The Little Death (11 page)

It started to drizzle. In a rush of taffeta and tittering, the women were ushered inside by their men. Louis and Mel followed, staking out a corner by the front door in the suddenly packed lobby. There was nothing to do but
stand there and take in the crowd. It was the same mix he had seen at Ta-boo: blondes with pneumatic cleavage squired by old men with gleaming teeth and clots of brittle matrons wearing golf-ball-size jewels.

There was an odd desperation to the laughter and chatter. Louis watched as everyone went through a weird choreography of kisses—quick pecks on the lips, full-court mouth presses, European air kisses, double air kisses moving from cheek to cheek. Louis had the feeling that behind each kind of kiss, you could somehow read a person’s status.

A flash of red hair caught Louis’s eye. He strained to see, and then, suddenly, the crowd parted for a moment, and there she was.

Sam—lovely Sam with no last name—standing near the bar. Her hair was twisted up on her head, her shoulders white against her emerald gown.

She was talking to a guy with dark slicked-back hair and a tangerine tan. It was the guy Louis had seen her with at Ta-boo, the one she had sent on his way with a kiss to the cheek.

The guy took a drink of champagne and leaned in to hear something Sam said. But all the while, his eyes, with the hard sheen of his onyx cuff links, wandered around the room.

Louis stared at Sam, willing her to turn.

Finally, she did. Their eyes met. Louis gave a discreet nod and a smile.

Sam turned away. She said something to the man. He put a hand at the small of her back and led her away.

Louis felt a hot flush travel up the back of his neck.
Well, fuck you, too, lady.

“What’s the matter with you?”

Mel’s voice didn’t register for a second. Finally, Louis turned to Mel. “Nothing.”

The lights dimmed, and a soft bell sounded. The ushers were trying to herd people inside the theater, but no one seemed interested in moving. A sudden crack of thunder drew gasps. Beyond the double doors, rain began to pound down, and the awning billowed and flapped in the wind.

Mel pulled out a handkerchief and wiped his sweating head. “Where the hell is Reggie?” he said.

On cue, Louis spotted Reggie’s pink face in the crowd. He had a white-haired woman in gray on his arm.

Reggie’s face was shiny with sweat, but he was smiling broadly as he drew up before them.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “may I present Margery Leigh Cooper Laroche.”

The woman was more than six feet tall, stick thin, and straight-backed, wearing a severe gown of gray satin set off with long strands of gray, white, and black pearls. There was no way to tell exactly how old she was, but Louis was guessing somewhere north of seventy. Whatever her age, she had been a beauty in her day. Her sharply chiseled face was accented by a slashing red mouth and deep-set gray eyes heavily outlined in black. As she slowly raised a bony hand, Louis thought of one of the majestic blue herons he often saw prowling the beach in front of his cottage.

“Hello,” she said.

If she hadn’t been so stunning, Louis would have thought she was a man, her voice was that deep. Shit, the way things were here in Bizarro World, maybe she was.

Mel stepped forward to take her hand. He didn’t shake it, just held it gently like a medieval courtier. “Ma’am,” he said with a smile.

“You’re Mr. Landeta.” She smiled. “Thank you for being such a good friend to Reggie.”

Reggie blew out a breath that lifted his wispy blond hair.

Margery Laroche focused on Louis, extending her hand. “And you must be Mr. Kincaid.”

Louis held her hand the way Mel had. Her eyes bored into his. Over Margery Laroche’s shoulder, he saw people staring and whispering.

“Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea,” Reggie said softly to Margery. “I don’t want to put you in a bad—”

“Ishkabibble!” Margery Laroche said.

The lights dimmed again, and the bell sounded. The ushers once again tried to move the crowd, this time with raised voices, like teachers admonishing children to take their seats.

“We should go in,” Reggie said.

Margery Laroche was still staring at Louis, still holding his hand. The crowd eddied around them, the whispers rising.

Margery Laroche finally let go of Louis’s hand. “Fucking Philistines,” she murmured.

