Finding Bess

by Victoria Gordon

  “Coffee,” she muttered to herself as she filled the kettle, no, the jug. Get it right, damn it, she thought, spooning freeze-dried instant coffee into what had become “her” cup in this house.

  Upon fleeing into the bathroom, so consumed with rage and humiliation she couldn’t think, could hardly see, she had vomited once again, spewing out what remained of her dinner in a futile bid to purge herself of the torment inside. Futile, wasted, but it had at least allowed her to then peep out and, finding herself alone, to creep into the bed and let sleep relieve the pain... temporarily.

  With morning comes a new day, she thought. And another after that. How many days before common sense took control and propelled her away from this house, away from this idiotic situation? Except that even in her despair, her professional pride was too strong to be lightly shaken off. She had come to do a job, she was doing a job, and she would somehow have to finish that job before she could depart Tasmania with a clear conscience.

  That was uppermost in her mind as she picked up the coffee and went to confront Geoff’s damned computer and Geoff’s damned book.

  No, their damned book!

  But when she opened the office door to see Geoff sprawled, still fully clothed, on the sofa, her heart caught in her throat, threatening to strangle her, choke her. She turned, but it was too late. With the sense of a hunted animal, he had come awake and was staring at her through heavy-lidded eyes the color of winter sea ice.

  Then he simply flowed upright and stood there, hair all tousled and the morning beard visible on his strong jaw. Looking at her with none of the contempt she might have imagined, none of the anger, just a warm, soft, gentleness. A gentleness tinged with a sadness so tangible she felt she could reach out and collect it in her hand.

  “You’re a glutton for punishment, you weird Yankee wench,” he finally said, and a shadow of a smile played across his incredibly mobile mouth. “The last thing I could face this morning would be that bloody computer, and here you are itching to get to work.”

  She couldn’t speak, couldn’t force even a good-morning past lips that suddenly remembered the incredible taste of him.

  “I’m glad you had the good sense to whip me into line last night,” he continued. “Damned cheeky of me to accuse you of being into the grog, seeing it was me who fell apart at the finish. Try not to think too badly of me, Bess.”

  Then he was gone, slipping past without touching her, but also, having restored her dignity, without leaving her any response that would have made any sense at all.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  They walked around each other like stray dogs for the next few days, saying little and choosing their words very carefully. Somehow, they managed to maneuver their way through the office, and the rest of the house, without physically touching.

  Geoff spent a lot of time away on business, which suited Bess. But it slowed work on the book and gave her too much time to think, so she began editing in the mornings and strolling through the city every afternoon.

  Sometimes she took Lady along for company. But all too soon she realized that having the demented dog only gave men an excuse to stop her and ask questions that quickly left the realm of dog interest and moved toward subjects she preferred to avoid. She did, however, make a mental note to pass this interesting bit of lore along to a few friends back home. Get a gundog and walk it where the men are; it’s safer than wearing a mini-skirt and far more effective.

  Bess visited the museum, checked out all the galleries and gift shops, even subscribed to Launceston's Theatre North, which offered dramas, opera, and musicals throughout the year. But mostly she just walked the streets, gradually extending her wanderings so that she covered all of the business district south of the River. Then she crossed over and meandered through Invermay, one of the city’s older industrial and residential districts.

  She spent a good deal of time in the library, trying to upgrade her knowledge of the period about which Geoff was writing. Australian history, so much like that of America on the surface, was almost totally different once the surface had been scratched. The language, the customs, the entire fabric was different. And, to Bess’s mind, extremely difficult to comprehend. Still, it had to be done, and she enjoyed the learning experience.

  One afternoon, having finished up at the library, she hurried through the Brisbane Street Mall, trying to get under cover before a looming shower decided to unload. Darting quick glances at a sky that had rapidly turned from dove-gray to steel-gray, she turned a corner and bounced off the burly form of Tom Rossiter.

  “Elizabeth! What on earth are you doing here?” he said, astonishment obvious in his world-weary eyes.

