by Rita Lakin
Whoa! Talk about sex and violence.
And cheap thrills.
45
The Captain, the Killer, and the Private Eye
We arrive at the captain’s office promptly at five. The Sicilianos are already there. “Don’t ask,” I told the girls when they asked about my dance with Roberto. “You don’t want to know.”
Angelina asks about Amy. I checked with the infirmary. She was still asleep.
The door opens and we are invited in. It is your ordinary conference room. A large gray table with matching chairs around it. Even the walls are gray. We all take seats. My group looks to me.
I introduce everyone to the captain and he introduces us to his three top men.
“Speak,” says Captain Standish.
I jump right in. “We have a murderer on board. His name is Robert Martinson, aka Roberto, who teaches your Latin dance class, and you should grab him fast.”
“Start from the beginning, Mrs. Gold, and then I shall determine what course of action I shall take.”
Okay, we know who’s in control here, don’t we?
I start. Nonstop. With no interruption.
I don’t know how long I’ve been talking, but my voice feels raspy and I don’t dare sneak a look at my watch.
I am aware of an occasional squeak of chairs, a cough now and then, and an intermittent need to hold on to the table since the ship is rocking quite a bit.
And once or twice I can see Angelina, clutching at a handkerchief and crying.
I can also tell my girls are dying to jump in and contribute but are awed into silence by the very intimidating captain.
Finally I wind down. “So, Captain Standish, what do we do now?” Notice the “we”—he’s my partner now.
We tell him where Amy is and her condition. For a moment there is silence. He addresses the Sicilianos. “I can only guess how difficult this situation is for you. Please know I shall do whatever I can to help you. I will, of course, inform all the necessary authorities. And until we can take Mr. Martinson into custody, you will be accompanied at all times by my men, and a guard will be posted outside the infirmary.”
“Gladdy was threatened, too,” Sophie pipes, then quickly shuts up.
He nods to his second-in-command, who goes to the wall phone and speaks softly and quickly.
The first mate hangs up the phone. “They’re searching for him right now. I told them not to do anything other than to locate him.”
“Good,” says the captain.
Captain Standish looks at me. I wish I could know what he’s thinking. What does that glint in his eye mean? Then he says, “I might mention that at your suggestion, Mrs. Gold, I contacted Detective Morgan Langford and retired detective Jack Langford. I was warned by them that you were a force unto yourself. And I should take you very seriously.”
I smile. There is a muttering of agreement among my group.
I say nervously, “I made a big mistake trying to outsmart Martinson by going to his dance class. There’s no doubt he’s on to us.”
Our group gets up, ready to leave, when the phone rings again. The first mate answers, listens, hangs up.
“They haven’t been able to locate him as of now, sir. He missed his four-thirty class.”
My heart sinks. I think of slippery steps and broken railings.
The captain turns to his men. “Find him. Be as inconspicuous as you can. I don’t want to alarm the passengers.”
Bella can’t stand it anymore. She blurts, “But what if he has a gun?”
Sophie joins in. “What if he runs for it?”
Evvie can’t resist a famous movie line: “‘He can run, but he can’t hide.’”
There is a smattering of nervous laughter.
“We’re out on the ocean, ladies,” the captain reassures us. “He can’t go far.”
“I want to have a turn at him when you catch him,” growls Elio.
“What if he grabs a hostage?” Ida adds.
The captain dryly asks us if we watch a lot of movies.
Yes, and a good thing, too. I want to say it but I resist the temptation.
He walks us to the door.
I stop. “Captain, sir, may I make a suggestion?”
“Can I stop you?”
“I think I have an idea of how to search for him while keeping the passengers out of harm’s way.”
“I’m listening,” he says. Boy, is he scary. This is the second time today I feel like a child. Afraid of this very big teacher standing there with a very large ruler in his hand.
Here goes nothing. “Maybe you should call a fire drill. Then everybody will be gathered together in controlled areas, and with the ship emptied out, he should be easier to spot.”
