“‘Drivers are not supposed to drink,’ I told him. And when my back was turned he took a can of beer from the refrigerator. Nervy, I call it.”
“But not uppity,” I reminded her.
“Oh, that.” Mrs. Marsden was worked up and going full steam ahead. “Next thing I knew he was no longer in the kitchen, and then I spotted him mingling with the guests. Took off his cap, he did, and made his way in like he was invited.”
“No one said anything?” I asked.
“In that crush, no one noticed.”
“Did he cop a proper drink?”
Mrs. Marsden shook her head. “I wouldn’t know that so I’m not saying. I would have told him to leave except he was talking to poor Mrs. Williams’s daughter, Veronica, and I didn’t want to make a fuss over nothing.”
I pricked up my ears without flexing a muscle or batting an eye. If Mrs. Marsden didn’t want to make a fuss over nothing, neither did I—if indeed it was nothing. Geoff knew Seth Walker. Why hadn’t it occurred to me to ask Veronica if she knew Seth Walker? Or had Seth singled out Veronica because she was the prettiest girl in the room? Either way, Veronica now knew Seth. That was obvious.
14
CONNIE WAS ON THE telephone trying to explain why Lady Cynthia Horowitz would not allow a tent city to be erected on her ten acres as a publicity stunt to aid Florida’s homeless. Waving me to a chair, she admonished the caller with “No! No, no, no. Not for a week, not for a weekend, not for a day and not for an hour.” With the press of a button she banished the intruder.
The “telephone” in Connie’s office was a keyboard upon which red and green lights twinkled like Christmas-tree baubles. The gizmo resembled a prop from an old Buck Rogers serial film of a bygone era. With the tip of one finger, Connie can connect and disconnect calls or redirect them to other persons in Lady C.’s household. She can hold a conversation, hands free, from any part of the room. She is equipped with voice mail, caller ID, call waiting, and call forwarding. The inimitable Ira Gershwin had it right when he penned, “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off.”
“Well, if it isn’t Popeye the Sailor Man,” was Connie’s open.
“You caught my act.”
“Thanks to Lolly Spindrift, everyone in Palm Beach caught your act.”
“So, Lolly alerted the troops to our little caper.”
“The way I heard it,” Connie said, “Lolly called a dozen people with the news and then asked each of them to call two people, who would then call—”
“The old pyramid game,” I cut in. “And it worked. What did you think of it?”
“I think the guy driving the speedboat should have his own show. So does Lady C.”
“Tell Lady C. the guy belongs to Phil Meecham.”
“That won’t discourage her, Archy. It will just pose a challenge and make her more determined.”
“Good lord, Connie, she’s a hundred years old.”
“Not quite, but still waters run deep.”
In Lady C.’s case, I would call it a flood tide. “What does she think about her ex-tennis maven being aced by his wife?”
“She said Geoff died the way he lived—in the saddle, as the saying goes.”
“I hate to put a wet blanket on the lurid rumors, but he was quite alone when the end came.”
“Recently alone, according to Lolly.” The phone rang and Connie once again pressed a button, sending the call into the next century, which, come to think of it, wasn’t that far off. “And Lady C. wants it made perfectly clear that she is not the Mystery Woman.”
“Which means she wants everyone to believe she is. Well, tell Lady C. she has nothing to fear. Young, is how Melva described her nemesis.”
“You tell her, Archy. I have my job to consider.” Remembering her manners, she then asked, “How is Melva doing?”
“The bail hearing is going on as we speak, and I expect she’ll be back home before long. The worst is yet to come for poor Melva.”
“Why did she do it, Archy?”
“You heard Lolly. She caught him in the act and lost her head. Oh, that’s what her lawyers will plead. Temporary insanity. Murder without malicious intent or forethought. It’s worked before and it can work again.”
“I never liked Geoff Williams,” Connie admitted.
“You’re at the end of a long line composed mostly of women he wronged. But don’t tell me you were never caught under his spell, Connie.”
“Not me,” she stated. “The driver of that speedboat is more my type.”
“Buzz?” I exclaimed.
