And it struck me for the first time that I had better try to head off Mr. Monti.
Hubert, my new best friend, was whining outside my closed bedroom door. “Beat it! I’m busy,” I grrred. Hubert grrred back, grrrs becoming barks becoming howls as I sat on my bed, taking deep breaths and telling myself, You can handle this.
Actually, I found myself thinking, How am I going to handle this? Like, what was I going to say to Joseph Monti?
Hubert was trying to break down my door when Rosalie clattered upstairs, hollering, “Brenda, why are you torturing Hubert?”
Losing my composure, I answered, biting out each word, “I Want. You. To. Take. Your. Fucking. Dog. Downstairs.”
“If that’s how you feel,” said Rosalie, escalating Instantly, “I also can take him straight back to New York.”
Outside my still-closed bedroom door Rose and Hubert had just been joined by Miranda. “Can’t a person,” she groused, “get some sleep around here? I’ll tell you one thing, Mother, if Hubert was sleeping and I was the one who was making this noise, you’d—admit it, Mother—have strangled me by now.”
“Blame your aunt for the noise. She’s the one who wouldn’t let Hubert—”
“Stop it!” I shrieked, then seized hold of myself. “I mean, please,” I said calmly and sweetly, “go eat breakfast. I’ve got a call I need to make—some corrections on one of my columns—but I’ll be back downstairs just as soon as I’m done.”
“Maybe Hubert and I will be there, and maybe we won’t,” said Rose, huffily departing from my doorway. “You took a nap with your makeup on?” Rose had turned her attention to Miranda. “You want to have pores the size of dinner plates? Youth doesn’t last for . . .”
I dialed Joseph Monti’s number, having decided to say—in my Elizabeth Fisher-Todd drawl—that our hostess had fallen ill and had, to her everlasting sorrow, been forced to cancel. I also intended to say that she’d been unable to contact her drivers, who thus might appear at his condo door (I’d had to reveal his name when I switched to Plan B) to pick him up. “Being devoted employees, they might be real insistent.” I also intended to tell him, “on taking you where their employers said they should. So you need to make it clear to them that die dinner has been canceled and that they can call their message machine to confirm.”
Although this ploy was, I’ll grant you, rather klutzy, it was also the best I could think of at the moment and it would, God willing, save Joseph Monti’s life. Having figured it out, I could feel my panic begin to subside, a state of relief that lasted until Mr. Monti’s voice on the telephone said. “Hello, I’m not home right now, but—” Where was everybody?
I left the message on his machine, said I’d be checking in again, and, pulling myself together, went downstairs.
Down in the kitchen Rose and Miranda already were barely speaking, in addition to which Rose was furious with me. Nor was she quick to accept my earnest apologies for, as I oh-so-grovelingly put it, using “insensitive language” about her dog.
“One of these days,” she warned me, when she finally received me back into her good graces, “you won’t get away with this ‘I’m so sorry’ routine. I’m a very forgiving person”—not true!—“but one of these days, Brenda, you’re going to do something unforgivable.”
But don’t let it be today, I silently prayed, as a shudder of apprehension swept through me. “Excuse me,” I said, and rushed upstairs to the phone.
Where, hyperventilating, I put in a call to Joseph Monti and then a call to Billy and Elton Jr. And got their machines.
Where was everybody? Where the hell were they?
I took a deep breath and told myself, You can handle this.
• • •
Wally, looking drained but relieved, came home a little past ten. “It’s all turned out for the best, I think,” he said, explaining that Dwayne, having, scared himself with his suicide attempt, had agreed to sign into a psychiatric hospital.
“Incidentally, Mom,” he said, “remember that van that was chasing me back in September? Dwayne told me he was driving it. He says it was a message—a cry for help.”
“Mmmm,” I muttered noncommittally.
“And it also turns out that Dwayne was the person disguised as that clown on my birthday. He says it was another cry for help.”
“Mmmm,” I muttered noncommittally.