  “I could ask the same of you, Tom. Has father decided he wants to annex Tasmania or something? Whatever it is, it must be serious business, or have you given up being his number one fixer?”

  “I guess I'm still doing the same old job, unless your father fired me and forgot to mention it.”

  To Bess's eyes, Tom Rossiter hadn't changed one bit since the last time she'd seen him... at Paul's funeral. Tom's suit was rumpled and looked slept in, his tie was askew, and his shoes were an absolute disgrace. But this large ungainly man had a strange aura of gentleness about him, so sometimes it wasn't all that difficult to ignore the kind of work he did for her father.

  “Come on, let’s find a place for coffee, or better yet, a drink,” he said. Grasping her by the elbow, he led her to the Royal Hotel, chanced upon a reasonably private corner table, and ordered some cold beer.

  Despite Rossiter's disheveled appearance, Bess felt self-conscious in her sturdy walking shoes, faded jeans, and oversized Denver Broncos tee-shirt. Maybe it was because her father had always insisted she maintain the “Cornwall image” by wearing tailored skirts and slacks. Fortunately, her Colorado friends didn't give a rat's spit if she wore cowboy boots with evening gowns, or air-conditioned-at-the-knees jeans, and Mouse's frequent comments that she looked like “Cinderella in denim” had fallen on deliberately deaf ears. Had, in fact, often led to more rebellion. Bess had never actually found the nerve to scalp her head or pierce her belly-button, yet she knew she could if she wanted to, and knew no one would give her a second glance. Well, maybe the scalped head.

  “It’s great to see you, Elizabeth,” Tom said, effectively slicing through her digressive thoughts. “I had no idea you were in Australia. I’m surprised your father didn’t mention it when he sent me down here.”

  “He probably doesn’t know. I didn’t tell him, and please, Tom, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t either. Father is so...so intrusive sometimes.”

  “Sure, honey, whatever you say. But what are you doing here? It’s a long way from home.”

  “I’m collaborating on a book with an Australian author, and I came down to sort out some of the details.” Bess wanted to be truthful without going into specifics. She liked Tom Rossiter, but when all was said and done he was still her father’s man.

  “Is it going well?”

  Briefly, she chewed over his question. “It's shoving my career in a new direction,” she said, parroting Geoff's original email plea. “But there's nothing wrong with having more than one iron in the fire. My visa's good for three months, and I’ve been here almost a...what's the Aussie word?...fortnight. I guess you could say the collaboration's going well, even giving me an opportunity to see a bit of Tasmania, which is a bonus. So, what are you doing here?”

  Tom seemed to hesitate. Then he said, “You know the old man, Elizabeth. He hasn't given me my instructions yet, but he probably plans to market kangaroo coats.”

  “Cruella Cornwall,” she said with a smile and a shudder. “That's from Disney's Dalmatian movie,” she explained.

  “Yup. I remember when everyone wanted to buy spotted dogs. Why don't you give me your phone number, honey, and I’ll take you out for dinner? I’m down here with Gerry Coolidge.”

  Just what I need, Bess thought. Rossiter was her father’s man, but Coolidge was... something e
lse again. If Gerald Coolidge saw an advantage in telling her father he’d seen the missing Elizabeth in Launceston... but then what could her father do?

  “I’d like that, Tom,” she said. Only to suddenly grow cautious again without really knowing why. “But my friend’s number is unlisted and I never have to use it, so I’m afraid I can’t give it to you because I don’t know it myself. Where are you staying? I can check my calendar when I get back, and call you.”

  “I’m at the Casino with Gerry. Do you know where that is?”

  “Yes. I ate some oysters there with my friend and another...friend.”

  Tom gave her the room number, adding that he would likely be heading home soon. “Please have dinner with us, Elizabeth. It would mean a lot to me. And Gerry, as well. He’s always liked you.”

  Bess knew exactly what it was about her that Gerald Coolidge liked, but she let the remark pass. “I will, Tom, I promise. Right now I have a ton of work to do and it's about to rain cats and dogs and kangaroos, so I’d better scoot. You take care of yourself, and please remember what I said about telling Father.”