For a long moment the captain stares at me. Then he shakes his head as if in disbelief. And there’s that twinkle in his eye again.
“Mrs. Gold,” he says, “who are you?”
I could tell him I’m from the planet Meshugeneh, but I think I’ve overstayed my welcome.
To his men he says, “Prepare to sound the alarm.”
46
Who’s Rockin’ the Boat?
It’s six-thirty P.M. and here comes the captain’s promised run-for-your-life-jackets mambo. If the runners and dashers passing us knew that I’m the one who’s interrupted French Gourmet Night in the dining room, I’d be skewered on a rotisserie for sure.
The ship is rocking from side to side. Then up and down. Then round and round. At least it feels like that. Winds are gusting hard and we are holding on to the outside rails as tightly as we can as we reach our Muster Station on the upper Starlight deck. Wearing that clumsy orange life jacket doesn’t help. I feel like I’m choking, and I can hardly see over the top of it as we run.
The girls are mad at me. Even Evvie, who is usually my steadfast ally, screams over the deafening alarm blasts, “You and your big ideas. You had to give the captain the suggestion to call a fire drill at dinnertime?”
“But—I didn’t say when—”
“Yeah,” says Bella, cutting me off. “We hardly had breakfast and didn’t eat more than a crumb after.”
Sophie gets on the bandwagon. “And we missed lunch because you made us hide in the room.”
Ida’s turn. “You think those stale peanuts satisfied anybody?”
Evvie’s big finish: “And now we’re missing pâté de foie gras! I’ll bet we’re the first people who ever starved on a cruise ship.”
What a bunch of ingrates! If I ever started getting a swelled head for my efforts, this group would know how to deflate it.
We weave from side to side, grabbing at whatever we can for handholds, at our station. Many other passengers are already there holding on to poles and guardrails and anything else bolted down that will keep them steady. The wind is whipping even stronger now. As frightening as the gusts are, the noise they make is worse. The earsplitting blasts add to the feeling of chaos and discomfort.
I wonder where the Sicilianos are. And I hope Amy isn’t frightened. Last I saw of Angelina and Elio, they were being accompanied by armed guards.
A nervous woman calls shrilly, “Is this for real? Are we in a hurricane?”
I want to reassure her, Hey, this is a false alarm. But is it anymore?
The ship’s getting even rockier. So much for stabilizers. The waves look ominous and high. My girls are wide-eyed and I’m beginning to really worry.
“Oh, no!” Evvie lets go of my arm and stumbles to the outer rail, hanging on for dear life, and throws up. Thank goodness the wind is blowing away from us. She leans her head weakly on one of the lifeboats latched to the outer rail.
Seeing Evvie is all it takes for Sophie to have her turn zigzagging her way to the rail and tossing what’s left in her stomach over the side.
And Bella, moaning, follows right after her. I am barely able to keep from being sick myself. I look at Ida, standing next to me, her head high, arms stretched out wide, letting the breeze caress her face. Her
eyes are closed. Her smile is beatific.
I can’t believe it. This is the real thing, not just sloshing soup! “Ida. Are you feeling all right?”
She opens her eyes. “What?”
“Everybody’s seasick.”
Ida looks at our gang hanging their heads over the rail. “Not me. I guess I finally got my sea legs.” She closes her eyes blissfully.
I hear Evvie at the rail say, “Now I’m glad we didn’t get much to eat today.”
Just then the ship tips and people start to topple into each other. Someone is yelling, “Oh, my God. Look at that!” So I do, and I see a fearful sight. A massive wave. Coming right at us. Huge. Terrifying.
Someone yells, “Hang on!” as the boat tilts the other way, like something is pulling the sea right out from under us. There’s no way we can make it to the inside and away from it.
Panic hits. People grip each other, stricken, whimpering or screaming. I hear a woman shout plaintively, “Murray! We’ll never see the grandchildren again.”
Her husband, I assume, answers her, “Shirley. They’re a pain in the neck and they treat you like dirt.”
