My Gal Sunday

  “Sir, to the left! Look!”

  Henry rushed to the other side of the helicopter. Through his binoculars he could see a figure out in the water, at least twenty yards from shore. He adjusted the focus, trying to get a clearer view. The figure appeared to be holding something down. He couldn’t make out what was happening, if maybe this might just be a lone fisherman intent on getting his catch at any cost. Time was too precious to waste it on the wrong thing.

  They were getting closer. He adjusted the focus once more; then he finally saw it: blond hair, floating on the churning surface of the water! Sunday, he thought. That has to be Sunday! “Dive!” he shouted.

  The helicopter began its rushing descent.

  Tightly held by Klint, Sunday was struggling, but she could not keep her head above the water. Good-bye, Henry, she thought.

  It was then Klint heard the roar of the approaching helicopters, looked up, and realized what was happening. Frantically he wrapped his arms around Sunday’s neck and pulled her under the water. He still had time to finish her. Even though he’d be caught, he’d have his place in the history books. He’d show those jerks. How much he hated them.

  Those jerks in Washington.

  It was Wexler Klint’s last thought before he woke up some minutes later, firmly in custody.

  Henry’s cannonball plunge into the ocean allowed him to spring immediately back to the surface. He grabbed Sunday in one arm. With the other, he ripped Klint’s face mask off and squeezed his neck in a paralyzing pinch. I hope he drowns, Henry thought. Helicopters deposited a fleet of agents into the water around them.

  “My love, my love,” Henry said over and over to Sunday as he swam through the breakers, towing her beside him.

  “Henry, darling,” a shivering Sunday whispered back as she wrapped her arms around his neck. “Don’t dare kiss me until I have a chance to brush my teeth.”

  In his entire life, Henry Parker Britland IV had hardly ever told anyone to shut up, but he came perilously close at that moment. He was also perilously close to tears as he reached the beach and rolled onto the sand, holding his beloved Sunday cradled in his arms. Ignoring her request, he kissed her lips and whispered, “Do be quiet, darling.”

  He was rewarded by a faint giggle, emerging through chattering teeth.

  He looked into her eyes. Hysterical, he thought. “Let it out,” he said soothingly. “You’ve had a terrible time.” Then added incredulously, “By God, you’re laughing!”

  “Oh, it’s not at you, darling,” she said, burrowing her face against his neck as a wave washed over them. “I was just thinking that this is a crazy time of year for us to be playing Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr.”

  “What are you talking about?” Henry asked, bewildered.

  “From Here to Eternity.”

  Hail,

  Columbia!

  THE NEW YORK TIMES. November 8

  Former President Henry Parker Britland IV has purchased the yacht Columbia, reclaiming ownership for his family. Built for the Britland family and launched in 1940, the Columbia was sold in 1964 to the late Hodgins Weatherby. Just prior to that sale, the vessel had been the scene of the mysterious and still-unsolved disappearance of Costa Barria’s Prime Minister Garcia del Rio.

  In the three decades after it passed out of Britland hands, the yacht acquired the reputation of being haunted, due in part to the disappearance of Mr. del Rio and in part to the rather eccentric and at times controversial behavior of her most recent owner.

  Larger and reportedly far more luxurious than the onetime official presidential yacht Sequoia, the Columbia has been a favorite retreat for presidents from FDR to Gerald Ford.

  In the Edwardian Room of Manhattan’s Plaza Hotel, Congor Reuthers, a thin, muscular man in his fifties, tremblingly followed orders to read the newspaper item aloud and then looked up in fear at his employer.

  They were seated at a window table that looked out on Central Park, and the horse-drawn carriages across the way were sending faint clip-clopping sounds into the quietly elegant room. As he waited for a response, Reuthers had an instant flashback to his first fox hunt. As a young lad, he’d wondered how the fox felt when trapped. Now he knew.

