“I have to go with Keegan tomorrow night to a dinner with the conference bigwigs, be on a panel Monday morning, and spend time evaluating pitches Tuesday afternoon. I was supposed to be back on Thursday night for the banquet but had already decided to be unable to make it because I have things scheduled at the office on Wednesday, am concerned about Libby’s activities Wednesday and Thursday nights, and there’s the wedding on Sunday. Not to mention I have a job.”
“What if you drafted Libby to help you out with Maggie this week? Might keep them both out of trouble. They are pretty close as I remember.”
“That is the dumbest idea you’ve come up with to date,” Charlie told the superstar, “and that is saying a whole lot.”
“You two sure sound like you have a relationship.”
“We’re just friends, Detective Solomon.” Charlie was gritting her teeth again. The dentist had warned her about that.
All three men shrugged this time. Charlie figured old Dashiell was doing the same outside in the hall/lounge. “And ohmygod, Mitch, it just might work.”
“I have good dumb ideas all the time. You never listen to me.”
“You sound married.”
“My daughter’s eighteen and I’ve pretty much lost control,” Charlie explained to the other two men in the room.
“Like what happened to Caroline with Dashiell,” Warren VanZant said helpfully.
Maggie groaned and rolled over in her sleep when Charlie crawled into bed beside her. For a few seconds she reminded herself she must not sleep deeply, must awaken if Maggie got up. Two seconds later Maggie was coming out of the bathroom, roughing her damp hair with one hand. Even Victorian excess at the windows couldn’t block out the California sun.
“Did you know you snore, Greene?” Fresh and dewy from the shower, you’d never guess Maggie Stutzman had found a dead doctor in the ebony eddy pool the night before.
“I do not snore. What time is it?”
“Ten something. You even slept through wake-up call.” She pointed at the round thing in the ceiling over the door. “We missed the enema and the Rolfing.”
“Oh damn.” Charlie almost broke her neck falling off the bed and missing the stool. “I thought the Rolfing was the cucumber yesterday.”
“It wasn’t a cucumber—it just looked like one.”
“Felt like two.”
They actually both laughed at the same time—at the same thing. That hadn’t happened in months. “The cucumber we get in the garden salad for lunch. Shower’s all yours.”
According to the abundant literature deposited about the place, the Sea Spa at the Marina del Sol had been built originally as a private home, bankrupted the owners before it was finished, became a rambling hotel which didn’t make it either, and had been turned into a spa. With the change in direction, concepts, architects, owners, contractors and fortunes the end result was a warren of cottages, footpaths, and gardens outside—different uses than intended inside. The parts were generally lovely, the whole confusing.
An example was their bathroom. It would have been a triangle but for one corner which was elongated for no discernable purpose. Quality tile and ornate appointments, an overlarge shower, marble pedestal sink, tiered rack for towels and makeup kits, pedestal stool, and this oblong end that held an out-of-place full length wood-framed mirror on a platform and uprights and trunnions so it could tilt. So you could watch yourself do things you seriously did not want to see yourself doing, but couldn’t get away far enough to see things you might like to check out—such as what your hair and outfit might look like to those behind you.
Basking under the hot pelt of the water and the aroma of lavender shower gel dispensed from a purple thing attached to the tile, Charlie considered the fact that one of the reasons her friendship with Maggie had been so successful was that they both seemed to sense how hard to push and when to back off. And they rarely had to say “I’m sorry,” an inbred female habit. So, when she was toweled and dressed, she didn’t ask all the questions trying to burst her brain, just followed Maggie down to the dining room for a cup of hot ship bilge which they carried out onto the deck and the crime scene. The tape was down, the eddies stilled, and out the window—the surf was up.
“Do you remember last night?”
“Some of it. Dr. Judy’s skirt sort of ballooned like air had gotten trapped under it in back. Her hair floated higher than she did. Probably the Jacuzzi bubbles. I don’t remember blood but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t any. I slept so good last night. Charlie, I’m not even hungry.”
“You don’t crave anything?”
“Only one. Chocolate.”
“Have you had your pills?”