“In fact, he says he sent a lot of messages to me, but I don’t know where he sent them—I never got them.” A sudden thought seemed to strike him. “Mom, did you ever happen to see any messages?”
I stopped being noncommittal. “Of course not,” I lied.
Wally went up to rest and I stuffed the turkey and started it roasting in the oven, after which I yet again attempted—and yet again failed—to contact either my hit men or Mr. Monti. By now there was only one reason why I wasn’t having my own psychotic break: I folly intended, if worse really came to worst, to drive down to the Watergate and stop Elton Jr. and Billy when they showed up.
This meant I would need, to be safe, to be down there no later than 12:45. It was now already 11:28. Fortunately, however—from a scheduling point of view—my guests would not be striving till half past three. I-think-I-can-think-I-can-I-think-I-can, I chanted, as I showered and put on my holiday attire. Except—uh oh!—if I was meeting Billy and Elton Jr., I’d need to be wearing my Prudence Gump disguise.
I called again, got machines, and decided that Billy and Elton Jr. were out on the streets attempting to steal a limo. I couldn’t imagine where Mr. Monti might be. A flash: Could Billy and Elton Jr. have somehow revised my plan, picked him up early, and already done him in? This was indeed a plausible thought, but such a hideous one that I immediately banished it from my brain.
Jake came into the bedroom. “Your sister and niece,” he said, “are going at it again. It’s the first time I’ve actually seen someone engage in sibling rivalry with a Great Dane.” He tilted his head and smiled at me. “So how come you’re not interceding with one of your . . . constructive interventions?”
“Qui, moi?” I answered innocently. “Why would I want to do that? I’m trying to work on being less what certain people insist on calling controlling.”
I needed to try those calls again, but my portable phone was busted, and every room with a phone was occupied: Jake getting dressed in our bedroom. Wally attempting to nap on the third floor. Rose and Miranda sniping at each other while doing the dishes in the kitchen. And Jeff in my office staring glumly into the middle distance and reminding me (as if I needed reminding) when I asked what was on his mind, “December first is my deadline, when Monti Enterprises gets everything else I own.”
I wished I had time to give him my whole maternal/supportive number, but unfortunately I had to cut to the chase. “Just remember, whatever material goods they take away from you, they can’t”—my eyes moistened—“take you away from you.”
“Yeah, right. I’ve already heard that song, Mom. But thanks anyway,” Jeff said, resuming his brooding. He needed more work, but I couldn’t do it right now.
I hurried down to the living room, occupied, only by Hubert, who was stretched out on my entire four-cushion couch. There, having finally found some relative privacy, and some privacy from the relatives, I dialed my two numbers for the final time.
Nobody home. I would have to go to the Watergate.
“Got to pick up a few things at the store,” I called to Rose and Miranda, firmly fending them off as each of them offered, insistently, to come along. “I need some private time and space,” I said to Miranda, who understood such needs. “I need you to baste the turkey,” I said to Rose. Then, stealthily shoving certain items into my canvas tote bag, I left the house solo.
First stop was a trip to the ladies’ room of the National Cathedral, where I put on my Prudence Gump hair and hat and suit, after which I drove to the Watergate, parked next door at the Kennedy Center garage, and nervously paced the front entrance, awaiting the longed-for appearance o
f Billy and Elton Jr.
One o’clock came and went. One-oh-five came and went. So did one-oh-six, seven, eight, and nine. At ten minutes after one I was forced to revive my banished question: Had I seen the light too late to prevent the execution of an innocent man? This was the kind of miscarriage of justice that has made folks ferocious opponents of the death penalty. Twelve minutes after one, and after years and years of favoring capital punishment, I’d become a ferocious opponent of the death penalty.
At quarter after one a car—but not the car I’d expected—slowed to a stop to front of the Watergate.
And there was Joseph Monti—alive and well and exceedingly perky—climbing out of the passenger’s seat, then coming around to the driver’s seat, then bending down into the car to engage in a long, deep goodbye kiss with . . . Birdie, his wife. I guess it was quite a kiss because instead of saying goodbye, he tenderly loosened her seat belt, slid in beside her, and started in with the kissing all over again.