  The reaction that unfolded was exactly what he had expected: His employer’s coffee cup was slowly returned to the saucer.

  Even the china-blue contact lenses could not conceal the searing fury in her frosty black eyes. As usual, Angelica was traveling incognito. Presently she was in her Lady Roth-Jones disguise, wearing the blue lenses, a severe dark blond wig, a tweed suit, and oxfords.

  When she continued to stare at him, Reuthers dropped his eyes. “ I’m sorry,” he mumbled, then wished he’d bitten his tongue.

  “You’re sorry.” The tone was level. “I would have hoped for a more appropriate response. Where was Carlos?”

  “He was there, as ordered.”

  “Then why didn’t he bid for the yacht? No, not bid; why didn’t he buy the yacht?”

  “He was afraid that one of the Secret Service men might recognize him. No one knew that Britland was planning to be there. We had not anticipated the competition. Carlos rushed out to send for Roberto to do the bidding. By the time Roberto could get through security, President Britland had tripled the opening bid. An instant later the yacht was his. The proceeds were going to charity, you see . . .”

  His employer stared at him in silence for several moments, then asked, “What are Britland’s plans for the yacht?”

  This time Reuthers would have preferred to swallow his tongue rather than answer. “He is said to be sailing on it immediately to his private marina in Boca Raton, Florida. He has an architectural degree, as you know, and it is said that he plans to redesign the interior himself, then present the yacht to the government so that once again it will become a retreat for visiting heads of state. With the gift, there apparently will be a sizable endowment for maintenance.”

  “We know what that means.”

  Reuthers nodded dumbly.

  “Neither Carlos nor Roberto is useful to me any longer.” Fingers that previously had held the delicate china coffee cup were suddenly convulsive as they gripped the edge of the table.

  “Surely . . .” Reuthers closed his lips to stifle the protest.

  “Surely?” A venomous whisper mocked him. “Be careful you don’t join your friends. What use are you to me? You should have known that Britland was planning to bid on the Columbia.” The hard eyes glared at Reuthers with heart-stopping coldness. “Get out of my sight!”

  “Henry, darling, I still can’t believe it,” Sunday sighed as she pressed against the railing of the Columbia, straining to catch the first glimpse of Belle Maris, the Britlands’ oceanfront Florida estate. Craning her neck, she brushed breeze-blown, wheat-colored hair from blocking the view of sparkling blue eyes.

  “My fairest, my espoused, my latest found, Heaven’s last, best gift, my ever new delight!” Henry Parker Britland IV mused as he looked up from the lounge chair on which he was stretched out, studying the blueprints of the Columbia. Since Sunday’s recent abduction, these tender words of Milton had come frequently to mind.

  “Why don’t you believe it?” he asked affectionately.

  “Because when I was nine, I read a book about the Columbia and tried to imagine what it must have been like when President Roosevelt and Winston Churchill sailed down the Potomac on her. Can you imagine the conversations they had? And President Truman used to play the piano for his guests when he and Bess had a party here. And the Kennedys and the Johnsons loved this boat, and did you know that President Ford used to practice his golf swing on the foredeck?”

  “He hit the captain, once,” Henry observed dryly. “In fact, the joke was that the staff received combat pay when President Ford got out his golf clubs.”

  Sunday smiled. “I should have realized you are aware of everything about the Columbia. You practically grew up on her.” Her expression became serious. “And I do know that you’ve never
forgotten the night Prime Minister del Rio vanished. And I can understand that. We’re still living with the ramifications of his disappearance.”

  “I was twelve,” Henry said somberly. “And the last person to speak to him before he went out on deck for a smoke. The most charming man I’ve ever known. He had asked me to walk with him.”

  Sunday could see that her husband’s eyes grew clouded and sad. She walked over to the lounge chair and perched on the side.

  Henry moved his legs to give her more room and reached for her hand. “Since I was the sole member of this generation of Britlands, my father included me on every possible occasion. Good heavens, I even flew with him to visit the shah, during the heyday of the monarchy in Iran.”

