Sea Change (The Nina Bannister Mysteries Book 1) (18 page)

Nina had no idea which.

She could not, though, deny that Eve Ivory The Magnificent had, if nothing else, a touch for the dramatic.

Just to the left of an anteroom was the grand entrance hall.
 
This would have been used for dancing.
 
Above and overlooking the dance floor itself, was an area ten feet deep and fifteen feet long, partitioned by a brass rail, where the orchestra would have sat.

There was only a speaker’s platform now.

Nina could not avoid the urge to visualize Mussolini stepping out of the palace doors and onto a balcony, two million Italian fascists cheering beneath him.

There were hardly two million straight chairs on the dance floor, though; there were only about fifty.
 
Reserved for the town’s elite,

Of which, she supposed, she was one, since she had been allowed into the room. These chairs were now filling as the clock approached eight.

Nina found a seat. Allana immediately saw her and joined her, sitting on her left.

Then came Macy and Paul, to her right.

“This is so exciting!” gushed Allana.

She looked beyond Macy and whispered to Paul:

“Do you know what she’s going to say?”

He shook his head:

“No.
 
Not exactly. Whatever the plan is, I think it’s going to have the school we want.”

“What about,” Allana asked, “The Auberge des Arts?”

He nodded:

“I lobbied hard for it. I think she’s going to do it.
 
It’s just––”

“Just what, Paul?” asked Nina.

“—there have always been other people involved.
 
People I never got to meet. People with a lot of money.”

Uh oh, thought Nina.

“I think she’s been trying to pull everything together under some sort of theme
 
But she’s never let me in on the whole thing. I don’t think anybody in the town knows.
 
She called me only a few hours ago.
 
She said it was a ‘done deal’ and that we would all be surprised.”

Uh oh
, thought Nina.

And then Eve Ivory appeared.

She walked out of the wall.

Then she approached the podium, grasped it, and looked down at the people below her, like a leopard looking down at the meat department of a supermarket.

“Hello, Bay St. Lucy!” she said, tapping once on the microphone and beaming as her voice filled the hall.

“Thank you
so
much for coming tonight!”

There was some scattered applause and murmurings.

“I’m so happy to share with you the fact that we have come to the end of a difficult—but immensely productive—three weeks.”

Eve Ivory was dressed in ivory but did not look like Eve—who, Nina had always surmised, wore nothing at all earlier in her life and something unfashionable later.
 
Warming herself behind the early evening bonfire that was her smile, she did not, on the other hand, look anything like Benito Mussolini.

She looked rather like The Ice Princess from
The Lion The Witch and the Wardrobe.

There, in one of those jacket pockets!
 
Nina found herself guessing:
 
Turkish Delight!

“Before continuing, I wish to thank in particular several of the town’s citizens who have made this entire project not only possible, but immensely thrilling.
 
First, there is of course the Mayor of Bay St. Lucy, Tom Waterston.
 
Tom, will you please stand.”

Tom Waterson did, and waved.

Then he sat down.

“Chief of Aldermen, Lucias Johnson.”

Same.

“All of the members of the City Council who are with us tonight.”

This of course included Nina, so she rose.

And then sat.

“And so many others, but, finally, my ‘right hand man,’ as I’ve been calling him: your school superintendent, Mr. Paul Cox.”

Paul rose, to the beaming adoration of Macy, who, through the strength of her grip upon his hand as he smiled and waved to the crowd, gave Nina a good indication of how the two might have spent the phantom forty-five minutes.

Breakfast indeed.

Then he sat down.

A moment for everything to calm down.

Then Eve Ivory, to the business at hand.

“I have now to say a few words concerning—well, some very difficult matters. You all know the stories concerning my family. These are matters that preceded me, that happened here, in Bay St. Lucy, before my birth. I was not responsible for them.
 
I did, on the other hand, fall heir to their consequences. My life, from its earliest moments, was not an easy one. I had many difficulties. I persevered, however, and with luck and fortitude, did well for myself. Much of my good fortune has been lavished on me by my late husband, who, I am deeply sorry to say, cannot be here at this podium to address you.”

Pause.

Collective breathing first from Eve Ivory from above, then from Bay St. Lucy from below.