Mel laughed. Reggie turned beet red.

The lights dimmed again. The bell pealed. Finally, the crowd was thinning out.

Margery Laroche’s hard gray eyes went from Mel to Louis. “I’m not going to let these high-hatters destroy Reggie,” she said. “What can I do to help?”

Louis looked to Reggie. He was staring at the floor, no longer trusting himself to speak.

“Just tell us the truth,” Louis said.

Margery’s large red mouth tipped in a wry smile. “The truth,” she said. “
Quel
interesting. Be at my place tomorrow at ten. We’ll do breakfast.”

She turned sharply and started away. Reggie mouthed a quick “Thank you” to Louis and Mel and hurried to catch up.

“What do you think?” Mel asked

Louis watched Margery Leigh Cooper Laroche disappear into the darkness of the theater. “I think that woman knows where all the bodies are buried.”

Chapter Nine
 

Last night’s rain had lingered, turning the morning as dark as dusk. Louis kept one eye on the curbside street signs and the other on his rearview mirror looking for cops. He hadn’t had a chance to get the Mustang’s broken taillight fixed yet.

Worse, Mel wasn’t along to help. He had begged off the breakfast meeting with Margery Leigh Cooper Laroche because of a blinding headache. Louis was worried, because the headaches, a symptom of Mel’s eye problems, seemed to be coming more frequently.

Margery’s home was “on the third El” off South Ocean Boulevard, Reggie had said. Louis spotted a curb sign: El Bravo Way. He slowed. The next one was El Brillo Way.

Another block, and there was El Vedado. Three Els. He swung a right.

Reggie claimed he didn’t know the house number. “I’ve never had reason to mail anything to her,” he said, adding that it was “the big pink house on the right. You can’t miss it.”

It was a three-story monster of a Spanish villa. And as Louis leaned forward to peer through the sweep of the wipers, he realized the property extended the width of the island from the ocean to the Intracoastal.

Louis turned into the broad circular drive, killed the engine, and jogged through the rain to the massive door under the portico. There was no doorbell, just a tiny security camera tucked into a corner above the door. He stared up at it and finally, feeling ridiculous, gave a small wave.

A few moments later, with a loud click, the door swung open. A small, stoop-shouldered old man in black stood aside to let Louis in. “Mrs. Laroche is waiting for you, sir,” he said in a hoarse, British-accented whisper.

Louis followed the shuffling fellow through a drafty entrance hall of high arches and marble and down a long corridor of polished tiles and mirrors. It was very warm and moist, like there was no air-conditioning. Huge palms in blue ceramic pots sat motionless in the still air. The place looked like an ancient Spanish castle, and Louis’s mind clicked back to the
Palm Beach Life
magazine he had thumbed through last night back at the hotel when he couldn’t sleep. There was an article on an architect named Addison Mizner, who had single-handedly left his imprint on Palm Beach back in the twenties—everything from Worth Avenue’s little alleyways to oceanfront mansions.

Sam was suddenly in his head, along with her brush-off at the ballet. And Joe was there with her, the sting of her words still in his ears. What did it say about him that he had to read an article about a dead architect three times before he fell asleep?

“Madame is in the loggia,” the old fellow said, gesturing to an archway.

Loggia?

The first thing that registered was the bracing sweep of rain-scented air. Two of the room’s walls were open archways with views of the gray ocean. From the high concave ceiling, painted sky blue, two paddle fans moved in lazy circles. The room was furnished in rattan, its blue cushions gently worn and dotted with limp yellow throw pillows and one needlepoint pillow with a dog’s face on the sofa. A glass coffee table was heaped with art books, glossy magazines, and newspapers, and two table lamps, with bases shaped like squatting monkeys, held out against the gloom. Off in the corner, a wrought-iron table was set with blue and white china, sparkling glasses, and a bouquet of white calla lilies.

“You’re right on time!”

Louis turned. Margery Cooper Laroche floated in on a swirl of rainbow silk. Her bony face was framed in a hot-pink turban. Big white hoops dangled from her ears. Four pug dogs circled her like chicks, snorting and barking.