“Cute name,” Connie said as if she meant it. There’s no accounting for taste.
“He’s a child, Connie.”
“So is Ms. Lolita Manning.”
That got me right where I live, as intended, I’m sure. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“What’s what supposed to mean?” She feigned surprise.
“Lolita, that’s what.”
“You’ve been baby-sitting the girl for two consecutive nights, is what I heard.”
“She’s twenty-two, Connie, not twelve, and I was helping Melva. She asked me to look after Veronica until things quieted down.”
“Lolita Manning never needed looking after, is the way I heard it.”
“Her name is Veronica.”
“Archy and Veronica. Just like in the comics and twice as funny. Is it true Veronica spent both nights at your place?”
“You’re overreacting, Connie.”
“I don’t think so. I’m just curious. I hear she’s become quite enamored of ‘Uncle’ Archy.”
“This, no doubt, from Lolly Spindrift. Have you been on the phone with him all day?”
“As a matter of fact, he was here,” Connie said. “Summoned by Lady C. She wants to give a ball, Archy, a masked ball. All the ladies will be masked, as I understand it. A Mystery Woman’s Ball is the theme. Get it?”
“That’s macabre,” I said. “I don’t put it past Lady C., but Lolly would never be a part of such a thing.”
“Oh, no? He almost swooned over the idea. Lolly sees it as bigger than Truman Capote’s Black and White Ball. I think he’s already talking to the national television networks. All the women unmask at midnight except the Mystery Woman, who refuses to be identified. They’re hoping the real Mystery Woman will show up—hence the television coverage. Lolly is beside himself with ideas.”
“Lolly is bonkers. This is macabre, Connie. Nothing less.”
“You’re overreacting, Archy. And it isn’t macabre, it’s Palm Beach, remember?”
“It’s the worse possible thing for Melva’s case. She needs sympathy, not a bunch of rich people making fools of themselves. The identity of the Mystery Woman—and I wish Lolly had never dreamed up that phrase—is crucial to Melva’s case. All this will do is force the Mystery Woman to stay in hiding.”
“I agree, Archy, and I’m not gloating. I like Melva as much as you do. All I’m doing is giving you the facts so you’ll know what the tide might be dragging in.” She took a deep breath and went right on. “And speaking of rich people making fools of themselves, delivering Lolita—excuse me, Veronica—to her back door by yacht is not going to have the crowd in the bleachers cheering for Melva.”
“I was doing a good turn, and it worked. How was I to know Lolly would turn it into a publicity stunt for himself? And now that he’s had a taste of fame, his appetite is ravenous. I’ve got to talk him out of this masked ball.”
“It’s Lady C.’s ball. Not Lolly’s,” Connie stated, and rightly so. “She’ll do it with or without Lolly’s advice and consent.”
Lady C. has always been sweet on me, even after our run-in over my father’s virtue. “I’ll talk to her. She might listen.”
“Maybe you could offer her a trade-off?” Connie suggested.
“Such as?”
“Deliver Buzz in exchange for her dropping the masked ball idea.”
“All she has to do is open her checkbook and Buzz will come run
ning.”
“Madam is loath to write checks. Penurious is the word for Lady Cynthia Horowitz. She got millions from her first five marriages, but all her last husband left her was his title. Hence, the Lady is feeling a bit pinched.”
“I take it the late Leopold Horowitz was really knighted by Her Majesty.”
“Yes, for a lifetime devoted to the mating habits of beetles. His book on the subject is considered the definitive source.”
“If he had researched the mating habits of Cynthia before he married her, he might still be alive today.”
“Don’t be silly, Archy. Leo fell out of a tree in pursuit of a beetle on his honeymoon.”
“She pushed him.”
“That’s not kind, Archy.”
“Lady Cynthia is not kind. I’ve got to talk her out of this madness, Connie.”
The telephone rang once again and Connie once again zapped the call with a touch of her fingertip. Turning back to me, she asked, “Do you know who the Mystery Woman is, Archy?”
I shook my head. “No. Cross my heart. Why? Do you?”
