Who Killed Mona Lisa?

by Carole Elizabeth Buggé

  Richard and Jeffrey sat at the table nearest the entrance, Richard cool and crisp in freshly pressed chinos and a Brooks Brothers shirt, Jeffrey in a black button-down shirt and jeans. He sprawled restlessly in his chair, his eyes searching the room for something to occupy his interest. In his left hand he held an unlit cigarette, which he tapped impatiently on the table.

  “If you want to smoke so badly, why don’t you go out and do it?” Richard said in a low voice. Sound in the room carried so, however, that Claire could hear every word they said.

  “What if I just smoked it here?” Jeffrey replied with a sneer. “What could they do to me—kick me out?” He laughed and stuck the cigarette in the side of his mouth.

  Richard sighed. “Don’t you think it’s high time you started acting your age?”

  Jeffrey removed the cigarette from his mouth and regarded Richard with mock surprise. “Oh, but I am acting my age. It’s you I’m worried about, Richard. You’re beginning to look your age, and that’s distressing.”

  Richard’s eyes narrowed. “You little shit. I should have . . .”

  Jeffrey laughed. “Should have what? Left me on the street where you found me? Oh, please—spare me the melodramatics! It’s a little late for that, don’t you think?”

  Richard shook his head. “Don’t you care about anything?”

  Jeffrey threw his handsome head back. “Yes, Richard, I do. I care about moi. Survival, baby, that’s what it’s all about. If I don’t look after me, no one else will.”

  “I’ve had just about enough of you,” Richard said, leaning forward; even in the dim light Claire could see his face redden.

  “Oh, you have?” Jeffrey replied smoothly. “Why don’t you just get rid of me, then? That should be easy enough.”

  Instead of replying, Richard rose from the table and stalked out of the room. The other guests’ heads turned to look, and Jeffrey snorted softly.

  “Glad we could provide you with some evening’s entertainment.” With that he got up and strolled out of the room. Claire heard the sound of the front door opening and closing; she guessed Jeffrey had gone outside to have his cigarette after all.

  “Thank you, Max,” Claire said as the chef lumbered over to their table with a fresh basket of scones. She passed the basket to Wally, who took one and gave them to Meredith.

  Meredith took one and made a face. “E-yew—raisins.” She plucked a raisin from her scone, placing it carefully next to her teacup.

  “You don’t like raisins?” Wally said with a smile.

  Meredith scrunched up her nose. “They look like mouse turds.”

  Claire had heard that one before; Meredith once made the remark within hearing of her stepmother, whose thin body had stiffened immediately at the child’s deliberate vulgarity.

  Claire thought about Jean Lawrence and her sad eyes . . . it seemed the more she tried to forget about certain people, the more their faces lingered in her mind. It was odd that Ted Lawrence had married a woman like that. Meredith’s mother, Katherine, had been the kind of person who made people feel secure and happy just to be around her. She was, Claire always thought, devastatingly competent, but with little hint of superiority; she just didn’t seem to see obstacles quite the way other people did. In college, Claire had always marveled at the way honors seemed to fall on Katherine like rain, her star rising brightly in the scholastic zodiac of the English department. Claire didn’t mind playing second banana to her brilliant friend; she was comfortable with the role. But now her friend was dead and this strange elfin daughter, an only child who had inherited her mother’s brilliance, had somehow been cast up at Claire’s feet.

  There was someone else who gave her a similar feeling, who had a similar sad, lonely personality, Claire thought, but she couldn’t remember who. At that moment Paula Wilson entered the room, and Claire realized that she was the one who reminded her of Jean Lawrence. She had the same haunted look in her eyes; even her body was similar: lean and stringy, as though years of worry had melted all excess fat from her bones. The taut, ropy muscles of her long thin neck stood out when she moved her head; her every gesture was tight and carefully controlled.

  She walked up to her son, who was putting another log on the fire. “Henry,” she said sharply, and the boy turned abruptly, as if he had been struck.