  Sunday never tired of hearing Henry’s stories about his adventures as a child and young man. It was so totally different from her own experience of growing up in Jersey City as the child of a motorman on the New Jersey Central.

  Now, keen as she was to find out what had happened when Henry visited the shah, Sunday was more interested to learn what had happened on the Columbia that night. “I didn’t know you were the last one to actually speak to Prime Minister del Rio,” she said quietly.

  “The dinner had been very pleasant,” Henry said. “The prime minister had announced Father’s plan to send his engineering company to build a series of bridges and tunnels and roads in Costa Barria, half of the cost to be his personal gift to the country. It would have drastically improved the economy. Everyone in that room realized that the economic boom would mean del Rio would be able to hold onto power absolutely and thus keep Costa Barria from sliding back into a dictatorship.”

  “Del Rio and his associates must have been extremely happy,” Sunday said. “Do you believe it’s possible that he committed suicide?” Noting the frown that suddenly clouded her husband’s forehead, she added, “Henry, darling, I think I know how painful it is for you to talk about this. So feel free to tell me to take a hike.”

  Henry raised his eyes. “Sweetheart, if you took a hike, you’d have a pretty good swim to shore. And even though you haven’t mentioned it — yet — I do know that you haven’t decided on your vote on the bill before Congress that would resume aid to Costa Barria.”

  Defensively, Sunday said, “I know you believe it would be better to continue to keep the squeeze on, but it is hard to ignore an island with eight million inhabitants, many of whom live in poverty and who desperately need our help.”

  “Bobby Kennedy gave a version of that argument concerning the opening of China.”

  “In 1968, wasn’t it?” Sunday asked.

  “June of 1968, to be exact,” Henry replied. “As to the prime minister, he was a great friend of my father and had visited with us regularly. I’m proud to say that he had taken a liking to me, and since I had made it my business to learn everything I could about his country, including the political situation as well as the economics, he enjoyed quizzing me. On that last day, he and I had been swimming together in the outdoor pool. It was a beautiful afternoon, but he seemed melancholy. And then he said something very odd. Quite somberly, he told me that for some reason Caesar’s final words had been haunting him.”

  “‘Et tu, Brute?’ Why on earth would he say that?”

  “I don’t know. He lived with the possibility of assassination, of course. It was a constant. But on the Columbia he’d always felt secure. However, I do know that he was subject to spells of depression, and from what I understand now, that constant apprehension may have gotten to him that evening.”

  “That’s possible,” Sunday agreed.

  “As I mentioned, the dinner was quite enjoyable and ended at quarter past ten. Madame del Rio retired immediately, but the prime minister stayed behind to exchange pleasantries. Then, as I was leaving the dining room, he appeared at my side and invited me to stroll around the deck. I replied that my mother expected me to phone her at ten-thirty. Mother was entertaining her old friend Queen Juliana of the Netherlands, who was visiting New York that week. Then, looking at his face, I realized that beneath the genial manner, del Rio was deeply troubled. I quickly told him that Mother would be honored for me to accept his invitation and accompany him.”

  “Then you can’t blame yourself,” Sunday insisted.

  Henry stared past her into the sea. “I remember that he patted my shoulder and said that I must not disappoint my mother, that perhaps I had made the best choice for both of us. He said that he needed to be alone, that there was something quite urgent he had to think through. Then he embraced me and in the same gesture surreptitiously took an envelope from his pocket and slipped it into mine. In a whisper he told me to hold it for him until he asked for it.

  “And so,” he continued, “I went down to my stateroom and called Mother to tell her about the evening, and then was awakened in the morning to the frantic screeching of Madame del Rio. And I knew that whatever had happened, I might have been able to prevent.”

  “Or you might have shared del Rio’s fate, trying to save him,” Sunday said briskly. “It would be just like you to dive in after him. Do you think a twelve-year-old boy, even you, could have changed what happened? You’re being too hard on yourself.”