  “No problem.” Rising to get himself another beer, Tom watched Elizabeth exit onto George Street, then disappear.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Gerald Coolidge’s reaction to the encounter was predictable.

  “You must have horse-shoes up your ass, Tom,” he said. “But your timing is rotten. Dinner would be perfect for stage two, when the plan is to get her back to her old man, but first – first, damn it! – we have to find a way to use her to turn Barrett around. And we sure as hell can’t have her suspecting our involvement, at least not at this stage.”

  “I didn’t even think of that,” Rossiter said. “It seemed like a good idea at the time, Gerry. Give us a chance to pick her brains and find out what’s really going on between her and Barrett. I thought we'd take her to dinner, ply her with fine wine, and you could put your talents to work.”

  “Talents?”

  “You know, get some information out of her. You're good at that.”

  “True,” Coolidge agreed, preening like a rooster. “But Elizabeth has always been very stubborn, even when she was under her old man's thumb being squashed like an ant. Obviously, she didn’t tell you very much.”

  “Only that she’s down here collaborating on a book. She didn't mention Barrett by name, but since he’s a writer it should be safe to assume he’s the one she’s collaborating with. What did you want me to do, Gerry? Come straight out and ask her? Damned smart that would have been.”

  “I'm not being critical, Tom. You’ve done splendidly, as far as it goes.”

  “Yeah, well, let’s just be sure your Sydney thugs don’t decide to kidnap the girl right after she’s been to dinner with us, okay? We don’t want even the slightest suspicion in our direction, and I’d expect Barrett has some fairly good contacts down here. Something we don’t.”

  “You just leave that part to me.” Coolidge's agile mind, often compared to a computer by less-than-amused colleagues, could almost be heard to whirl and hiss. “When do you think she’s likely to get in touch with you?”