I looked up and down the street. If Joseph Monti was here and intact, could Billy and Elton Jr. be far behind? And if they weren’t around, which they clearly weren’t, then I needed to. move almost instantly into my fallback position.
I ducked behind a parked truck and reached into my tote bag (equipped, of course, for this contingency), withdrawing my violet contacts and my Elizabeth Fisher-Todd wig and installing them on the appropriate parts of my body. I just had time to scrawl on a beauty mark, unbutton four buttons on my Prudence Gump blouse, and emphatically shove my breasts upward in search of cleavage, when Joseph Monti offered his beaming Birdie a final embrace and entered the lobby. I was right behind him.
“Hah there,” I hummed ecstatically. “Lordy, lordy, I am so pleased to see you”.
Joseph Monti was flustered. “Why are you here?” he wanted to know. “Wasn’t the limo supposed to get and then you?” He scowled and fingered the sleeve of my suit. “And, excuse me for mentioning this, but how come you’re not more dolled up for this big-shot fancy pants Thanksgiving dinner that you’re taking me to?”
He was, of course, referring to my Prudence Gump ensemble, which even four unbuttoned buttons couldn’t de-frump.
I explained that I wasn’t dolled up because our dinner had unexpectedly been canceled. “I’ve been trying to call and tell you since eight A.M.”
Joseph Monti actually blushed. “Well, you see,” he said, “I didn’t sleep here last night. My wife and I got together for dinner, and one thing led to another, and we . . .
“That is so wonderful. That is so fabulous. I am so happy for you.” My relief was turning me into a babbling idiot. “So it’s all working out jes fahn, and you’ll be having Thanksgiving dinner with your family?”
Mr. Monti shook his head. Why was he telling me no? “Why are you telling me no?” I impatiently asked.
“She doesn’t want to spring it on the children all at once. She thinks they have to get used to the idea. So”—Mr. Monti clasped my hand—“since neither of us has a place to eat turkey today, you and I are going out to a restaurant.”
My mind went into overdrive. “No, wait, I can’t,” I replied. “I mean, like you said, I’m not dressed for the occasion.” But when Mr. Monti pressed (“What’s your problem? A nice respectable meal. No monkey business”) and refused to return my hand till I acquiesced, I made my escape by telling him that I’d go home and change my clothes (“I’ll get all dolled up”) while he called around and made us a reservation.
“Give me an hour,” I told him, as I pushed/escorted him to his elevator, ‘I’ll phone you when I’m ready to be picked up.”
Euphorically—I had saved the day!—I wafted through the front door of the Watergate building, and there at the curb, in the longest stretch limo I’d ever gazed upon, were a neatly liveried Billy and Elton Jr.
Luckily, I saw them before they saw me.
Darting behind the same truck behind which I had made the quick switch from Prudence to Elizabeth, I took out my contacts, rubbed off my beauty mark, buttoned my buttons, put on my limp brown wig, and re-emerged as Prudence once again. Leaping into the limo, I emitted a terse “Let’s roll,” and two seconds later Billy and Elton Jr. and I—Elizabeth, Prudence, Brenda—were cruising toward Virginia on Rock Creek Parkway.
I and the victim-to-be had worked out our differences, I notified my cohorts. Their services wouldn’t be needed after all. I suggested that in the future, if they were hired for a hit, they should show up on time, not half an hour late. I told them that they could keep the five thousand dollars I had paid them in advance, and asked them to please turn around now and drop me off.
“Not till you give us the other five grand,” said Billy.
“For what?” I protested. “You don’t have to kill the man.”
“And we won’t,” said Elton Jr. “We won’t kill him—but only if you pay us the other five grand.”
Having been made an offer I couldn’t refuse, I reached in my tote bag and paid them the rest of the money.
“Pleasure doing business with you,” said Elton Jr. when they stopped the car.