“No. But rumors are flying up and down the A1A faster than the traffic. Ever hear of a gal named Elizabeth Fitzwilliams?”
I nodded, but didn’t divulge my source.
“She’s a fast package, as we used to say, and she was seen having a drink with Geoff the night before the murder.”
Fitz could have been in one of our local pubs when Geoff walked in, and seeing a friend of Veronica’s, he stopped to say hello. An encounter that would never have been remembered if Melva hadn’t lost her head. This kind of gossip and conjecture was inevitable. People were suddenly going to remember every female Geoff Williams had ever said hello to, from waitresses to grandes dames.
Veronica said her stepfather was not smitten with any of her friends, and I believed her because, as some Roman said, cui bono?—who benefits from the lie? In this case, no one—hence, no lie. Veronica wouldn’t sacrifice her mother to spare a friend a bit of embarrassment. And what Geoff was up to the night before his death was a moot question. Whom he was with the night he died is what mattered.
Here, I recalled the purpose of my visit to Lady C.’s commodious residence. “Remember the guy Lolly was interested in a few days back? The one he spotted at Lady C.’s reception.”
Connie cocked her head in the way she does when she’s trying to recall something. “The one I saw talking to Veronica Manning?”
She couldn’t get Veronica out of her mind, and my question didn’t help the cause. “One and the same,” I ceded. “He’s John Fairhurst’s new chauffeur.”
“Who told you that, Veronica?”
“Connie, I wish you would stop saying that name. It’s boorish.”
“Did she get a peek at your third-floor lodgings?”
“No!” I lied.
Cui bono? Archy, I’m ashamed to admit. But I’ll think about that tomorrow.
“And we were well chaperoned,” I continued. For effect, I raised my right hand, and in lieu of a Bible, I placed my left hand on Lady C.’s Palm Beach telephone directory. “Nothing—I repeat—nothing inappropriate passed between Veronica Manning and moi.” Surely a kiss or two could not be construed as inappropriate? Besides, how binding was the Palm Beach telephone directory?
“Oh.” Relieved, she waved a hand at me. “I was just teasing you, Archy. That was a very clever trick you pulled, getting her home by boat, and the top of your hat was quite fetching. I’ve never seen you the way birds do.”
Consuela was backing off. I had won our little game, which just goes to prove what car and insurance salesmen have long known: First you lie, then you swear to it, and then you make the sale.
“Thank you, Connie. And I know you were kidding when you said Buzz was your type.”
“I wouldn’t go that far, Archy.”
She laughed. I laughed. And disaster, once again, was averted. But for how long? I had a lot to think about tomorrow.
“So tell me, how did a chauffeur crash the reception?”
“It wasn’t the first time and, I’m sure, it won’t be the last time that’s happened. The way people dress these days, you need a scorecard to tell the guests from the caterers.”
“I trust that was not a slur on my wardrobe, Ms. Garcia.”
“I love your wardrobe, Archy. Especially the top of your hats.”
“Are you busy tonight, Connie?”
“I was going to stay home and wash my hair, maybe rent a film, and just hang out, as Veronica might say.”
“Veronica goes home to Mommy today, and Uncle Archy will make you dinner while you wash your hair. Rice and beans?”
“How’d you ever guess? Shall we say seven?”
“And I’ll rent the film. You have lousy taste in films, Connie.”
“I’d like to see something made in the last twenty years, Archy.”
“Like I said, you have lousy taste in films.” I rose to go. “Would you punch out a number for me before I leave?”
“Let’s have it,” she answered.
I gave her the number for the “palace,” as Al Rogoff calls the police station, on County Road.
“Sergeant Rogoff,” the familiar voice boomed across Connie’s office.
“Archy here,” I boomed right back.
“Yes, sir. How may we help you?”
This meant someone was in hearing distance of Al’s desk. “I’m heading for the Pelican. I’ll stand you a burger and a bottle of suds.”
“A break-in? You say the window is broken?”
“And the rain she’s coming in...”
“Where are you located, sir?”
“The bar of the Pelican in half an hour.”
