Fleur De Lies (11 page)

I laced the fingers of my free hand through his and held tight for
a long, consoling moment. “You were a blessing to Solange, Osmond,”
I said in a quiet voice. “But you weren’t her screaming chicken. You were her angel.”

He bobbed his head as if dismissing the idea, which is when I noticed what I hadn’t noticed before. “You’re not wearing your cervical collar anymore!”

“Nope. Pulling the lever on that one-armed bandit all afternoon did my neck more good than a month’s worth of physical therapy. Pain’s all gone. See?” He swiveled his head left, right, forward, back. “Good as new.” He winced as he rubbed his arm. “Now the only pain I’ve got is in my elbow.”

“So how’d you do at the casino? Were you as lucky as you felt?”

“Nah. Margi was the only big winner.”

“No kidding? The church raffle, now this? Good for Margi!”

He lowered his brows and tucked in his lips. “We’re not so sure it’s good.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t wanna be spreading rumors, so the only thing I’ll say about the matter is—unexpected windfalls aren’t always what they’re cracked up to be.”

“Oh, c’mon, Osmond. You can’t leave me dangling like this.”

He locked his lips with an imaginary key. “Talk to your grandmother. She’ll fill you in.”

Both baffled and alarmed by his statement, I made my way toward the lobby, taking note of other guests who had wandered into
the lounge for conversation and discounted drinks. Woody was hold
ing court in the center of the room, surrounded by distinguished-looking white-haired and bald gentlemen with sober demeanors and serious eyes. Cal was deep in discussion with a group of men his own age, occupying the settees and chairs next to the port windows. I wondered if the two opposing parties had conducted their business meeting yet, because if they had, it didn’t look as if they’d resolved anything. As I neared the exit, I passed good old Irv, slouched in an armchair, cane braced against the cushion, dark glasses still hugging his face, highball glass nestled in his lap, with three empties sitting on the table in front of him. I gave him a little finger wave as I passed, but when he didn’t wave back, I figured he was either dozing behind his shades or too impaired to lift his hand. Either way, it looked as if Irv was planning to indulge in a liquid diet this evening rather than the four courses the rest of us would be served.

“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Miceli,” the purser commiserated when I made
my inquiry at the front desk. “Mrs. Saint-Sauveur hasn’t responded to
your request yet, but I promise to let you know the moment something comes in. It shouldn’t be long. She’s ever so good about answering her email.”

We both winced as feedback blared out over the speaker system.
KREEE … KREEEOOO!
“
Bon soir, mesdames et messieurs.”
Heavy breath
ing. More feedback.
“
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. For your dining pleasure, the restaurant doors are now open.”

Knowing what would come next, I idled at the front desk in an effort to avoid the stampede from the lounge, but to my amazement,
there was no stampede. A few of Cal’s cremationists trickled out from
the lounge, but they were well-mannered and orderly, and proceeded down the corridor without throwing one elbow, cutting anyone off, or accidentally tripping each other on purpose. They were so civil, it nearly brought tears to my eyes.

“Anything wrong, Mrs. Miceli?” asked the purser. “You look so …
forlorn.”

“I’m just surprised that my group is being so laid back this evening. They usually fight their way to the front of the line when the dinner bell rings.”

“In the lounge, are they?”

I nodded.

“Enjoying Happy Hour?”

“Yup.”

“Brilliant.” Bending toward me over the counter, she remarked in a confidential tone, “The discounted drink specials always cause a bit of a lag in response time.” Her expression turned solicitous as she
looked beyond me. “Blimey,” she whispered. “Poor Mr. and Mrs. Martin.
The dishy girl who fell off the cliff was in their party. I can’t imagine how dreadful they must feel about the accident.”

I turned around nonchalantly to observe Victor being ushered
from the reading library by Bobbi and Dawna, who’d each grabbed
an arm and were assisting him across the lobby. Virginia trailed
behind, stone-faced and aloof, her makeup untouched by tears, appearing ill-tempered and bored.

“He looks devastated,” the purser rasped.

And so did the girls. They were both red-eyed and weepy and didn’t look as if they’d bothered to retouch their lip gloss or comb their hair, which said a lot about their mental state. They actually looked crippled by grief, which kinda surprised me because, based on their performance last night, I wasn’t convinced they were capable of being affected by someone else’s misfortune.