“As a result of all things past, though, a circuitous and highly complex assortment of events has given me the privilege, and rather awesome responsibility, few individuals in our time are called upon to bear.
 
In most towns and villages, the ownership of property divides, subdivides, passes from one generation to another, from one heir to another, so that no one individual or family owns more than an acre, a five acre block, a building, an estate, etc. But I have recently found myself, according to the terms of my grandfather’s will, in proprietorship of a great deal of the village of Bay St. Lucy.
 
My first inclination, upon hearing the
 
news, was disbelief. I had no idea how to respond to such a challenge.
 
But after much thought—and, yes, prayer, for that came into it, also—I decided to meet the challenge head on.
 
I decided to come here, meet you, work with your leaders, and prepare a plan that, were my particular land holdings to be scattered through the hands of multitudinous owners, would be impossible to fulfill. I’ve listened to many proposals, all of them thoughtful, all of them clearly meant to help ensure a prosperous Bay St. Lucy. Some of these plans I have been able to incorporate into the vision you will be sharing within the next minutes. Others, regrettably, have fallen by the wayside—for now. Not, I promise you, forever.”

A movement forward toward the rail, the podium rocking somewhat.

“I simply must point out, though, and I wish you to keep this always in your minds.
 
The long term goal, of any master plan, is the welfare not only of you, but of your children. You want beautiful Bay St. Lucy not only to survive today, in the hard economic times that are our environment, but to prosper and grow into tomorrow.
 
You want your children’s lot to be better than yours; and their children’s lot to better than theirs; and on, and on, into the future.”

Applause.

More applause.

Everyone standing now.

Eve Ivory nodding, and finally, palms down, gesturing for everyone to be seated.

Everyone was seated.

Finally she said:

“And so, all of these things said, dear fellow citizens—the time has come.
 
The work has been done.
 
The vision has been completed. And I now give you:
 
the Bay St. Lucy of tomorrow!”

Lights in the hall went down, and they could have been in a darkened theater, except for the filtered light seeping like dust from the green house beyond the great windows.

The faint rasp of static began echoing through the room, and two vast screens fell from the ceiling.

Lights played across the screens, glowing red, yellow, blue, green—

––then blinding white, as the echo turned into a deep sonorous voice, which surrounded them, leaping in and out of rich orchestral music much as Nina’s dolphins leapt into and out of the ocean waves.

The dolphins turned into words, which, playing their way down the coastline in rich orchestral chords, were:

“MEGAVENTURES INCORPORATED PRESENTS:
 
BAYWORLD!
 
A NEW CONCEPT IN VACATION EXISTENCE!

The music swelled, thundered, rolled, eddied slightly, then mushroomed into a gigantic cloud of melody, lightning, and avalanche, overwhelming the people below and within it as though it were an avalanche of C chords and violin arpeggios.

Meanwhile buildings began to fill the screen.

Massive buildings.

High rise buildings.

Sandstone in color, they appeared, disappeared, dissolved one into another, opened out, zeroed in, and continually invited, invited, invited, revealing themselves as all that could be conceived in a quest for HAPPINESS HAPPINESS HAPPINESS forever, with everything that might be wanted hovering there before one, waiting to be experienced.

THE NEWEST CONCEPT FROM MEGAVENTURES, BAYWORLD EXPLODES UPON THE BEAUTIFUL GULF COAST WITH A MAGIC ALL ITS OWN, ABSOLUTELY UNIQUE IN ITS RICH BLENDS OF CONCEPTS IN VACATION LIVING HERETOFORE UNHEARD OF, HERETOFORE UNIMAGINED!

––while the images went on.

This screen, that screen.

The huge hotels, Nina could now tell, were to be built exactly on the ocean front.

Where her small shack now stood.

They even had names.

Amber Breeze.

Bayview.

Dolphin Rider.

THE FINEST TREASURES OF BOTH SEA AND LAND:
 
CAPTAIN KIDD’S
 
FISHING PIER, TO BE THE LONGEST ON THE AMERICAN COAST, EXTENDING MORE THAN A MILE INTO THE BEAUTIFUL TURQUOISE WATERS OF THE GULF OF MEXICO!
 