“Very good. I’ll be there ASAP, sir.”
“I’m starved, Al. And thirsty.”
“I feel the same way, sir. About break-ins, that is.”
“Ta-ta, Sergeant.”
Connie pressed her magic button. “You’re both nuts,” she said.
“That reminds me. I’ll bring the nuts for our cocktails.”
“Was that dirty, Archy?”
“Why, Connie...” I blushed.
15
“HOW’S THE MARKET TODAY, Mr. Pettibone?”
“Fair to middling, Archy. Fair to middling.”
“Much like myself,” I said to our bartender and factotum, Simon Pettibone, as he placed before me a hand-drawn glass of ale topped with a head of foam. It looked too perfect to consume, but that didn’t stop me from hoisting the brew to my parched lips.
“I would stay clear of utilities and investigate corn futures,” he advised. “It was a dry summer and corn will be at a premium.”
“I’ll remember that, Mr. Pettibone,” I said politely, although I could not for the life of me figure out why anyone but pigs and cereal manufacturers would be interested in the future of corn.
Mr. Pettibone keeps his eyes on Wall Street as well as on the Pelican Club, and excels in both venues. Six months after the club was founded it went bankrupt, thanks to gross mismanagement on the part of its founders. The Pettibones were taken on to run the club, which they did, and do, with military efficiency if not always with a great deal of style. But who’s complaining? Since the Pettibones moved into the second floor of the two-storied clapboard house that is the Pelican Club, our bottom line has gone from red to black, the amenities vastly improved rather than diminished. One of those amenities was son Leroy’s cooking, an essential reason why the club was usually overflowing at lunch and dinner.
And if Simon Pettibone took his own market tips as seriously as those who followed his advice, he might very well be the richest man, or woman, in our lodge.
“We watched you on the television last night, Archy,” Mr. Pettibone said, with a nod toward the big screen hovering over the far end of the bar. I wondered if those who appear regularly on television are subjected to the same disclosure by everyone they meet. If his statement meant that Mr. Pettibone had watched it on the bar screen,
everyone in the club must have gathered around for the boat ride and Lolly’s announcement. Knowing the Pelican boys, I guessed all of them thought he knew, perhaps intimately, the identity of our Mystery Woman.
Mr. Pettibone served gin and tonics to a couple at the bar before returning to me. “Poor Mrs. Williams,” he intoned. Somewhere between New York and Palm Beach, there must be someone saying, “Poor Mr. Williams.” Perhaps a waiter Geoff once overtipped?
“I remember her and the girl coming here with you in the old days, Archy. Pretty little thing, that girl, and what a stunner she’s become, if the camera doesn’t lie.”
“Indeed it doesn’t, Mr. Pettibone. Her name is Veronica, as you may recall, and what you saw on the television screen is what you get in person. Maybe even more so.” Veronica somehow managed to insinuate herself into every conversation I had had in the past two days. But then, she was that kind of girl.
After filling a bar order for Priscilla, who looked ravishing in a miniskirt and halter, her father returned to say, “Terrible tragedy, this affair. The kind of thing you read about that isn’t supposed to happen to people we know. How is the child taking it?”
“Stoically, Mr. Pettibone. And we’re hoping her mother will be out on bail today.”
“How will she plead?”
“Oh, she’s already admitted to the crime. The trial will decide cause, not guilt.”
“The bail will be a million at least,” Mr. Pettibone stated.
“I think the lady can scrape it together.”
Mr. Pettibone leaned across the bar conspiratorially and said in hushed tones, “The boys are getting up a pool to name the Mystery Woman. Five hundred bucks a pop. I thought I’d mention it, as they didn’t know if you’d be interested, seeing as how close you are to Mrs. Williams and things in general. They all saw how you smuggled the child in and out of her home, right under the noses of the press, on Mr. Meecham’s yacht. You’re a hero around here, Archy.”
A hero, I thought, who is close enough to Melva and her daughter to know the identity of the Mystery Woman. These sharks wouldn’t let me near the pool if I offered them odds and they were using Pettibone to deliver their message.
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