  Rossiter shrugged his massive shoulders. “She was almost cagey about not wanting me to contact her, and of course I couldn’t let her know we already know where she is and who she’s with. But Elizabeth and I have always been friendly, Gerry, and she seemed more than pleased with the idea of getting together, so it shouldn’t be too long.”

  ~~~

  Hunched in front of Geoff’s computer, Bess tried to concentrate on Kate, who had to defend her virtue from the brutal and sadistic ship’s captain. Bess was also thinking about how soon she might have dinner with Tom Rossiter.

  And Gerald Coolidge, if that couldn’t be avoided.

  She liked Tom, always had. But something kept prodding at her, now that she had said she'd phone and arrange a get-together. One element of the issue was that she did not like Gerald Coolidge, who had always struck her as the slimiest of snake-oil salesman types, despite his immaculate appearance and polished good manners. He was a man with whom she would not wish to be stuck in an elevator for any length of time.

  But what it came down to, she kept thinking, was that she resented bitterly this intrusion – intentional or not – of her father’s world into her own. She had traveled to Tasmania to get away from that, but now it seemed to have caught up with her.

  “And I do not like that!”

  “Don’t like what?” Geoff said, causing Bess to snap upright with a small cry of dismay. “Have I gone and offended your American verbiage again?”

  “I do wish you wouldn’t sneak up on me, Geoff. It's very disconcerting.”

  “Okay, I’ll start wearing steel-shod motorcycle boots, or I'll stamp my feet. What’s the problem, Bess? It must be fairly serious. I can’t remember you getting quite this vehement about my writing before.”

  “It’s got nothing to do with you. Just something personal I’ll have to fix.”

  “Need help?”

  She could tell by his expression that it was a genuine offer. “No. No, thanks. It really isn’t all that serious. This afternoon I met a guy from back home. He wants me to have dinner with him, and I’m not sure I want to go.”

  “Seems pretty simple to me. If you want to, you do, and if you don’t want to, you don’t. Couldn’t be simpler.”

  “I just wish it was,” she said with a sigh. “But it isn’t your problem, so forget it. What I want you thinking about is Kate, and whether she’s going to be able to fend off this sadistic captain. And if so, how? You’ve gotten her into a pretty pickle here, Geoff, and I really don’t see how she’s going to survive this voyage with her so-called virtue intact. You haven’t given her any sort of escape route that I can see. I mean, she can’t very well jump ship and swim ashore.”

  “Maybe our hero—”

  “Tom.”

  “You named our hero Tom?” Geoff grinned. “After your first boyfriend, I presume.”

  “How... oh, the monkeys. No, that was Tommy, and he wasn't very heroic. He took me to the movies, but I paid him to take me. I wanted to prove to... to someone that I could date a popular boy, a football jock. When I wouldn't let Tommy touch my breasts, he asked me to be his girlfriend and I said yes. My steady status lasted exactly ten days. As soon as I refused to pay for movies and hamburgers, Tommy demanded his jock jacket back. Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “It's hard to imagine you paying someone to romance you.”

  “I didn't say romance. Okay, picture a very heavy Shirley Temple with red hair. That was me at fifteen. By the time I slimmed down, Tommy had gotten some girl in trouble. He'd also been kicked off the football team, and my father...I mean, his father...well, just let's say Tommy's family business went bust. Please, Geoff, can't we talk about your book?”

  “Our book. Okay, so where were we?”

  “Saving Kate's virtue. I think we decided she couldn't swim to shore.”

  “A shame they didn’t have aircraft in those days.”

  His second grin proved he wasn’t taking her seriously. Bess had exhausted her verbal sparring skills for the day on Tom Rossiter, and she was in no mood for this.

  “Fine,” she said, flinging herself out of her chair. “Why don't you think about it, and when you know, kindly let me know, because I can’t do much more until you do!”

  She stomped out of the room, leaving the hapless Kate to the mercies of her creator, then slipped into the back yard to play with Lady. Damn Geoff, she thought, and had to smile. Because she'd just realized that at least half her pique was the result of his too-casual attitude toward her Tom dilemma, and as the demented dog whirled out of the kennel, Bess gave herself a mental kick in the pants. What had she expected? That Geoff would suddenly get all jealous and possessive? And why on earth had she recited some stupid story about her first boyfriend, who wasn't even her boyfriend? She should have told Geoff the truth. That she'd named their hero for Tom Rossiter, the man
who'd invited her to dinner.

  “Maybe then he'd have shown some interest,” she said, for the moment oblivious to the whirling dervish at her feet. Glancing down, she had the most vivid mental picture of a childhood bedtime story about a little boy up a coconut tree with tigers running round the base until they melted into butter.

  “What would you turn into, chocolate milk?” she asked the demented dog. “Lady! Pay attention! Sit!” Which, somewhat to her surprise, the dog immediately did, squarely on Bess’s foot.

  “You’re spoiling my dog, but I suppose you know that,” Geoff said from the open doorway, and discipline again flew out the window as Lady, exhibiting her usual paroxysms of ecstasy, raced over to sit on his feet.

  “You should have bought a Labrador retriever,” Bess retorted, throwing back at him the concept he so often threw at Lady whenever the Springer spaniel was driving him to distraction.

  “I think maybe we should have hot dogs for dinner,” he said with a broad grin, whereupon the dog wriggled with delight and Bess couldn’t help but respond with a grin of her own. Anyone hearing the way Geoff talked to Lady might have been forgiven for thinking he hated the dog, except for the warmth in his voice when he called her names and threatened all sorts of dire retribution for her many failings. The fact was, of course, that no dog could be more loved, and as fractious as Lady behaved, Geoff wouldn’t have traded her for anything.

  “I thought you were supposed to saving Kate's virtue, Mr. Barrett. Or is such a task too difficult for a mere man? I suppose it is, actually. Am I asking too much, expecting you to set aside the sworn purpose of your gender in order to help create a book that might sell?”

  “What’s made you so damned cranky? No, don’t answer because I suppose I shouldn’t even ask.”

  “Damn straight,” she said. “And I can’t do much more with ‘our book’ until you do some more writing, so would you like to get busy?”