Did they regret acting so snotty to each other at their last meal together? Victor’s proposed bonus had really brought out the worst in them. But if Krystal’s assessment of her sales record had been correct, and Bobbi and Dawna
knew
she was the undisputed top dog, why had they gone out of their way to insult her? I mean, why waste your breath if you already know who’s going to win?

As the foursome entered the main corridor, I realized that Krystal’s death had changed the entire dynamic of the Mona Michelle group. The prize would now be awarded to one of the other contenders because, as of this afternoon, the “sure thing” was out of the picture.

A frisson of unease pricked my spine as I watched the girls disappear.

Gee
. How convenient.

ten

Four hours upriver from
C
audebec-en-Caux sits the capital of U
pper Normandy—a medieval port famous for having the highest church spire in France and infamous for having burned a nineteen-year-old peasant girl at the stake. It’s called Rouen, and when we moored alongside its north bank after breakfast the following morning, the sky was clad with angry storm clouds that were drenching the city in a torrential downpour.

From behind my balcony doors I looked out at the rain lashing the pavement and tried to decide which pair of favorite sandals I’d be forced to ruin on our port walk.

Knock, knock, knock
.

“We voted to skip the walkin’ tour,” said Nana when I answered the door. “The final tally was eleven yeas, one nay, and one abstention.”

“Eleven and two? Isn’t that
…
thirteen votes?”

“Yup.”

I regarded her narrowly. “You only have twelve people in your group.”

“We got thirteen now. We’re makin’ Jackie an honorary member on account of them two blondes are tryin’ to kill her, so we’re puttin’ her under our protection.”

Oh, God
. I pulled her into my room. “No one is trying to kill Jackie.”

“We figure it’s better bein’ safe than sorry.”

I sat her on the bed. “Her conspiracy theory is imaginary. She’s inserting herself where she doesn’t belong because she doesn’t know how
not
to make everything about herself. I know. I was married to her. Him. Her.”

“She says if she’d been anywhere near them girls on the top of that cliff yesterday, she woulda been the one what fell.”

“Did she tell you what prompted her to think her fellow reps are trying to kill her?”

“She says they was lookin’ at her funny.”

“How does that signal murderous intent?”

“She explained it to us real good, dear, but I can’t recall what she said now. We was all on the edge of our seats though. She really got our hearts poundin’.”

Alarm bells went off in my head. “No good is going to come of this, Nana. Trust me. I can feel it in my bones.”

“Maybe what you’re feelin’ is a touch of rheumatism, dear. The rain can bring it on real bad.”

“How do you propose to guard a six-foot transsexual?”

She regarded me over the tops of her wirerims. “We was plannin’ on wingin’ it.”

I rolled my eyes. “So in a concerted attempt to keep Jackie safe, you all voted to skip the port walk and miss exploring one of the oldest towns in Normandy?”

“We’re stayin’ on the boat on account of it’s rainin.’ Folks don’t wanna risk ruinin’ their orthotic inserts, ’cuz once you get ’em wet, they’re not worth beans no more, and Medicare don’t pay for no more than one set a year.”

“Oh.” Viewed in that light, they’d actually made a very calculated, reasonable choice. Wow. What was up with that? “So have you given any thought as to how you’re going to entertain yourselves if you stay aboard ship all day?”

“There’s a whiteboard in the lobby what lists all the onboard activities what’s happenin’ in the lounge all day long, dear. Food tastin’. Lectures. Demonstrations. Art lessons. And a couple of time slots sayin’ ‘surprise session.’ George says it sounds a lot like boot camp, only without the guns or latrine duty.” She peeked at her watch. “I hate to cut this short, dear, but Tilly’s savin’ a seat for me in the front row, so I gotta run.” She hopped off the bed.

I held up a finger to detain her. “Two things before you go. I was
going to ask you to make a special effort to keep Osmond’s spirits up,
but if he was feeling engaged enough to conduct a vote this morning,
he must be feeling more like his old self, right?”

“Osmond didn’t conduct no vote, dear. It was Osmond what abstained. He’s so twitchy right now, he got a notion to give up his official duties until he’s not feelin’ so ‘mentally distracted’.”

“So who did the honors?”