I hear Bella, still at the rail, moaning, “We’re gonna die, we’re gonna die.”
I keep waiting for my life to pass before my eyes, but it doesn’t. I think of death and I think of my Jack’s death. Am I now going to join him? I think of my Emily and my beautiful grandchildren. And the thought that I may never see them again. All I can do is stare at that black mass relentlessly coming toward us. It’s like a tsunami. Larger than life. Mother Nature at her worst. I close my eyes.
The wave crashes. The ship creaks ominously, but holds, as the wave hits hard against the hull below us. Thank God. We didn’t drown, but we sure got soaked.
There is silence as everyone stands unmoving, unsure of what might happen next. The winds have lessened.
Evvie, Sophie, and Bella stagger their way back to where Ida and I are still hanging on to our rails.
“Wasn’t that invigorating?” says Ida.
We look at her as if she’s crazy.
We all hug, glad we’re still alive.
Evvie says, “I have such a headache. When I was leaning against that lifeboat, something moving inside kept knocking against the side and kept hitting my head.”
“Maybe the anchor,” says Ida.
The seven blasts haven’t stopped. That means they still haven’t found Bob Martinson. I turn and look at that lifeboat. “Maybe not an anchor?” I look at Evvie.
“Maybe not,” she says, reading my mind.
Evvie and I make our tortuous way toward the boat. The other girls, surprised, follow carefully after us. I put my ear against its side, listening.
Suddenly, the cover is kicked off and there, disheveled and disoriented, is Bob Martinson, tearing himself out from under the canvas. He sees us. We see him. For a moment we are like some frozen tableau, no one moving.
Then Bob looks behind him, seeing nothing but a great fall down to the ocean. Looks back at us again.
Bella says, amazed, “Just like in the movies. They always hide in the lifeboats.”
I yell to the passengers, “Someone call the captain!”
Ida can’t resist. “Get out, putz. Women and children first.”
Bob makes his decision between the deep blue sea and us “devils.” He jumps out of the lifeboat and onto the deck, knocking us aside like a row of bowling pins.
He runs through the crowd. We run after him. “Stop him! He’s a murderer!”
People are confused. Some move out of his path. Some grab for him and miss.
Amazingly, Ida manages to take hold of his fancy dance jacket and now he is pulling her along.
“Hold on!” I yell.
“Cha-cha-cha,” Ida yells back gleefully.
Meanwhile the girls are looking for weapons. Sophie grabs at a shuffleboard stick hanging on its hook. Bella seizes a life preserver off the wall.
“Make way!” I shout. Some people let us through, others get in our way.
I can still see Ida hanging on for all she’s worth, while he keeps trying to shake her off. Now she’s down almost on her knees and she makes a grab with both arms for one of his legs. He drags her along and now she’s nearly flat on the ground, the toes of her shoes scraping the deck.
Sophie is almost up to him and she flails her shuffleboard stick out, trying to hit him.
“Ouch,” says one of the passengers near her.
“Sorry,” says Sophie.
Bella takes her best shot and skims the life preserver like a Frisbee into a perfect ring toss. Only it’s landed on the head of a befuddled little old man in a wheelchair.
“Oops,” Bella says as she pulls it off.
Other passengers seize upon the excitement and join the chase. All of us are still wobbling from side to side, slipping and sliding. Some are hitting the deck. Literally. The girls are chanting, “Stop him! Stop him!”
With elbows flailing, Robert plows through the crowd, shoving people out of his way.
And finally he has shaken loose of Ida, who lands flat on her face. I catch up to her and help her up.
I hear a familiar voice ahead of us. Who could forget that midwestern twang? It’s the Green Bay Packers guy, Greg. “Don’t worry, ladies,” he shouts. “He ain’t gonna make that first down.”
With that, we see him dive for Robert. He tackles him, and the two of them go flying. Three other men jump into the scrimmage and grab on, too. From under the resulting pile, I hear Greg gleefully say, “Brett Favre, how do you like them cheese curds!”