“Caroline VanZant took the whole sack of them with her. And I slept so good.” Maggie’s tears ran down her face anyway.
“What?”
“I don’t know. I’m not even sad. I’m glad I’m here. I think I’ll get help here, Charlie.”
Charlie sure hoped so. How could life get so bad you wanted to be deprived? Dead maybe, but—“Maybe you can get your enema this afternoon.”
Five
Caroline VanZant bustled out with her own cup of bilge and two pills for Maggie. “Now listen, I’ve talked to three doctors, one of them yours, listed the medications you’ve been taking and the problems you’re having. The only thing all agreed on was the hormone therapy. Knock ’em down and we’ll work with the rest. Glad you both slept in this morning. You needed it.”
“Come on, Maggie,” Charlie urged. “It’s not for the rest of your life. Just to get you through a rough time.” This medication had finally proved dangerous if taken far into post-menopause as had been prescribed for years and as many breast-cancer patients had suspected for years too. They were still considered helpful for women at the onset of this wonderful time in their lives if their hot flashes were unbearable and there was no family history of breast cancer. But the jury was still out and enthusiasts for hormone replacement therapy questioned the stats on this one. And no, natural or phyto estrogens didn’t really cut it.
“We’ve lightened up on her regimen,” Caroline said in that soft, sweet voice you wished your mother had. “I’ve got police and press downstairs to deal with. Could you stay with her through lunch, Ms. Greene? We’ll try to work out something later.”
Charlie rather thought she could leave Maggie with anyone but Dashiell until she met Sue who apparently had not received word of the lightening up of Maggie’s regimen.
Sue, according to her name badge, had a ponytail and a clipboard like the female sheriff’s deputy and the snappy number. “Are you Charlie and Maggie? What are you doing dressed like that? You should have reported to the pool half an hour ago.”
They were wearing spa sweats and tank tops. Without much hope, Charlie tried, “We didn’t bring our suits.”
“Your suits are down at the pool. Come along, ladies.”
“Don’t leave me again, Charlie,” Maggie pleaded with a look that tore at Charlie’s gut far worse than any enema could have, not that she’d ever had one.
“If that damn flute from the eddy-pool deck starts up down here, I’m going to drown that dork,” Charlie whispered and narrowly escaped a lung or two full of chlorinated lavender water. The pool, very large and very warm, was empty except for her, Maggie, and Raoul—their hydro-hypno-aroma-dream-therapy specialist. Not that anybody asked, but Charlie would have preferred a dolphin. The lavender was for aroma, the chlorine for burning your eyes. Raoul was for irritation.
“Butt up, Marg-a-r-r-retta. Breathe more deeply. Char-r-r-lemagne, head back, chin up, deeper breathing for you also. Arms out. Now flooooaat, gently. The water is your frienda, remember.” Seemed like he rolled the wrong “r’s” or something. One thing was certain, he thought he was a stud. Charlie, which was actually short for Charlemagne but only irritating people called her that, could not fathom why.
What gives here? On the way down, the elevator and halls were as empty of others as the poo
l. Were Charlie and Maggie simply so out of sync in the “regimen,” having skipped earlier tortures, that they had the facilities to themselves? Were there different stages of spa treatments so that no one had the same schedule unless they arrived together? Had the murder of Dr. Judy Judd made everyone but them check out early? Or was everyone else up in the lobby waiting to be questioned in the office by Detective Solomon?
“Nowww, allowww the dreams of wondrous, peaceful places to washa over you, seep inside your heads. Looooz yourselves in what you desire most at the momennnnto—if you could have anything at this momennnnto—let it be so in your minds—and then flooooat off deeper into the real you, you have just begun to discover.” Somebody Charlie’s mother’s age might find his voice sexy.
It was like church, a leap of faith sort of thing, with an ancient hippie-like cast to it. Was Charlie being baptized without knowing it? She had a headache again. She dreamed of floating in a pool of caffeinated espresso while sipping a latte from a straw. She could almost feel the grit of residue from fresh-ground coffee in that hard place to get to between the fourth and little toe, the residue that leaves a stain in the sink when you rinse out your cup.