LAGUNA SLIPS, THE WORLD’S MOST LAVISH AND WELL EQUIPPED YACHT HARBOR:
 
DUNES ’36, THE FIRST GOLF COURSE IN THE UNITED STATES DESIGNED EXCLUSIVELY BY TIGER WOODS HIMSELF, AND MEANT TO HOST, IN FALL OF 2016, THE FIRST ‘TIGER WOODS BAYSHORE CLASSIC
 
GOLF TOURNAMENT,’ GRAND PRIZE WINNINGS OF MORE THAN TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS!

And there it was on the screens in front of them.
 
The verdant putting greens overlooking deep blue ocean vistas. There was Tiger Woods himself, his beaming visage somehow transplanted to the beach, with yachts and mega-story hotels behind them.

This all continued for some time.

The music was so loud, and the darkness so complete, that not much could be ascertained concerning the response of the audience.

That was probably good
, thought Nina, who had busied herself by counting hotels, and was now up to five of them.

What had the last been called?

Oh yes.

The Waverider.

It had, she was able to note by looking at the screen on the right, an indoor Olympic-sized pool on the twenty seventh floor.

How nice
, she found herself thinking.

Wake up in one’s room on the fifty fourth floor; do a few weights and calisthenics in the gym on the forty third floor; a spot of tea in Burmaland, the small breakfast restaurant on the twenty ninth floor; and then finally a nice dip on the twenty seventh floor, swimming in water while looking down at water.

One could work one’s way down, the entire day, the Jacuzzi on the eighteenth floor, the beauty salon on the fifteenth floor, the small African Market Place Specialty Grocery Outlet on the ninth floor, the indoor driving range on the fourth floor, The Cinema Multiplex Sixteen, on the third floor—

–so that by nine or ten P.M., one would, upon staggering out of the hotel, have only just enough energy left to stagger back in again and take the elevator home, ready to begin the entire descent yet again the following day, following, much like Dante, concentric circles ever deeper into the Hell that was now to be Bay St. Lucy.

AND OF COURSE THE CENTER OF IT ALL!
 
THE PIECE DE RESISTANCE!
 
THE PLACE TO BE SEEN, FOR THE DECADE TO COME! LODESTAR OF CINEMA ICONS TO SPORTS HEROES TO POLITICAL LEADERS TO THE FRANK SINATRAS AND DEAN MARTINS OF THE THE TWENTY FIRST CENTURY---
SEA-VEGAS
, THE MOST OPULENT GAMING CENTER, THE MOST RICHLY DECORATED AND FANTASTICALLY ADORNED CASINO—IN THE WORLD!

And there it was.

There it was, all spread out before them.

The very rooms they had just been walking through.

The dining rooms, the galleries, the sun decks, the porches, the studies—

––these rooms were now being shown on the massive screens, but overlaid with crap tables, roulette wheels, and rows after rows of slot machines.

That was to be the center of Bay St. Lucy.

A casino.

Tom Broussard’s words came back to her as the “virtual tour” continued.

“The story is not over until it has taken the worst possible turn of events.”

The lights were rising now.

The screen was depicting a sunset and three banally idiotic HAPPYPEOPLE, a robot woman and a robot man and a robot child, all hand in hand, watching the sun set into the waves, not caring that such a thing might be more probable on the Pacific coast than here on the Gulf

“The story is not over until it has taken the worst possible turn of events.”

A few more bars of music and then, done.

Lights up.

Movie over.

So the presentation is over,
Nina found herself thinking.

But the story is not over.

And the worst possible turn of events—

––is still to come.

For a while there was absolute silence.

Then Allana Delafosse rose.

Very slowly, she lifted her arm, and pointed her hand up at the woman who stood above them:

“What—have you done?”

The tone of the words, the expression on Allana’s face—they were all ghastly, as though delivered in the Voice of the Dead, in a combination of supplication and damnation.

“What have you done?”

There they hung, not seeming to have reached the demi-heaven from which Eve Ivory was sending down her decrees, but still some few feet above the graveyard where sat the few corpses that were still remnants of what had been Bay St. Lucy.