“The Dicks. One of ’em called for the vote while the other one done the tally.” She gave her head a woeful shake. “Them two’s gonna make a real sham of the democratic process. The one don’t know
how to state the proposition and the other don’t know how to add. It took
’em five rounds to get the tally right on account of Bernice decided to tweet her vote, so the final count never jived. She never would of pulled no stunt like that with Osmond ’cuz he woulda disqualified her for votin’ irregularities. He don’t tolerate no funny business with the electoral process. So’s all I’m gonna say is, if the Dicks have to fill in for Osmond for more than a day or two, it’ll be the end of the group as we know it. Them Dicks don’t got a half a brain between ’em.” She regarded me with pleading eyes. “You got any idea how much longer Osmond’s gonna be mentally distracted?”

I offered her a reassuring smile. “Not much longer, I hope. Which brings me to my second point. What’s the scoop with Margi? Os
mond suggested that her winning streak at the casino was more curse
than blessing. He said you’d clue me in.”

She shuffled back to the bed and sat down. She exhaled a deep sigh.
“I hate to break it to you, dear, but Margi’s turned into one of them folks what does the same thing over and over again.”

I gasped. “She’s been diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder?”

“Nope. She’s one of them addicts.”

“MARGI?”

“I never thought it could happen to one of my own friends. Stuff
like this is only s’posed to happen to movie stars recoverin’ from back
ailments.”

“Oh my God. Is it work related? She has such easy access to drugs at the clinic. What’s she addicted to? Oxycontin? Vicodin? Percocet?”

“The BBWS Network.”

I waited a beat. “What?”

“The Big Beautiful Woman’s Shoppin’ Network. It’s on account of that shoppin’ spree what the church raffled off. Ever since she won, she can’t do nuthin’ but buy, buy, buy. We’re thinkin’ she needs an intervention.”

Unh-oh
. Sounded like she got zapped. I knew such things happened to people—that a person’s life could change in the blink of an eye. But I thought the transformation typically revolved around an experience that was more deeply religious than a church raffle. “You’re telling me that Margi had such an awesome time at Farm and Fleet when she selected her new wardrobe, that she somehow
activated a latent buying gene that’s turned her into a flaming shop
-aholic?”

Nana looked puzzled. “She didn’t buy no new wardrobe at Farm and Fleet.”

“Then how did she come by all her spiffy new clothes?”

“I just told you. The Big Beautiful Woman’s Shoppin’ Network.”

I eyed her narrowly. “If she didn’t buy clothes with her five-thousand-dollar gift certificate, what
did
she buy?”

“Flat-screen TVs. One for every room in her house. She didn’t have no high-definition megapixel set before, so now that she can see what all them shoppin’ items really look like, she’s buyin’ everythin’ in sight, from every room in the house, twenty-four hours a day.” She lowered her voice to a library whisper. “Even from the potty. She’s got her sleep cycle so topsy-turvy, she’s been real bound up.”

“So … if I’m understanding this correctly, none of you are happy she was the big winner at the casino yesterday because … you’re afraid she’ll blow it on things that make her look chic and elegant?”

“Them winnin’s are just gonna feed her addiction, Emily. We couldn’t hardly pry her away from them TVs of hers before. Now that she’s got cash to burn, she’s gonna go straight to the dogs. We’ll never get to see her no more.” She glanced down at her hands dejectedly. “We’ll probably have to start buyin’ our own hand sanitizer.”

“How much money did she win?”

“Ten thousand Euros.”

“WHAT?” I tried to do a quick currency conversion in my head but got hung up on all the zeroes. “How much is that in US dol—”

“Thirteen thousand forty-eight dollars. And eighty cents. She just
kept movin’ around the room, hittin’ the jackpot on everythin’ she touched. The management finally asked her to leave on account of they was runnin’ out of money to refill the machines. I never seen nuthin’ like it. But I’m glad we left early ’cuz that give us a chance to see the beach.”

“Oh my God! How come she wasn’t shouting the news from the rafters last night?”

“She was too busy carryin’ on about nosebleeds. You seen her. No one on earth gets more of a buzz talkin’ about blood than Margi.”

“So is she planning to spend some of her winnings in Paris? Think of the shopping spree she can have, Nana. Yves Saint Laurent. Chanel. Christian Dior. Givenchy.”

“She don’t plan to try on no clothes in Paris.”

“Why not?”

“’Cuz gettin’ in and outta clothes is a pain. The fun part for Margi is pickin’ up the phone and makin’ that call. The one-on-one contact with the gal what takes her order makes her feel like she’s gettin’ real old-fashioned customer service.”