  “Yes?” he replied, his eyes downcast.

  “Did you see that all the guests received clean towels this morning?”

  “Yes,” he answered, still not looking at her.

  “Very well, then, why don’t you go see if Max needs any help in the kitchen?”

  The boy glanced at Meredith, who was slurping up her soup greedily, a scone clutched in her other hand.

  “Well, I—” he said, but his mother interrupted by laying a hand on his shoulder.

  “Go on,” she said in a tone of voice that seemed meant to be kindly but that had a subtle edge of menace.

  The boy half shrugged, half shivered, as if the weight of her hand were too much for his small body to bear, then he turned and went meekly in the direction of the kitchen.

  His mother watched him go, shaking her head. “He’s a good boy, really he is,” she said, smoothing her flawlessly coiffed hair over her ears.

  Claire couldn’t for the life of her figure out how—or why—a woman would spend as much time as Paula Wilson evidently did on her grooming. Certainly she was different from most of the women Claire had seen in central Massachusetts and throughout New England; they all had an unstudied look, a refreshing naturalness.

  “He’s unusually shy,” Meredith remarked through a mouthful of scone.

  “He’s at an awkward age,” Paula Wilson replied, sounding irritated at Meredith for pointing it out.

  “What is he—eleven?” said Wally.

  “Fourteen,” his mother replied. “He’s small for his age.”

  “I’ll say,” Meredith exclaimed. “I’m way taller than him and I’m only thirteen.”

  “But you’re tall for your age, Meredith,” Claire interjected.

  Meredith sighed. “Tell me about it. It sucks being taller than most of the boys in my class. ’Course, they’re all a bunch of dweebs, anyway.”

  Paula Wilson’s taut body stiffened even more. Claire could see Wally was suppressing a laugh, and trying hard not to meet her eyes. She was afraid Paula would ask her to explain what a dweeb was, but to her relief, the woman made a little “humph” sound under her breath, then went back toward the kitchen. Out in the hall, Shatzy stood waiting for her, his misshapen tail wagging.

  “Ha,” Meredith said when she had gone. “She’s way weird, if you ask me. And her kid is scared to death of her,” she added, biting into a scone.

  “You’re hungry tonight,” Wally remarked. Claire wasn’t sure if he was changing the subject on purpose or not. It was true, though; Meredith’s appetite came and went. Sometimes she ate so much it was hard to imagine all that food in such a thin body; at other times she picked like a bird, eating so little that Claire would fear she was anorexic.

  Just as dinner was winding down, the lights flickered briefly and went on. The sudden appearance of electricity was odd after several hours of candlelight.

  “Aw,” Meredith said in a disappointed voice. “What a drag—just when we were getting used to it.”

  “Speak for yourself,” said Max as he trotted past their table with a tray of salad. “You don’t have freezers full of food waiting to spoil.”

  “Yes, this must be a relief to you,” Wally observed.

  “You bet,” said Max. “God bless Boston Edison.”

  That night, on her way up to the room, Claire stopped by the bookshelf in the hall; it was stuffed with paperback novels and travel books, complete with outdated maps, she supposed, and quaint regional attitudes about the world. Wally and Meredith had already turned in for the night; instead of getting the girl a second room, Claire had decided to keep her in with them for the time being. She thought it would be safer, and though
she didn’t say so to Meredith, she and Wally were keeping an eye on her, making sure they knew exactly where she was at all times.

  Claire looked at the books tucked so neatly into the shelves, and, putting her face close to them, smelled the musty odor of browning pages. She pulled one out; its pages were brittle as an old person’s bones, soft and crumbling under her fingers. Suddenly she thought she heard a sound downstairs, and since everyone else had supposedly gone to bed, she wondered what it could be. She crept down the back stairs and stopped at the bottom, and then realized what she heard was the sound of someone weeping softly. She thought it was coming from the kitchen, so she tiptoed across the thin hallway carpet. A single light glowed in the kitchen, and from where she stood Claire could see the solitary occupant of the room: Frank Wilson. He sat hunched over the counter, head in his hands, weeping quietly. Claire stood still for a moment, then turned and crept back upstairs. She was pretty certain she was the only one who had heard him—as usual, her sensitive hearing picked up things other people missed—and she wasn’t sure she wanted to tell anyone else about it. She felt sorry for him; there was something pathetic about seeing such a solid, strong-looking man consumed by grief. And yet the question nagged at her: why was he crying? It seemed to be a missing piece in a puzzle that just kept getting more complicated as time went on.