“I love a man who’s punctual,” she said. “So many people today forget about manners.” She frowned. “Where’s the big bald fellow, Marvin?”

“Mel,” Louis said. “He’s a bit under the weather.”

She waved toward the open window. “Yes, vile, isn’t it?
Quel sale!
But at least it’s nice and cool out here. You don’t mind being out here, do you?”

Before Louis could answer, she went on, “I don’t use air-conditioning. Bad for the sinuses, and don’t even get me started on what it does to the skin, dear. I mean, why should I pay a hundred bucks for an enzyme peel and then have air-conditioning freeze my face like I’ve been entombed in dry ice like a six-pack of Bud—”

She stopped suddenly. “Listen to me. I’m beating my gums again. I know I do it. Reggie tells me all the time that I do.” Her wide red mouth curled up into a smile. “Next time I do it, you just tell me to shut up.”

Louis smiled as he kept one eye on the dog sniffing at his ankle.

“Can I get you a drink?” Margery asked.

Again, before Louis could answer, Margery yelled, “Franklin!”

The old fellow in black materialized.

“Shampoo, please,” Margery ordered.

The fellow nodded and left. Margery spun back to Louis. “Sit, please,” she said, waving at the rattan.

Louis settled into the cushions of the sofa. Margery arranged herself on a lounge across from him. Three of the pugs bounded into her lap, and she drew them to her like babies. The fourth dog jumped up and positioned itself at Louis’s thigh, staring up at him with baleful brown eyes.

“So, Reggie tells me you want to know what our little island is really like,” Margery said.

What he wanted were the names of any women Mark Durand had slept with. But Louis had a feeling that the only way into Margery’s confidence was via the long and winding scenic route.

“This is a strange place to an outsider like me,” Louis said.

Margery’s hard gray eyes seemed to be taking stock of him.

The butler or valet or whatever he was returned with a tray holding an ornate ice bucket and two stemmed glasses. He set the tray on the table in front of Margery and left.

“Shampoo?” Margery asked, raising the dripping bottle of champagne.

“Please.” Louis accepted the glass and took a drink. He had little to compare it with—just the pink André in a plastic glass Frances let him sip on New Year’s when he was sixteen and some other stuff over the years that tasted like carbonated kerosene.

But this—he snuck a glance at the label that read Heidsieck—this was great, like someone had crossbred pears with Pop Rocks.

He drank down half the glass. Margery was smiling at him as he lowered it. “Swell stuff, huh?” she said.

“Not bad.”

A phone was ringing somewhere in another part of the house. It had been ringing for at least a full minute now, Louis realized. He noticed an old rotary-dial yellow phone on a table in the corner, though it apparently had its ringer off.

Margery seemed not to hear the phone. “Now,” she said, “let’s talk about Reggie. I adore him. He’s like family to me. But he’s a helpless old thing in many ways, and some people here take advantage of his good nature. So, before we go any further, I want to make sure you are a right gee.”

“Ma’am?”

“A good guy. Excuse me, I slip back into the slang of my youth sometimes. I get away with it because I’m so old, and when you get old enough, you’re allowed to mutate into an eccentric.”

The phone finally stopped ringing.

She eyed him. “You’re very young. How old are you?”

“Just turned thirty.”

“How old do you think I am?”

Louis smiled. “I know better than to answer that question when a lady asks it.”

She let out a low-throated guffaw. “Tell me about your background. I want to know what kind of man is going to be helping my Reggie.”

Louis wasn’t sure where to go with this. “I’m an ex-cop. I’ve been working as a private investigator for three years.”

Again, the eyes bored into him. “But who are your people, dear?”

He had been in Bizarro World long enough to know what she meant. Family and name were everything here. He’d be damned if he’d let her intimidate him into spilling his guts about his messed-up childhood. But before he could answer, Margery waved a dismissive hand.

“Never mind,” she said. “That was rude. Lou would have skinned me for asking that.”