She checked her watch again and leaped to her feet, panic in her eyes. “Dang. Tilly’s probably havin’ to use her cane to fend off folks what’s fightin’ for my chair. I gotta run.”

I hurried ahead of her to open the door.

“Are you goin’ on the walkin’ tour?” she asked as she rushed into the corridor.

“You bet.”

“Would you take a picture of the site where them fellas burned St. Joan of Arc? I promised the gals at the Legion of Mary that I’d bring back authentic photos, so they’ll revoke my membership if I show up empty-handed.”

“I’m sure they won’t penalize you for weather-related issues beyond your control.”

“They might. I forced ’em to brush up on the life of St. Joan by makin’ ’em sit through that 1948 tearjerker movie with Ingrid Bergman. At the end of two and a half hours, Lena Eggebraaten was so worn out from cryin’, her eyes swelled shut behind her trifocals.”

“She didn’t realize St. Joan was going to die?”

“She didn’t realize the dang movie was gonna be so borin’. There wasn’t no special effects. Not a one. Lena takes her grandkids to see them
Transformer
flicks, so she was missin’ the thrill of watchin’ the screen explode in digital 3-D and Dolby surround sound.”

The corridor started getting congested as passengers ventured out
of their cabins toting raingear and umbrellas.

KREEEOOOO
!
Bzzzzt
…
Bzzzzzt
. “Good morning, ladies and gentle
men, and welcome to Rouen. A reminder to those of you who’ll be participating in our port walk this morning. Please stop by the front desk to pick up your port passes, headphones, and receivers. The tour is set to commence in fifteen minutes. Thank you.”

I hurried back into my cabin, riffled through my shoes, jammed my feet into my least favorite pair of wedges, threw on my raincoat, stuffed my umbrella into my shoulder bag, and joined the crowd that was surging toward the lobby.

Mayhem surrounded the front desk. Hands yanking pre-packaged earbuds out of bins. Cellophane wrappers being ripped. Port passes flying out of mailbox slots. Receivers being slapped into waiting hands. Names being yelled to the purser and her assistant over
the counter. I’d intended to inquire about the status of our email
request
before leaving the boat, but the situation was so chaotic, I figured I’d have better luck when I got back.

I announced my name to the assistant purser, picked up my port pass, hung a receiver around my neck, pulled a package of earbuds from the bin, snugged my hood over my head, and headed down the gangway to join the guests clustered beneath their umbrellas along the embankment. Happily, the pelting rain had dwindled to a light but steady shower, so my feet weren’t getting as wet as I thought they would. Rob stood off to the side, studying a clipboard beneath his oversized tour director’s umbrella. I hastened over to him.

“Any word back on Krystal’s autopsy report yet?”

He regarded me blankly, as if trying to figure out who I was.

“Emily Miceli? I’m on the tour?”

“Oh, sure. Emily. Sorry. Names and faces are my downfall, but I’m working on it.”

A tour director who was bad with names and faces was a bit like an accountant who was bad with adding and subtracting, but hey, what did I know? “You’re not alone,” I sympathized. “I think a majority of people are bad with names and faces.” But fortunately, they were wise enough to enter professions where remembering names and faces
wasn’t the most essential part of their work
.

“Yeah. It’s hell. No sooner do a few guests start looking familiar than they leave, and you have to start all over again with a different group.”

“I guess that’s why you encourage us to wear our name tags.”

“It’d be a lot more convenient if we could print guest names on
baseball caps. That way we wouldn’t always be staring at people’s chests.
The company gets a lot of complaints from the ladies about that.” He paused. “I’m sorry. What was your question?”

“Krystal’s autopsy?”

“Right. I received a call just before I left my cabin but haven’t had a chance to tell anyone other than Mr. and Mrs. Martin. She apparently died from a brain hemorrhage.”

My mouth fell open.
Uff-da
. I hadn’t seen
that
coming.

“The report states that the hemorrhage was so massive, she probably died instantly, so she was most likely dead even before she fell off the cliff. In fact, the police might have to amend their initial report to state that it was her sudden death that caused her fall rather than her poor choice of footwear.”

“Oh, my God. I don’t know what to say.” Other than I was relieved
foul play hadn’t been a factor in her death, and I was sorry I’d looked at Bobbi and Dawna last night with mounting suspicion.

Krystal had died from natural causes.

There were no killers in our midst, which meant Jackie was in the protective custody of the gang for no reason at all and would therefore be treated to the full brunt of Bernice’s tirades all day.