Garden of the Moongate (16 page)

Disentangling Deb's arm from around his own, Ric started to stand also. "I'll walk you back, Allie."

Uttering a little protest, Deb caught his hand. "But, Patrick, you said you wanted to discuss last quarter's financial statement with me. And I'd really like to get started before dinner. I did so want to get to bed early tonight." Giving Allendre a gloating smile, she seemed to be implying she didn't plan to go to bed alone.

As Allendre turned away in disgust from the silent yet obvious insinuation confusion made her refuse Ric's offer to escort her. "I can walk back alone, thank you," she said stiffly, not looking at him. "I certainly wouldn't want to keep you from your work." As she then said goodbye to Mr. Hopkins, however, her tone lost its former resentful edge. "Thank you again for telling me all those wonderful stories."

"Thank you for listening to them," he replied. "And do come back to visit me again."

Nodding, Allendre walked down the porch stairs and across the neat, lushly green lawn, her shoulders squared, her chin jutting out rather defiantly. Only as she approached the copse of poinciana trees did she glance back involuntarily. Then she wished she hadn't.

Deb and Ric were walking toward his house, and Deb was clinging to his arm, gazing up at him, an expression of nearly imbecilic adoration on her face. Even if they were that eager to be alone together, they could at least have waited until she was out of sight, Allendre thought resentfully. As she turned back to walk on, a sudden weariness made her bend her head, and she bumped directly into a man leaving the copse. It was Derek Harrison, but he no longer looked like the aloof maitre 'd she had always seen in the dining room. With his tie loosened and his collar open, he looked considerably more approachable. Allendre easily returned the warm smile he gave her. But as he looked past her and saw Rick and Deb, Derek Harrison's smile vanished, to be replaced by the grim, strained line of his tightly closed lips. When his hands balled into fists at his sides, Allendre hurried past him, knowing exactly how miserable he was feeling. Obviously, Derek's interest in Deb involved more than mere friendship. The sight of Ric and Deb together seemed to enrage him. It wasn't the first time Allendre had noticed Derek's interest in Deb and what she could only suppose was his jealousy of Ric, though she had never before seen the proper Englishman reveal his feelings so plainly.

With a silent sigh, Allendre trudged through the copse. This tangle of relationships was becoming ridiculous. Everyone was involved with everyone else, especially Ric. There were so many women in his life— Chantel and Deb and the unknown New York socialite, plus who knew how many others. And Allendre knew she couldn't allow herself to become another one of them. She needed to go home to Chicago, where she could get back into a normal routine, where she could begin to forget Ric and the way he made her feel. She couldn't possibly do that when he was so near. Home was where she needed to be. Sighing again, she massaged the nape of her neck with a weary hand. If only her assignment here were finished…

Three days later, when Abigail Chandler answered Allendre's dinnertime knock, the dots of rouge she wore were emphasized by the unusual pallor of her cheeks. Lips atremble, she beckoned Allendre into the room she shared with Myrtle Wainwright.

"Is something wrong, Mrs. Chandler?" Allendre asked worriedly, touching the woman's trembling arm. "Aren't you feeling well?"

Gesturing vaguely, Mrs. Chandler shook her head. "Oh, it isn't me. Myrtle is… oh, I simply don't know what to do or say that would make her feel the least bit better."

"But what's the matter with her?" Allendre exclaimed softly, trying to peer around Abby to see if Mrs. Wainwright was in bed. "Is she ill?"

"Well, no, not ill, exactly, but she's very upset, and you know it's just not like Myrtle to get upset. She's always such a pillar of strength. I depend on her so much, you know, and I just can't think what to do now. She's overwrought, and I've never ever seen her that way, at least not since her husband—his name was Jack—died. Naturally, she was overwrought at such a terrible time, but since then…"

"But why is she anxious now?" Allendre prompted, knowing Abby's tendency to ramble on and on. "What's happened?"

"Why don't you come along and see her, dear?" Mrs. Chandler suggested instead of answering the question. "Maybe you'll know what to do or what to say to her. She might listen to you; she thinks you're such a nice young lady."

Anxious to discover what was wrong, Allendre followed her into the lamplit room. When she saw Myrtle Wainwright sitting dejectedly on the edge of one of the beds, she really became concerned. Myrtle, who had always seemed so calm and capable—even a bit cynical, perhaps—looked years older now. Her eyes were red-rimmed, as if she had been crying, and she was winding a lace handkerchief around and around her frail fingers.

"Allendre's here to go to dinner with us, Myrtle," Abby said softly. "You do want to go, don't you? You really must eat."

Smiling tremulously, Mrs. Wainwright shook her head. "I'm really not hungry at all. Why don't the two of you just go on to dinner without me?"

"Most certainly not!" Abby protested, unusually emphatic. "I wouldn't think of leaving you here alone. Dear, you can't just sit here and brood about this, and besides, you have to eat. We wouldn't want you getting sick, now, would we?"

Unable to stand the mystery a moment longer, Allendre sat down beside Myrtle on the bed. "What's bothering you, Mrs. Wainwright? Why are you so upset?"