And then she was trying to remember who Raoul reminded her of—some old actor or a combination. That’s the trouble with working in Hollywood, even on the fringes, your frame of reference sucks. Who …?
“Ahhh, Char-r-r-lemagne, you allow your butta to sink you will surely drown,” Ricardo Montalban crooned in her ear and ratcheted up her lower torso so suddenly she took in more lavender and chlorine at the top end. “You must concentrate anda relax at the same time. Nobody saida perfection of tranquility is easy.” He held her up so she could cough to the point of retching spit—even the bilge seeming to have moved on down her digestive tract. He wore lots of interesting hair on his chest, his arms looked shaved, his mustache quivered when he spoke. All of his hair was white.
If the pool water didn’t wash out her contacts the tears just might.
Ricardo Montalban and Mr. Rogers? Or Count Dracula—who was that guy—Vincent Price. Raoul kind of switched between the two—but Mr. Rogers was not entirely absent either.
The pool was on the lowest level, the number of levels varying by the whim of changing designs and landscaping. It was ground level here and looked out on hillocks of rock formations instead of gardens. If Maggie got into one of her moods at the Sea Spa at the Marina del Sol, she could get real lost and right fast.
Charlie had a room at the convention hotel. Could she possibly get back here after the dinner and take Maggie to her room there, bring her back the next morning? She couldn’t quite trust this place—maybe it was the murder, maybe it was Raoul.
Sue had them back in their spa sweats and tank tops and off to the garden salad lunch, their hair still dripping, almost before Raoul had finished intoning. Did embarrassing people by forcing them to look horrible make it easier to convince them to take enemas? The garden salad was actually not too bad. Cup of soup, crusty bread, and a glass of wine would have helped. They actually served the ship bilge over ice—without lemon and sugar of course. Did the VanZants dine on this stuff? And Sue was their server. She kept track of what they ate on her clipboard.
“So, what did Dr. Judy say last night besides there’s orgasm after menopause?”
“Oh, things like, ‘excuse me, I’m just going to run out and fall face down in the second eddy pool from the left.’”
“Maggie.”
“Things like hormone therapy is the only thing that will save your sanity during menopause. I think Raoul’s a plant, don’t you?”
“You mean like a philodendron? With him, more like seaweed.”
The blossoms in the stem vases today were blue. There were maybe half the people here now than last night. Unoccupied tables were not set up and had no blossoms. Perhaps the crowd that had been here for Dr. Judy left last night.
“You’re afraid to talk to me because you think I’m crazy, huh?”
“No, I’m afraid to talk to you because you think you’re crazy. Maggie, you are suffering from depression due to a screw-up in your chemicals. We just straighten out your chemicals and you’ll be fine.” And what the hell am I to do in the meantime? I’ve got a fancy dinner to go to tonight.
“You’ve got parsley stuck between your two front teeth, Greene. I think Raoul is a spy either for the psych squad or maybe the sheriff’s department.”
Charlie washed her mouth out with iced ship bilge, speared a cucumber slice and thought better of it. “What makes you think that?”
But their conversation was at an end. Apparently they were to be treated to a lecture rather than dessert. Well, this place was advertised as offering an intense program for busy people. And were there any other kind of people who could afford it these days?
Their server, Sue-of-the-clipboard, introduced herself to the tiny gathering in the large room as Sue Rippon. She was probably early forties, trying to pass for early twenties. Athletic and firm extremities, a little too wide at the waist and hips, Sue remembered how to swing her ponytail and smile big, but the bouncy sparkle was fading. Would that be Charlie in six, eight years? Was that Charlie now?
Sue proceeded to explain the importance of cleansing the colon and the wonderful benefits that would ensue. Charlie kind of zoned-out but thought the message was that colons are dirty. Noooo, really? They are the sewers of the body and it was important that they not become the landfill. Hence they needed flushing, scrubbing, and sanitizing. The result would be an enormous increase in energy because all the slime, waste, sludge, and garbage would be scraped away leaving the body renewed and ensuring that the liver and digestive track could be young again after years of refuse abuse. All the nutrients from digesting foods could be absorbed from intestines no longer coated with grease. Sue could say “grease” and conjure nasty images. It was the way she wrinkled a once-perky nose while pruning her lips and widening her eyes. It brought up visions of murk and bubbling, hissing, fuming poisons—stench beyond bearing.