“Any time,” said Billy, coming around and gallantly opening the door.
I was starting to walk away when Billy said, “Hold up there a minute,” and scrutinized me meditatively. “I’m gonna give you a tip. You go out and get a hot red dress, you get some red shoes, you color up that hair, and you’re gonna look like—what’s that blondie’s name?” He pointed his finger at me and said, “Yeah, right You gonna look like Goldie Hawn’s first cousin.”
• • •
I was back at the house by two, prepared to lie about a flat tire, but no one seemed to notice how long I’d been gone. Everyone noticed, however, that I was totally manic with joy as I bopped around the kitchen stirring, sautéing, and singing, at the top of my lungs, a pull-out all-stops “I’m Sitting on Top of the World.”
The Thanksgiving dinner was beautiful.
Our dinner guests were beautiful.
The report on Dwayne—the hospital called to say he was doing very well—was beautiful.
I was sit-sit-sitting on top-top-top of the world.
• • •
On Friday Jo phoned Wally to say that her father had come to the house Thanksgiving evening and taken her mother off to a motel.
On Saturday Jo phoned Wally to say that she fully, without reservation, accepted the validity and the legitimacy of the lesbian lifestyle.
On Sunday Jo blazed up to our house on the back of a highly aggressive-looking motorcycle. Dressed in studded black leather, with an earring in her nostril, Jo wasn’t looking any too gentle herself. I hovered out of sight but not out of earshot, and heard Jo tell Wally, “You said you wanted to talk to me, so I’m here, but I don’t have much time. Benito is waiting.”
“Well, maybe that answers my question,” said Wally, his voice on the borderline between anguish and anger, ‘I’m trying not to crowd you, but I need to know about you and Vanessa Pincus.”
Josephine replied that although she fully, without reservation, accepted the validity and legitimacy of the lesbian lifestyle, she’d nonetheless concluded that she herself seemed to be of an alternative inclination.
“That’s real good news,” said Wally, “I’m glad—”
“And besides”—Jo hadn’t stopped talking yet—“a woman can be a fully feminine woman, and still be strong and brave and independent.”
“You’re right,” Wally said. “You’re right and—”
Jo still wasn’t finished. “But you will meet people who want to call these masculine characteristics. Which, as I certainly hope you agree, is sexual stereotyping of the worst kind.”
“I agree,” Wally said. “You’re completely correct, and I—”
Jo kept going. “And also,” she said, “a woman—it’s not just guys who feel this way—can crave excitement, can want to—uh—walk on the wild side.”
“Or”—Wally’s patience was fraying—“ride on the wild side. S
o maybe you’d like to explain about that hulk hunched over the Harley. And why you’re all done up like a Hell’s Angels groupie.”
“I’m not explaining anything,” Jo replied with withering dignity. I heard her heavy trots clonk down the hall. “But I think you ought to know that Benito says the Hell’s Angels have gotten a really bum rap.”
• • •
Later on Sunday Birdie phoned. She wanted us to come to her house that evening. “I’m sorry it’s such short notice»” she said, “but Tuesday’s December first, and I think we need to have a big discussion.”
“You mean, about Jeff and his contract with Monti Enterprises?
“I mean,” said Birdie mysteriously, “about everything. So maybe after dinner—let’s say eight-thirty—you and Jeff and Wally and Jake could join us.”
“Us?” I inquired.
“Us. Joseph and me.”
• • •
We joined them in the den because the Monti living room had been demolished. The furniture was gone. The drapes were gone, The beige-on-beige wool carpeting was gone. “I’ve sent out the couches and chairs to be recovered in golds and maroons,” Birdie softly explained to me while her husband and my three men exchanged tense pleasantries. “And I’m thinking of doing the drapes”—she pressed some boisterous swatches upon me—“in one of these prints.”
I nodded enthusiastically. “Very unstagnant,” I told her. Then giving Mr. Monti my hand and one of my lesser smiles, I dissemblingly said to him, “Long time no see.”
Murdering Mr. Monti Page 27