Myrtle lifted her shoulders, then let them sag again as she expelled a long, shuddering breath. "I'm just a foolish old woman. Don't pay any attention to me. I'm ashamed of myself for getting in such a state over such a little thing." Her chin wobbled. "I keep trying to tell myself it's no disaster—I only lost my wedding ring."

"Oh, what a shame," Allendre commiserated. "I'm terribly sorry."

Gazing soulfully at her bare left hand, Myrtle shook her head. "It wasn't anything fancy, just a plain gold band. That's all Jack could afford when we got married; and later, when we had money, I couldn't bear the thought of replacing it with one that was fancier and more expensive. I wore that ring for forty-five years. I simply feel naked now without it."

"Of course you do. It only makes sense for you to feel that way, and I don't blame you at all for being so upset," Allendre said gently. "I suppose you don't have any idea where you lost it, do you?"

Surprisingly, Myrtle nodded. "Oh, yes, I know exactly where I lost it, not that it does me any good. You see, I was taking a shower and… well, I've lost a little weight lately, and with soap on my hands the ring simply slipped right off my finger; the running water carried it right down the drain, pretty as you please. So it's gone forever now, no hope of ever seeing it again."

"But that's not necessarily true," Allendre disagreed, looking up at Abby. "I used to work at an old hotel during summer vacations from college. A woman lost a diamond earring in a drain once, and the maintenance man found it for her easily enough. He had to take the pipes apart, but once he'd done that, the earring was easy to find."

"Well, I thought I'd heard of people doing that," Abby spoke up, her hands aflutter in her uncertainty. "But when we told that young woman at the desk about the ring, she said there was no way it could ever be found. I guess they just have different kinds of pipes here than they had at that hotel where you worked, dear."

Allendre grimaced almost comically. "I'm not absolutely sure, of course, but I think plumbing is about the same everywhere. In the hotel where I worked there was a sort of J-shaped piece of pipe right under the bathtub drain, and the maintenance man found that earring right where the pipe curved around and up. It had caught in there."

"Then they must not have J-shaped pipes in this hotel," Myrtle said hopelessly. "Because that Miss Hopkins said she was sure my ring had been washed down into the waste-water system."

"Oh, what does she know?" Allendre said impatiently, rising to her feet. "Could I see your bathtub? The old hotel where I worked had nice little doors in the walls behind all the bathtub faucets so the maintenance man could work on them if something went wrong."

"I've never noticed any little door, have you, Myrtle?" Abby asked; then, seeing her friend's woebegone expression, she added more cheerily, "But it can't hurt to look for one, now, can it?"

Allendre snapped her fingers. "Now I remember. The little doors were on the other side of the walls, behind the bathtubs. So if your bathroom here is arranged like mine, the door should be in the back wall of your closet."

That was where they found it. About two feet square, it looked as if it had been painted over several times and wouldn't be easy to open. But it was there, and it provided Myrtle with a hope she hadn't had before.

"Well, I wonder if that snooty Miss Hopkins even knows about this," she remarked, her hands on her hips, her eyes shining with some of her former spunkiness. "And I wonder if she'd be willing to send the maintenance man up here if we told her about it."

"I'll go ask her," Allendre offered hastily, knowing Deb would probably refuse. Quite a bit of prodding, she thought, would be required to change her mind. But the threat of going to Ric with the problem should do the trick nicely, and Allendre wouldn't hesitate to talk to him if Deb proved too difficult. Giving both women a confident smile, she went to the door. "Don't worry, now. I'm sure Miss Hopkins can be persuaded to see that everything possible is done to help find the ring."

Deb wasn't at the desk, though, nor was she in her office. "She had a little headache and left early this afternoon, miss," Loretta explained to Allendre two minutes later. "But perhaps I could be of some help to you?"

Nothing ventured, nothing gained, Allendre decided. "I wanted to talk to her about Mrs. Wainwright's ring. I don't know if you heard anything about it—it went down the drain while she was taking a shower."

"Oh, yes, I heard her telling Miss Hopkins about that. But Miss Hopkins told her there was nothing she could do."

"Yes, but…"

"Why don't I let you talk to Mr. Shannon about the problem?" Loretta suggested, trying to be helpful. "He's in the office right now, as a matter of fact."

"Oh, is he?" Allendre said, her voice strained. Guided by an instinct for self-preservation, she had been avoiding Ric for the past three days. It wouldn't be wise to seek him out deliberately now; yet she didn't know what else she could do. She didn't want to disappoint Myrtle, who was waiting up in her room at that very moment, hoping somebody would at least try to find her ring. Reminding herself of that, she finally nodded. "Well, okay, I'll…"

"I'll get him for you," Loretta said, going toward the door immediately and knocking. "I'm sure he'd want to know about this situation anyway."

After Loretta stepped into the office, Allendre unnecessarily smoothed her golden hair, then straightened the collar of her white georgette blouse and brushed an imaginary piece of lint from her best black skirt. With extreme reluctance she lifted her head when the office door opened again, and, as she had feared, simply seeing Ric made her heart beat with dizzying rapidity. As usual, he looked too good. His cream-colored turtleneck sweater emphasized the dark smoothness of his skin, and the dark brown trousers he wore didn't totally conceal the muscular lines of his long legs. He smiled warmly at her, and she smiled back but clasped her hands together to hide their embarrassing shakiness.