And as a final treat all were presented with a plastic cup of dirt. There was dessert after all.
“Come on, Charlie, it’s medicine.”
“God, you’ll take anything offered you. Without questioning it, or how it will mix with other stuff you’re taking. Can you say Roto-Rooter?”
“I spit out the hormone therapy pill when you weren’t looking. I’ve had nothing today. Or last night. I’m ready to cleanse my system.” Maggie continued to spoon up the dirt and rinse it down with a big gulp of water to make it a clay in her body.
“Even Dr. Judy prescribed hormone replacement therapy, don’t forget. Your face is red and your forehead’s wet. You, girl, are having a hot flash already.”
Okay Greene, what are we doing here? You are at the end of your rope with this depression business because you have other things you want to do. Remember how often Maggie has been patient with you and your life problems?
“Oh shut up. Maggie? I didn’t mean you. I was talking to myself. Maggie?”
But Margaret Mildred Stutzman had already shut Charlie out with a chilling blankness in her eyes.
Six
Today the snappy number wore flats and low riders displaying the jewel in her navel. She sat in the office with Detective Solomon when Charlie went looking for Caroline VanZant.
“Come in, Ms. Greene. I take it you’ve met Ms. Singer?”
Ms. Singer looked blank until he named names. “Charlie Greene, Ruth Ann Singer.”
Charlie Greene. The name she remembered. The face she forgot—trait of an over-organized species. “That’s her, Detective, the woman who didn’t come to the auditorium for Dr. Judd’s presentation, waited outside to kill Judith instead.” Ruth Ann tapped her foot in irritation like a grade-school teacher Charlie’s daughter, Libby, once had. “Don’t let her walk around like this. Put her in jail or something.”
Charlie and the cop exchanged shrugs. Something about this room made people do that. H
e said, “I’m afraid her alibi is airtight.”
“But I told you I have it on the video. She’s the only one who wasn’t in her seat. It couldn’t have been anyone else.”
“I’m looking for Caroline,” Charlie said, happy to ignore her accuser.
Solomon thought Caroline had gone to the auditorium. “Out the hall and to your left. Just follow the signs.”
The auditorium was really the studio and again photos of its transformations and printed explanations of its history were displayed on the walls on either side of the doors. Originally built as a lavish private screening room for an old-time producer, it had become, before it was finished, an even more lavish recording and filming studio for the producer’s heir to record his own music which was in the latest fad—which no one could any longer remember. But the place was lost to the family before the son of privilege could make his mark.
The seats were spacious and the rows tiered, all with a clear view of the stage or screen depending on the need and with no pillars or ceiling supports to interfere with the line of sight. The screen was normally hidden behind a curtain when not in use. A large flat monitor hung to one side of the podium to display succinct and numbered points or “steps” in logic, leaving a large area of stage for the speaker to perform and prance and gesture. It looked rather cold now without the special lighting that would enhance the colors for the TV screens at home.
At a quick glance Charlie figured the room could seat at least fifty people in a semicircle around the stage. Cameras could zoom in on particularly interesting expressions of the audience as well as different angles of the speaker. And the windowed control room from which the director could direct the shots by line of sight as well as from the video bank, was state of the art maybe twenty, thirty years ago.
Caroline discussed the dead doctor’s choreography last night with the lady deputy who had met Charlie and Mitch after the amazing lobster dinner. She followed them around the stage and screen backdrop to discover a door that led to a hall which eventually led to the eddy-pool deck. Charlie stood there as they talked and watched the particular pool in question. It had been drained. She could see nothing important there now either, other than to imagine the Jacuzzi bubbles making Judith Judd’s clothes billow when she was dead. The undrained pools lay dormant but still held water as was normal when no one was in them. Did the murderer turn on the bubbles for the dead doctor?