  She went back to find the book she had left on top of the bookcase. She looked at the title—Girl of the Limberlost— and sighed. Everything seemed so transitory, ephemeral, and she supposed that Mona’s sudden death had brought this grim fact home to everyone in the hotel. Writing was yet another stab at immortality, she thought: every writer hoped that even when he was long gone he would continue to live on in his books.

  And a murderer—what does he want? Claire wondered. The thought came to her unbidden, as though a voice inside of her could not leave the subject alone, but kept worrying it like a dog with a bone. Well, good, she thought as she replaced the book, slipping it in between an ancient-looking French cookbook and a collection of nineteenth-century English verse. Good; maybe if I think enough about it, something will come of it. Again the question formed in her mind.

  What does a murderer want?

  “If you find the motive, opportunity and means are not far behind,” Wally had once said. “Everything we do proceeds from our desires—our motives, if you will—and often that will tell you as much as any forensic evidence.”

  Claire ran a hand through her hair, took a deep breath, and let it out slowly.

  What did the murderer want?

  Chapter 10

  Unable to sleep that night, Claire lay in bed staring at the maple tree outside her window. Snow clung to the knot in the tree, an uneven white coating nestling in its nooks and crannies, creating an illusion of white eyebrows and beard on the “face” of what Claire had come to think of as the old wood gnome.

  As she lay awake in the dark, every sound seemed to be magnified a hundred times; it was as if her senses were suddenly preternaturally sharpened by the lateness of the hour and the stillness of the building around her. She could hear Meredith’s gentle snoring, and she thought of all the ways in which life would disappoint the girl, of the pain that lay ahead as she got older. She remembered her mother saying to her once, “You know, there are things I can’t protect you from, and that’s hard for me.” At the time Claire had only a vague idea of what her mother was talking about, but the words always stayed with her. Claire’s instinct was to run interference for Meredith, to step between her and all of the harsh realities of the world—and yet. Not only was she unable to, but it would have been wrong to try. To step back and let what must happen just happen; that was not something that came naturally to Claire.

  Just then a new sound broke into her consciousness. It was the sound of a door unlatching, followed by the groan of old hinges as it opened. There was a kind of shuffling sound, then she heard the door closing again. Slowly, carefully, so as not to wake Wally, she slipped out of bed and went to the door of their room, stepping quietly across the braided rug, its knobby surface bumpy under her feet. She felt for the doorknob and turned it slowly, trying to make as little noise as possible. There was a metallic clink as the knob turned; she glanced over at Wally, the moonlight silver on his hair, but he did not stir. She opened the door and slipped out of the room.

  The hall was dimly lit by two brass lanterns at either end; Claire’s room being in the middle, she found herself standing in the deep shadows between the lights. She looked toward where she heard the door opening and saw a tall form at the other end of the hall, walking away from her, toward the front staircase.

  Her heart in her throat, Claire followed, trying not to step on any of the creaky boards that were so abundant in the old building. She crept along the hall, sticking to the side, hugging the wall, on the theory that boards creak louder in the middle, a theory her brother had formulated when they were children living in the big house on the lake. Paul had, during the many family occasions and holidays on which their cousins visited, developed a passion for sneaking up on their cousins and scaring them. Claire joined him on many of those forays into familial terrorism; she especially enjoyed scaring the Miller boys, her cousins from Toledo. Paul’s schemes were inventive and endless; one night he hid under Donny Miller’s bed for an hour, waiting until Donny was almost asleep before he jumped out, snorting like a possessed animal. Donny’s screams woke up everyone else in the house, and Claire could still remember her gentle father alternating between anger and amusement as he tried to come up with a suitable punishment.