  Henry shook his head. “I suppose you’re fight. It’s just that I keep going over and over that evening, knowing that I might have observed something untoward and not understood it at the time.”

  “Oh, come on, Henry,” Sunday protested. “You sound like some of the people I represented as a public defender: ‘The guy who shot my wife went thataway.’”

  “No,” Henry contradicted. “What you don’t understand, darling, is that my father had told me to write down my every impression of that eyening, as I had of all the other significant events at which I’d been present. My journal was a loose-leaf binder, so that in the future, I could group that chapter with others in a similar vein. Which of course is what I’m doing now that I’m writing my memoirs.”

  “My diary was in a spiral notebook,” Sunday told him.

  “I would very much enjoy reading it.”

  “Not on your life. But anyhow, what are you telling me?”

  “After I spoke with Mother — even though I was extremely tired — I forced myself to make a detailed entry. I left the journal on my desk with the prime minister’s envelope on top of it. During the night, those pages as well as the envelope disappeared while I slept.”

  Sunday looked at him, astonished.

  “You mean some unknown person got into your room while you were sleeping and stole the envelope as well as your impressions of the evening?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then, Henry dear, two words come to mind, Foul Play.”

  * * *

  “They’re here, Sims,” Marvin Klein called as he stood at the front windows of the salon in Belle Maris and watched the sleek yacht drop anchor.

  Sims moved at a stately pace across the room where he’d been rearranging the flowers on the coffee table. “So they are,” he said warmly. “And I am happy to say everything is quite in order to receive them. My, the Columbia is a beautiful vessel, is she not? I sailed on her several times, you know.” He sighed. “Until that last dreadful event.”

  “You were on board the Columbia that night?” Marvin exclaimed.

  “Yes. I had been in the employ of the family not quite two years. Mr. Henry Parker Britland the Third was kind enough to find me attentive to the small matters that make for gracious service and always took me on the yacht for special events like that weekend. The president was still just a boy, but I remember he was terribly distressed about the prime minister’s disappearance. Naturally. Indeed, he was quite ill for the next several days. He had tried in his enthusiastically youthful way to determine just what had happened, but his father ordered the subject closed.”

  Sims’s reflective look vanished and he allowed himself a contained smile at the sight of Henry and Sunday descending to the launch. “I am so pleased that the stone crabs are close t
o perfection,” he told Klein. “The president will be delighted, I know.”

  “I’m sure he will,” Marvin agreed. “But just one question, Sims. You say the subject of the prime minister’s disappearance was closed. But there must have been a big investigation?”

  “There was indeed, especially in view of the fact that the prime minister’s body was never found. But what could anyone say? All possible security measures had been taken. As you will see, the largest suite is a half landing above the others and has a private deck. Mr. Britland had given it to the prime minister that weekend. The minister’s bodyguards were stationed at the foot of the staircase leading up to the suite. Naturally the yacht had been thoroughly searched before sailing, and everyone on board, from the crew to the personal staff, was above suspicion. The prime minister had four of his personal security guards with him as well.”

  “And his wife was there?”

  “Yes. They were newlyweds at the time, and he never traveled without her.”

  “From what I understand, she became one tough cookie,” Klein observed.

  “Quite. She succeeded Garcia del Rio in office. Mr. Henry Parker Britland the Third never expected her to hold onto the position, but she skillfully played on the love the common people had for her late husband and eventually became entrenched. She managed to deflect much of the opposition, saying that her husband’s enemies had driven him to his death. Now, of course, she is a virtual dictator.”

  Marvin Klein looked thoughtful. “I met her seven years ago, when President Britland had a meeting of the Central American nations. She’d just turned fifty then and was still a beauty. President Britland referred to her as ‘Madame Castro.’ But he would always add that if her husband hadn’t died, her life would have been totally different.”