And here comes the cavalry—oops, I mean the captain—and his gang for the coup de grâce. Roberto is toast.
And, when he gets up, we girls hug Greg in another kind of scrimmage.
We never do get to eat. Due to the storm, the French Gourmet Night and the midnight buffet are canceled. It doesn’t matter because we wouldn’t have made it anyway. Terror and excitement wore us out. When we get to our room, we notice our message button on the phone is blinking, but we’re too tired to check. We are asleep as fast as we can drop out of our sopping wet clothes, shower, get into our jammies, and fall into our beds.
47
Two Jacks
I wake up from my dream, smiling. At eight A.M., waddaya know. A dream ending at a decent hour. Or maybe it was Evvie’s leg heavily thrown over mine that woke me.
I sit up. Both girls are still asleep. Ditto the two in the next room. No surprise after the exhausting day and night we had. I hope the sun is shining after that horrific storm. Too bad we have no porthole.
The dream. What a dream! I relish the quiet so I can savor it.
New York City. In front of the main branch of the public library on Fifth Avenue and Forty-second Street. The place where I worked. Jack is going up the stairs. My husband, Jack, wearing the de rigueur outfit for the fifties’ college professor, a tweed jacket with leather patches, cords, black horn-rimmed glasses, and a pipe in his mouth. Usually unlit.
“Where did you leave it?” he asks me.
“In my desk, right-hand drawer,” I tell him.
“What’s the name of it?”
“Paradise Lost,” I remind my absentminded professor yet again.
He gives me one of his dazzling smiles, waves, and goes inside.
I wait, happily basking in the bright sunlight.
The two famous, originally pink, now gray, marble lions that guard the stately front doors turn to me. “You must have patience,” says the one whose name is Patience. “You must have fortitude,” says the one named Fortitude.
I giggle. This is delicious. Originally the lions were named after their benefactors, Lord Astor and Lady Lennox, but our famous mayor, Fiorello La Guardia, renamed them to inspire people to persevere during the economic depression of the thirties.
One of the front doors opens again. It’s Jack, grinning and waving a book at me.
But it’s Jack Langford. Dressed in a suit and tie and an o
pen trench coat, with a shiny brass NYPD police badge attached to his lapel.
“Jack?” I say in the dream, surprised.
“The book you wanted was gone, but this one was there in its place.”
He hands me All This, and Heaven Too.
How perfect. A real soppy soap opera of a book now given to me on a ship called Heavenly.
I laugh. And then I cry.
48
All’s Well That Ends
People breakfasting in the dining room are all abuzz. Everyone is talking about last night’s storm and the great chase on the Starlight deck. And sure enough, this morning, the weather is gorgeous, as if nothing had ever happened.
As we dip into our oatmeal, the Bingo Dolls barrel toward us. “Where were you?” Judy snaps at us. “We’ve been looking all over.”
Rose says, “Don’t you girls ever pick up your phone messages?”
We apologize. “Hey, the storm—” begins Ida.
“Storm, shmorm,” says Judy. “Who cares. What matters is you won the big prize.” With that, Judy opens her ample bingo bag and spills a thousand dollars in cash onto the table.
We are dumbfounded.
Sophie asks excitedly, “Whose packet won it?”
“Who knows?” says Rose. “You ran off so fast you never marked your names on them.”
The girls paw the money happily as the Bingo Dolls watch us with great satisfaction. “You won it on the last coverall.”
Evvie smiles. “So how come you told us? You could have kept it all for yourselves.”
Rose is insulted. “That would be stealing.”
“Just teasing,” Evvie says, grinning. “So take your half. That was our deal.”
Sophie sputters, wanting to object, but Evvie gives her a dirty look. We all know Sophie will say she never made that deal.
The Dolls hesitate. “Take it,” Ida insists.
They happily count out their half as Sophie turns away, unable to bear the sight of money being given away. Evvie puts the rest of the bills in her purse.
“So how come you ran off so fast?”
“We had to catch a killer,” Bella says brightly.