  Now she crept along, running her fingers lightly along the wall, inhaling the scent of pine and eucalyptus from a large wreath at the top of the stairs. Something else was mixing with the smell, though—a cologne of some kind, she thought, something with a burned edge to it, like sandalwood. Claire reached the front stairs and looked down the shiny wooden steps. The staircase looked long, too long, stretching down, down into—the thought came to her unbidden—hell.

  Tyger! Tyger! burning bright

  In the forests of the night . . .

  She descended the staircase slowly, gripping the hard railing tightly with her right hand. It was only when her hand slid a little on the smooth wood that she realized her palms were sweating. The bare wood steps were like ice under her feet. As she reached the bottom step she heard a sound at the top of the stairs, and turned to see Meredith standing above her, her flannel pajamas hanging loosely on her skinny frame.

  “What are you doing?” she whispered, but Claire held a finger to her lips.

  Meredith started down the stairs. “What’s going on?”

  “Shh,” Claire hissed.

  “Looking for someone?” The voice was right next to her, loud in her ear, and it was all Claire could do not to scream. She turned to see Jeffrey, dressed in a white sleeveless undershirt and striped pajama bottoms. The shirt shone unnaturally white; in the moonlight, it was the color of bleached bones. He carried a parka over one arm.

  “Oh, God,” she said when breath finally returned to her body. “You scared me to death.”

  “Did you lose someone?” he said. The muscles of his bare shoulders glistened as though they had been polished. Claire was uncomfortable being this close to him. She knew Jeffrey was gay, but she sensed a vaguely sexual threat, and she had an instinct to back away.

  Meredith took a couple more steps down the staircase and sat down on the stairs. “What are you doing up at this hour?” she asked.

  Jeffrey looked at her, a little smile on his handsome face. What was discomforting about him, Claire thought, was that he was so studied; every gesture, every expression seemed done for effect. He was like an actor who had carefully rehearsed each response, each line reading, so as to leave nothing to chance.

  Jeffrey shrugged, a display of nonchalance Claire didn’t quite believe. “I was going outside for a cigarette.”

  Meredith raised her eyebrows. “At this hour?”

&n
bsp; Jeffrey laughed softly. “Honey, when you gotta have it, you gotta have it. You’re too young to know what addiction is.”

  “No, I’m not,” Meredith snapped. “I live with an addict, so I know exactly what it’s like.”

  Jeffrey looked genuinely nonplussed. “Really?” he said, with a disapproving look at Claire.

  “Oh, not her,” Meredith snorted. “I mean my stepmother.”

  “Your stepmother?” he repeated blankly, looking thoroughly confused now. He glanced at Claire for help. “Then who—”

  “It’s a long story,” she said. “Meredith and I aren’t related.”

  “But you look—”

  “I know, I know; we look alike, right?” said Meredith. “That’s what everyone thinks.”

  “Well, not exactly alike,” Jeffrey corrected. “So your stepmom is a smoker?”

  Meredith rolled her eyes. “I wish that were all. Yeah, she does that, but she goes in for the hard stuff, too—coke.”

  “Really? That’s tough on you.” Jeffrey seemed genuinely concerned. There was something softer in his manner when he talked to Meredith; it occurred to Claire that this jaded, world-weary young hustler might be more comfortable around children than adults.

  Meredith shrugged. “I’m used to it.”

  “Well, don’t let me stop you from having your cigarette,” Claire said to Jeffrey.

  “You shouldn’t smoke, you know,” Meredith admonished.

  Jeffrey looked at her in mock astonishment. “No,” he said. “Really? I never knew!”

  “Hardy-har-har,” Meredith responded, then she sighed. “I don’t get grown-ups. They do all this disgusting stuff they know is bad for them.”