“So Vanessa used the wall switch and closed the door. Is that what you’re saying?”
“That’s right. Now picture this. Vanessa’s in the freezer looking for the brownies. She finally finds them and she’s opening the package when the lights click off. Naturally, she panics and runs for the door, but it’s pitch-black, and she trips over that case of lobster tails and crashes into the corner of the table.”
Hal reflected for a moment. “That tracks, Alan. Even better than Columbo. Vanessa used to love reruns of Columbo.”
“Buck up, old bean.” Jayne patted Hal’s shoulder. “I think you’d better stay in our guest room tonight so we can keep an eye on you.”
Hal struggled to his feet. “No, I’m okay. I’ll just take the rest of this brandy with me, if Alan’ll let me.”
“Go ahead, Hal.” Alan got up to offer a steadying arm. “Laureen and I’ll walk you home. And if you need another bottle just bang on our door.”
They all said good-bye to Moira and Grace and went out.
“Shall we hold the elevator?” Paul offered at the third floor. Laureen shook her head. “We’ll take the stairs down to our place. It’s good exercise.”
Ellen stared glumly at the indicator light as they passed Johnny’s unit on the fourth floor. He was a two-timing rat and she was glad he was gone, but she hoped he was safe in Italy. Those plane tickets bothered her. She’d driven him to the airport a couple of times, and before leaving he’d always checked to make sure he had his tickets.
Number five flashed next and Ellen shivered a bit. Had Clayton and Rachael made it down the mountain on the snowmobile? Or were they at the bottom of a ravine somewhere, under a pile of twisted wreckage? The sixth floor was Betty’s and thinking about her didn’t make Ellen feel any better. At least number seven was Marc’s floor.
“See you tomorrow.” Marc gave a wave and Ellen sighed with relief. Eight was hers and nine was Jayne and Paul’s. But ten was the spa and that’s where they’d found the hand in the pool. Ellen blinked hard. Suddenly this whole building seemed like a tomb to her, or a death trap for those still living.
“Ellen?” Walker tapped her on the shoulder and she almost jumped out of her skin. “We’re home.”
“Oh, sorry. I must have been daydreaming.” Ellen turned and managed a smile for Jayne and Paul as she stepped off the elevator.
“Night, Ellen, honey.” Jayne gave a little wave. “See you tomorrow, Walker.”
As Walker unlocked her door, Ellen turned to watch the indicator light on the elevator. The up-arrow glowed, then flickered off at the ninth floor, where it would stay until morning unless somebody called for it in the middle of the night.
“Ellen? Coming?” Standing by the open door, Walker looked concerned. Ellen forced a smile. As she stepped inside and closed the door behind her, the indicator light began to glow again as Betty’s secret friend rode to the sixth floor for another long night of surveillance.
Moira released her tight chignon and ran her fingers through her hair. This upswept hairstyle hurt like hell, but it was worth it if Grace didn’t notice her wrinkles. She scowled at her reflection in the mirror of the white French vanity Grace had bought her for her birthday. It was rumored to have once belonged to Marilyn Monroe, and Moira hadn’t had the heart to tell Grace that claiming reproductions had once belonged to the rich and famous was a thriving business. Once, when a client had specifically requested a Napoleon Bonaparte bed, Moira had spent months looking. She’d found six, each with papers testifying that the little dictator had slept in them. And every one had been a fake.
The workmen had delivered the vanity while she was at work and when Moira had come home, she’d found it sitting in the bedroom with a note from Grace stuck in the corner of the mirror. Moira had left it there. It said, This once belonged to MM. You’re not blond, but you’re still my bombshell.
Moira pulled open the drawer to take out her hairbrush. The rollers on the drawer were made of a plastic that hadn’t existed when Marilyn was alive, but she’d never tell Grace. She was brushing her hair, preparing to pull it back up into its uncomfortable twist, when Grace came in. “Leave it down, Moira,” she suggested gently. “You’re not going to have any hair left if you keep pulling it up so tight, and I like it better down, anyway. Think we ought to go up and check on Hal?”
“Hal’s a big boy, Gracie. He can take care of himself.”
“I suppose so,” Grace sighed, “but he had a lot of that brandy.”
“Don’t worry. He’ll come down if he needs anything, and if we hear any loud crashes, we’ll run upstairs.”
“Moira? Could I ask you a question?”
Moira studied Grace’s anxious expression. “What is it, Grace?”
“Did you mean what you said at Laureen’s?”
“I said a lot of things at Laureen’s. Did I mean what?”
“That you knew what Vanessa was doing all the time. And that you’d never look at anyone but me.”
Moira turned to face her lover, who looked very beautiful in lavender baby-doll pajamas, an effect thoroughly sabotaged by the old blue and red flannel shirt draped over her shoulders. “I meant it then. Right now, I’m not so sure.”
“What do you mean?” There was a quaver in Grace’s voice.
“Oh, you know how it is, Grace. You live with someone for years and they start taking you for granted. When bedtime rolls around, they wear ugly flannel shirts over absolutely scrumptious baby-doll pajamas.”
Grace let out a relieved sigh and began to grin. Moira loved to tease her about her flannel shirts.
“I know what you mean. I was in love with a woman who went to bed in an old college sweatshirt. Can you imagine that?”
Moira smiled. She was wearing her college sweatshirt, so old that the red was now a washed-out pink and the mascot was totally unrecognizable. “Must have been grim, Grace. Did you love this woman a lot?”
Grace sighed. “Oh, yes, much more than she deserved. One night when I couldn’t stand seeing her like that any longer, I ripped that sweatshirt right off her body and covered her all over with kisses.”
“You did?” Moira flicked off the lights in the dressing room and took Grace’s hand. “Come on, Gracie, tell me more.”
Betty glanced at her secret friend and smiled. At last she knew who he was, and she felt proud that such an important actor had come to visit her. She wished she could find the words to ask him why he only made scary movies, but perhaps he’d take that as an insult. Sir Laurence Olivier had refused certain movies when he hadn’t approved of the scripts, but her secret friend might not have that kind of bargaining power.
There was something she’d meant to tell him, something about his appearance in the undertaker movies. Betty frowned and searched her mind, but her head felt light and empty, almost as if she were dreaming. Even the forbidden channels showed people sleeping, except for channel three where the funny animal man did nothing but sit on the floor and look through big piles of papers. Letting random images pop into her mind was much more interesting.
Her secret friend had brought the candy again. Someone must have told him what she liked. As she reached for her second piece, an image popped into Betty’s mind and she smiled. A boy was handing her a box of this very same candy, wrapped in silver paper. There was a little green and red bow on top so it must have been Christmas. The card had a reindeer with a very red nose and the boy’s name was Rudolph. No, that was the reindeer’s name. The boy’s name was Charles, Charles G., and he’d drawn her name from the basket at school. No present over four dollars. No exchanging names if you got someone you didn’t like. Miss Parker was very strict about that. She could see Miss Parker now, playing the old upright piano in their classroom. They were all sitting at their desks, five rows across, seven in each row, hers second from the front in the middle row. Amy C. sat in front of her and Doug S. behind.