Hotel could counter that the room couldn’t be rented because of Kelly’s death, and that the group should be liable for the charge.
In disgust, Am said, “I’m surprised Kendrick didn’t insist we charge ten dollars to put pennies on the dead man’s eyes.”
Roger surveyed the list of charges once more. “I don’t see that notation anywhere, Am. Should we be adding that to the bill?”
XXXIII
The staff parking lot, referred to as Outer Mongolia, was on the southeastern edge of the Hotel property. The valets parked guest vehicles in what was called Inner Mongolia, which was much closer to the Hotel. Frequently Am took the bus to work or bicycled from his Del Mar bungalow, but today he was glad he had driven. If only Annette (he wasn’t in the New Age habit of naming cars but had accepted her name along with her pink slip) cooperated, he could make his getaway and look forward to a few hours of blessed sleep.
Annette was a vision of a bygone California dream and behaved like something out of “The Twilight Zone.” A 1951 Ford station wagon, the car was an anachronism that looked even more dated than her years. Annette was a bona fide woodie, a wood-paneled wagon. Nowadays there are only ersatz versions of woodies, cars with garish plastic wooden veneer. Of course those same sidings don’t need the constant attention of oils, lacquers, varnish, and elbow grease, and owners don’t have to worry about the sun, elements, termites, and fighting off drunks trying to get toothpick souvenirs. Am knew that woodies were the real thing, and that woodies were history, but more than anything else he knew that woodies were a pain in the ass.
He had never aspired to own a woodie, wasn’t one of those Californians who pined for a visual reminder of the beach blanket gatherings of the early sixties. Decades back, woodies were the ultimate beach buggies, ideal for carrying the now-dinosaur long boards. In days of yore, surfers didn’t risk only the waves, they risked hernias getting to them.
Am’s friend Gerry had forced the woodie on him. When Gerry was tipped off that the DEA was investigating him, he’d decided to leave town in record time.
“You take my baby,” he had told Am. “You take Annette.”
Am had suggested he call Frankie Avalon.
“Just give me three thousand,” he had said. “Annette’s worth ten, easy.”
Am had told him no. Three thousand times, no.
“But it’s not like I’m really going to be selling you Annette,” Gerry had explained. “When things settle down, I’ll come back and reclaim Annette.”
And Am’s three thousand dollars?
“You mean your five thousand dollars,” Gerry had said with a wink. “You know I could never give my baby up.”
Ten years had passed since Am’s last conversation with Gerry. His only communication had been a dog-eared postcard sent from Colombia. “How’s she running?” Gerry had written. He had signed his name but left no return address. He hadn’t even added the usual SoCal greeting, “The weather’s here, wish you were fine.”
There was a love/hate relationship between Am and Annette. Though her bikini days were long over, Annette still liked to go to the beach. Am was convinced she was a vehicle that Stephen King should write about. If you drove Annette along the coastline, she rode like a Ralph Nader dream, but unfortunately all roads didn’t lead to the ocean. Annette invariably balked whenever Am strayed from her approved route.
The ignition started. Purred, even. Am pulled Annette out and drove toward the exit, toward his bed. Through the illumination of her headlights he saw a familiar scarecrow figure running toward them. Ted Fellows, the Hotel sous chef, was difficult to mistake. He was tall and thin and dressed in whites. His white hat was bobbing, and his arms were gesticulating wildly. Am knew Ted’s apparent neediness didn’t bode well. He would have ignored him, save that to do so successfully would have entailed hit-and-run. It was still tempting. Annette slowed to a stop, and Ted jumped onto the passenger’s seat.
For a few seconds Ted sucked in air and was unable to speak. “It’s Marcel,” he said finally, either too short of breath or too indignant to say anything else.
“Marcel’s the murderer?” asked Am.
Ted shook his head, sucked in some more air, then said, “This morning he learned the meaning behind road kill. And then we learned the meaning of temper tantrum. Marcel broke a few blood vessels and more than a few plates. The special should have been tossed pans.”
His tale begun, Ted started breathing easier. It was Am’s turn to hyperventilate.
“After exacting ample revenge for Waterloo,” Ted said, “Marcel left for a few hours. When he came back, he didn’t say anything to anyone. He just went into his office, closed the door behind him, and drew the curtains.”
“He didn’t knife anybody, did he?” asked Am. “Tell me he didn’t knife anybody.”
Ted shook his head. “It wasn’t a knife we were afraid of, Am. It was a bomb.”
“Oh, God,” said Am. He had always thought Marcel was a lunatic, not a terrorist.
“We'd all seen him carry in this big burlap bag, and we couldn't help but wonder what he had in it. Then he started making mysterious trips in and out of his office. He gathered all sorts of ingredients, including a lot of herbs and spices, but he was very quiet about it, very unlike
Marcel. Later that afternoon we all felt better when he started shouting orders and questioning everybody's competence. He, Marcel Charvet, wasn't going to look bad in his culinary Super Bowl because of the kitchen's ineptitude.”
Am had forgotten about the food critic being feted that night. “What's the menu?”
“It's top secret. That's not unusual. Marcel's done that before. But I had this weird feeling that something wasn't right. Then, about a half hour ago, I overheard him telling the server that his special was Meurtre de la Route. Marcel made the waiter repeat the phrase several times to make sure he got it right.”
“I'm not familiar with that dish,” Am said.
“Neither was I,” said Ted. “I figured it was some arcane dish with a fancy French name, but I couldn't find it in any of my recipe books. I even got out a French dictionary, but I wasn't sure of the spelling.”
“So why didn't you just check the entrée out?”
“I did. But his Meurtre de la Route was bagged.” “Bagged?”
“Papillote. Sealed in buttered parchment paper. Sometimes you do that for flavoring and tenderizing.”
“Look, Ted,” said Am, “this has all been very interesting, but I'm sure you've heard about the day I've had—“
“Not ten minutes ago,” said Ted, “Marcel was called out to the floor by some guests. I don't have to tell you that he could teach a peacock how to strut, especially when he has a good audience.”
Marcel's next temper tantrum, thought Am, would be when he learned the staff referred to those performances as his “phallic Gallic.” When summoned to tables, Marcel always donned his huge white chef's hat, the kind of headware only the Queen Mother should have been allowed to wear. Then he strolled through the restaurant as though he were the feature attraction in an Easter hat parade.